A Review of Legacy of Ashes – The History of the CIA
The subject of this book review is Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA, authored by New York Times writer Tim Weiner and published in 2007. The book is based on more than 50,000 documents, many from the CIA’s own archives, as well as interviews with former director of central intelligence and employees of the agency. It charts the course of the Central Intelligence Agency from its previous incarnation as the Office of Strategic Services in World War II through its inception in 1947 up until the present day.
Unlike most histories of the CIA or accounts dealing with the agency’s activities, Legacy of Ashes presents the case that the CIA was never very effective, suffering one humiliating setback after another. This is a quite different look at the activities of the agency, as numerous other accounts examine more conspiratorial aspects of various operations. These books often grant the CIA abilities which Weiner argues it never had; namely, a clear understanding of the world, the ability to infiltrate communist movements in the Soviet Union and third-world countries, and reasonable planning as a result of good leadership.
In fact, in reading the book, it almost seems to appear that Weiner is presenting the “Homer Simpson” view of the CIA: blundering headlong into situations it never understood, putting untold numbers of people in harm’s way that often led to their torture and death due to the agency’s own incompetence, and further compounded with laziness and alcoholism. Throughout the CIA’s history, there are numerous accounts of various operations where agents were dropped into communist countries with instructions to begin resistance movements and infiltrate the Soviet System, only to be promptly identified, captured, tortured for information, and exterminated. Failure after failure did not deter these types of operations, or cause more than a momentary frustration on the part of the CIA in not knowing how the Soviets knew so quickly and so clearly everything that the US was doing to undermine it.
With each unsuccessful covert operation, the main objective of the agency was to cover up the incompetence — not learn from previous mistakes. The agency, especially under director Allen Dulles, utilized access to the media to prevent any leaks of these mistakes. As long as the people of America did not hear about the failures, and the documents could be destroyed or classified until long after the fact, they simply did not exist.
Weiner’s book also examines the very precarious relationship that each president of the United States had with the Central Intelligence Agency. From President Truman, who wanted a daily newspaper on what was happening in the world, to Nixon, who blamed the CIA for his failure to win the presidency in 1960 and used it for his own illegal purposes as president, to Clinton, who displayed less interest in foreign affairs than any president before him, the agency was pulled from one extreme to another throughout its existence. Presidents used the CIA for illegal acts against American citizens and to overthrow unfriendly governments, putting the agency in jeopardy of being caught and the bright light of public scrutiny shined upon it. Others dismissed or totally ignored the CIA, causing it to languish and its work to become less and less relevant. Weiner mentions George W. Bush’s 2004 remark that the CIA was “just guessing” about the Iraq War as a “political death sentence.”
An important distinction that Weiner raises in this book is the difference between the intelligence-gathering aspect of the CIA and the “cloak and dagger” operations. One seeks to understand the world; the other seeks to change the world. The agency, though, attempted to do both and was unable to perform either action effectively. A far greater share of the CIA’s budget was devoted towards covert operations involving propaganda, assassinating heads of state, and overthrowing democratically-elected governments. Many of these operations failed, and the most successful of them resulted in the infamous “blowback:” unintended consequences like a hatred of the USA in Iran, hundreds of thousands of dead civilians in Guatemala under an oppressive regime, and the Islamic holy war that was directed at America as soon as the Soviets had left Afghanistan at the end of the Cold War.
These failed attempts to mold the world in the CIA’s eyes, along with the lack of interest and resources available for intelligence gathering and analysis, have resulted in an agency that missed one important event after another, while predicting things that never existed. The CIA underestimated the Soviet’s and India’s ability to build a nuclear weapon, the testing of which came as complete surprises to the agency. They also predicted that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction before the US invasion in 2003, among other predictions and suggestions, nearly all of which turned out to be wrong.
