Get Access The Moscow Rules: The Secret CIA Tactics That Helped America Win The Cold War Constructed By Antonio J. Méndez Offered As Digital Copy

listened to the audiobook version, and it was easy listening mainly because there is no depth whatsoever.
At least it's short.

I assume this book is coming out now because some random piece of content has hit ayear automatic declassification, but it doesn't feel like there's anything groundbreaking in here.
Essentially, it's an overview of the basic "sitelinkMoscow rules" for the behaviour of American CIA agents conducting Cold War espionage told through anecdotes.


There are some interesting tidbits tossed in, specifically about how chemists lateral thinkers, artists attention to detail capable of recreating things without access to cameras or photocopiers, and magicians sleight of hand, understanding of human attention and perspective were heavily recruited, but the majority of the book was devoted to the most clichéd "spy moves" from Hollywood movies.
More authoritative resources would say that most spycraft is really, really boring and the vast majority of intelligencegathering activities aren't as clandestine as you'd think: more like moving in the same circles as folks and/or desk work.


Recommended for: middle graders looking for their First Grownup Nonfiction Book, people who want confirmation that espionage is exactly like what they see in the movies and aren't willing to consider otherwise, those entertaining dreams of being a professional magician.
While the various CIA spy tactics presented were interesting, this book didn't enthrall me like I had anticipated something on this topic would.
This book will appeal to those interested in spycraft, U, S. Soviet relations, and the Cold War, It may also appeal to fans of sitelinkIan Fleming and sitelinkJohn le Carré, but I cannot otherwise recommend it to the casual reader.
For specialists in the field, the book is a strong argument in favor of humanas opposed to electronicintelligence operations.


First, a couple of clarifications, Human intelligence HUMINT means information derived from a foreign "agent" and provided to an intelligence "case officer.
" CIA employees are "officers" and foreign sources are "agents, " The agents are essentially traitors and are motivated by four things: money, ideology, compromise, and ego pp.
. American traitors are mostly interested in the money, although many traitors during and after World War II shared an ideological affinity for communism.
Compromise, e. g. , blackmail, is less common but not unknown the case of U, S. Embassybased Marine Clayton Lonetree. Soviet agents, by comparison, were singularly motivated by ego, which is to say, workplace disgruntlement, revenge, disappointment, anger, frustration, or alienation from the Soviet system.


Signals intelligence SIGINT means information derived from spy satellites, electronic eavesdropping, cryptography, and the like.
A great many U. S. agencies engage in signals intelligence but only CIA practices human intelligence, The authors, longtime CIA officers, make the case here for HUMINT, arguing that human sources can provide things like schematics of enemy weapons systems and insights into the motivation of our enemies, whereas SIGNIT can do neither of these things.


The The Moscow Rules's title refers to a set of practices and devices that the authors and others developed exclusively for use in the CIA Moscow Station, including ID transfer, street disguises, surveillance detection runs, the SRRradio monitors countersurveillance devices, the JIB or JackintheBox popup dummies, subminiature cameras, working in the gap momentary evasion techniques, and deepcover case officers" p.
. Astonishingly, many of these devices were developed with the aid of Hollywood magicians and filmindustry special effects and makeup artists!

CIA's Moscow Station achieved startling successes using human intelligence during the period covered here but there were also disastrous failures.
Some of those failures can be attributed to treachery in the U, S. intelligence community itself Clayton Lonetree, Aldrich Ames, Robert Hanssen, Edward Lee Howard and the irresponsible actions of a few journalists sitelinkEdward Jay Epstein.
As Director of Central Intelligence, Admiral Stansfield Turner's hostile attitudes toward human intelligence set back HUMINT activities in Moscow for years and costloyal and competent officers their jobs pp.
. A suspicious fire almost destroyed the U, S. Embassy in Moscow inand similarly complicated the work of Agency case officers,

