Pot Shards Fragments of a Life Lived in CIA the White House and the Two Koreas edition by Donald P Gregg Politics Social Sciences eBooks
Download As PDF : Pot Shards Fragments of a Life Lived in CIA the White House and the Two Koreas edition by Donald P Gregg Politics Social Sciences eBooks 
Pot Shards is a memoir, based on the author's memorable experiences. He served as a CIA's agent on the island of Saipan, during ten years in Japan, a tour in Burma, four years tied up in the Vietnam War, two tours in Korea, the second time as ambassador, and ten years in the White House, where he worked for Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, and George H. Bush.
Pot Shards Fragments of a Life Lived in CIA the White House and the Two Koreas edition by Donald P Gregg Politics Social Sciences eBooks
I recognized Donald Gregg's name from his on-screen interview in The Man Nobody Knew (excellent documentary about William Colby) and his insights shared in Tim Weiner's history of the CIA, Legacy of Ashes, so I was delighted to see that Mr. Gregg had written his own book. The title is entirely appropriate, since the author's approach is to "connect to the dots" -- to share his most vivid memories of his long career as a CIA officer, national security advisor, and US diplomat. Each chapter -- from "JFK and Vietnam" to "The White House Years with Reagan and Bush" -- is informed by his unique perspective and thoughtful analysis. His candor and warmth make this book immensely readable. Seeing key historic events and players from his unique POV has been highly rewarding. Recommended!UPDATE: The May/June issue of Foreign Affairs just gave this book a well-deserved enthusiastic review: "Throughout, he provides a rich sense of the highs and lows of family and professional life in government service and reflects on the role of personalities in making policy machinery work well (as was sometimes the case in South Korea) or poorly (as was often the case in Vietnam)."
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Pot Shards Fragments of a Life Lived in CIA the White House and the Two Koreas edition by Donald P Gregg Politics Social Sciences eBooks Reviews
I hesitate to use the word "inspirational", as I feel like it has been badly abused by reviewers, but I am unable to come up with a better word. Mr. Gregg has lead a fascinating life, moving among the most powerful people in the world. During all of it, his driving motivation was "make a difference".
I couldn't put the book down, finishing it less than 33 hours after I started. The conversational tone, combined with the structure of the book, made me feel like I was sitting on the porch with him, listening to him relate a series of stories to me.
A fantastic read, if it ever comes out on Audible I will buy it there as well. (They ought to get Adam Curry to read it, not only does Adam have a great voice, Mr. Gregg is also his uncle.)
The best work of nonfiction I've read this year. I found it fascinating on at least four levels.
First, as a millennial subjected to high school American history courses that effectively "end" with the Yalta conference in 1945, I learned a lot of history from this book. It's also history as told from the perspective of a consummate insider -- CIA operative in Vietnam during the war, White House National Security Counsel staffer under Reagan, national security advisor to George HW Bush, Ambassador to Korea, and since then director for various nonprofits where he is still (apparently) one the most competent and well-informed diplomatic figures on Korean matters. For me, the historical aspect is especially interesting during the 1980s; without getting bogged down in minutiae, this book left me with a much greater understanding of late Cold War diplomacy in Europe, the surprisingly rich tale of the emergence of democracy in South Korea, as well as the Iran-Contra scandal.
Second, the book paints a fascinating portrait of the conduct of diplomacy since 1980. I'll make two points here. One is that George HW Bush seems to have been a genuinely impressive diplomat. The other is that games of tennis seem to have played a surprisingly large role in his diplomatic efforts.
