Goodreads helps you keep track of books you want to read.

Start by marking “Three Minutes to Doomsday: An Agent, a Traitor, and the Worst Espionage Breach in U.S. History” as Want to Read:

Other editions

Enlarge cover

Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Open Preview

Three Minutes to Doomsday: An Agent, a Traitor, and the Worst Espionage Breach in U.S. History

Joe Navarro

4.01 · Rating details · 654 ratings · 111 reviews

An intense cat-and-mouse game played between two brilliant men in the last days of the Cold War, this shocking insider’s story shows how a massive giveaway of secret war plans and nuclear secrets threatened America with annihilation.

In 1988 Joe Navarro, one of the youngest agents ever hired by the FBI, was dividing his time between SWAT assignments, flying air reconnaissan An intense cat-and-mouse game played between two brilliant men in the last days of the Cold War, this shocking insider’s story shows how a massive giveaway of secret war plans and nuclear secrets threatened America with annihilation.

In 1988 Joe Navarro, one of the youngest agents ever hired by the FBI, was dividing his time between SWAT assignments, flying air reconnaissance, and working counter-intelligence. But his real expertise was “reading” body language. He possessed an uncanny ability to glean the thoughts of those he interrogated.

So it was that, on a routine assignment to interview a “person of interest”—a former American soldier named Rod Ramsay—Navarro noticed his interviewee’s hand trembling slightly when he was asked about another soldier who had recently been arrested in Germany on suspicion of espionage. That thin lead was enough for the FBI agent to insist to his bosses that an investigation be opened.

What followed is unique in the annals of espionage detection—a two-year-long battle of wits. The dueling antagonists: an FBI agent who couldn’t overtly tip to his target that he suspected him of wrongdoing lest he clam up, and a traitor whose weakness was the enjoyment he derived from sparring with his inquisitor. Navarro’s job was made even more difficult by his adversary’s brilliance: not only did Ramsay possess an authentic photographic memory as well as the second highest IQ ever recorded by the US Army, he was bored by people who couldn’t match his erudition. To ensure that the information flow would continue, Navarro had to pre-choreograph every interview, becoming a chess master plotting twenty moves in advance.

And the backdrop to this mental tug of war was the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the very real possibility that its leaders, in a last bid to alter the course of history, might launch a devastating attack. If they did, they would have Ramsay to thank, because as Navarro would learn over the course of forty-two mind-bending interviews, Ramsay had, by his stunning intelligence giveaways, handed the Soviets the ability to utterly destroy the US.

The story of a determined hero who pushed himself to jaw-dropping levels of exhaustion and who rallied his team to expose undreamed of vulnerabilities in America’s defense, Three Minutes to Doomsday will leave the reader with disturbing thoughts of the risks the country takes even today with its most protected national secrets. ...more

Get A Copy

Hardcover, 368 pages

Published April 18th 2017 by Scribner

More Details... Edit Details

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Reader Q&A

To ask other readers questions about Three Minutes to Doomsday, please sign up.

Be the first to ask a question about Three Minutes to Doomsday

Lists with This Book

Everything Belongs to Us by Yoojin Grace Wuertz

2017 Best Books

117 books — 54 voters

The Spy and the Traitor by Ben Macintyre

Great Books on Espionage (nonfiction)

160 books — 24 voters

More lists with this book...

Community Reviews

Showing 1-30

Average rating 4.01 ·

Rating details

· 654 ratings · 111 reviews

More filters

Sort order

Start your review of Three Minutes to Doomsday: An Agent, a Traitor, and the Worst Espionage Breach in U.S. History

May 19, 2017 Peggy Ryan rated it it was amazing

I have a lot of feelings about this book, most of which can be summed up by saying holy shit. I cannot stress enough to people that they need to read this book if they're at all interested in Cold War espionage and human behavioral patterns. Navarro weaves the events as effortlessly as a fiction novel, and you find yourself forgetting that this actually occurred.

