“Even by the standards of the terrorists involved,” Robert Baer wrote in his valuable book, See No Evil, “the scale of assault [on 11 September 2001] was unimaginable. The point, though, is that we didn’t even try to find out what was headed our way.”2 Mr. Baer’s book is the engaging and often suspenseful story of an excellent field intelligence officer. It has the field operative’s savvy and swagger, and the comprehensiveness of a world traveler’s view. Still, Mr. Baer’s above conclusion is incorrect. Not only was the scale of the 11 September attack imaginable, but Mr. Baer and other U.S. intelligence officers—often at the risk of their lives—had spent most of a decade gathering and analyzing the intelligence that, had it been used fully and honestly, would have allowed all U.S. leaders and, indeed, all Americans to know what sort of storm was approaching.
Book Title: Imperial Hubris
File Size: .38 MB
Pages: 329
Language: English
Format: PDF
Written By: Robert E. Lee, Memoirs
