Pentagon officials are claiming that the book Operation Dark Heart written by a former intellifgence officer, contains “highly classified material”—as in names of spies—and are trying to buy up an entire print run of the book from publisher St. Martins Press. St. Martins say that the material that the Pentagon is asking them to remove is decades old and has already been revealed elsewhere.

Now speculation is picking up around the blogsphere that the military is more concerned about the way it’s being portrayed in the book and the author’s claim that evidence that could have prevented 9/11 was ignored. From the Guardian:

It’s every author’s dream – to write a book that’s so sensationally popular it’s impossible to find a copy in the shops, even as it keeps climbing up the bestseller lists.

And so it is for Anthony Shaffer, thanks to the Pentagon’s desire to buy up all 10,000 copies of the first printing of his new book, Operation Dark Heart. And then pulp them.

The US defence department is scrambling to dispose of what threatens to be a highly embarrassing expose by the former intelligence officer of secret operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and of how the US military top brass missed the opportunity to win the war against the Taliban.

The department of defence is in talks with St Martin’s Press to purchase the entire first print run on the grounds of national security.

The publisher is content to sell the books but the two sides are in a grinding dispute over what should appear in a censored version and when it should be released.

Now St Martin’s Press says it will put the partly redacted manuscript on sale next week whether or not the defence department likes it – and there doesn’t appear much the authorities can do.

Nope, nothing besides seeing to it that this book climbs rapidly up the best-seller lists…

Pentagon tries to buy entire print run of US spy expose Operation Dark Heart (Guardian)