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When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

- Charles McCarry
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Author:
Charles McCarry
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Organization
Blame
Assignment
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There's nothing new about European anti-Americanism. To go to a dinner party of intellectuals in Paris in 1960 was like walking into a tiger's den with a piece of raw meat in your hands.

I have to tell you, I'm a happy man. I've lived the life I wanted to live. I've written the books I wanted to write. No publisher has ever even suggested that I change so much as a phrase - commas and periods, yes - and I suspect that I have a lot of serious readers; in fact, I know.

I cannot grasp the difference between killing people with drones or rifles and knives. The objective in war is to kill the enemy before he kills you. I can't fathom the almost religious zeal with which the use of drones is being opposed.

I've always been baffled by critics of the CIA, who are horrified that it does illegal things. That is the purpose of an intelligence service: to perform illegal acts.

I've consciously tried not to romanticize anything, especially not intelligence work. I've always said that I've been writing a series of episodic, naturalistic novels. The people just happen to be spies, politicians, civil servants.

As an old man who remembers the intellectual exhilaration and the pleasure of having done good work that characterized the CIA when it was young, I wonder if it might not be better to speak and think in terms of restoring its culture.

I was swimming in my swimming pool when 'The Secret Lovers' popped entire into my head. I got out, dried off, went upstairs, and finished the book in about 50 days.

Anything that's secret, clandestine, loaded with such a supercargo of speculation, misinformation, disinformation and, for that matter, accurate revelations, creates an appetite.

Richard M. Helms, the first director of Central Intelligence to rise from the ranks, was fond of saying that the CIA had been founded to make sure that there would never be another Pearl Harbor. Underlying this mission impossible was the wishful supposition that an America that knew everything could prevent anything.

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When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.

When it comes to the assignment of blame, the CIA has by and large been a luckless organization.