Covert Action in the Cold War

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Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1350170836
Total Pages : 287 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (51 download)

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Book Synopsis Covert Action in the Cold War by : James Callanan

Download or read book Covert Action in the Cold War written by James Callanan and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2020-06-25 with total page 287 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Born out of the ashes of World War II, the covert action arm of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was created to counter the challenge posed by the Soviet Union and its allies and bolster American interests worldwide. It evolved rapidly into an eclectic, well-resourced organization whose activities provided a substitute for overt military action and afforded essential backup when the Cold War turned hot in Korea and Vietnam. This comprehensive examination of a still controversial subject sheds valuable new light on the undercover operations mounted by the CIA during the Cold War. Using a wide range of unpublished government records and documents, James Callanan traces the growth of the agency chronologically as it forged a covert action mission that sought to advance US foreign and defense policy in all corners of the globe. Offering a powerful perspective on a pivotal period in American history, "Covert Action in the Cold War" makes a crucial contribution to our understanding of global politics during the Cold War.

A Covert Action: Reagan, the CIA, and the Cold War Struggle in Poland

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Author :
Publisher : W. W. Norton & Company
ISBN 13 : 0393247015
Total Pages : 372 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (932 download)

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Book Synopsis A Covert Action: Reagan, the CIA, and the Cold War Struggle in Poland by : Seth G. Jones

Download or read book A Covert Action: Reagan, the CIA, and the Cold War Struggle in Poland written by Seth G. Jones and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2018-09-11 with total page 372 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A tale of victory for peace, for freedom, and for the CIA— a trifecta rare enough to make for required reading.” —Steve Donoghue, Spectator USA In 1981, the Soviet-backed Polish government declared martial law to crush a budding democratic opposition movement. Moscow and Washington were on a collision course. It was the most significant crisis of Ronald Reagan’s fledgling presidency. Reagan authorized a covert CIA operation codenamed QRHELPFUL to support dissident groups, particularly the trade union Solidarity. The CIA provided money that helped Solidarity print newspapers, broadcast radio programs, and conduct an information campaign against the government. This gripping narrative reveals the little-known history of one of America’s most successful covert operations through its most important characters—spymaster Bill Casey, CIA officer Richard Malzahn, Solidarity leader Lech Walesa, Pope John Paul II, and the Polish patriots who were instrumental to the success of the program. Based on in- depth interviews and recently declassified evidence, A Covert Action celebrates a decisive victory over tyranny for US intelligence behind the Iron Curtain, one that prefigured the Soviet collapse.

US Covert Operations and Cold War Strategy

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Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 113410412X
Total Pages : 286 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (341 download)

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Book Synopsis US Covert Operations and Cold War Strategy by : Sarah-Jane Corke

Download or read book US Covert Operations and Cold War Strategy written by Sarah-Jane Corke and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2007-09-12 with total page 286 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Based on recently declassified documents, this book provides the first examination of the Truman Administration’s decision to employ covert operations in the Cold War. Although covert operations were an integral part of America’s arsenal during the late 1940s and early 1950s, the majority of these operations were ill conceived, unrealistic and ultimately doomed to failure. In this volume, the author looks at three central questions: Why were these types of operations adopted? Why were they conducted in such a haphazard manner? And, why, once it became clear that they were not working, did the administration fail to abandon them? The book argues that the Truman Administration was unable to reconcile policy, strategy and operations successfully, and to agree on a consistent course of action for waging the Cold War. This ensured that they wasted time and effort, money and manpower on covert operations designed to challenge Soviet hegemony, which had little or no real chance of success. US Covert Operations and Cold War Strategy will be of great interest to students of US foreign policy, Cold War history, intelligence and international history in general.

Covert Regime Change

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Publisher : Cornell University Press
ISBN 13 : 1501730681
Total Pages : 329 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (17 download)

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Book Synopsis Covert Regime Change by : Lindsey A. O'Rourke

Download or read book Covert Regime Change written by Lindsey A. O'Rourke and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2018-12-15 with total page 329 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: O'Rourke's book offers a onestop shop for understanding foreignimposed regime change. Covert Regime Change is an impressive book and required reading for anyone interested in understanding hidden power in world politics.― Political Science Quarterly States seldom resort to war to overthrow their adversaries. They are more likely to attempt to covertly change the opposing regime, by assassinating a foreign leader, sponsoring a coup d'état, meddling in a democratic election, or secretly aiding foreign dissident groups. In Covert Regime Change, Lindsey A. O'Rourke shows us how states really act when trying to overthrow another state. She argues that conventional focus on overt cases misses the basic causes of regime change. O'Rourke provides substantive evidence of types of security interests that drive states to intervene. Offensive operations aim to overthrow a current military rival or break up a rival alliance. Preventive operations seek to stop a state from taking certain actions, such as joining a rival alliance, that may make them a future security threat. Hegemonic operations try to maintain a hierarchical relationship between the intervening state and the target government. Despite the prevalence of covert attempts at regime change, most operations fail to remain covert and spark blowback in unanticipated ways. Covert Regime Change assembles an original dataset of all American regime change operations during the Cold War. This fund of information shows the United States was ten times more likely to try covert rather than overt regime change during the Cold War. Her dataset allows O'Rourke to address three foundational questions: What motivates states to attempt foreign regime change? Why do states prefer to conduct these operations covertly rather than overtly? How successful are such missions in achieving their foreign policy goals?