Chilling, gripping and fantastically written. 5/5 stars. ...more

flag 14 likes · Like · see review

Feb 03, 2017 Donna Davis rated it liked it

Recommends it for: those that love espionage stories--get it free or cheap

Shelves: primary-sources, memoirs-biographies-autobio, arc-scribner, net-galley, blogged, reviewed

“Nothing’s ever over till the fat lady sings.”

Trite? Yes. Abrasive? Absolutely! Sexist? All the damn time. Profane? Seriously profane, and not in a way that some of us might find amusing. And yet, this memoir has a strangely fascinating aspect as well. It combines two stories, the primary one an espionage case in which the author plays the primary role, and a secondary one, the implosion of the author’s personality and marriage. It’s not fun reading, but after a certain point, there’s no turning “Nothing’s ever over till the fat lady sings.”

Trite? Yes. Abrasive? Absolutely! Sexist? All the damn time. Profane? Seriously profane, and not in a way that some of us might find amusing. And yet, this memoir has a strangely fascinating aspect as well. It combines two stories, the primary one an espionage case in which the author plays the primary role, and a secondary one, the implosion of the author’s personality and marriage. It’s not fun reading, but after a certain point, there’s no turning away from it either. Thanks go to Net Galley and Scribner for the DRC, which I received free of charge in exchange for an honest review.

Navarro is a hot-shot young FBI agent in 1988, and it is while conducting what is expected to be a fairly routine interview that he notes a “tell” from former US soldier Rod Ramsey. It becomes the basis of an espionage case that goes much deeper than anyone anticipated. Navarro uses his expertise in nonverbal communication to tell what Ramsey is feeling during the various phases of his interviews, and he also uses it to control and manipulate Ramsey into cooperating with the investigation. Ramsey is the one soul on this planet with fewer friends than Navarro, and so Navarro spends years making Ramsey believe that he himself is that sought-after friend, practically family. He does it so he can have this kid busted and send him away for a really long time.

Navarro knows a lot about reading and controlling others nonverbally, but he doesn’t know a thing about building a family life or about how to make friends, and it’s clear he knows this, yet he can’t help himself. He tells us that an agent he wants to assist him on the Ramsey case tells a supervisor that she would prefer to work with someone else, and specifically, with anyone, anyone, anyone else but him. A number of other people echo this sentiment, and yet his personality continues on its hell-bent-for-leather downhill trajectory.

While he continues his self-aggrandizement with a hearty side-serving of brazen braggadocio, Navarro recounts again and again how much he hates the office staff at work, little people that are getting in his way by attempting to do their jobs. Clearly they just don’t understand how very important he is, but that’s okay, because he is letting the world know now. Regarding the office manager that dares remind him of small requirements like changing the oil in his official vehicle, he uses a tired aphorism:

“Don’t try to teach a pig to sing. It annoys the pig and it wastes your time.”

He lets us know that he swore at, patronized, and berated her constantly, and lest we take his admissions as a sign of penitence, he also lets us know that he hates her still. He has changed her name for obvious legal reasons, but he hasn’t changed his obnoxious attitude or gained a speck of humility.

Add to this the fact that, though this espionage case is terrific book material, Navarro isn’t much of a writer. Clichés abound, and very basic principles of narrative writing are either never learned or disregarded. He starts chapters with lists, apparently too busy and important to transform these into paragraphs. I’m not all that sure he ever edited his work (because he might have noticed his overuse of parenthesis) and I’m not sure he permitted anyone else to do so either (because surely they would have come to his rescue).

Still, it’s an interesting story. Whereas someone else could no doubt do a finer job of writing this thing, it’s undeniably compelling. I recommend this memoir to those that enjoy espionage thrillers and true crime stories, but don’t give up the full sticker price. Read it for free or cheap, and save your serious dollars for serious writers. ...more

flag 10 likes · Like · see review

Oct 10, 2016 Leslynn rated it it was ok

Shelves: 2016-reading-challenge

Copy courtesy of NetGalley

This book sounds more glorious than it is and should have been titled "Intense Focus on doing my job, so fuck the people around me"! This guy was an absent father and husband and just an all-round asshole, but he was really good at what he does for a living and was able to connect with bad guys in order to save his country; kudos for that.

