My thanks to all those individuals—active and retired intelligence veterans; interested observers and contractors; foreign officials and intelligence partners; academics, philosophers, and scientists; journalists and historians; friends, relatives, and neighbors; politicians and statesmen; never Trumpers and Trump diehards; strangers on a train, in an airport, or on Twitter accounts—who were willing to share their unvarnished views with me. Most of you will remain nameless here, but you functioned as a needed compass in unexplored terrain, and I have worked hard to give a fair account of the depth, honesty, and legitimacy of your thoughts and feelings.
Thanks, too, to the folks at Penguin Press, especially Scott Moyers and Elisabeth Calamari, and agent Andrew Wylie, who would hazard a second book on my part with none of the inherent buzz of a CIA memoir. Thanks, too, to other editors at The Hill, CNN, and the Washington Post, who urged me to write on these subjects as they were happening and helped me put thoughts to paper.
And I’ve also got to thank the Sisters of Mercy, Marianists and Spiritans who, over fourteen years of liberal education, gave me an appreciation for history and philosophy that became even more important as I grew older. They also added a love of country, a love of America as a creedal nation, one that was always more revolutionary idea than territory, population, or blood.
And, of course, to my wife, Jeanine, who—in addition to all the love and support—patiently endured draft after draft as first reader and unsparing critic.