A look inside the global information war

Stengel calls the book "the first and only insider account exploring how the U.S. tried — and failed — to combat the global rise of disinformation that eventually spilled into the 2016 election."

• "I tell that story in the first person through the work I did as an Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs at the State Department."
• As a longtime TIME writer and editor, "I knew a lot more about content than folks in government. But, alas, it didn’t make much of a difference."

"What I saw ... was the innovative use of disinformation by ISIS and Russia on social media through the weaponization of grievance."

• "Then, in 2016, we saw Donald Trump use the same techniques in the presidential election, weaponizing the grievances of Americans who felt left out by modernism."
• '"I take the reader to Saudi Arabia for a midnight meeting with Mohammed bin Salman; to Moscow for a meeting with Putin’s closest aide; and to Palo Alto for a private sitdown with Mark Zuckerberg."

Asked about Alex Jones' Infowars, Stengel said: "Titles are not copyrighted — plus we have a space between Info and Wars."