The 9/11 attacks and the war in Iraq sprang in no small part from massive intelligence failures, that much is well understood. How the CIA got to a point where it could fail so catastrophically is not.

According to John Diamond, this slippage results from the tendency to overlook the links between seemingly unrelated intelligence failures and to underestimate the impact of political pressure on the CIA: factors we need to examine to understand both the origin and magnitude of the 9/11 and Iraq intelligence failures.

To bring these links to light, Diamond analyzes the CIAs role in key events from the end of the Cold War (when the Soviet Union—and thus the CIAs main mission—came to an end) to the war in Iraq. His account explores both CIA successes and failures in the Soviet break-up, the Gulf War, the Ames spy case, the response to al-Qaedas initial attacks, and the US/UN effort to contain and disarm Iraq.

By putting into historical perspective the intelligence failures--both real and perceived—surrounding these events, Diamond illuminates the links between lower-profile intelligence controversies in the early post-Cold War period and the high-profile failures that continue to define the War on Terrorism.