The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How The War on Terror Turned into a War on American Ideals
May 2009 · Anchor
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NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AND TOP 10 BOOK OF THE YEAR • A sweeping account of the fateful decisions, flawed intelligence, and destructive ideologies that led to America’s post–9/11 forever wars
“Deeply troubling, but splendidly executed . . . Mayer does invaluable work locking these reports into a coherent narrative framework and sketching in vital connective details and insights. . . . Superb.”—Los Angeles Times
NATIONAL BOOK AWARD AND NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY: The Washington Post, The Economist, Salon, Slate, The Plain Dealer
WINNER: J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize, Goldsmith Book Prize, Edward Weintal Prize, Ridenhour Prize, Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, New York Public Library’s Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism
The Dark Side is a dramatic, riveting, and definitive narrative account of the disastrous missteps the United States made in the pursuit of terrorists around the world—decisions that not only violated the Constitution, but also hampered the pursuit of Al Qaeda.
In spellbinding detail, Jane Mayer reveals how key players, namely Vice President Dick Cheney and his powerful, secretive adviser David Addington, exploited the crisis to further a long-held agenda to enhance presidential powers to a degree never known in U.S. history, and obliterate Constitutional protections that define the very essence of the American experiment. Drawing on real, specific cases set against the larger drama unfolding in Washington, Mayer examines the intelligence gained—or not—and the extraordinary price paid. U.S.-held prisoners, some of them completely innocent, were subjected to brutal treatment, while coercive interrogations often produced false or unreliable information with devastating results.
A gripping investigation of power, fear, secrecy, and the consequences of abandoning fundamental principles, The Dark Side chronicles one of the most disturbing chapters in American history.
“Deeply troubling, but splendidly executed . . . Mayer does invaluable work locking these reports into a coherent narrative framework and sketching in vital connective details and insights. . . . Superb.”—Los Angeles Times
NATIONAL BOOK AWARD AND NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD FINALIST • NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY: The Washington Post, The Economist, Salon, Slate, The Plain Dealer
WINNER: J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize, Goldsmith Book Prize, Edward Weintal Prize, Ridenhour Prize, Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, New York Public Library’s Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism
The Dark Side is a dramatic, riveting, and definitive narrative account of the disastrous missteps the United States made in the pursuit of terrorists around the world—decisions that not only violated the Constitution, but also hampered the pursuit of Al Qaeda.
In spellbinding detail, Jane Mayer reveals how key players, namely Vice President Dick Cheney and his powerful, secretive adviser David Addington, exploited the crisis to further a long-held agenda to enhance presidential powers to a degree never known in U.S. history, and obliterate Constitutional protections that define the very essence of the American experiment. Drawing on real, specific cases set against the larger drama unfolding in Washington, Mayer examines the intelligence gained—or not—and the extraordinary price paid. U.S.-held prisoners, some of them completely innocent, were subjected to brutal treatment, while coercive interrogations often produced false or unreliable information with devastating results.
A gripping investigation of power, fear, secrecy, and the consequences of abandoning fundamental principles, The Dark Side chronicles one of the most disturbing chapters in American history.
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AND TOP 10 BOOK OF THE YEAR • A sweeping account of the fateful decisions, flawed intelligence, and destructive ideologies that led to America’s post–9/11 forever wars
“Deeply troubling, but splendidly executed . . . Mayer does invaluable work locking these reports into...
Ratings and reviews
15 reviews
A Google user
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October 12, 2011
This book could be very informative, if it wasnt so poorly written. This was a required reading for my class on Torture and Human Rights at the University of Washington. As a junior in the college, I have had a lot of experience in reading academic writings, and have even taken a number of academic writing courses. It seems to me that even the most basic argumentative writing "rules" have been broken in this book. The sentences are run-on for a majority of the script, and none of the weitnesses or sources has any credibility. in one instance the author literally writes that "an employee" of an important government office has some very implicating and decisive comments to make. How she thinks that an "employee" of anything is a credible source in a government agency is absurd. In my estimation, the majority of her sources are stretched beyond their real importance. how do we know this wasn't the janitor at the pentagon who has suddenly decided he can be a credible witness to the inter-workings of the Joint Chiefs of Staff?
Stick Morris
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August 10, 2014
Shakes you to the core, a brilliant book that should be studied in every law curriculum in colleges
2 people found this review helpful
Siti Zulaiha (Zte Collection)
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August 8, 2014
I like this book
1 person found this review helpful
About the author
Jane Mayer is an award-winning staff writer for The New Yorker and the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Dark Money and The Dark Side, for which she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. Her books have been named to multiple New York Times Top 10 Books of the Year lists, selected as National Book Award and the National Book Critics Circle Award finalists, and won the J. Anthony Lukas Book Prize, the Goldsmith Book Prize, and New York Public Library’s Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism, among many other accolades. She also coauthored Landslide: The Unmaking of the President, 1984–1988, with Doyle McManus, and Strange Justice: The Selling of Clarence Thomas, with Jill Abramson. Mayer lives in Washington, D.C.
Jane Mayer is an award-winning staff writer for The New Yorker and the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Dark Money and The Dark Side, for which she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship. Her books have been named to multiple New York Times Top 10 Books of the Year lists, selected as National...
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