The Secret Team

2025-04-30T03:44:38Z

2603:9001:4500:1C09:C4C4:2351:2489:D6AA: /* Reception */ Multiple punctuation failures, improperly nested brackets, excessive linking

{{Short description|1973 book by L. Fletcher Prouty}}
{{for|the esports team|Team Secret}}
{{Infobox book
| name = The Secret Team: The CIA and Its Allies in Control of the United States and the World
| image = File:The Secret Team, by L. Fletcher Prouty.jpeg
| caption = Cover of the 1973 Prentice-Hall first edition.
| author = [[L. Fletcher Prouty]]
| publisher = [[Prentice-Hall]]
| media_type = [[book]]
| pages = 496
| isbn = 978-0137981731
| oclc = 869053900
| country = [[United States]]
| language = English
| genre = History
| pub_date = 1973
| external_url = https://archive.org/details/secretteamciaits00prou
| external_host = [[Internet Archive]]
}}

'''''The Secret Team: The CIA and Its Allies in Control of the United States and the World''''' is a book by [[L. Fletcher Prouty]], a former colonel in the [[US Air Force]], first published by [[Prentice-Hall]] in 1973.

==Publication history==
After initial publication in 1973, [[Prentice-Hall]] republished ''The Secret Team'' in 1992 and 1997. The book was published again in 2008 and 2011 by [[Skyhorse Publishing]], the latter edition including an introduction by [[Jesse Ventura]].<ref>[https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Secret-Team/L-Fletcher-Prouty/9781616082840 ''The Secret Team''.] [[Simon & Schuster]].</ref>

The book was offered for sale by the [[Church of Scientology]] through their ''[[Freedom (magazine)|Freedom]]'' magazine, during the time when Prouty was a senior editor of the magazine.<ref>{{cite magazine |url=https://ia802908.us.archive.org/12/items/freedommagdecember1985/Freedom%20December%201985%20OCR.pdf |title=Masthead of Freedom Magazine |magazine=[[Freedom (magazine)|Freedom]] |publisher=[[Church of Scientology]] |volume=18 |issue=4 |page=3 |access-date=June 15, 2023}}</ref>

==Reception==
In ''[[Studies in Intelligence]]'', an official journal and flagship publication of the [[Central Intelligence Agency]], Walter Pforzheimer described reading the book as "like trying to push a penny with one's nose through molten fudge".<ref name=pforzheimer>Staff writer. [https://books.google.com/books?id=7SnRNI37OAoC&dq=Studies%20in%20Intelligence%2C%20vol.%2049%2C%20no.%204&pg=PA4 "Book Reviews in ''Studies'': Intelligent Literature About Intelligence Literature."] ''[[Studies in Intelligence]]'', vol. 49, no. 4, Special Issue: Fifty Years of ''Studies in Intelligence'' (2005), [https://books.google.com/books?id=7SnRNI37OAoC&dq=Studies%20in%20Intelligence%2C%20vol.%2049%2C%20no.%204&pg=PA4 p. 4.] Published by the [[Central Intelligence Agency]].</ref> Despite what he grants as Prouty's "considerable background and knowledge", he says the book is punctuated by "faulty recollections" and "unwarranted conclusions".<ref name=pforzheimer/> In a later issue, a staff writer provides a retrospective of books reviewed in ''Studies in Intelligence'' and wonders aloud "whether word ever got back to [Prouty]".<ref name=pforzheimer/>

''[[Washington Monthly]]'' magazine noted that "marvelous anecdotes about the CIA's dirty-trick department are accompanied by a troubling overstatement best suggested by the subtitle, 'The CIA and Its Allies in Control of the United States and the World'".<ref>Staff writer. "Political Book Notes." Review of ''The Secret Team'' by [[L. Fletcher Prouty]]. ''[[Washington Monthly]]'' (April 1973), p. 64.</ref>

Assassination researcher and former [[Office of Strategic Services]] officer [[Harold Weisberg]] was less than enthusiastic about Prouty's book. He was particularly turned off by the claim that [[Daniel Ellsberg]] was a CIA agent: "He hemmed and hawed a bit on this when confronted with an unequivocal denial made by E. to Fred Graham and to Prouty by phone. Thus he loses the legitimate point."<ref>[[Harold Weisberg|Weisberg, Harold]]. [http://jfk.hood.edu/Collection/Weisberg%20Subject%20Index%20Files/P%20Disk/Prouty%20L%20Fletcher/Item%2004.pdf Review of ''The Secret Team''] by [[L. Fletcher Prouty]]. [[Harold Weisberg|Harold Weisberg Collection]], [[Hood College]] (April 2, 1973)</ref>

==See also==
* [[Brought to Light]]
* [[Business Plot]]
* [[Conspiracy theory]]
* [[Military-industrial complex]]
* ''[[The Power Elite]]''

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
* ''[https://openlibrary.org/books/OL5292878M/The_secret_team The Secret Team]'' available for online reading at [[Open Library]]

==Further reading==
*[[Chip Berlet|Berlet, Chip]]. [https://archive.today/24im "Populist Party/Liberty Lobby Recruitment of Anti-CIA Critics."] [http://www.publiceye.org/rightwoo/rwooz9_TOC.html ''Right Woos Left''.] [[Political Research Associates]], February 22, 1994. Archived from [http://www.publiceye.org/rightwoo/rwooz9-09.html the original.]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Secret Team}}
[[Category:1973 non-fiction books]]
[[Category:Non-fiction books about the assassination of John F. Kennedy]]
[[Category:Non-fiction books about the Central Intelligence Agency]]
[[Category:American non-fiction books]]
[[Category:Prentice Hall books]]

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The Secret Team