The story dragged on too long, and totally disappointed. ...more

flag 10 likes · Like · see review

May 17, 2018 Steve rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: history, nonfiction, read-in-2018, early-review-netgalley, spies-espionage

I received this from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

For a real-world true-to-life account written by the very FBI agent responsible for the arrest and conviction of the worst traitor in American history, this was surprisingly well-written and fraught with tension, ramping up with each turn of the page. I even went so far as to do a little research about Roderick Ramsay and Clyde Conrad, thinking that the things that they did -- selling state secrets to the Communist Bloc, including c ...more

flag 6 likes · Like · see review

Dec 07, 2016 Bent Hansen rated it liked it

Shelves: arc, netgalley, non-fiction

Joe Navarro definitely knows about interrogation techniques, non-verbal communication, and how to make himself appear selfless, humble, and professionally brilliant. He may indeed be all these things, but much of this book just seems a little too self-aggrandising to my taste.
The story takes some time to get going, and although Navarro's style of writing is quite fluid, the first third of the book was quite a struggle for me. Once the enormity of the case started to become clear, however, I was ...more

flag 5 likes · Like · see review

Dec 07, 2016 Cristina rated it liked it

I received an advanced review copy of this book from NetGalley, but my opinions are honest and all my own.

And honestly, I wanted to love this book. I started out loving this book and then it went a little downhill for me.

I was very intrigued, I have not read anything by this author before but former FBI agent skilled in behavioral techniques sounded very Criminal Minds, so I was on board! I was worried it would be too technical or advanced for me to understand, since I am not in the military n ...more

flag 3 likes · Like · see review

Apr 18, 2017 Chandra Claypool (WhereTheReaderGrows) rated it really liked it

I won't bore you and regurgitate the synopsis for this one - the title says it all (but if you really want to know, go to my blog and it'll be posted there). So let's just get into it, shall we?

I'm not a big non-fiction reader, nor do I care for history, historical fact, the past, etc. etc... so why would I ever pick up this book then since they are both?? Because it's so damn intriguing! Behavioral analysis and profiling? Check! FBI agents? Check! Espionage? Check! Intellectual cat and mouse t ...more

flag 2 likes · Like · see review

Dec 27, 2019 Angela Han rated it really liked it

Shelves: nonfiction

The book is about how Joe Navarro discovered about a major espionage through casual interviews. I appreciated how he did not rant on the frustration of the bureaucratic barriers. He found ways to work around the barriers to get the job done despite the frustrations.

This book is a must read.

I did give the book a 4 star due to prologue. It did not lure me into the book. Interest in the book for me started around chapter 3.

flag 2 likes · Like · see review

Nov 17, 2016 Karen added it

Three Minutes to Doomsday by Joe Navarro
This story tells about the investigation of Joe Navarro into Rod Ramsey who sold private United States classified information to the Soviet Union. Joe Navarro was an FBI agent who worked in counter Intelligence out of the Tampa, Florida FBI field office. Starting in 1988 FBI agent Joe Navarro was dividing his time in SWAT, air reconnaissance and working counter intelligence. Joe is an expert at reading body language. That Joe Navarro was so good at reading Three Minutes to Doomsday by Joe Navarro
This story tells about the investigation of Joe Navarro into Rod Ramsey who sold private United States classified information to the Soviet Union. Joe Navarro was an FBI agent who worked in counter Intelligence out of the Tampa, Florida FBI field office. Starting in 1988 FBI agent Joe Navarro was dividing his time in SWAT, air reconnaissance and working counter intelligence. Joe is an expert at reading body language. That Joe Navarro was so good at reading body language and being able to tell when he was being lied to was what impressed me about reading th.is story.

