Written by one of the Pentagon's seniormost intelligence officers, Chekisty: A History of the KGB is a classic in the fields of sovietology, Russian political studies, and intelligence. Relying heavily on Russian-language primary sources, author John J. Dziak crafted a meticulous and highly readable history of the KGB. The 1991 Soviet collapse did little to diminish the relevance of this book, as the structures Dziak describes remain at the core of Russian politics and governance.