Reddit reviews The World Was Going Our Way: The KGB and the Battle for the the Third World - Newly Revealed Secrets from the Mitrokhin Archive

https://www.amazon.com/Sword-Shield-Mitrokhin-Archive-History/dp/0465003125

https://www.amazon.com/World-Was-Going-Our-Way/dp/0465003133

Read these. I'm fascinated with Russian political history, especially in regards to the KGB, and these books are the best of the best when you want to learn more. They get into the deep specifics on why things are done the way they are done. Since Putin was the head of the KGB, you really get an idea on why and how he does specific things.

More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitrokhin_Archive

The other book is The KGB and the Battle for the Third World.

They are large books but trust me it is beyond interesting. Now this all took place before Putin took power, but Putin was the best of the best and was rising in ranks. He was so good that they placed him as Director of the KGB. He is the brains behind basically everything.

https://www.amazon.com/Sword-Shield-Mitrokhin-Archive-History/dp/0465003125/

https://www.amazon.co.jp/World-Was-Going-Our-Way/dp/0465003133

変な本がCIA内部では重要扱いされてるみたいな展開を期待したけど普通の本だった

The first problem you're going to run into is that no one (with good reason) wants to tell you what "works" because as soon as that becomes public knowledge, people will craft means and methods against it. There's absolutely no value to disclosing what works aside from for public relations. So understand that.

Books like this and this are great for grasping a bit of knowledge and getting a storyline, but don't share much about the nitty gritty. I've read them both, and though I have no experience in operations in the 40s-70s, I do with what Bamford speaks of and there's quite a bit of fearmongering there. Either way, it's helpful to find the perspective of what's trying to be done. These aren't people trying to trample your friends, it's people trying to find a balance between freedom and security.

A book like this is basically just a nice story. It's a few biopics in one and the writer clearly likes the people he's writing about, so he's extremely pretty sympathetic to them. Still good for motivations and perspective, though.

These two are extremely useful because they get into that nitty-gritty that I spoke of earlier.

But as I said, it basically comes down to the balance between freedom and security. If you- like a crazy amount of redditors and young people seem to be- are way way way more interested than freedom than you are security, you're never going to like what people in the IC do. And that's your preoperative, but it seems that many people that of that cloth usually live within a secure environment and just don't really worry about. It's easy to not give a shit about heavy jackets when you live in West Maui. Moreover, the craze that I've seen in reddit is just...amazing? So many people with so little experience of education in these things that insist they know just so much. These same people will flip shit if you wander into their area of expertise acting like you know what's up when you clearly don't but...if someone's talking about CIA/NSA/FBI/etc or even just international politics in general? Suddenly they're the expert. It's weird.

This is why I chuckle when people think the redacted portions of the 9/11 Commission Report somehow point to an inside job, letting it happen, or a vast Saudi conspiracy. The redacted portions were redacted because of classification, and things are classified to protect means and methods, 99% of the time. Sometimes technology is classified, but it's rare and I don't know much about that anyway.

If you want to read about some interesting fuckery during this period in South America, and other 3rd world countries, read The World Was Going Our Way https://www.amazon.com/World-Was-Going-Our-Way/dp/0465003133
this is the follow up to The SWord and the Shield, another great book.

But that would ignore the amount of money the USSR was pouring into Chile, and specifically Allende's pockets since the early 1950s as well.

Money that payed for the establishment of Chile-Soviet relations in 1964 backed by Allende who recieved a $50,000 subsidy by the KGB by that time.

Or how they payed $18,000 to a left-wing Senator to prevent him from running outside Unidad Popular coalition.

Allende was given $60,000 by the USSR personally to bribe political and military leaders.

As president Allende constantly looked towards the USSR for financial aid to keep the economy a float, including a $45 million loan and a $200 million rubles revolving facility.

http://www.amazon.com/The-World-Was-Going-Our/dp/0465003133

Of course, I'm not excusing the US actions at all. But let's always keep in mind this stuff wasn't ocurring in a vacuum.

This is the same, tired Soviet propaganda narrative western communists have been shilling for the past fifty years.

If you want to read all the stuff elided from this bullocks, check out The World Was Going Our Way.