By All Means Available

I feel bad giving this book ⭐️⭐️⭐️, given the man's contributions, but as a compiled work, it was really more of a ⭐️⭐️ situation. Didactic, repetitive, opinionated, and focused on self in a way that was somehow grating, this confusing melee of memories really let me down.

The first 5-10% about the author's early career were really interesting. Even some of the initial CIA covert action stuff was fine, given his unique perspective as the ops officer running something so well-known... but everything after that was confusingly circular, focusing on topics instead of following chronology, providing narrative from a perspective of continuity even when he was in completely different roles.

Overall, it felt like either a case of “if I had more time this would have been shorter” or “I want to get all my opinions and perspectives aligned in a self-reinforcing manner to refute any objections,” not the work of a senior national security advisor recounting his career. I don't think there's more than one point where he admits anything he said or did may have been in error, but I would say a solid 20% of the book is riddled with accusations levied at how others did not follow his advice and “look where that got us.”

While I am grateful for his service, the book makes very clear that Mike Vickers was more of an opinionated manager than an inspired leader, someone who cares about doing “the right thing the right way” (without room for alternative views or personal errancy) regardless of the self-contradictions or absurdities. If you took his one-sided views at face value then the defense budget would be 50% of the US GDP and we would have troops deployed in every country in “small forces tamping down insurgencies” or “countering regional hegemonic encroachment” (because global hegemony is somehow the obvious natural state of things).

Maybe this book will get better with age... it's unlikely I'll ever find out, as there's really nothing worth returning for after you've a slogged through once. Ironically, that makes Afghanistan a more appealing place to spend some time than between these pages... if Vickers was a true “insurgent at heart” (which seems to be at least partly true) then perhaps some solace will be found in the reader's immediate need to divest from the overwhelming self-indulgence of this work... an intellectual revolt, if there ever were one.