Reviews for Marcell Mallet: A Gift to the Poor from the Heart of God, Foundress of the Sisters of Charit...

The average rating for Marcell Mallet: A Gift to the Poor from the Heart of God, Foundress of the Sisters of Charit... based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2012-05-22 00:00:00 Nancy Sneider A well-written and interesting story that flows well. This book of Bearden and Risen though, is one that both popular historians and casual reader alike can get into. They show that often intelligence services make educated guesses on fragments of information that may or may not be compromised by the enemy. Concerned with a period of global turmoil that was surprisingly governed by understood rules of intelligence gathering and other activities, this book brings the reader into the world of the CIA. Far from the James Bond style killing and counter killing by the Allies and Soviet Empire, it was one of limited violence between the two principal powers. A busted or captured agent was interrogated briefly and put on a plane for home, no killing and seldom more than a mild roughing up. The dying days of the Soviet Empire were ironically the period that that the KGB (with help from American traitors like Aldrich Ames and Robert Hannsen)had wiped out most of the CIA operatives in Russia. The Americans had been sent home and the Russian agents of the Americans killed. The US had virtually no human intel assets behind the Iron Curtain. This is some of the most interesting parts of the book, seeing how much damage a couple of American traitors did as we blindly tried to understand what was going on. The bewildered KGB agents simply cannot believe their Empire is collapsing while they have gotten the upper hand over their Western enemies. Bearden makes much of the delivery of the "120mm Spanish mortar" to the Mujahideen in 1987, and elaborates on how teams were trained in applying GPS readings to precisely deliver their ordnance beyond visual range. "It came...with a ranging system worked out by Langley...that fused the low-tech mortar with the high-tech world of satellite guidance." And "Once their exact coordinates had been calibrated, the leader of the team would feed the GPS data into a small computer, add the coordinates of the target, and then query the computer for the precise compass direction and elevation..." This procedure, GPS and all, supposedly led to devastating night attacks on the Spetsnaz battalion at Chagasaray on 28 Nov 1987 and 15 Dec 1987. Problem: Although initial use of GPS was reported in 1990, it did not become operational until 1993. In 1987 the satellites had not been launched yet (this was during the Challenger stand-down). This book illustrates a critical period in our history. Depicting intelligence services being blindsided by events is something critics should remember happens far too often. No intel service of any country has a 100% batting average, not even the legendary Mossad of Israel and that is something Congress and the American public too often forget.

Review # 2 was written on 2018-06-03 00:00:00 Douglas Dodd I had mixed feelings about this book. Bearden was a CIA operative of long-standing and well placed, and these are his reminiscences, joined with research (oral and written). It is very well informed. I found the first part fascinating -- dealing the mole hunts from Angleton to Aldrich Ames. Part II (the book was published in 2003) was a triumphalist view of Charlie Wilson's War -- the American support for the Mujahadeen in the Soviet-Afghan war -- which looks like a catastrophic blunder in hindsight. Yet Bearden, who was on the ground there, takes credit for thus winning the Cold War. Part III deals with the collapse of the Soviet Union -- has much interesting detail, but again missed the dangers inherent in the collapse of Gorbachev's regime. Because of these complaints I found the book somewhat of a slog at time, despite the crisp writing and wealth of detail. Those who can overlook these faults will enjoy this book enormously. Those, like myself, who cannot, well...