Listen free for 30 days

Listen with offer

Preview
  • A Pretext for War

  • 9/11, Iraq, and the Abuse of America's Intelligence Agencies
  • By: James Bamford
  • Narrated by: Robertson Dean
  • Length: 11 hrs and 52 mins
  • 4.4 out of 5 stars (7 ratings)

£0.00 for first 30 days

Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

A Pretext for War

By: James Bamford
Narrated by: Robertson Dean
Try for £0.00

£7.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £12.99

Buy Now for £12.99

Pay using card ending in
By completing your purchase, you agree to Audible's Conditions of Use and authorise Audible to charge your designated card or any other card on file. Please see our Privacy Notice, Cookies Notice and Interest-based Ads Notice.

Summary

This book says outright what many have merely hinted at: that President George W. Bush knowingly misused the findings of the erroneous and incompetent U.S. intelligence community to provide a pretext for war with Iraq. The author hones in on the systematic weaknesses of the intelligence agencies that caused them to ignore the crucial signs leading up to the attacks of 9/11. Incompetence, deception, and misinformation from these agencies simply left the door open for President Bush and his cronies, who were less interested in the capture of Osama bin Laden and the destruction of his terror network than in following a dubious agenda in Iraq. The missing "weapons of mass destruction" are merely the latest by-product of Bush's co-optation of intelligence for political ends.
Want to learn more about the author and A Pretext for War? Listen to James Bramford on the June 8, 2004, edition of Fresh Air.
©2004 James Bamford (P)2004 Books on Tape
activate_Holiday_promo_in_buybox_DT_T2

Listeners also enjoyed...

Top Secret America cover art
The Shadow Factory cover art
Body of Secrets cover art
Confront and Conceal cover art
Playing to the Edge cover art
Putin's Wars cover art
Against All Enemies cover art
Intelligence Matters cover art
The Finish cover art
Dereliction of Duty cover art
Washington Bullets cover art
I Am Legend cover art
The Hacker and the State cover art
Spies, Lies, and Algorithms cover art
The Cell cover art
Hard Measures cover art

Critic reviews

"Much of the information and many of the theories in Mr. Bamford's book will be familiar to readers from earlier magazine and newspaper articles, and other books....But Mr. Bamford unearths new details about everything from the identity of one of the disclosed locations used by Vice President Dick Cheney after 9/11...to the failures of a special CIA unit charged with tracking Osama bin Laden, and he connects the many dots, both old and new, to create a vivid, unsettling narrative." ( The New York Times)

What listeners say about A Pretext for War

Average customer ratings
Overall
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    3
  • 4 Stars
    4
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    5
  • 4 Stars
    2
  • 3 Stars
    0
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0
Story
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    3
  • 4 Stars
    3
  • 3 Stars
    1
  • 2 Stars
    0
  • 1 Stars
    0

Reviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.

Sort by:
Filter by:
  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

revealing and interesting

brilliant from start to finish.

Worth listening to if you want the truth behind the secret state.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

An important contribution to the history of 9/11

This is an excellent telling of the lead-up to the Iraq war - it shows how far apart lie the fiction and the reality surrounding America's intelligence services.

It also tells the truth about the real duplicity of the US President and his allies (especially UK Prime Minister) in their push for regime change.

One thing about the reader, who is generally very good and deals well with many difficult names - I did laugh out loud when he talked about the infamous 'doggy dossier' (it should be prodnounced 'dodgy' - dɒdʒi/ or 'dod-gi').

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!