Body of Secrets
James Bamford
721 pages, including index and notes
published in 2001
Don't get fooled by what's on the front and back cover of Body of Secrets. This is not a scathing expose of Project Echelon. Nor is this about both the NSA and the GCHQ, even if the subtitle "How America's NSA and Britain's GCHQ eavesdrop on the world" gives that impression. Instead, Body of Secrets is a critical history of America's National Security Agency, written by somebody who has some sympathies for the agency and its employees.
To be honest, this is not a bad thing, even if I read this book under false pretences. The NSA's history is fascinating, far more so than an Echelon expose would've been. What's more, James Bamford manages to write well too. There's a craft to writing non-fiction that's just as difficult, if not more so, to master as writing fiction is. Even the less exciting parts of the book stay fairly interesting, without descending in the sort of breathless machosismo that characterise certain secret service books.
What I particularly like about Bamford's writing is that he's not afraid to let his opinions show. I've noticed that many non-fiction books are written in a bland faux neutral voice, the author carefully avoiding strong emotions in their writing. Not Bamford. For example he becomes very scornful when writing about Operation Northwoods, the early sixties proposal by the US Joint Chiefs of Staff to engage in terrorist actions against their own country and blame it on Castro, so as to spark a war with Cuba.
The book is divided in fourteen chapters, each of which look at a different side of the NSA, as well as telling something about its history. So chapter two starts with the founding of the agency, while chapter fourteen talks about the challenges it faces now and in the near future. The way James Bamford prevents this from becoming a morass of facts and figures is by focusing about the various crises the NSA and America went through, from the Cuban missile crisis to the Israeli attack on the Liberty and the North Korean capturing of the Pueblo spy ships, not to mention Vietnam. He isn't just regurgitating other people's research either. Operation Northwoods mentioned above for example was actually uncovered in this very book.
James Bamford is a good enough writer that even the dryer parts of the NSA's story aren't too awful. As with most broad historical overviews, the narrative flags somewhat when approaching the present, but not fatally so. Quite recommened if you're at all interested in the NSA.
