The Good Spy: The Life and Death of Robert Ames
The Good Spy: The Life and Death of Robert Ames book cover

The Good Spy: The Life and Death of Robert Ames

Paperback – May 26, 2015

by
Price
$12.45
Format
Paperback
Pages
464
Publisher
Crown
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-0307889768
Dimensions
5.25 x 1.24 x 7.99 inches
Weight
13.4 ounces

Description

New York Times BestsellerA Washington Post Notable BookA Christian Science Monitor Top Ten Book, 2014 New York Times Book Review Editor's Choice Entertainment Weekly 's Best Spy Book of 2014A Daily Beast Best Biography of 2014An Apple Top 10 Biography of 2014 “A rich nuanced portrait of a man who, in the CIA's term, had a high tolerance for ambiguity... One of the best accounts we have of how espionage really works .”—Mark Mazzetti, The New York Times Book Review “Cool and authoritative… The book’s understated pleasures come from reading a pro writing about a pro. Mr. Bird has a dry style; watching him compose a book is like watching a robin build a nest. Twig is entwined with twig until a sturdy edifice is constructed. No flourishes are required …. Mr. Bird’s style is ideal for his subject.” —Dwight Garner, The New York Times “A well-researched, engagingly presented biography... The Good Spy is a fascinating book that sheds much-needed light on one of the murkier corners of CIA—and Middle Eastern—history .”—Max Boot, Wall Street Journal “ Full of great morsels and details … Bird has found in Ames a wonderful new subject…. The Good Spy succeeds on the basis of Bird’s considerable research skills, his interviews with intelligence officials, his access to Ames’s letters home and, above all, his ability to spot and put together an engrossing biography. ”– Washington Post “Bird captures the acrid taste of regional politics and offers a perceptive portrayal of the internal workings and interplay of personalities within the CIA at the time… An enthralling read.” – Houston Chronicle “[ Bird] spent years researching this terrific biography of one of America’s most important covert operatives. It was worth every minute .” –Seattle Times “Engrossing… This absorbing book suggests that even the best of intentions, and the best of spies, aren’t enough to bridge the chasms in the Middle East.” —Los Angeles Times “ Riveting…[Bird] relates fascinating details (drawn from interviews with some 30 retired CIA andxa0Mossadxa0officers) about the culture and practices of the agency, including the life-and-death implications of designating an individual as either a ‘source,’ a ‘recruit’ or an ‘asset.’”– San Francisco Gate “With its pacy narrative, exotic locales and colourful cast of CIA and Mossad agents, Palestinian and Iranian revolutionaries, Lebanese operators and even a winner of the Miss Universe contest, the book has all the ingredients of a first-class thriller . Kai Bird writes well enough to be a novelist, too, but his sentences have the additional virtue of being true.” – Times Literary Supplement “In his riveting, illuminating account of Ames' life and ultimate death in the 1983 embassy bombing in Beirut, Bird pulls back the thick black curtain on the world of clandestine intelligence affairs — a world that turns out to be more blazer-and-pen than cloak-and-dagger, though no less engrossing — to tell the story of one individual's good work in a not-so-good system. A ” – Entertainment Weekly “One of the best nonfiction books ever written about the West’s involvement in the Arab world.” —The Spectator (UK) “All of this is engrossing for those fascinated by the machinations of the people and politics of the Middle East…But this book should appeal to a wider audience. It underlines the need for intelligence-gathering by humans as well as by machines, and illustrates the gap between spying and policy.”– The Economist One of 2014's best books so far. “A lucid, thorough, fascinating biography.”– TIME.com “It is a reflection of the drama of this patch of history as well as Bird’s skill in rendering it that the book is as compelling a read as most spy novels.”– National Interest “ Kai Bird has written a riveting biography… This intriguing book shares many exciting exploits of Ames’ life as a spy, but most captivating was his poignant relationship with Ali Hassan Salameh.” –Jewish Journal (Massachusetts) “Painstakingly researched...In addition to being an admiring biography of a uniquely gifted CIA operative, The Good Spy reminds us of those long-ago days when some sort of resolution was considered even a remote possibility.”