Joe Navarro and another FBI agent have a meeting with Rod Ramsay, who was a former American soldier in Germany. Rod Ramsey was working with Clyde Conrad who both sold classified American military secrets while they were in Germany in the military. Navarro in that chance meeting with Rod Ramsey notices Ramsey twitch, when Clyde Conrad's name is mentioned. Clyde Conrad was already arrested in Germany for selling classified information. The story is about the fifty interviews Joe Navarro had with a female agent usually in a hotel room in Orlando, Florida with Rod Ramsay. Rod Ramsay had the second highest IQ in the United States military. Rod Ramsay has a big ego and begins to tell Joe Navarro over the course of fifty interviews how he and his former partner Clyde Conrad sold these classified secrets overseas.

This book was both easy and hard to understand because it involves all of the bureaucracy that FBI Agent Joe Navarro had to deal with while he was slowly but steadily getting information from Rod Ramsay. The NSA, the US Army Intelligence and Security Command and the former Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency were all obstacles during Navarro's interviews with Rod Ramsay. Nobody seemed to want to acknowledge that there was a severe breach in US intelligence.
This book will find itself a great audience with anybody who has had any experience in the military or any government agency. At it's heart this book is the behind the scenes look at how one FBI agent doggedly pursued a Cold War Spy. Joe Navarro had to deal with endless red tape from the FBI's Washington Field office and the FBI headquarters.

Thank you to Net Galley, Joe Navarro and Scribner for providing me with my digital copy for a fair and honest review.

f
...more

flag 2 likes · Like · see review

Oct 21, 2016 Cindy McBride rated it it was amazing

PRELIM REVIEW: I'm just now about a quarter of the way through this book, but I'm absolutely compelled to give a sneak preview to those considering this book. As someone who spent almost 30 years negotiating very high-dollar, highly-classified contracts with Prime government contractors, I can tell you that Navarro's method of interacting with a promising source of information (or, in my case, my opposition during negotiations) is 100% spot-on. I can't even count the number of times I used my "n ...more

flag 2 likes · Like · see review

Sep 18, 2016 Nancy rated it really liked it

This is my second book by this author and I quite enjoyed it. Joe has made a serious study out of nonverbal communication. To learn more about the "tells" of deceit, read another of his books because this isn't it. This book is the grueling year and some months he spends unraveling secrets from a guy named Rod Ramsey who worked with another guy named Clyde Conrad in West Germany during the Cold War during their time in the army. Ramsay is just a check mark on a list. Talk to him and move on. Sim ...more

flag 2 likes · Like · see review

Nov 20, 2016 Victoria rated it liked it

Shelves: netgalley

Thanks to Scribner and NetGalley for the ARC. This book didn't live up to my expectations, mainly due to my dislike of the narrator/main character. While I am highly appreciative of the work performed by Joe Navarro and his colleagues in the FBI, I found his lack of concern about his own behavior (even 25 years later) troubling or off putting. The times he talks about his behavior seem insincere to me and included only because he realized he should have learned something regarding his marriage, ...more

flag 2 likes · Like · see review

Mar 26, 2019 Francisca rated it really liked it

i have mixed feelings about this book. or more like, mixed feelings about how this book is presented. let me give you an excerpt of the blurr on goodreads: a traitor whose weakness was the enjoyment he derived from sparring with his inquisitor ... not only did Ramsay possess an authentic photographic memory as well as the second highest IQ ever recorded by the US Army, he was bored by people who couldn’t match his erudition.

so, no blame on me, but i thought this book would be about a battle of i have mixed feelings about this book. or more like, mixed feelings about how this book is presented. let me give you an excerpt of the blurr on goodreads: a traitor whose weakness was the enjoyment he derived from sparring with his inquisitor ... not only did Ramsay possess an authentic photographic memory as well as the second highest IQ ever recorded by the US Army, he was bored by people who couldn’t match his erudition.

so, no blame on me, but i thought this book would be about a battle of wits, a thriller-like retelling of brewing interrogations and tense situations. my take now i've finished the book: sort of.

joe navarro is an author specialised on body language. it's an element of his training vital to the uncovering and development of this case. i don't think joe navarro is that good at actually writing/describing personalities. to me, it felt like half of this spy's remorseless, psycopathic behaviour got a bit lost from the experience into the page. i believe him on it; i just couldn't really see it for myself.

