Suzannah Rowntree’s Reviews > The Secret World: A History of Intelligence > Status Update

Never before heard an analysis of 9/11 from an intelligence perspective before. Andrew is pretty scathing of US interdepartmental rivalry and hubris here.

Ah yes, and here we are at the 1814-1815 Congress of Vienna, the only event in European history of which every description resembles bad erotica for monarchists

ok but I just feel that more people should know about Charles II sending hit squads around Europe to hunt down everyone who came within sniffing distance of his rotten father's death warrant

Fascinated by how Andrew compares Spanish Inquisition tactics with those employed by the USSR to ensure ideological purity. But the kicker is the fact that the Spanish Inquisition invented waterboarding and the US adopted it while repressing the Philippines.

sitting with my head in my hands, processing the fact that the big thing the Christianisation of the Roman Empire contributed to the history of intelligence is that the emperors made divination illegal so that instead, FINALLY, of running to seers every time they needed military guidance, people had to start using the brains God gave them

ok but I'm LIVING for the scathing commentary on the state of classical Greek intelligence as compared to that of the ancient Hebrews. "the Greek gods, unlike the Hebrew God, did not value intelligence at all." The Greeks used diviners instead, with predictable results...