– Highbrow Magazine “More exciting than le Carré’s George Smiley or Fleming’s James Bond, Bird recreates the life of CIA superspy Robert Ames… Bird’s meticulous account of Ames’s career amid an ongoing Mideast climate of caution and suspicion is one of the best books on the American intelligence community.” —Publishers Weekly (Starred Review) “A moving biography within a balanced presentation of the complex diplomacy over the Palestinian quest for statehood and Israeli need for security.” —Library Journal (Starred Review) “A poignant tribute to a CIA Middle East operative who helped get the Palestinians and Israelis to talk to each other—and died for it.” —Kirkus Reviews “Kai Bird has produced a compelling and complex narrative that must be read on many levels—including as a detailed account of the immense influence that a truly good man can have on an agency as cynical as the CIA, and as a reminder of a myriad of losses. xa0Robert Ames did not live long enough to get what he most desperately wanted—a real peace in the Middle East. xa0And America's intelligence agencies no longer seem as welcoming to agents with the wisdom, vision and integrity that Ames exemplified.”—Seymour Hersh, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Price of Power, The Dark Side of Camelot, and Chain of Command “Kai Bird has delivered two miracles—the best day-by-day account of a secret intelligence career in the CIA, and the best book about the murderous intelligence war between Israel and her enemies with America smack in the middle. For years Robert Ames—The Good Spy—tried to nudge both sides toward peace until he picked the wrong day to visit the U.S. Embassy in Beirut and was killed by a car bomb. Bird has written a powerful and revealing story that leaves the reader with a troubling question—how did America get trapped in this war it can do nothing to end?” —Thomas Powers, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Intelligence Wars and The Man Who Kept the Secrets: Richard Helms and the CIA “The Good Spy gives us the CIA up close and personal—the intricate dance of recruiting ‘assets,’ the bureaucraticxa0maneuverings, the family compromises. But because Ames was a Mideast specialist his biography also becomes a knowing history of that region's political failures and relentless descent into violence. Well reported, even-handed, compelling reading -- one of the best books ever written about the CIA.” —Joseph Kanon, New York Times bestselling author of Los Alamos and The Good German "Beautifully written and researched, The Good Spy is the best book I've ever read on espionage . It perfectly captures the CIA at its best. What's more, it's a book you can't put down, right to its tragic end. I need to add this: while Bob Ames's career and mine crossed paths over the years, it's Kai Bird who has finally put the story together for me. Reading this, I wondered at times if Kai somehow pulled off a black bag operation to get into the Agency archives."—Robert Baer, former CIA operative and New York Times bestselling author of See No Evil “Kai Bird has unearthed an astonishing amount of detail about Robert Ames, the CIA, and U.S. spy operations in the Middle East. His book could not be more timely in showing us the perils and advantages of clandestine actions in the name of national security. The Good Spy gives new meaning to the adage that truth can be stranger than fiction.” —Robert Dallek, author of the #1 New York Times bestseller An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy 1917-1963 "If John le Carré were a nonfiction specialist, he surely would feel the lure of writing the story that is at the heart of The Good Spy . Kai Bird works the seam between history and espionage.xa0 He has produced an arresting book—one that is knowing, and masterful in its rendition of a time when the United States cast a huge shadow across the Arab world. Robert Ames, the spy in Kai Bird's title, is a figure of unusual poignancy because his guile and innocence run side by side.”—Fouad Ajami, Senior Fellow at The Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and author of The Syrian Rebellion KAI BIRD is the coauthor or author of four previous books: American Prometheus, Crossing Mandelbaum Gate, The Chairman , and The Color of Truth. He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and a MacArthur Writing Fellowship.

