The World Factbook, produced annually by the CIA, has become the ultimate, authoritative source of information on all the nations of the world. It provides current data for more than 250 countries and territories, from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. Potomac Books publishes a commercial version of The World Factbook in order to extend the limited audience reached by the CIA's own publication. This current Potomac Books edition is identified by the year 2010, following the pattern used in our other annual publications, since the CIA completed its volume late the preceding year. Topics addressed include the political climate, natural resources, environment, population, ethnic groups, GDP, agriculture, industries, defense expenditures, literacy rate, religion, legal system, and much more. Key data are grouped under the headings of geography, people, government, economy, communications, transportation, military, and transnational issues. The World Factbook also contains maps of each country and of key territories. In addition, readers will find handy appendixes on international organizations and groups, international environmental agreements, and a cross-referenced list of geographic names. The World Factbook is a must for curious individuals concerned about a rapidly changing world.

The ultimate, comprehensive guide to official country data and statistics, from the world's most sophisticated intelligence-gathering organization. From Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, The CIA World Factbook 2022-2023 offers complete and up-to-date information on the world's nations. This comprehensive guide is packed with data on countries' politics, populations, economics, and environment for 2022 and looks ahead to 2023. The CIA World Factbook 2022-2023 includes the following for each country: Geopolitical maps Population statistics, with details on languages, religions, literacy rates, age structure, HIV prevalence, and much more Up-to-date data on military expenditures and capabilities Geography information, including climate and natural hazards Details on prominent political figures and parties Contact information for diplomatic missions Facts on transportation, trade, and communication infrastructure Also included are appendices with useful abbreviations, international environmental agreements, international organizations and groups, terror organizations, and more. Originally intended for use by government officials and policymakers as well as the broader intelligence community, this is a must-have resource for students, travelers, journalists, and anyone with a desire to know more about their world.

While the Committee of Secret Correspondence was meeting secretly in Philadelphia with agents of France, Arthur Lee was meeting in London with Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, the successful author of The Barber of Seville (and later The Marriage of Figaro)-who was a French agent. Lee's inflated reports of patriot strength, which either he fabricated for Beaumarchais' benefit or were provided by Lee's regular correspondent, Sam Adams, won the Frenchman to the American cause. Beaumarchais repeatedly urged the French Court to give immediate assistance to the Americans, and on February 29, 1776 addressed a memorial to Louis XVI quoting Lee's offer of a secret long-term treaty of commerce in exchange for secret aid to the war of independence. Beaumarchais explained that France could grant such aid without compromising itself, but urged that "success of the plan depends wholly upon rapidity as well as secrecy: Your Majesty knows better than any one that secrecy is the soul of business, and that in politics a project once disclosed is a project doomed to failure." With the memorial, Beaumarchais submitted a plan proposing that he set up a commercial trading firm as a cover for the secret French aid; he requested and was granted one million livres to establish a firm to be known as Roderigue Hortalez et Cie for that purpose. Beaumarchais' memorial was followed by one of March 12, 1776, by the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, the Comte de Vergennes. Royal assent was granted, and by the time Silas Deane arrived in Paris, French aid was on its way to the patriots. Deane expanded the Franco-American relationship, working with Beaumarchais and other French merchants to procure ships, commission privateers, recruit French officers, and purchase French military supplies declared "surplus" for that purpose. On September 26, 1776, the Continental Congress elected three commissioners to the Court of France, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Silas Deane, resolving that "secrecy shall be observed until further Order of Congress; and that until permission be obtained from Congress to disclose the particulars of this business, no member be permitted to say anything more upon this subject, than that Congress have taken such steps as they judged necessary for the purpose of obtaining foreign alliance." Because of his wife's illness, Jefferson could not serve, and Arthur Lee was appointed in his stead. With Franklin's arrival in France on November 29, 1776-the first anniversary of the founding of the Committee of Secret Correspondence-the vital French mission became an intelligence and propaganda center for Europe, an unofficial diplomatic representation, a coordinating facility for aid from America's secret allies, and a recruiting station for such French officers as Lafayette and Kalb. In October 1777 the Continental Army won a crucial victory over the British at Saratoga, and on February 6, 1778, the French-American treaty of alliance was signed. On March 30, 1778, Franklin, Lee, and Deane were received at the French Court as representatives of the United States of America, and on July 7 of that year Comte d'Estaing's French fleet cast anchor in the Delaware River. France was in the war; the mission to Paris had succeeded. Spain, at the urging of French Foreign Minister Vergennes, matched France's one million livres for the operation of Hortalez et Cie. But that was not the beginning of secret Spanish aid to the Patriots. During the summer of 1776 Luis de Unzaga y Amezaga, the governor of New Spain at New Orleans, had privately delivered some ten thousand pounds of gunpowder, out of the King's stores, to Captain George Gibson and Lieutenant Linn of the Virginia Council of Defense. The gunpowder, moved up the Mississippi under the protection of the Spanish flag, made it possible to thwart British plans to capture Fort Pitt.

Did you ever lose your keys? Lock picking is the skill of unlocking a lock by analyzing and manipulating the components of the lock device, without the original key. Although lock picking can be associated with criminal intent, it is an essential skill for a locksmith. Lock picking is the ideal way of opening a lock without the correct key, while not damaging the lock, allowing it to be rekeyed for later use, which is especially important with antique locks that would be impossible to replace if destructive entry methods were used.

Released by the Freedom of Information Act. This document is a thorough description of how the CIA recommends interrogating a subject. To get the information that is needed there is nothing withheld short of torture. For example in "Threats and Fears," the CIA authors note that "the threat of coercion usually weakens or destroys resistance more effectively than coercion itself. The threat to inflict pain, for example, can trigger fears more damaging than the immediate sensation of pain." Under the subheading "Pain," the guidelines discuss the theories behind various thresholds of pain, and recommend that a subject's "resistance is likelier to be sapped by pain which he seems to inflict upon himself" such rather than by direct torture. The report suggests forcing the detainee to stand at attention for long periods of time. A section on sensory deprivations suggests imprisoning detainees in rooms without sensory stimuli of any kind, "in a cell which has no light," for example.