Squeezing the Lemon Slowly: A Case History

In the late 1980s, as the Cold War entered its final chapter, a CIA Chief of Station orchestrated one of the most ambitious intelligence operations of the era-the recruitment of a Romanian code clerk with access to Warsaw Pact secrets. Through meticulous planning, careful manipulation, and an elaborate commercial cover story, the operation codenamed LEMON unfolds as a high-stakes game of trust and deception.

SQUEEZING THE LEMON SLOWLY provides a rare, unvarnished look inside the world of human intelligence operations. The author details the psychological chess match of recruiting foreign assets, the delicate dance of interagency cooperation between the CIA and FBI, and the patient work required to transform an initial contact into a producing spy. Written with gripping authenticity by a career operations officer, this narrative illuminates the sophisticated tradecraft and complex human dynamics at play in America's intelligence service during a pivotal moment in history.

Inspired by real events, this is the story of how the CIA runs its most sensitive operations-not with car chases and shootouts, but through psychological insight, careful planning, and the art of building trust with those who hold the keys to America's adversaries' most closely guarded secrets.

Kenneth A. Daigler is a former CIA operations officer who served for nearly 25 years in the clandestine service, including multiple overseas assignments and senior positions at CIA headquarters. After retiring from the CIA, he turned his attention to writing and historical research, with a particular focus on intelligence operations during the American Revolution. He is the author of "Spies, Patriots, and Traitors: American Intelligence in the Revolutionary War" (2014, Georgetown University Press) and, as P.K. Rose, he authored Founding Fathers of Intelligence and Black Dispatches: Black American Contributions to Union Intelligence During the Civil War (CIA.gov).