In the whirlwind of accusations and recriminations that emerged in the wake of 9/11 and the Iraq war, one man's vital testimony has been conspicuously absent. Candid and gripping, At the Center of the Storm recounts George Tenet's time at the Central Intelligence Agency, a revealing look at the inner workings of the most important intelligence organization in the world during the most challenging times in recent history. With unparalleled access to both the highest echelons of government and raw intelligence from the field, Tenet illuminates the CIA's painstaking attempts to prepare the country against new and deadly threats, disentangles the interlocking events that led to 9/11, and offers explosive new information on the deliberations and strategies that culminated in the U.S. invasion of Iraq Amazon.com

We placed this book on the Bookshelf for its timeliness and for the insights it offers into the policymaking process – especially in time of war. Former CIA chief George Tenant gets away from the tired argument about WMD and examines the policy process that led up to the invasion of Iraq.

He describes the two important alternatives available to the administration going into Iraq: in Vice President Cheney’s words the choice between “control and legitimacy.” The CIA lobbied for an inclusive and transparent approach that would have included more Iraqis in the political process and avoided the wholesale disbanding of military units and Baathist technocrats (teachers, government administrators, army officers). Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld and Jerry Bremer (the Coalition Provisional Authority) chose “control,” and the appointment of Hamid Karzai and the Iraqi National Congress as de facto reconstruction government in Iraq. Bremer then took control of the process on the ground, making costly mistakes that were reversed years later.

How did the U.S. enter a war with no clear game plan on how to win the peace, following an almost certain military victory? How did three powerful men hijack the policy process and insure that no consensus was reached within the administration regarding the resolution of the “control” vs “legitimacy debate? The lessons may someday apply to U.S. policy toward Latin America, where the U.S. is still fighting a shadow war today.

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