Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA

Tim Weiner, a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist, presents a comprehensive history of the CIA from its creation after World War II through the Cold War, the war on terror, and its near-collapse following 9/11. The book examines why nearly every CIA director has left the agency in worse shape than he found it, and how these failures have jeopardized national security. Based on more than 50,000 documents primarily from CIA archives and hundreds of interviews with CIA veterans, including ten Directors of Central Intelligence, the work documents the agency's hidden history. It explores why eleven presidents and three generations of CIA officers have been unable to understand the world, and how the agency's mission shifted from gathering intelligence to attempting to change world events when it failed to succeed in its primary objective. The book reveals how the CIA maintained a formidable public reputation despite its poor record by keeping its failures classified. President Eisenhower described this outcome as "a legacy of ashes."