From Warsaw with Love

Spanning decades and continents, from the battlefields of the Balkans to secret nuclear research labs in Iran and embassy grounds in North Korea, this saga begins in 1990. As the United States cobbles together a coalition to undo Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait, six US officers are trapped in Iraq with intelligence that could ruin Operation Desert Storm if it is obtained by the brutal Iraqi dictator. Desperate, the CIA asks Poland, a longtime Cold War foe famed for its excellent spies, for help. Just months after the Polish people voted in their first democratic election since the 1930s, the young Solidarity government in Warsaw sends a veteran ex-Communist spy who'd battled the West for decades to rescue the six Americans.

From Warsaw with Love by John Pomfret is a gripping account of the 1990 cliffhanger in Iraq and is just the beginning of the tale about intelligence cooperation between Poland and the United States. This cooperation is described by one CIA director as "one of the two foremost intelligence relationships that the United States has ever had." Pomfret uncovers new details about the CIA's black site program that held suspected terrorists in Poland after 9/11, as well as the role of Polish spies in the hunt for Osama bin Laden.

In the tradition of the most memorable works on espionage, Pomfret's book tells a distressing and disquieting tale of moral ambiguity, in which right and wrong, black and white, are not conveniently distinguishable. As the United States teeters on the edge of a new cold war with Russia and China, Pomfret explores how these little-known events serve as a reminder of the importance of alliances in a dangerous world.