The Great Pretense: A Tour Through the Boneyards of the CIA’s War for Drugs offers readers a journey to the boneyards of the CIA's “war for drugs” in Latin America and beyond, with all of its complexities and moral dilemmas. Conroy’s book, part memoir and part exposé and thriller, is based on Conroy’s lived experience over decades of reporting on national security and the illegal drug trade. It emphasizes the vital role of authentic journalism in a landscape marked with manipulation and deceit by powerful entities, such as the CIA.
The book highlights the challenges of investigating the intricate relationship between intelligence operations, law enforcers and narco-traffickers. The book also reveals, with evidence, how the CIA operates in the drug war — against other U.S. agencies, or with them, and in ignoring or even enabling cartel drug trafficking — all in pursuit of intelligence-gathering and other opaque national security goals.
Conroy’s 40-year journalism career has focused heavily on investigative reporting — as an editor-in-chief, managing editor and reporter. His work has been published online and in print for a range of publications, including daily newspapers; alternative and business weeklies; magazines; and national online publications, such as the Daily Beast, Narco News and HousingWire. He also have appeared in investigative documentaries aired by major networks, including the BBC, CNBC, the History Channel, Prime Video and Al Jazeera-Europe.
CIA assets and spies must be adept at carrying out illegal deeds overseas and then covering their tracks. That’s because the CIA is breaking laws in any foreign nation in which it conducts espionage or other covert operations. CIA brass, by contrast, must concoct a public image and press narrative that conceals or deflects attention from that underlying illegal clandestine reality. It's spy culture. It keeps the gears of “The Great Pretense” in motion.
