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An explosive, headline-making portrait of Allen Dulles, the man who transformed the CIA into the most powerfuland secretivecolossus in Washington, from the founder of Salon.com and author of the New York Times bestseller Brothers.Americas greatest untold story: the United States rise to world dominance under the guile of Allen Welsh Dulles, the longest-serving director of the CIA. Drawing on revelatory new materialsincluding newly discovered U.S. government documents, U.S. and European intelligence sources, the personal correspondence and journals of Allen Dulless wife and mistress, and exclusive interviews with the children of prominent CIA officialsTalbot reveals the underside of one of Americas most powerful and influential figures.Dulless decade as the director of the CIAwhich he used to further his public and private agendaswere dark times in American politics. Calling himself the secretary of state of unfriendly countries, Dulles saw himself as above the elected law, manipulating and subverting American presidents in the pursuit of his personal interests and those of the wealthy elite he counted as his friends and clientscolluding with Nazi-controlled cartels, German war criminals, and Mafiosi in the process. Targeting foreign leaders for assassination and overthrowing nationalist governments not in line with his political aims, Dulles employed those same tactics to further his goals at home, Talbot charges, offering shocking new evidence in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.An expos of American power that is as disturbing as it is timely, The Devils Chessboard is a provocative and gripping story of the rise of the national security stateand the battle for Americas soul.