Overt Chronicle of Covert Operations

摘要

In Surprise, Kill, Vanish, Annie Jacobsen-a Princeton graduate, acclaimed New York Times journalist, and Pulitzer Prize finalist-compiles archive sources and hundreds of hours of interviews with current and former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) paramilitaries, to create one of the first histories narrating the story of the CIA's Special Operations Group (SOG) Ground Branch. The book is a welcomed addition to the bookshelves of practitioners and students of intelligence history alike. Jacobsen begins her chronicle by explaining the title of the book. She notes that the motto of Office of Strategic Services (OSS) Jedburghs-a joint Allied program, among the OSS Special Operations, the British Special Operations Executive, and the French Central Bureau of Intelligence and Action-fighting behind Nazi lines was "Surprise, Kill, Vanish." Next, the author explains that covert actions-sometimes referred to as the president's "hidden hand"-operate between war and diplomacy. The author notes that during the earliest OSS professional training, the French Operational Group of Jedburghs taught irregular warfare techniques to future Agency directors Richard Helms and William Casey. The Jedburgh Team code named Team Hugh became the first OSS team parachuted into occupied France on the night of 5 June 1944. As Jacobsen laments, in little more than a year after victory in a world war, President Truman would sign an order abolishing the OSS. She then reveals that, two years later, the president created the CIA, which would conduct-under National Security Council Directive 10/2-covert operations under the administrative moniker "Office of Special Projects," later changed to "Office of Policy Coordination," and several additional descriptors before "Special Activities" became accepted over the longer term.