Bill Kelly's Review of David Talbot's "The Devil's Chessboard"

[Peter Lemkin]

I just received my copy of this book....and have spent a day with it.... not finished by a long shot, but what a great book Talbot has written. It really appears to be a collaborative effort more than many books - though certainly Talbot's final sifted resultant - but building upon the work of many others I admire. I'll have more to say when I finish it in a few days - but already a great book about a truly horrible human who along with some of his pals set America on the quick path to Hell in the post-War era. I think this book really nails the problem of the covert intelligence world, work and mindset - and the lawyers, bankers and oligarchs who they work really work for. Certainly more than just a biography and in many ways dissecting our all but dead democracy - so a great book, as autopsy on America, seen through the life of one of its really bad actors. He nailed it in the Introduction - Dulles was one of the people involved in the JFK Assassination before the fact (all too well known how he was after it), as well as having in large part made the CIA the monster it was and is today.

.....so now back to reading this hard to put down 650-pager.