Regulating Covert Action

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Publisher : Yale University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780300050592
Total Pages : 264 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (55 download)

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Book Synopsis Regulating Covert Action by : William Michael Reisman

Download or read book Regulating Covert Action written by William Michael Reisman and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 1992-01-01 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Covert activity has always been a significant element of international politics. This book attempts to assess the lawfulness of covert action under US and international law and faces the implications for democratic states that covert operations pose.

In the Shadow of International Law

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0190096616
Total Pages : 288 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (9 download)

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Book Synopsis In the Shadow of International Law by : Michael Poznansky

Download or read book In the Shadow of International Law written by Michael Poznansky and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-04-28 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Secrecy is a staple of world politics and a pervasive feature of political life. Leaders keep secrets as they conduct sensitive diplomatic missions, convince reluctant publics to throw their support behind costly wars, and collect sensitive intelligence about sworn enemies. In the Shadow of International Law explores one of the most controversial forms of secret statecraft: the use of covert action to change or overthrow foreign regimes. Drawing from a broad range of cases of US-backed regime change during the Cold War, Michael Poznansky develops a legal theory of covert action to explain why leaders sometimes turn to covert action when conducting regime change, rather than using force to accomplish the same objective. He highlights the surprising role international law plays in these decisions and finds that once the nonintervention principle-which proscribes unwanted violations of another state's sovereignty-was codified in international law in the mid-twentieth century, states became more reluctant to pursue overt regime change without proper cause. Further, absent a legal exemption to nonintervention such as a credible self-defense claim or authorization from an international body, states were more likely to pursue regime change covertly and concealing brazen violations of international law. Shining a light on the secret underpinnings of the liberal international order, the conduct of foreign-imposed regime change, and the impact of international law on state behavior, Poznansky speaks to the potential consequences of America abandoning its role as the steward of the postwar order, as well as the promise and peril of promoting new rules and norms in cyberspace.

Secret and Sanctioned

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Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN 13 : 0195100980
Total Pages : 274 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (951 download)

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Book Synopsis Secret and Sanctioned by : Stephen F. Knott

Download or read book Secret and Sanctioned written by Stephen F. Knott and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1996 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This eye-opening account reveals that covert intelligence operations in the U.S. date much farther back than most people realize--back to the Founding Fathers. Detailing clandestine, unscrupulous operations that took place under such presidents as Washington, Jefferson, Polk, and Lincoln, Knott reveals that presidents have rarely consulted Congress before engaging in such operations.

A Companion to Dwight D. Eisenhower

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Publisher : John Wiley & Sons
ISBN 13 : 1119027675
Total Pages : 755 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (19 download)

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Book Synopsis A Companion to Dwight D. Eisenhower by : Chester J. Pach

Download or read book A Companion to Dwight D. Eisenhower written by Chester J. Pach and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2017-04-07 with total page 755 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Companion to Dwight D. Eisenhower brings new depth to the historiography of this significant and complex figure, providing a comprehensive and up-to-date depiction of both the man and era. Thoughtfully incorporates new and significant literature on Dwight D. Eisenhower Thoroughly examines both the Eisenhower era and the man himself, broadening the historical scope by which Eisenhower is understood and interpreted Presents a complete picture of Eisenhower’s many roles in historical context: the individual, general, president, politician, and citizen This Companion is the ideal starting point for anyone researching America during the Eisenhower years and an invaluable guide for graduate students and advanced undergraduates in history, political science, and policy studies Meticulously edited by a leading authority on the Eisenhower presidency with chapters by international experts on political, international, social, and cultural history

Foreign Relations of the United States, 1945-1950

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Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 1184 pages
Book Rating : 4.E/5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis Foreign Relations of the United States, 1945-1950 by : United States. Department of State

Download or read book Foreign Relations of the United States, 1945-1950 written by United States. Department of State and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page 1184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

The CIA and Third Force Movements in China during the Early Cold War

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Author :
Publisher : Lexington Books
ISBN 13 : 1498570062
Total Pages : 343 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (985 download)

