Secrets
In 1971 former Cold War hard-liner Daniel Ellsberg made history by releasing the Pentagon Papers-a 7,000-page top-secret study of U.S. decision-making in Vietnam-to the New York Times and Washington Post. The document set in motion a chain of events that ended not only the Nixon presidency but the Vietnam War. In this remarkable memoir, Ellsberg describes in dramatic detail the two years he spent in Vietnam as a U.S. State Department observer, and how he came to risk his career and freedom to expose the deceptions and delusions that shaped three decades of American foreign policy. The story of one man's exploration of conscience, Secrets is also a portrait of America at a perilous crossroad.
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8mentions
7people
2010–2024years
63% recommend38% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- From Ellsberg's Secrets, describing giving advice to Henry Kissinger on Vietnam in 1968.
Good book. Interesting life. Marine Officer, nuclear weapons analyst, drove around Vietnam evaluating pacification, ..
- Which Ellsberg book(s) have you read? I read his memoir Secrets a while back and enjoyed it; I've been meaning to read his book on nuclear war planning, The Doomsday Machine.
- For a great book on the military decision making at the time, I’d recommend Secrets: A Memoir of Vietnam and the Pentagon Papers by Daniel Ellsberg
- This is a relevant and interesting read from Ellsberg's book Secrets: http://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/02/daniel-ellsber...
- Ellsberg's book "Secrets" is a great read, describing his evolution and eventual decision to smuggle out the Xerox copies of the Pentagon Papers.
In 2008 when I was helping organize the Get FISA Right protests on my.barackobama.com, some email went across the list from somebody named Daniel Ellsberg. I sent him mail saying "you probably get this all the time, but by any chance are you the Daniel Ellsberg?" Much to my delight, it was, and we struck up an email conversation. Wow!
- Daniel Ellsberg giving advice to Henry Kissinger about security clearances, in 1968, from his book "Secrets", https://www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/02/daniel-ellsbe...
> You will deal with a person who doesn’t have those clearances only from the point of view of what you want him to believe and what impression you want him to go away with, since you’ll have to lie carefully to him about what you know. In effect, you will have to manipulate him. You’ll give up trying to assess what he has to say. The danger is, you’ll become something like a moron. You’ll become incapable of learning from most people in the world, no matter how much experience they may have in their particular areas that may be much greater than yours.
Full quote: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36364006
HN ranking history for this thread: https://hnrankings.info/41238823
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