Pretty interesting look at the CIA. I love hearing of his training and time as an agent. A middle chapter or two was a bit boring but it was then interesting again until the end.

Baer was a bona fide spook, a case officer placed in many of the hottest spots in the world. He is outraged at the failure of intelligence that allowed a 9/11 to happen, and goes into why it was possible for that to have occurred. Baer theorizes that there is indeed a strong relationship between Arafat, AL-Qaeda, Iranian fundamentalists and the other terrorist entities of the region. He talks about the massive decline in human intelligence (humint) as the US seemed to have mostly gotten out of the business of spying. Iran, he says, has been responsible for many terrorist operations, hidden under the responsibility of nom de plume IJO. Although he does talk about declines in intelligence capability and interest during Republican administrations, he seems to reserve intense ire for Democrats, neglecting to mention that the GOP was more than happy to strip away funding from intelligence when it suited them.

Great insight into the political correctness and corruption that has spilled into the US Intel community. If the CIA was willing to take risks in the 80s and 90s, instead of refusing to upset the apple cart, the tragedy of 9/11 could have been prevented.

Informative

Phenomenal look into the world of the covert intelligence operatives.

A mostly riveting story of sleuthing, spying, and adventure by a true wild man of the CIA. Baer is a fascinating and outrageous personality who does not hold back on blasting the institution in which he spent his career. He clearly chafed against the post-Church committee CIA, with its more cautious and red-tape bound approach. His accounts of training in the CIA and working in Lebanon, Iraq, India, and elsewhere are fascinating. They offer great insights into the inner working of terrorist groups and how they are unraveled.

Not every part of the book is gripping. The last 50 pages or so are about an oil-related campaign finance scandal in the Stans that Baer doesn't provide enough context for. Overall I'd recommend this for students of intelligence work or those who like cloak and dagger/spying memoirs. Baer is an engaging if blunt writer who is mostly fun to read.

I believe we are a decaying country. Mr Baer’s portrait of a CIA that can no longer keep us safe because it has been politicized and purchased is example one. We do have enemies, both inside and outside our country, and no one has our back. Thank you for your service. Sorry we citizens did not live up to your sacrifice.

A compelling CIA case officer memoir. The stories are seemingly accurate and portray the government apparatus well. Robert opines about how “political correctness” ruined the Agency but he never explains what he means by that and instead offers explanations that are seeming all political. Not a bad inside look into the life of a case officer but the book lacks a cohesive narrative throughout. Bob has an axe to grind against the agency for perceived slights against him and it is very evident in the final 100 pages or so. He always complains about lobbying, money in politics, and borderline corruption but he himself was involved in such actions domestically while “working for the agency.” Bob thinks he is a white knight pointing out how and where our intelligence community went wrong, but maybe it’s people like Bob that led to the restructuring and changes the community needed. I feel there is a total white washing of Bob’s actions to make himself look noble and everyone else corrupt or stupid.

This should be required reading for Americans bothered to care about such things and who think they know what they're talking about. It would be hard to argue with Baer's conclusions since, well, he was intimately involved in them. This is as much a critique of current American intelligence policy as it is a series of pastiches highlighting Baer's own work in the CIA, mostly in Beirut and Central Asia. Baer details for us the slow collapse and malingering catastrophe of an increasingly politicized CIA. Admonished, it feels, at every turn, Baer's work in the Middle East especially was at loggerheads with pencil pushers back home who knew far less than he did, and reading his accounts is often frustrating and will cause some head-scratching. His details of the morass of oil money and American politics (including the tantalizing tidbit where an oil man casually mentions Russian government funding going into Clinton's re-election campaign chest) will seem familiar. That's because, despite the best efforts of folks like Baer, shit hasn't changed. In fact, it's gotten worse, as far as intelligence gathering.

Robert Baer might be the most qualified person in Middle East Affairs, with an extensive experience working in Beirut during the eighties, or elsewhere especially in Iraq dying the 90s
From what concerns me, I was interested in reading about his Beirut experience, and indeed the book provides some good info about that era, in particular the US embassy bombing in 1983, and the quest to decipher and find the planners, he later names “in a quasi certain way” the truck driver.
I believe he could be more generous in providing more info, the thirst for info about that era is still very high level.

I believe Baer writes a very interesting book full of information he gathered and learned from others. His personal accounts of who he met, what they said, what he saw, and what he experienced while being overseas is a but a small peek into what CIA operative’s must go through. Spy movies are one of my favorite and this book feeds that need for a good plot twist. However, as entertaining and informative as this book is, it lacks structure. From one chapter to the next you can jump a year or so forward or back in time. Given the type of book it is and the message he is trying to relay, I believe Baer could have done better by providing a more chronological order of events. Not a bad book by any means, just for my preference it seemed out of order.

Baer does a good job keeping the reader on the edge of their seat as he recounts his decades long employment in the CIA. It's a very interesting read, especially in light of the NSA news coming out. When Baer first entered the CIA, they focused on human intelligence--contacts with people who had personal connections and knowledge of the goings-ons in the world. Baer says that this strategy changed over the years until US intelligence relied almost entirely on technology-gathered information.

Having recently started the Frontline documentary, United States of Secrets, I think this book fleshes out another interesting aspect of the story of US intelligence and defense. It seems like those in Washington are interested in protecting their power in the US government while making money at the same time.