The agency, under nineteen directors of central intelligence, had never achieved its role of providing the US with a clear understanding of the world. It seemed to be at its most effective during covert operations, overthrowing governments, creating its own image of itself in American media, trading weapons for hostages, or conducting extraordinary rendition programs in secret prisons around the world. None of these covert actions, though, ever resulted in one continuously positive consequence for the agency or the United States. Weiner argues that the same problems that faced the agency in its beginnings are the same ones facing it now: an inability to gather intelligence and effectively analyze it, a willingness to take on illegal covert operations without a thought to potential consequences, and a lack of qualified personnel to carry out any of its activities.
Obviously, the CIA is an easy target to take shots at when it is down, possibly at its lowest point in public opinion of its existence. However, Legacy of Ashes’ central point is to argue that the agency was never really up to begin with, and its few shining success stories are overshadowed by a long history of failed missions and an unhealthy but potentially justifiable resentment against America. Weiner’s book misses issues (such as the CIA’s role in the international drug trade), but his unique perspective on the history of the agency presents one of the most intriguing looks at the CIA ever published.
For anyone who wants to understand the role of this agency in the world in general and its relationship to each of the holders of the office of the President of the United States, Legacy of Ashes answers the most important questions that can be asked, and refreshingly presents all of its answers on the record, with no use of confidential sources or classified documents. It is an unparalleled, timely, and significant history of the Central Intelligence Agency.
Drug Rehab for Women – Do Women Need Different Therapies?
The drug rehab business is undoubtedly a for profit business, and as such when someone sees a marketing niche as yet unfilled. You can bet they’re going to start filling it; whether it’s truly needed or not. It can therefore be very tough to know what you need, who to trust and where to go.
Do women need a distinct form of rehab, or do they recover just as well in a general adult rehab program?
They do.
Well, they do need to recover in a rehab that meets their unique needs anyways. If a general adult rehab can offer gender specific therapies and the treatments that women need to better their unique obstacles to recovery, then that can work fine as well.
Women suffer greatly through addiction or alcoholism, they suffer more than men do in fact; but thankfully, and as if to make up for this unfair reality, when women get the therapies and treatments they need, they have lower relapse rates than men do. Women need the same kinds of therapies than men do. They need 12 steps group meetings, they do very well in group therapy and they benefit as anyone does from individual sessions with a therapist. But women need more than this alone.
Gender specific therapies
Women bring a unique personal history into a drug or alcohol rehab, and they have in many cases endured some very different challenges on the dark journey through addiction. Without having their needs met, and their challenges understood, they cannot hope to make a full recovery.
Sexual abuse therapy
Studies show that about half of all women entering into addictions treatment have suffered sexual violence or assault, either during the period of abuse, or as a catalyst to that abuse. Women who have experienced sexual assault need sexual trauma therapy, to start to work through those issues lingering from abuse. A rehab program that fails to deal with a legacy of abuse offers women little hope of a full recovery.
No rehab can heal the scars of trauma in a month or more, but therapies that unearth lingering issues and start the healing process give women the tools they need to start healing, and to start to move beyond assault.
STD’s
Women entering into rehab are twice as likely to suffer from an STD as are men. Any lingering and unresolved health challenge hampers recovery, and since health problems can provoke relapse, failing to acknowledge and deal with STD’s and other health challenges leaves women very exposed to relapse.
Children
A loft of women bring enormous shame and guilt into recovery. No one can get better until they can forgive themselves for the sins of the past, and family reconciliation therapy helps women to understand that although they may have done some very irresponsible things while under the power of addiction, they are not what they did, and they can do better in the future. Parenting and familial reconciliation therapy ensures that women gain the self awareness and tools to move forwards and do better, without getting dragged back by the shame of the past.
Women only rehabs
Women do not need to go to a women only rehab, although many do choose to and this is an equally valid option for recovery, but they should never consider a rehab that does not understand their challenges, and that does not treat the concerns of their gender with respect and with treatments that work. Get help today, move beyond the pain, and look forward to a better tomorrow.