Third, this book has a lot to teach civilians like myself about the CIA. I have been harshly critical of -- and sometimes even completely disgusted by -- the operations of our national intelligence agencies since 9/11, as have been gradually revealed to us by investigative reporters and whistleblowers. I suspect that prosecutions for blatantly illegal activity, major structural reorganization, continued declassification efforts, and increased transparency would all be to the benefit of our country, allowing us to roll back the worst excesses of the military-intelligence-industrial complex. I'm not sure Mr. Gregg would necessarily disagree, but I do think he would have significant reservations about shaking the CIA up too much. Gregg paints a picture of an agency that is generally highly competent and a-political, which by virtue of its clandestine mission and inability to tout its successes, necessarily appears to the outside world as an idiotic bureaucracy stumbling from scandalous failure to scandalous failure. Probably the truth lies somewhere in between; unfortunately the exact location will remain highly classified.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, this book is incredibly important for anyone wanting to understand the state of our diplomatic relations with both North and South Korea. Probably people who were paying close attention at the time knew these things, but I missed them. (1) In 1993, North and South Korea were close to reaching an historical nuclear disarmament agreement, due in no small part to Gregg's efforts to stop joint US-South Korean military exercises. Then Defense Secretary Dick Cheney stepped in, reinstated those exercises summarily, landing us directly in the series of nuclear crises that have arisen periodically with North Korea ever since. (2) By 2001, as the Clinton Administration was leaving office, very successful diplomatic efforts had led to a remarkable degree of detente between the US and Kim Jong-il. But the George W Bush administration (idiotically, in my view) adopted a hard-line posture against North Korea and stymied these positive developments, making things even worse with the infamous "Axis of Evil" speech. How many North Korean peasants have starved to death since then because of this hubris? Gregg makes the poignant remark that thirty years ago, there was a country in northeast Asia with a brutal dictator that routinely tortured its people, secretly purchased weapons we didn't want them to have, and developed a covert nuclear weapons program that country was South Korea, now our strongest ally in the region. We got from point A to point B not by isolating our counterparty or by writing them off as incorrigible miscreants, but by talking to them and working to support democratic reforms. I was especially saddened by Gregg's account of the travesty our recent approach to North Korean diplomacy because the administration of South Korean President Kim Dae-jung (in office 1998-2003) seemed to offer a unique opportunity to make progress with North Korea, which we foolishly squandered.
On a related note, before reading this book I watched The Interview, and I sort of enjoyed the comedy. But after reading this book, I can't help but find some wisdom in the opinion of the Chinese government about the movie, as expressed through their state media "No matter how the US society looks at North Korea and Kim Jong-un, Kim is still the leader of the country. The vicious mocking of Kim is only a result of senseless cultural arrogance." Make no mistake, Kim is a ruthless dictator, and an entirely appropriate object of our ridicule. But American society in 2014, Gregg's book makes clear to me, is certainly guilty of "senseless cultural arrogance" in our approach to North Korea.
Oh, and ITM everyone.
I'm the Rudy mentioned in Ambassador Gregg's book. It would have been a shame, for him not to have documented his unusual life's history for us to share and understand. I consider this wonderful dedicated and extremely talented gentleman, the most compassionate, humorous, considerate, and intellectually superior individual I ever had the privilege of working for. He made the difficult life we led in Vietnam digestible, leading by example and encouraging all of us to do the best job we could. During my tenure at the National War College, I invited Don to speak to our Intelligence Elective course to give a White House prospective into national security concerns. The students love his candid descriptions, many of which are contained in Pot Shards. I always thought President Bush should have selected him to be his national security advisor since his vision of future events was repeatedly accurate. I highly recommend the book for it pulls no punches and represents history much like Porter Alexander's memoirs of the Civil War.
I recognized Donald Gregg's name from his on-screen interview in The Man Nobody Knew (excellent documentary about William Colby) and his insights shared in Tim Weiner's history of the CIA, Legacy of Ashes, so I was delighted to see that Mr. Gregg had written his own book. The title is entirely appropriate, since the author's approach is to "connect to the dots" -- to share his most vivid memories of his long career as a CIA officer, national security advisor, and US diplomat. Each chapter -- from "JFK and Vietnam" to "The White House Years with Reagan and Bush" -- is informed by his unique perspective and thoughtful analysis. His candor and warmth make this book immensely readable. Seeing key historic events and players from his unique POV has been highly rewarding. Recommended!
UPDATE The May/June issue of Foreign Affairs just gave this book a well-deserved enthusiastic review "Throughout, he provides a rich sense of the highs and lows of family and professional life in government service and reflects on the role of personalities in making policy machinery work well (as was sometimes the case in South Korea) or poorly (as was often the case in Vietnam)."
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