as far as this book is concerned, the battle of wits and the tense interrogations never really happened. this apparent spy-master (or third-generation spy) was almost desperate to brag about his actions. like, it didn't seem to take too much for him to start spilling the beans on him comitting treason or giving away vital evidence. i was almost glad by the end that other people had also questioned what had happened: this guy has the second highest iq in military history (not that iq-testing is a perfect mark of brilliancy) and he just built his case for them without realising he was signing his confessions every time he opened his mouth?

there's a small debate on why this happened by the end of the book. my best guess is this poor fella was desperate to latch on to whatever father figure was available. that's how he ended up selling highly classificed state secrets and that's why he ended up telling all about it to an fbi agent. maybe my empathy levels are higher than the author but i felt sorry for him. i don't have his enduring patriotism, sorry about that.

regardless of this problem, i did enjoy this book. i got a bit emotional by the end, to be honest.

but me getting emotional over other people getting emotional isn't such a hardship.

still, i shoudl say this book's biggest asset is its choice of verb tense. unlike what i was expecting and the usual narrative non-fiction books i've read so far, this is written in the present tense. like journal entries occurring in real time. i'm not even sure they are factual entries because for what the author says, he didn't even have time to shower, where would he get the time to sit down and write what was happening? and if they are real-in-time, editing obviously occurred.

regardless of this, having everything told as it was happening gave the story the immediate sense of the political thriller i was expecting. it failed a bit in terms of presenting a credible villain (in my opinion) but the pacing was spot-on. case in point, i read the second half of this book in a single day (today) and i could have gone reading it for a bit longer. ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Jan 09, 2020 Maarja Mets rated it really liked it

Truly fascinating insight into the soul of an actual spy, instead of the inhumane villains that they are sometimes made out to be. The way Rod Ramsay was looking for approval of an older male friend, a character fault that brought on his downfall: first, in Germany, going along with his military superior´s schemes to sell information to the enemy´s side and then, back home, trusting an FBI agent so thoroughly as to tell him all about his illegal activities. On a personal level, it´s a sad story ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Sep 10, 2020 Charlotte rated it really liked it

Shelves: american, non-fiction, 20th-century, politics, psychology, audiobook, memoir, crime, usa

Super interesting, and honestly extremely sad. Imagine if someone like Rod Ramsay had not had the bad turns of his childhood/youth. From this book, he could be a "cure cancer" guy. Instead he's a "drugs'n'hookers" guy who sold vital military intelligence because he was bored. Similarly, it's scary to think about what Joe Navarro could do, if he decided to use his skills for less lofty goals. In a way, it sounds a lot as though, had things been different, the two men could swap places.
As much as ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Oct 27, 2020 Denise rated it liked it

Shelves: read-2020, own

As you may or may not have noticed, I'm a sucker for all manner of espionage tales - very much including the real-life ones. Involving a potentially devastating leak of top secret war plans and more in the late days of the Cold War, this sure is one hell of a story. If only its author didn't come across as such a self-aggrandizing, patronising and abrasive character. Evidently great at his job? Sure. Humble about it? Not even a little bit. ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Jun 03, 2019 Rodney Cannon rated it it was amazing

Compelling true story of Special Agent Navarro and his dedication to the truth. His behavioral analysis was groundbreaking for the time, and has influenced much of today's interrogation techniques. I look forward to seeing this on the big screen, as I read Clooney's production company bought the rights. ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

May 08, 2018 January Gray rated it really liked it

This was okay. I really don't have much to say about it. ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Aug 14, 2019 Kay Cugini rated it liked it

Gave up on this half way through, sorry just not for me, normally love this sort of book but felt the repeated tracking down and interviewing of the same guy didn't appeal to me ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Jan 15, 2020 Vitalii Mainarovych rated it really liked it · review of another edition

The story with impressive scale. Nicely put and reads easily.

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Jun 12, 2020 Katelyn rated it it was amazing

I LOVED this book so much! There was definitely some language in there, but it is SO worth your time. It is, mind-blowing, fascinating, & emotional. I felt like I was experiencing all the burdens the author was. This has to be one of my favorites books ever!

