Operation Shakespeare

May 12, 2014
While contemporary notions of surveillance may conjure fears of domestic data mining, Shiffman investigates governmental efforts to use spying for international security. The eponymous sting operation was a mid-2000s attempt to apprehend arms dealers who specialized in running U.S.-made military technology, often “tiny, seemingly innocent items” that “could pose a threat to U.S. Forces.” These devices can have dual uses in, say, either advanced medical work or in illicit bomb building, and it is this ambiguous nature that enables the circumvention of the “ridiculously complex” import/export regulations, allowing malicious smugglers to claim ignorance of the laws. The elaborate sting operation required “subtlety, research, creativity, money, patience, and risk.” Shiffman describes a character-driven “symphony of moving parts,” with fascinating personalities on either side of the battle, contrasting the driven, deceptive American agents with their oblivious, business-oriented Iranian target. The book’s strengths are the humanizing portrayal of the agents and the captivating insights into the psychology of undercover work. Shiffman’s exciting and eye-opening look into the “tiny weapons of modern war” and the international machinations that control them will appeal to espionage junkies and the techno-thriller crowd. Agent: Larry Weissman.

June 1, 2014
In this mix of true crime and political expos', Shiffman reveals that, in the years after the 9/11 terror attacks, many foreign countries were using American technology, illegally obtained, to build their cutting-edge military machines (state-of-the-art explosive devices, for example). Homeland Security, a new agency at the time, decided the best way to stop the flow of technology from the U.S. to these foreign countries would be to set up a complex sting operation to apprehend the various brokers and intermediaries who handled the merchandise. This book, which chronicles the operation, isn't as engaging as it could bedespite its exciting subject, it reads a bit on the dry sidebut it does tell a fascinating story and would probably make a thrilling movie (a companion piece, perhaps, to Argo). Readers of true crime and stories about government sting operations, like Robert W. Greene's The Sting Man (1981), about Abscam, should give this account a warm reception.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)