Collusion: International Espionage and the War on Terror

by Carlo Bonini, Giuseppe D'Avanzo, James Marcus (Translator)

"Bonini and D'Avanzo are the Woodward and Bernstein of Italian journalism. They, more than any other reporters, penetrated the Iraqi uranium fraud—one of the great, and most consequential, scams of our time."— Michael Isikoff, author Hubris "These two reporters, authors of this book, are truth seekers who do the kind of hard, honest work that all reporters should do—find the truth and print it."— Seymour Hersh, author Chain of Command “Probes the most enigmatic questions at the heart of the greatest foreign policy catastrophe in American history."— Craig Unger, author House of Bush, House of Saud After George Bush pronounced the reasons behind going to war in Iraq—the infamous "sixteen words"—it was La Repubblica reporters Carlo Bonini and Giuseppe D'Avanzo who discovered that Bush's "smoking gun" evidence was fake, planted by Italy's intelligence agency, SISMI. Now Bonini and D'Avanzo, Italy’s two most important investigative reporters, expand the story, incorporating stunning new information about international terrorism investigations and pre-war intelligence. Of particular importance are the details of a series of secret pre-war meetings in Rome between high-ranking Bush administration officials and Iranian agents. Carlo Bonini and Giuseppe D’Avanzo work for Rome’s La Repubblica newspaper.

256 pages, Hardcover

First published April 1, 2007

Reviews

[Aiza · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cover was sick, I remember being mad confused reading this, I should re read

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well this one is a tricky one. I really get into books that tell me the politics behind current policies, wars, etc. And I was into this book as well... but it was so damn confusing that I feel like I was blackout drunk and trying to recall the details of last night. So many foreign names, foreign agencies, and liars that real undisputable facts are lost in the mix. I couldn't tell you what was true and what was false in the events that led up to the "war on terror" and that is precisely what I wanted to know!

I guess the parts that did strike a chord in me include the entire fabrication of Niger selling uranium to Iraq- a story made up by a few crummy, poor informants who needed money. These guys then sold the fake documents (with all kinds of discrepancies) to several of the world's leading intelligence agencies.
Most, if not all the government agencies knew the documents were garbage - especially after the US sent some agents to Niger to check it out and realized the claims were logistically impossible.

The other part that struck me was how much governments wanted to find terrorists after 9/11 - they needed scapegoats so bad that they fit together any "evidence" they could and ended up wrongly accusing dozens of men around the world of being involved in different terror cells.

Basically, it's a book about a bunch of liars, and the authors don't realize this enough to delineate what really checks out to the reader.

[david-baptiste · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a superb book by two leading Italian journalists on the history of the forged "Italian Letter" which became the famous "16 words" used by Bush and later Colin Powell to justify, instigate, the Invasion of Iraq. The letter also played a large role in the events surrounding the Joe Wilson/Valerie Plame attacks and leaks, as well as leading to books by Wilson and the one just out by Plame.
Two other books directly concerned with the llet i have been reading are "The Itlain Letter" & "House of Bush"

That a well known forgery was used nonetheless for War, along with the alcoholic ravings of "Curveball" (another good book)--is beyond belief yet more horrifying that reality.

But the, as a Europe-based commentator pointed out, the USA is daily barraged with advertising, which is based on lies, so why not just swallow who9le forgeries, made up lies, along with the rest and go off to war based on these?
I've been fascinated by the roles fakes, forgeries, hoaxes, mis/distranslations, "black ops," "echo effects," have played in the history of literature and the literature of history for a long time, so this and the other books have been happy grist for the mills of some projects i am working on in these regards.

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very compelling read, that unearths all of the background politics and covert operations that occurred under the auspices of U.S. and other world leaders, particularly those employed by Italy's intelligence agency SIRSI. It was interesting to read about individuals closely tied to the Bush administration, struggling to make firm connections between Al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein, and that if there was any evidence of links, they were often provided through fabrications, and word-of-mouth confessions of corrupted officials. This books proves that the world was swindled into an expensive and unnecessary war.

[Melville House Publishing · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Probes the most enigmatic questions at the heart of the greatest foreign policy catastrophe in American history.” -- Craig Unger, author House of Bush, House of Saud