Know Thine Enemy: A Spy’s Journey Into Revolutionary Iran

As a CIA spy, Edward Shirley operated on the front lines in Europe and the Middle East ferreting out the secrets of the most vociferous enemy of the United States. But, though he studied Iran and was obsessed with it from childhood, he never actually could cross its borders. The agency would recruit only native-born Iranians to enter the country as spies. After leaving the clandestine service, Shirley had to find out what was happening on the ground in Iran, so he smuggled himself into the country inside a box in the back of a friend’s truck.In narrating Know Thine Enemy, a gripping and wry account of his trip, Shirley blends a spy’s cunning and nose for adventure with shrewd insights into the Iranian character. What he finds runs counter to what most American know about Iran. He depicts glamorous Westernized Iranians, disillusioned Muslim fundamentalists, and a crippled veteran of the Iran-Iraq war. Ordinary Iranians, he reports, are weary of Islamic dogma and the clerical regime and have resorted to cynicism, conspiracy, and black humor as everyday survival tactics, because the radical Islam promulgated by Khomeini and his successors has solved few of Iran’s problems. Unique and engrossing, Know Thine Enemy is a vivid, firsthand portrait of the clash of Western and Muslim civilizations.