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Title: Intelligence: From Secrets to Policy by Mark M. Lowenthal ISBN: 1-56802-759-1 Publisher: CQ Press Pub. Date: 01 July, 2003 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $39.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.44 (9 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Intelligence: From Secrets to Policy
Comment: This is the one book you should read if you want to understand how the complex process of producing intelligence for the U.S. Government really works. The work is clearly intended to be used as a textbook for college level courses on intelligence, but I strongly reccommend it to anyone interested in the subject. You get a lot for your money including a very good reading list at the end of each chapter which is very helpful if a particular chapter topic interests you. Also, rather surprisingly, the author, Mark M Lowenthal, is quite a good writer and stylist so that the book is not only informative, it is a good read.
I do have one caveat about this book. Lowenthal has spent his career fairly far up the intelligence food chain which has good and bad effects on his book. The good effect is that he understands and explains with wonderful clarity the complete intelligence process from requirements to finished intelligence for policy decisions. The bad effect is that he is not that well informed on the specifics of collection, processing and exploitation which are at the heart of the process. Indeed he is guilty of some mistatements on this aspect of the process. On the other hand he is fair and accurate in his overall treatment of collection and processing, which for this book, is probably more important.
In sum, this is an excellent book which which I think even old hands in the intelligence world would benefit from reading.
Rating: 5
Summary: Primer for Presidents, Congress, Media, and Public
Comment:
Mark Lowenthal, who today is the Associate Deputy Director of Central Intelligence for Analysis and Production (ADCI/A&P), was briefly (for a year) the President of OSS USA (I created OSS Inc., the global version). So much for disclosure and "conflicts of interest". The previous review, after a year of being irritatingly present, needs to be corrected. Dr. Lowenthal was for many years the Senior Executive Service reviewer of intelligence affairs for the Congressional Research Service, then he went on to be Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence & Research (Analysis), and then he became the Staff Director for the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, where he supervised one of the two really serious really excellent studies on all that is wrong with intelligence and what needs to be fixed. OSS was lucky to have him contribute to its development for a year before he moved on to another corporation and then to the #5 position in the US Intelligence Community. He needs no help from me in either articulating his ideas or doing good work.
What the previous reviewer fails to understand is that Dr. Lowenthal's book represents the *only* available "primer" on intelligence that can be understood by Presidents, Congressmen, the media, and the public. While my own book (The New Craft of Intelligence) strives to discuss the over-all threats around the world in terms meaningful to the local neighborhoods of America, Dr. Lowenthal's book focuses on the U.S. Intelligence Community itself--the good, the bad, and the ugly. He is strongest on analysis and the politics of intelligence, somewhat weaker on collection and counterintelligence covert action. There is no other book that meets the need for this particular primer, and so I recommend it with enthusiasm. It is on the OSS.NET list of the top 15 books on intelligence reform every written.
Rating: 3
Summary: A good basic text on the subject
Comment: Mark Lowenthal knows the intelligence community and the process of producing intelligence. His works are recommended reading and occupy shelf space throughout the government.
My only caution is to take the review written by Mr. Steele with a grain of salt. Mr. Steele is the CEO of Open Source Solutions, the same company that Lowenthal is the COO for. Can you say conflict of interest?
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Title: Silent Warfare: Understanding the World of Intelligence by Abram N. Shulsky, Gary James Schmitt ISBN: 1574883453 Publisher: Brasseys, Inc. Pub. Date: 15 May, 2002 List Price(USD): $24.95 |
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Title: For the President's Eyes Only : Secret Intelligence and the American Presidency from Washington to Bush by Christopher Andrew ISBN: 0060921781 Publisher: Perennial Pub. Date: 10 April, 1996 List Price(USD): $19.95 |
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Title: Reshaping National Intelligence for an Age of Information by Gregory F. Treverton ISBN: 052153349X Publisher: Cambridge University Press Pub. Date: 03 March, 2003 List Price(USD): $26.00 |
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Title: Best Truth: Intelligence in the Information Age by Bruce D. Berkowitz, Allan E. Goodman, Allan Goodman ISBN: 0300093977 Publisher: Yale Univ Pr Pub. Date: 01 March, 2002 List Price(USD): $17.00 |
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Title: The U.S. Intelligence Community by Jeffrey T. Richelson ISBN: 0813368936 Publisher: Westview Press Pub. Date: March, 1999 List Price(USD): $50.00 |
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