Review: The CIA World Factbook – 2016

December 13, 2015

cia factbook

Well, I guess this is the first publication I have bought that was authored by The Central Intelligence Agency. It is, however, published by Skyhorse Publishing, which I believe also prints some out-there conspiracy books among their wide selection. At 940 pages The CIA World Factbook (2016 edition) is a real brick of a book. Of course, it’s not meant to be read page-by-page, it is a reference book where information on every country in the world is organized.
The introduction to the book is pretty interesting in itself; it describes the history of the Factbook, which began to be published after World War Two. Clearly there was a need to have one consolidated unit of basic intelligence on countries that the United States was involved with. The intro describes The intelligence cycle as 1. information (raw data) 2. intelligence (collected and integrated information) and 3. finished intelligence (prepared intelligence for policy makers).
Further, there are three types of finished intelligence; basic intelligence (fundamental and factual material), current intelligence (new development) and estimative intelligence (judging probable outcomes). All three are mutually supportive. The factbook contains over twenty pages of definitions of the information contained in each analysis.
The CIA World Factbook is a great coffee table book for world travelers or information geeks. I mean, you just can’t imagine all the obscure but important statistics that are presented in this thing. Just taking a skim through the pages we see: agriculture, airports, birth rates, budgets, climate, coastlines, constitution, debt, distribution of income, drinking water, electricity, economy, physical resources, industry, hospitals, internet use, infant mortality, legal system, military, maritime claims, natural gas, pipelines, ports, religions… you get the idea. There are some countries in the book that I had never heard about, information just spills out of this thing.
The only thing I think they could have done better is the maps. The print on the maps is fairly light, and the paper stock it somewhat thin. I believe this may have saved money in publishing. A good world atlas would be a necessary companion to this volume.
And talking about price of publication, it’s so affordable you almost can’t pass it up. I bought my copy online, and the price was $11.57 including shipping.
It is a fascinating book to browse through, and for very specific information it may be useful to international businessmen, travelers – or spies.
Hey, at $12.00, why not?

Tags: , , ,

One Response to Review: The CIA World Factbook – 2016

  1. Mr. Patterson on December 16, 2015 at 2:38 am

    Have you tried the online version? Used to teach it when I taught business research. Very useful!

    https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

RSS Northwest Research & Covert Book Report

  • Review: Killers Of The Flower Moon
    Soon to be a major motion picture, this story has some real promise. Promise to help solve age-old crimes, promise to resolve inhuman atrocities, promise to help make things right. This is the promise of “Killers Of The Flower Moon – The Osage Murders And The Birth Of The FBI”, by David Grann. Sadly, it […]
  • Review: Pandora’s Gamble, By Alison Young
    Review: Pandora’s Gamble Where do I begin with this startling and disturbing book? First, the author, Alison Young, worked as a reporter for USA Today, the Detroit Free Press, the Atlanta Journal Constitution, and has won numerous awards for her investigative reporting. “Pandora’s Gamble” is subtitled “Lab Leaks, Pandemics, And A World At Risk”. Much […]
  • Review: Floating Stones – Great Pyramid Built With Water Power
    Now here is an interesting find, recommended by a good friend. This book is a very thought-provoking theory of how the Great Pyramid was built. Authors Samuel R. Sampson is an architect, and co-author Michael N. Read is an engineer. Together they have come up with a very plausible scenario on how the largest Egyptian […]
  • Review: “The Dawn Of Everything”
    In my recent study of ancient civilizations, I bought this huge book – “The Dawn Of Everything – A New History Of Humanity”, by David Graeber and David Wengrow. This was a completely different type of read for me; Graeber and Wengrow are anthropologists and archeologists, and write as such. I don’t know a lot […]
  • Review Of Two Books On Neanderthals
    After reading Hancock and Schoch describing the destruction and survival of the human population during the last Ice Age, I wanted to learn more about the development of primitive man. Mind you, Hancock believed the destruction was caused by a comet that broke apart and hit the earth, while Schoch has evidence that the destruction […]