Features & Highlights

  • The Good Spy
  • is Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Kai Bird’s compelling portrait of the remarkable life and death of one of the most important operatives in CIA history – a man who, had he lived, might have helped heal the rift between Arabs and the West. On April 18, 1983, a bomb exploded outside the American Embassy in Beirut, killing 63 people.  The attack was a geopolitical turning point. It marked the beginning of Hezbollah as a political force, but even more important, it eliminated America’s most influential and effective intelligence officer in the Middle East – CIA operative Robert Ames.  What set Ames apart from his peers was his extraordinary ability to form deep, meaningful connections with key Arab intelligence figures. Some operatives relied on threats and subterfuge, but Ames worked by building friendships and emphasizing shared values – never more notably than with Yasir Arafat’s charismatic intelligence chief and heir apparent Ali Hassan Salameh (aka “The Red Prince”). Ames’ deepening relationship with Salameh held the potential for a lasting peace.  Within a few years, though, both men were killed by assassins, and America’s relations with the Arab world began heading down a path that culminated in 9/11, the War on Terror, and the current fog of mistrust. Bird, who as a child lived in the Beirut Embassy and knew Ames as a neighbor when he was twelve years old, spent years researching
  • The Good Spy.
  • Not only does the book draw on hours of interviews with Ames’ widow, and quotes from hundreds of Ames’ private letters, it’s woven from interviews with scores of current and former American, Israeli, and Palestinian intelligence officers as well as other players in the Middle East “Great Game.” What emerges is a masterpiece-level narrative of the making of a CIA officer, a uniquely insightful history of twentieth-century conflict in the Middle East, and an absorbing hour-by-hour account of the Beirut Embassy bombing.  Even more impressive, Bird draws on his reporter’s skills to deliver a full dossier on the bombers and expose the shocking truth of where the attack’s mastermind resides today.

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
30%
(248)
★★★★
25%
(207)
★★★
15%
(124)
★★
7%
(58)
★
23%
(189)

Most Helpful Reviews

✓ Verified Purchase

Good book, great story.

Amazing story of an intelligence officer who worked with had worked in the Middle East trying to bring together two groups of people who have been fighting since the 1930's. Part of the reason why I like this book is that it is a wonderful thriller that shows the ins and outs of the intelligence community and the hard work that they do, especially when pressured by outside forces (President, Congress, etc...) But I also like that this biography didn't just give a timeline of what happened in Mr. Ames life in a linear format. This combined the history of the region and the conflict with how Mr. Ames fit into the process that was going on during the time. Of course, there needed to be some biographical information involved, but this wasn't just about him and ended when he died. The story flowed too that made the reading enjoyable and not hard to read. Good book, great story.
2 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

A Consequential Life - and a Solid Primer on the Real Work of Human Intelligence

I’m loath to add another (unread) comment to this thread, but I thought it might be useful to observe that, among those who had lived the “Secret Life” (as a friend of mine likes to label it), Kai Bird’s book on Bob Ames is a particular favorite. Personally, I go as far as former Agency officer and author (and one of Bird’s many sources from the US national security community) Bob Baer and call The Good Spy simply the best book on espionage I've ever read. (For what it's worth, I've read considerably more than a few, have given graduate seminars on intelligence, and, yes, made a career in that world.)

I didn't know Bob Ames but envy those who did, several of whom are friends. Bird tells his remarkable story at a level of detail that is itself remarkable for all the information he surfaces about a man whose children did not learn his true employer until after his death in the tragic April 1983 bombing of the US embassy in Beirut, Lebanon. And in telling this story, Bird provides a useful primer on the tasks of espionage and “the wilderness of mirrors” that is intelligence and counterintelligence.