Notwithstanding these setbacks, the authors claim that human intelligenceand the Moscow Rules in particularplayed a large role in the victory of the United States in the Cold War.
It is difficult to refute this claim, Which brings me to the harassment and interference by the current U, S. administration toward America's law enforcement and intelligence agencies, Simply put, if foreign agents come to feel that the United States is unwilling or unable to protect their secrets, they will just stop talking to us.
Human intelligence becomes more difficult if possible at all, That leaves the United States with signals intelligence as our only line of defense against foreign adversaries.
That is not only frightening, it is a selfinflicted injury, As the authors note, "We are wading into a new and dangerous territory" p,. Dangerous, indeed. I really enjoy reading about spy craft and intelligence gathering and the Cold War has some amazing stories.
The authors summarize a lot of what happened between the CIA and the KGB in Moscow during the Cold War and each story or operation could be its own book.
Learning about the techniques used and technology employed by the CIA was really interesting and most of it new to me.
Over all this book might not be as exciting as it could have been but it was a good audio listen.
Id definite like to read more about some of the specific operations and spies involved, This book is mainly about how to make contact with sources and spies in a heavily surveilled country.
Tricks of the trade, some from movie special effects experts are described, Cultivating and managing sources, many being defectors unsatisfied with the regime, Very entertaining until you remember the numerous victims of those spy vs spy games, Hi tech is a tool but basic low tech is still very valuable, There is no real debate within the intelligence community about using technical or human sources, both are seen as essential.
But when a CIA chief with no knowledge or experience in the field is named he is bound to underestimate valuable possibilities or even act as destructive force as shown by the author.
It obviously applies today. Makes you wonder how the intel community survived under the Trump administration when the head of state acted as a tool for a direct adversary.
Publicly sided with a foreign dictator against his own intel community in Helsinki, It is quite a dilemma when the head of state is a threat to national security let's hope that this story gets to be told some day.
First if you think your are going to enter into a world of intrigue and plots put it down.

Moscow rules is a limited documentary with some insight into old spy craft and some outdated technologies.
It is shallow in its story telling and jumps around with scarce detail, There is considerable name dropping in an effort to gain some legitimacy,
There is some entertainment in the short stories of how magicians helped invent some of the devices and some albeit limited in accounts of how our own officers turned to spy and ended in the loss of lives of both our officers and our Russian informants.

I know that the CIA requires its former officers to submit their manuscripts for approval if writing books and articles so don't expect much to be disclosed here.


Hard decision forstars, Overall:.out of. The book is more worth it to read than it is to not, however, there is no central storyline and the historical context is a little lost in the pseudo self aggrandizement of the authors.
If the writing style was married with the stories of an actual case officer instead of head of disguise, this book would have been much more interesting.


Cool read, definitely wouldn't read it again, but I'm glad I did, Nice tale. Very thoughtprovoking insider secrets of the CIA in dealing with Russia during the Cold War, It was fascinating to read about the espionage tactics that the U, S. employed during that time. Also, very disconcerting to read about the traitors that caused so much detriment to the U.
S. government. If you find spying and espionage interesting, you will find this book fascinating, It's about how the CIA developed new ways of spying during thes,s, ands because Americans were constantly tailed by KGB agents while in Moscow.
It doesn't have a lot of depth, but that is something I actually liked about it.
It was easy to listen to it fast, Each chapter would talk about a different "Moscow Rule" that was developed by the CIA using an anecdote.
It felt like I was listening to Antonio Mendez tell cool stories from his and his friends' careers in the CIA but if you know the story of Argo, then you know these aren't his craziest stories.
I specifically found the stories of the developments he and his wife made in disguise so interesting.
In this book, Mendez describes how he developed the idea to create disguises that agents can quickly change as they walk down a busy road.
So cool! The real life spy stories were really cool, And the way they incorporated professional illusionists into the CIA was sweet! If you're into that stuff, this reads like a novel, but it's all true.
No profound life insight, just fun to read, : Definitely could have used another pass by an editor simple things like typos Columbia instead of Colombia for the country, for example and using inconsistent names for people were distracting.
But overall, an interesting book and good inspiration for creativity for this current round with Russia.
At the height of the Cold War, the CIA developed tactics to use against the KGB known as The Moscow Rules.
Author Tony Mendez used his unique skills to help agents in Moscow lose KGB tails, meet with spies, and collect sensitive information.
He often used illusionists methods to outwit KGB surveillance including slightofhand, misdirection, and disguises, Its the history of how these techniques were used in thes ands by CIA agents stationed in Moscow that Mendez presents here.


I found it shocking that despite their best tactics and careful maneuverings, so many of the CIAs Russian agents were discovered and executed by the

KGB.
Yes, the U. S. gained priceless intelligence from their spies, but at a cost, Mendez and company had to constantly rethink how to make contact with Russians willing to spy against their country without compromising them, which was never simple or straightforward.
This was spy against spy in a ruthless and dangerous environment, and Mendez presents his involvement in an engaging if somewhat acronymheavy way.


I received a complimentary copy of this book via the Amazon Vine program, .