The Secret Sentry
The Untold History of the National Security Agency
By Matthew M. Aid
June 2010
$19.00
432 pp
5.5 x 8.25 in
Paperback
By Matthew M. Aid
"This, very simply, is the most informative book ever written on the inside bureaucratic struggles and the outside operations of the National Security Agency. Matthew Aid is our reigning expert on the NSA ."-Seymour M. Hersh, author of Chain of Command: The Road from 9/11 to Abu Ghraib
Peering from space via satellite, tapping phones and networks, monitoring cell phone frequencies around the globe, the NSA watches friends, enemies, and terror suspects alike. Some 60 percent of the president's daily intelligence briefing comes from this one agency. No one knows the NSA better than Matthew M. Aid, who has packed two decades of research in declassified archives into The Secret Sentry, the most complete account ever written of this elusive organization. From Eastern Europe to Korea to Iraq and Afghanistan, the NSA has played a key role in America's geopolitical successes, and some of its failures. Aid follows the NSA from its tense beginnings in the Cold War to its controversial role in the War on Terror. The Secret Sentry is nothing less than a shadow history of global affairs in the past half century. This meticulous and engrossing narrative gives an unrivaled look at the most powerful spy agency in the world.Advance Praise for The Secret Sentry
"This, very simply, is the most informative book ever written on the inside bureaucratic struggles and the outside operations of the National Security Agency. Matthew Aid is our reigning expert on the NSA.—Seymour M. Hersh, author of Chain of Command: The Road from 9/11 to Abu Ghraib
Reviews for The Secret Sentry
Matthew M. Aid and his "heralded history of the agency [N.S.A.]", the The Secret Sentry, are part of the compelling story, The Secret Sharer, in the New Yorker magazine.
Matthew Aid, author of The Secret Sentry, was interviewed live on WMJI in Cleveland this morning. Listen!
“The Baltimore Sun stories simply confirmed that the agency was ineptly managed in some respects,” said Matthew M. Aid, an intelligence historian and author of “The Secret Sentry,” a history of the N.S.A. Such revelations hardly damaged national security, Mr. Aid said."—New York Times Read full review
Matthew Aid's The Secret Sentry was reviewed in New York Review of Books by James Bamford. Read review.
“NSA analysis now comprises as much as 60 percent of the president’s daily intelligence briefing, and Aid provides a critical history of the agency that has the ear of the leader of the free world. A sprawling but revealing look at a powerful, shadowy agency of the American government.””—Kirkus Reviews
“Now, a new book, The Secret Sentry by Matthew Aid, to be published next week, reveals that the information handed over by Prime – whose code-name was Rowlands – told the Russians their codes had been broken.”—Times of London. Read full review..
“Tigerishly researched.”—Bloomberg. Here's the complete feature / review.
The Atlantic’s blog – calls the book “marvelous”. Read all about it.
“Matthew Aid is an indefatigable researcher, poring over documents in government and private archives and conducting interviews with former officials of the National Security Agency…Aid also delivers excellent accounts of key battles and the role of SIGINT in supporting military maneuvers that were decisive in the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the two engagements with Iraq…By the end of this work, the reader will have a much clearer idea of what the NSA does and how it accomplishes its mission, as well as insights about why the NSA needs to restructure itself so that in the future it will be able to accomplish more and do so with less resources.” —Barnes and Noble Review.
“The Secret Sentry by Matthew Aid is a comprehensive new history of the National Security Agency, from its origins in World War II through its Cold War successes, failures and scandals up until the present.”—The Secrecy News Blog.