In short, as Bird is careful to detail, Ames led a consequential life. Early in his Agency career, he became fascinated by the Middle East, Arab civilization, and the Arabic language, and he became CIA’s most esteemed Arabist. Early on, he rose rapidly in the organization but later ran afoul of bosses who thought him too scholarly and hesitant to “seal the deal” by formally recruiting foreign agents. At the time of his death, Ames filled a senior Intelligence Community analytic post, National Intelligence Officer for Near East and South Asia, making him the top advisor to the Director of Central Intelligence on Middle East topics. Unusually, Ames saw maintaining contacts with old sources as part of the job and, because of his stature, few voiced objections to his crossing of intelligence streams – analysis and operations.

At the heart of Bird's narrative is a single intelligence relationship of a decade's duration. During the Nixon administration (and into the Carter presidency), the United States pursued a policy of shunning the PLO as a terrorist organization; any departure from that paolicy would have caused serious repercussion in relations with Israel and would have made domestic US politics as well, riling American supporters of Israel. In 1969, however, well before American diplomats met with Palestinian Liberation Organization members, Ames opened up a back-channel to Yassir Arafat and the Palestinian Liberation Organization through Ali Hassan Salameh, the suave, wealthy, handsome head of Force 17, a PLO intelligence organization that also provided Arafat’s security detail. Ames arranged meetings and venues in his relationship with Salameh – both men would have called it a "friendship" – through a mutual friend, Lebanese businessman Mustafa Zein, whom Bird terms “an Arab Zelig,” a fascinating character in his own right. Salameh was never a recruited CIA asset – that is, had never consented in writing to be directed and remunerated by the US government – but Ames and Salameh helped each other convey to their respective sides information that saved lives and advanced policy agendas.

But the ambiguities of the Ames-Salameh relationship, through the eyes of each side, are part of the essential imponderables of relationships between officers of rival intelligence organizations. Questions of “who’s running whom?” are always part of the picture and, as depicted by Bird, created internal pressures within the rival agencies and political pressures from above, not only for specific information but for heightened security lest word leak out that “the US government is in liaison with terrorists who have murdered Americans and Israelis.” (Reports generated by Ames were “close hold” but routinely passed to Presidents and National Security Advisors, beginning with Nixon and Kissinger.) As one Agency officer who had read the entire file on Ames and Salameh observed, “Part of the time, Salameh was probably telling Arafat the he had recruited a CIA officer…And Ames probably knew this. He would have understood that there was probably some resentment inside Fatah [the dominant Arafat faction of the PLO] circles against Salameh’s friendship with ta CIA officer. Salameh needed to tell his own people something like this for his own protection.”

Most readers will have known how Ames' life ended before picking up this book. Bird's telling of the final days in Beirut, from myriad points of discerning view, is both graphically shocking and powerfully moving. Some passages of almost flat description were nevertheless heartrending and shook me profoundly.

I have one gripe with the book, although it's probably more with Bird's editor than with the author himself. The petty redundancies in the text occasionally drove me to distraction. The editor, Rich Horgan, gets a generous credit in Bird's acknowledgements, but I’m presuming he found Bird's dramatis personae too large, foreign, and unwieldy and - I repeat: I surmise - insisted the text contain an identifier that frames recurring characters in context, despite how many times we've met the person in the text. The customary editorial rule-of-thumb, of course, is to identify the person at first mention, then merely use his name - either, depending on how recent the last mention, given name and surname, or simply surname - as circumstances warrant. The Bird text contains irritatingly redundant introductions of people we’ve sometimes met a page earlier.

That said, such nits cannot detract from Kai Bird's magisterial account and shouldn't deter anyone (except perhaps a particularly punctilious Miss Grundy, who might fling the book across the room) from picking up The Good Spy. The reader will meet real human beings conducting dangerous business on behalf of their countries while gaining a detailed picture of espionage as conducted by practiced professionals. Between the lines, readers can consider Ames' reasoned, alternative American slant on Arab-Israeli affairs, amplified by Bird, that remains, in most US national security and foreign policy circles, a minority position.
2 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Five Stars

very interesting book!
1 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

A life in the clandestine service

Unfortunately, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is as thorny, intractable and relevant in 2016 as it was thirty-plus years ago when the civil war in Beirut dominated the headlines. This page-turner of a book, “The Good Spy: The Life and Death of Robert Ames” by Kai Bird is a fabulous view into the reality of late twentieth century spycraft.

