Old Boys

"The Old Boys is the first book to trace the evolution of America's fledgling intelligence apparatus from its origins in the aftermath of World War I to its climactic debacle at the Bay of Pigs. This is the never-before told story of how an elite East Coast Ivy League Wall Street clique, patriotic but arrogant, and often amateurish, dominated the OSS and later the CIA. Taking a hitherto unexplored perspective on the years between the wars, Burton Hersh reveals 'America's unadvertised geopolitical intent' as it manifested itself through the lives of the men who directed the secret campaigns of an undeclared intelligence war with our global 'enemies." Hersh uncovers the history of how a secret government alien to our constitutional system grew into the CIA, which ultimately fostered the extralegal scandals of the Iran-Contra affair. He brings to life the entire circle of 'would-be global salvationists' who built a world parallel to the known corridors of power in Washington. He relates, in dramatic detail, how a bitter Germany secretly armed, while establishment figures, notably John Foster Dulles, collaborated with Nazi industrial supporters for large legal fees. Interwoven are portraits of men such as Allen Dulles, William C. Bullitt, and Wild Bill Donovan and largely unfamiliar but equally crucial figures such as Reinhard Gehlen, Frank Wisner, and the sinister and irrepressible Carmel Offie. Drawing on previously unavailable documents ranging from Gestapo records to the private papers of John and Allen Dulles (as well as State Department material declassified expressly for use in The Old Boys), Burton Hersh has written a unique portrait of our national security apparatchiks, a book that is must reading for history, military, and intelligence afficionados [sic]."--Jacket. Traces the CIA's evolution from it's origins in the aftermath of World War I to the Iran Contra affair of today and major people involved.