The Cutout

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This book is dedicated with love to Rafe Sagalyn, literary agent and friend, who made me write it;

and to Barbara, the original Mad Dog. I'd never have survived the Farm without you.

Cutout: A third person used to conceal the contact between two people — usually an agent and a handler who do not want to meet because one or both may be under surveillance.

—Norman Polmar and Thomas B. AI. Len

The Encyclopedia of Espionage

A tour through the Intelligence world is marked by a series of rituals. There is the initiation of the polygraph; the rite of passage that is tradecraft training; the ceremonial presentation of the first Certificate of Merit or presidential stickpin. And upon exiting, there is the moment when one is required to sign an oath of secrecy. That oath obligated me to submit The Cutout to the CIA's Publications Review Board, which is charged with removing classified material from text written by former employees. The board reviewed this work in both draft and final manuscript form, and I would like to thank them for their thoroughness, expediency, and professionalism — and for requesting me to change only one word.

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