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Jun 22, 2018 Cathy Sites rated it really liked it

Yikes! Scary tale of how slippery National security can be. I continue to love Navarro’s work on the unsaid clues that people unconsciously reveal. More to learn from Navarro - genius in his own right.

flag 1 like · Like · see review

May 17, 2018 Jack Hansen rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, history, thriller, adventure, based-on-real-events, cultural-world, military, cultural-russia, war, detective

This is a well written, true story about espionage and investigation by those who are elite in their field and how bureaucracy between agencies can bog down efficient efforts to resolve cases. The job takes its toll on families and personnel as intrigue and intellect carry this interesting plot without hot pursuits and buckets of blood.

Joe Navarro is the protagonist and author. Opportunists, Clyde Conrad and Rod Ramsey, are genius antagonists. George Newbern narrates through the protagonist, wh ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Nov 07, 2018 Brian Walter rated it it was ok

Went into this with high hopes after reading other spy stories but was disappointed to find this was written by a super cop who wanted to say how he saved the world by noticing a slight quiver. Had I wanted a Sherlock Holmes novel I would have picked that up, but here I was in the midst of a tale without any real depth. The author (supercop) failed to provide many details that would have fleshed out the crime, though we did get exorbitant details of their meals. I understand he was proud of his ...more

flag 2 likes · Like · see review

Jun 08, 2017 DjS rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Tedious, and self aggrandizing. The story is weak and the Entertainment value is zero. Navarro's oversized ego makes the quarry out to have a genius level IQ. Instead this so called 'espionage spy' is really just a lonely underachieving sad sack loser living in a trailer. Years before, this weak individual goes along with his smarter more savvy overseas colleague's information leak forays, doing so not for ideology or monetary return but for the respect and friendship he seeks. The confession of ...more

flag 2 likes · Like · see review

Feb 06, 2018 Jay C rated it it was ok

Interesting - and scary - story about national security information leaks from the late 1980s but for me it was made almost unreadable by the insufferably condescending tone of the author, who seemed, in addition to wanting to reveal a 'near miss' for national security, just as intent to convince us how much more clever he was than his associates and those he was investigating. I did like the insight into non-verbal communication and was reminded of the book "Spy the Lie" (though I think that bo ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Aug 05, 2018 Mark Carter rated it liked it

Based on reviews I was very excited to read this book. I could have easily been a 4 or 5 star book for me. The problem wasn’t the story but the story teller. Instead of a professional author telling the spy story you get the former agent telling the story. Though it may be true - it gets tiresome to repeatedly be told how the agent is always the best and smartest and everyone else is getting in his way or not working hard enough. Navarro likely was an excellent FBI agent - but it’s unfortunate t ...more

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Mar 19, 2018 Jeff Kowalk rated it liked it

Shelves: true-crime, non-fiction

Interesting, but the author is quite the narcissist, and seems to drag the whole thing on for too long.

flag 1 like · Like · see review

Oct 22, 2018 Mike rated it it was amazing

Shelves: history

I a huge fan of spy stories, both fiction and real. I had heard about Joe Navarro, an FBI counterintelligence specialist and body language guru. I didn't know about this case, the selling of war plans to the Soviets in the 1980's. This was a huge deal at the time, but looking back at it more than 25 years later, it is pure luck that nothing dramatic came of it. Such as the invasion of Europe by the Warsaw Pact.

The author is an intense, mission driven FBI agent with a focus on counterintelligence I a huge fan of spy stories, both fiction and real. I had heard about Joe Navarro, an FBI counterintelligence specialist and body language guru. I didn't know about this case, the selling of war plans to the Soviets in the 1980's. This was a huge deal at the time, but looking back at it more than 25 years later, it is pure luck that nothing dramatic came of it. Such as the invasion of Europe by the Warsaw Pact.