“The Good Spy” is ostensibly a biography of Robert Ames, the legendary CIA Arabist killed in the car bombing of the US embassy in Beirut in April 1983, but in fact it is a sobering assessment of the value of covert operatives in general.

Naturally, Ames is the hero of the story. Tall, handsome, intelligent, hard working and, perhaps most important of all, deeply empathetic, his only fault, in Bird’s flattering narrative, was that “he loved those damned, troublesome Arabs too much.” The story is roughly broken into two parts. The first covers Ames’s career as a clandestine operative in the Middle East in the 1960s and 70s when he developed “soft recruitment” back channels to key PLO contacts, especially Ali Hassan Salameh, one of Yasir Arafat’s main lieutenants.

Ames’s cultivation of Salameh was highly controversial. The U.S. government claimed to have no contact with the terroristic Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO), but in fact Ames, then still a mid-level operative, was the sole secret conduit. “Bob Ames befriended Ali Hassan Salameh, someone whose resume at the time spelled ‘bad guy.’ But most people would probably agree today that Ames’s calculation was a moral one. He was bringing Salameh in from the cold to a place where he could end violence and bring some definition of justice for his people: a two-state solution to the Palestinian conundrum.” In the end, Salameh paid for his relationship with Ames with his life; he was assassinated by the Israeli Mossad in Beirut in January 1978. Salameh was believed to have played a central role in planning the 1972 attack on the Israeli Olympic team in Munich, but his role as the diplomatic back channel to the U.S. government was reason enough for the Israelis to eliminate him.

The narrative of Ames’s years in the field provides a great view into the life and career of a CIA clandestine officer. Far from the romantic, fast-paced world depicted in James Bond movies, Bird describes a low paying, unfulfilling and generally ineffective job in a sprawling, backstabbing bureaucracy. Indeed, Bird writes that “A CIA survey of the DO [Directorate of Operations] covering the three decades prior to 1985 concluded that less than 5 percent of DO case officers recruited someone capable of producing protected, significant information.” In other words, the vast majority of CIA operatives never once accomplish the primary mission to which they have dedicated their careers and risked their lives.

Not only is the job dangerous and penurious (the Ames family lived paycheck-to-paycheck their entire lives and a financial consultant advised Ames to leave government service if he had any hopes of sending his six children to college), it also has limited influence on policymaking. According to Graham Fuller, a fellow clandestine officer cited by Bird, “The loss of innocence comes in stages…you have this notion that all that you need to do is get the right skinny, the right facts before the policymakers – and things would change. You think you can make a difference. But gradually, you realize that the policymakers don’t care. And then the revelation hits you that U.S. foreign policy is not fact-driven.”

Suffice it to say, this is not the kind of book that will make readers want to run out and join the clandestine service.

The second half of the book deals with Ames’s Washington years as the National Intelligence Officer for the Near East and South Asia (NESA) when he emerged as a key advisor to senior policymakers in the early Reagan administration. Much of this part of the book reads like a basic history of the war in Lebanon, known as “Israel’s Vietnam.” Bird describes well the chaos and viciousness as rival Sunni, Shiite, and Maronite militias battered each other silly while the Israeli army stalked the suburbs of Beirut. It is also where Ames’s story ends. On April 18, 1983 he was one of nearly two dozen Americans killed in the truck bombing of the U.S. embassy. Most amazingly, it had been his first trip back to the Middle East in five years (!).

