Secret Warriors: Inside the Covert Military Operations of the Reagan Era - Hardcover

Emerson, Steven

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0399133607 ISBN 13: 9780399133602

Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1988

Synopsis

Previously unpublished documents and personal interviews reveal the Pentatagon's attempt to establish a "mini-CIA" after the doomed 1980 Iran hostage rescue attempt and the role it played in the Iran-Contra affair

About this title

From Publishers Weekly

Emerson describes how the Pentagon set up its own clandestine "mini-CIA" following the bungled attempt to rescue the hostages in Iran in 1980. A leak in 1983 led to a widespread investigation by certain Army officials and the Justice Department, resulting in secret court-martials and the conviction of several key Army officers who had "decided they knew what was best for the country." More recently, some of the original players participated in a reincarnation of the scheme called "Enterprise," according to Emerson (The American House of Saud). Part business empire, part military-intelligence operation under late CIA director William Casey and National Security Council staffer Oliver North, the Enterprise operation reportedly provided a framework for retired Air Force Gen. Richard Secord and Iranian-born businessman Albert Hakim to control elements of U.S. foreign policy while making huge profits. Emerson focuses on what he sees as the central paradox of covert operations: they are necessary, but they tend to spin out of control. First serial to U.S. News & World Report.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

$17.95. military studies In 1964, David Wise and Thomas B. Ross published The Invisible Government , detailing for the first time the inside doings of the CIA. Since then, Americans have become accustomed to the flood of exposes about the depth of America's secret governmentall in the name of national security and anti-Communism. This timely new book, by an editor at U.S. News & World Report, describes the covert "black" operatons carried out by the military, as distinct from the CIA or the Iran-contra NSC gang. Emerson accepts the need for covert action, but his stranger-than-fiction exposure of the Pentagon's underside makes one wonder. On the basis of interviews and unpublished documents, Emerson says the secret government is alive and well. For lay readers and specialists. H. Steck, SUNY Coll. at Cortland
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: G.P. Putnam's Sons
• Publication date: 1988
• ISBN 10: 0399133607
• ISBN 13: 9780399133602
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 256