The Ghosts of Langley ─ Into the CIA's Heart of Darkness

The Ghosts of Langley is a provocative and panoramic new history of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) that tells the story of the Agency through the eyes of key figures in CIA history and its covert actions around the world. Drawing on a wealth of newly declassified documents, celebrated historian of intelligence John Prados throws fresh light on classic agency operations such as the Bay of Pigs, and discerns a disturbing continuum from the practice of covert actions from Iran in the 1950s, Chile and Vietnam in the 1970s, and Central America in the 1980s to the current secret wars in the Muslim world.

Prados delves into early Agency history to show that spy chief legends including Allen Dulles and Frank Wisner were masters of obfuscation who shielded the agency from government probing, to the extent that they have cast a ghostly shadow over their bureaucratic descendants. Thanks to these legendary spymasters, over the seven decades since its creation the CIA has slowly decoupled itself from government accountability, going rogue in a series of highly troubling and even criminal ventures that reach their tragic apotheosis with the secret overseas prisons and torture programs of the War on Terror.

John Prados is a senior fellow of the National Security Archive, where he directs the CIA Documentation Project and the Vietnam Documentation Project and helps in other areas. He writes books, twenty-eight at last count, on aspects of intelligence, diplomatic, military, and national security, including The Ghosts of Langley (The New Press), Storm over Leyte: The Philippine Invasion and the Destruction of the Japanese Navy, Islands of Destiny, Safe for Democracy, The Family Jewels, William Colby and the CIA, Presidents’ Secret Wars, and The Soviet Estimate. His papers, articles, and reviews have appeared widely, and he has served as historical consultant on film projects.