Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter and local resident Tim Weiner won the National Book Award's nonfiction category for Legacy of Ashes: The History of the C.I.A., a sweeping 600-page critical history of the agency with a particular emphasis on the intelligence failures that have occurred during the agency's relatively short period of existence. "Legacy of Ashes," writes Weiner, “is the record of the first sixty years of the Central Intelligence Agency. It describes how the most powerful country in the history of Western civilization has failed to create a first-rate spy service. That failure constitutes a danger to the national security of the United States.”

Weiner goes further:

Legacy of Ashes sets out to show how it has come to pass that the United States now lacks the intelligence it will need in the years ahead….This book is based on my reading of more than fifty thousand documents, primarily from the archives of the CIA, the White House, and the State Department; more than two thousand oral histories of American intelligence officers, soldiers, and diplomats; and more than three hundred interviews conducted since 1987 with CIA officers and veterans, including ten directors of central intelligence. Extensive endnotes amplify the text. This book is on the record—no anonymous sources, no blind quotations, no hearsay. It is the first history of the CIA compiled entirely from firsthand reporting and primary documents.

What does the CIA think of Legacy of Ashes?

Arts and Letters Daily links to a September review of the book in the publication Studies in Intelligence, published by The Center for the Study of Intelligence. Both the organization and the publication are provided ample room on the CIA’s website, however the agency takes pains to remind us that “all statements of fact, opinion, or analysis expressed in Studies in Intelligence and CSI Publications are those of the Authors. They do not necessarily reflect official positions or views of the Central Intelligence Agency or any other US government entity, past or present.” The reviewer, Nicholas Dujmovic, is, according to CSI’s website, “a CIA historian, a veteran intelligence analyst and member of the Studies Editorial Board.” Here’s a snippet from his review:

Starting with a title that is based on a gross distortion of events, the book is a 600-page op-ed piece masquerading as serious history; it is the advocacy of a particularly dark point of view under the guise of scholarship. Weiner has allowed his agenda to drive his research and writing, which is, of course, exactly backwards.

Indeed, the agency itself issued a press release upon the book’s publication. Obviously, it took issue with Weiner’s conclusions (note as well the agency’s use of the word “dark” to describe Weiner’s outlook): “Tim Weiner’s recently published book, Legacy of Ashes, paints far too dark a picture of the agency’s past. Backed by selective citations, sweeping assertions, and a fascination with the negative, Weiner overlooks, minimizes, or distorts agency achievements.” Both the review and the press release include a list of what apparently are some of the book’s mistakes, mis-readings, and misinterpretations.

It appears that Weiner has once again done his job, the job of any reporter: to unsettle the powerful.