“A most unusual memoirist, Baker is a government bureaucrat with a philosopher's bent and a passion to tell you what he didn't achieve. And this tough-minded, candid work is a cautionary tale to those who slough off hard decisions with a dismissive claim that we do not have to make choices between our values and our security. As Baker points out, security is a value and those who pretend otherwise--be they business interests, privacy advocates, or international groups--put Americans at risk. His chilling retelling of the events leading up to 9/11 seem to echo some of the events of the current day, especially as he reminds us that Mohamed el Kahtani, the one 9/11 hijacker that was actually stopped, left this country with the promise "I'll be back." Kahtani, of course, was later captured, but we need no reminder that like-minded terrorists remain to threaten us.”
-General Michael Hayden, director of the Central Intelligence Agency (2006–2009) and director of the National Security Agency (1999–2005)
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