Pieces of the Action is excellent. A non-autobiography autobiography.
Many points in the book feature him being discreet about some name or some incident, even 20+ years on. For example, 'General Blank'early in the book, or this excerpt towards the end that is speculated on:
'...other incidents such as a moment where he [Truman] and Forrestal and I were talking about something, and Forrestal spoke about the political implications of the decision. President Truman said to him 'Look, Jim, when you take a thing as serious as this to the American public, you should forget political considerations." '
It's fun recognizing that sometimes VB must be read in a Straussian way. Even to his security-cleared peers, under wartime / atomic secrecy he has to write with implication rather than directly due to risk of security lapses. The nuclearsecrecy blog by Alex Wellerstein is a great source for this kind of thing.
Many points in the book feature him being discreet about some name or some incident, even 20+ years on. For example, 'General Blank'early in the book, or this excerpt towards the end that is speculated on:
'...other incidents such as a moment where he [Truman] and Forrestal and I were talking about something, and Forrestal spoke about the political implications of the decision. President Truman said to him 'Look, Jim, when you take a thing as serious as this to the American public, you should forget political considerations." '
It's fun recognizing that sometimes VB must be read in a Straussian way. Even to his security-cleared peers, under wartime / atomic secrecy he has to write with implication rather than directly due to risk of security lapses. The nuclearsecrecy blog by Alex Wellerstein is a great source for this kind of thing.