It's little wonder "Legacy of Ashes" was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. The text is fascinating, frustrating and flawless. As a reader of footnotes, I understand the need for end notes, but have never been a fan. However, Weiner has done more than slap some chapter notes in the back. He has created a bibliography that reads as smoothly as the main text.

There is politics, but not party politics. Both GOP and Dems get a good thrasing for preventing the CIA from doing their job. The CIA gets a good thrashing for forgetting what's it mission was.  The result - well, lets say it leaves you shaking your head at how well the U.S. did in the Cold War and continuting to shake it as the U.S. failed to register the Islamic partisans were turning on its masters.