Written for high school and undergraduate students, this three-volume reference provides entries on policy, political organizations, states, weapons, terminology, events, and personalities associated with the broad themes of the title. Each entry gives a description and history of the topic and includes a short list of references. The encyclopedia is strongly focused on topics relative to the United States, though some of the contributors are outside the US, in Russia, Italy, Canada, New Zealand, the UK, and Germany. A sample of entry topics includes /anthrax, ballistic missiles, Bay of Pigs, CDC, Coast Guard, dosimetry, European Union, Mossad, toxicology, / and /windtalkers./ There are short entries on the intelligence and security policies of a selection of countries. As noted in the introduction, terrorist organizations are described using information from the US Department of State. The editors' affiliations are not noted.

Cryptohistories is a collection of essays which provides a meeting ground for historians and cultural scholars analysing discussions of cryptic discourses in history and in historical narratives with roots in the mysterious. The focus here is on history as a subjective narrative, as a conscious construct and as manipulation. Equally important for all the contributors brought together in this book is the mechanics of the rise, popularity and apparent necessity of such narrative strategies. The essays address a variety of issues revolving around the study of cryptic aspects of discourses, ranging from theoretical approaches to secretive narratives of history, cultural encoding and decoding of cryptohistories, microhistories focusing on historical mysteries, and mythicised pasts and processes of mythicization of the past, as well as histories and theories of chance and manipulation. Among its specific subjects Crytpohistories features discussions on the reasons why certain quasi-historical narratives do not reach the status of history; on conspiracy theories analysed from the perspective of contemporary video-games; on the paradoxes of truth and falsehood in history; on parasitology as a cryptohistorical discourse; on the codes of Victorian floriography; on cases of cross-dressing and sartorial camouflage; on the Vietnam War MIAs; on manipulations lying at the core of contemporary Bulgarian identity; on the search for a racial utopia in the American South; and on the fiction of Beryl Bainbridge as a form of cryptohistorical literature.

Encyclopedia of espionage, intelligence and security (GVRL)