January 19, 2007
Mr. Bamford will discuss the growth of the NSA as a secret tool for domestic eavesdropping over the decades, from the tiny Black Chamber during the 1920s to today's city-sized spyopolos.
James Bamford is one of the country's leading writers on intelligence and national security issues and the author of The Puzzle Palace and Body of Secrets, both New York Times bestsellers and the only two books on the ultrasecret National Security Agency. His most recent book is A Pretext for War: 9/11, Iraq and the Abuse of America's Intelligence Agencies, which Time called "probably the best one-volume companion to the harrowing events in the war on terrorism since 1996." Mr. Bamford has also written for many magazines, including investigative cover stories for The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post Magazine and The Los Angeles Times Magazine, and is a contributing writer for Rolling Stone. He recently won the 2006 National Magazine Award for Reporting, the highest honor in the magazine industry, for a "The Man Who Sold The War" in Rolling Stone. His other awards include the Investigative Reporters and Editors Gold Metal, the Overseas Press Club Award for Excellence, and the Society of Professional Journalists Deadline Award for the Best Investigative Reporting in Television. Mr. Bamford also spent nearly a decade as the Washington Investigative Producer for ABC's World News Tonight, covering stories throughout much of the world. In addition, he served as a distinguished visiting professor at the University of California at Berkeley where he taught National Security, Public Policy and Information Technology at the graduate level. Mr. Bamford has testified as an expert witness on intelligence issues before committees of the Senate and House of Representatives as well as the European Parliament in Brussels and the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. He has also served as a guest lecturer at the Central Intelligence Agency's Senior Intelligence Fellows Program, the National Security Agency's National Cryptologic School, the Defense Intelligence Agency's Joint Military Intelligence College, the Pentagon's National Defense University and Air War College, and the Director of National Intelligence's National Counterintelligence Executive. In addition, he has served as a consultant to the U.S. State and Justice Departments.