In all, “The Good Spy” is a level-headed and sobering account of a highly successful CIA career. For those with an interest in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or spycraft, this is a fun and fast read.
1 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Must read

Well written and documented. A look behind the headlines.
✓ Verified Purchase

Excellent book on an important figure in the history of the CIA & Middle East Conflict(s)

I got this as an audiobook and this is a highly engaging, well-written and researched book on Robert Ames. It's a must for anyone interested in the history of the CIA in the Middle East and especially for those interested in the history of the Lebanese Civil War, the PLO and the Munich Olympics massacre and its aftermath. This is NOT a book for the casual reader as it references many figures and events one must be familiar with in order to make sense of the story.

Perhaps the most important aspect of the book is the relationship between Ames and the so-called Red Prince and the possible reasons for his assassination other than supposed ( and likely?) involvement in the Black September terrorist group. The book brings up the interesting question: would the Mossad have liked to eliminate the Red Prince because of his relationship with the CIA and the increasing possibility that the recognition of the Palestinian state, because of Ames, was likelier than ever? Ultimately I don't think it would have happened because of the Reagan administration's political inclinations but it's a fascinating angle.

The other thing it brought up and made me think about was the relationship between the founding of the Hezbollah group and the invasion of Lebanon by Ariel Sharon. It's hard to believe it now, but Hezbollah would likely not have been founded hadn't it been for the Israeli invasion of Lebanon.

Also the PLO really messed up and lost it ... I didn't know they had tried to get rid of the King of Jordan (LMAO). Talk about hubris.

This book is so timely and it makes me think about the future of the Middle East and the role Lebanon has played in it. I am very interested in the Lebanese Civil war and have read many books about it, Hezbollah, Iran, Syria, and so forth, and it's a very interesting moment. It's scary how quickly the Lebanese Civil War and the subsequent Israeli invasion gave way to the religious fundamentalist terror groups that have now become (sadly) synonymous with the Middle East conflict, like the diametrically opposed Sunni drug addicts of ISIS and the Shia ascetic *truly scary* warriors of Hezbollah.

Iran ( with its Lebanese arm Hezbollah, ultimately responsible for Ames' death ) remains the most committed, disciplined and serious threat in the region. With Assad's recent 'win' in the Syrian Civil War ( and its indebtedness to Iran as a result ) , Iran/Hezbollah's power is increasing with alarming speed. God Help Us !!!! I just hope Israel can wake up from the recent propaganda theater of 'peace plans' with non-threatening nations like Marrocco ( WTF) and focus 100% on the reality of Hezbollah in Southern Syria. Iran is not playing y'all.
✓ Verified Purchase

Fantastic book - gripping, informative and well written

Well the author does jump to conclusions on a few points, overall it is an entertaining, thoughtful and well written book.
✓ Verified Purchase

Four Stars

Enjoyed the story.
✓ Verified Purchase

Great

Riveting book. A very easy read about a great subject matter. I have also given this book as a gift it was so good.
✓ Verified Purchase

A Exceptional Book about an Extraordinary Man

It is wonderful when an author zeros in on a hero who does not garner headlines while doing exceptional things. In fact, if Robert Ames had been in the headlines during his life, he would not have been such an effective spy.

I particularly appreciate a biography as Kai Bird has given us because he ties the (often fragmented) historical events in a far-off lands into one understandable whole. It is obvious that the author did an exceptional amount of research.

This is the story of one exceptional Arabist, Robert Ames, and his large family. It is a very interesting story of spy craft in the Middle East. There are focused cameos on important personages in Robert Ames' working world. The history of the whole region is the backdrop for Bob Ames' story.

Reading the facts of the Beirut Embassy bombing in April 1983 is beyond painful. But the reader cannot turn away because these people have become important through the reader's appreciation of their work, as outlined by the author. I was overcome by the feeling of loss and the horror of the waste of such talented individuals in the service of our country.

I found it interesting that John Le Carre was involved in some events in the Middle East. Having learned about all I know about spy craft from Le Carre's George Smiley, it seemed such an ironic touch. I think George Smiley would have been proud to have had Robert Ames on his team.

Related Books