The author is an intense, mission driven FBI agent with a focus on counterintelligence. Finding spies and pulling out the details from the those under investigation. He uses his study of body language to gauge the sincerity of the person being interviewed. At that time it was considered by many in his office voodoo, but it worked (the author was eventually part of the FBI's initial group focused on using body language techniques for interviewing across the Bureau). He has a tendency to burn out partners and isn't home all that much. In this account, the author lets us see, warts and all, the people involved. This includes his strained home life, the negative things said about him by other agents and just how silly the internal workings of the FBI really are. In the end the author had to go on 9 months of sick leave, as he had pushed himself so far that in the end his health was broken. This story is a battle of wills that takes place over years and drains everyone involved.

The case is focused on a couple of ex-Army guys who used lax security protocols and social engineering to gain access to & sell the NATO war plans to the Soviets. The person that the author interviews for hundreds of hours is a scary intelligent guy that lacks a moral compass. He is mentored by another guy how to move sell documents. For them, it was all about the thrill and the money. No ideology here. At one point we learn that the pair had given our nuclear codes to the Soviets, in the original form used by the guys in the vaults to validate a strike order. Think about the impact all of that could have made if the Soviets, as their empire collapses, freaks out and attacks. The assessment by the military and NSA is that NATO would have lost. Easily.

There are a couple of big, scary revelations in the book. This is beyond the dedication and perseverance of many unsung heros protecting us. It is that those who are tasked with protecting us overall, could care less about country and worry more about themselves.

First is the lax attitude at the US Army planning sites in Europe. Drugs & alcohol permeates everything. Small time black markets, too. Security is lacking. The mastermind had figured out where the holes were and then worked to quietly exploit them. Because of this small group, NATO was put at risk. It also a sad state of affairs on leveraging the smartest among us. The person that the author interviews is super intelligent. 2nd highest IQ score ever seen by the Army, along with a photographic memory. Society and the military don't do much with that kind of talent. He is kicked out of the Army after failing a drug test. He then drives a cab. Just think of what he could have accomplished if given the proper guidance?

Second is the politicking inside of the FBI. Many in Washington wanted the case swept under the rug, either due to the amount of work that would be required to actually due the case justice or it was simply embarrassing. Then there is the whole jurisdiction thing, as the suspect is in Tampa, but the folks in Washington want to be in charge. They want to discredit the author at every turn, just to spite him. A lot of leaks out of the Washington office were done to make the author look bad. This in a sensitive counterintelligence case! As the suspect had a photographic memory (he freaked out the NSA folks), he could have easily defected to Moscow and spent years writing out everything he knew. Just to get an approval to arrest the guy was a nightmare. I hope that the FBI has learned from this and fixed a lot of the culture, but being a bureaucracy run by humans, I doubt it.

This book reads like a heart pounding spy thriller, though without car chases. It is all real, which is all the more scary. ...more

flag Like · see review

Mar 28, 2021 A Cesspool rated it did not like it · review of another edition

The Scores: How I Opened the Hottest Strip Club in New York City, Was Extorted Out of Millions by the Gambino Family, and Became One of the Most Successful Mafia Informants in FBI History's of espionage books.

That comparison is apropos. Joe Navarro just can't resist pantomiming Scores author Michael D. Blutrich's running inner-monologue prose, stitched-up with faux-witty quips, pedantic metaphors, and ponderous, fcking pon·der·ous, sub-plots.
I really could've used a lot more "procedural" and a ...more

flag Like · see review

« previous 1 2 3 4 next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

There are no discussion topics on this book yet. Be the first to start one »

Recommend It | Stats | Recent Status Updates

Readers also enjoyed

See similar books…

Genres

Nonfiction

25 users

History

23 users

Crime > True Crime

11 users

War > Military Fiction

5 users

Spy Thriller > Espionage

5 users

Audiobook

3 users

Mystery > Crime

3 users

Autobiography > Memoir

3 users

Psychology

3 users

Thriller

2 users

See top shelves…

About Joe Navarro

Joe Navarro

493 followers

Joe Navarro is an author, public speaker and ex-FBI agent. Navarro specializes in the area of nonverbal communication or body language and has authored numerous books.