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Book Synopsis The CIA and Third Force Movements in China during the Early Cold War by : Roger B. Jeans

Download or read book The CIA and Third Force Movements in China during the Early Cold War written by Roger B. Jeans and published by Lexington Books. This book was released on 2017-11-27 with total page 343 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When the Chinese Communists defeated the Chinese Nationalists and occupied the mainland in 1949–1950, U.S. policymakers were confronted with a dilemma. Disgusted by the corruption and, more importantly, failure of Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist armies and party and repelled by the Communists’ revolutionary actions and violent class warfare, in the early 1950s the U.S. government placed its hopes in a Chinese “third force.” While the U.S. State Department reported on third forces, the CIA launched a two-prong effort to actively support these groups with money, advisors, and arms. In Japan, Okinawa, and Saipan, the agency trained third force troops at CIA bases. The Chinese commander of these soldiers was former high-ranking Nationalist General Cai Wenzhi. He and his colleagues organized a political group, the Free China Movement. His troops received parachute training as well as other types of combat and intelligence instruction at agency bases. Subsequently, several missions were dispatched to Manchuria—the Korean War was raging then—and South China. All were failures and the Chinese third force agents were killed or imprisoned. With the end of the Korean War, the Americans terminated this armed third force movement, with the Nationalists on Taiwan taking in some of its soldiers while others moved to Hong Kong. The Americans flew Cai to Washington, where he took a job with the Department of Defense. The second prong of the CIA’s effort was in Hong Kong. The agency financially supported and advised the creation of a third force organization called the Fighting League for Chinese Freedom and Democracy. It also funded several third force periodicals. Created in 1951 and 1952, in 1953 and 1954 the CIA ended its financial support. As a consequence of this as well as factionalism within the group, in 1954 the League collapsed and its leaders scattered to the four winds. At the end, even the term “third force” was discredited and replaced by “new force.” Finally, in the early 1950s, the CIA backed as a third force candidate a Vietnamese general. With his assassination in May 1955, however, that effort also came to naught.

Subversion as Foreign Policy

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Publisher : University of Washington Press
ISBN 13 : 9780295976181
Total Pages : 338 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (761 download)

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Book Synopsis Subversion as Foreign Policy by : Audrey Kahin

Download or read book Subversion as Foreign Policy written by Audrey Kahin and published by University of Washington Press. This book was released on 1997 with total page 338 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Based on access to secret documents and interviews with many of the participants, Subversion as Foreign Policy is an extraordinary account of civil war in Indonesia provoked by President Eisenhower and Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, and resulting in the killing of thousands of Indonesians and the destruction of much of the country's air force and navy. "This startling new book reveals a covert intervention by the United States in Indonesia in the late 1950s involving, among other things, the supply of thousands of weapons, the creation and deployment of a secret CIA air force and logistical support from the Seventh Fleet. The intervention occurred on such a massive scale that it is difficult to believe it has been kept almost totally secret from the American public for nearly 40 years. And this CIA operation proved to be even more disastrous than the Bay of Pigs". -- San Francisco Chronicle "An exemplary study of an ignominious chapter of the Cold War in Southeast Asia". -- Journal of Asian Studies "Subversion as Foreign Policy is a remarkable book.... The Kahins have provided a rare insight into the workings of U.S. policy towards Indonesia, both clandestine and official". -- London Times Literary Supplement

Cold War Exiles and the CIA

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 019257681X
Total Pages : 348 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (925 download)

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Book Synopsis Cold War Exiles and the CIA by : Benjamin Tromly

Download or read book Cold War Exiles and the CIA written by Benjamin Tromly and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2019-09-19 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At the height of the Cold War in the 1950s, the United States government unleashed covert operations intended to weaken the Soviet Union. As part of these efforts, the CIA committed to supporting Russian exiles, populations uprooted either during World War Two or by the Russian Revolution decades before. No one seemed better prepared to fight in the American secret war against communism than the uprooted Russians, whom the CIA directed to carry out propaganda, espionage, and subversion operations from their home base in West Germany. Yet the American engagement of Russian exiles had unpredictable outcomes. Drawing on recently declassified and previously untapped sources, Cold War Exiles and the CIA examines how the CIA's Russian operations became entangled with the internal struggles of Russia abroad and also the espionage wars of the superpowers in divided Germany. What resulted was a transnational political sphere involving different groups of Russian exiles, American and German anti-communists, and spies operating on both sides of the Iron Curtain. Inadvertently, CIA's patronage of Russian exiles forged a complex sub-front in the wider Cold War, demonstrating the ways in which the hostilities of the Cold War played out in ancillary conflicts involving proxies and non-state actors.

Secret Wars

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Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691204128
Total Pages : 342 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (912 download)

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Book Synopsis Secret Wars by : Austin Carson

Download or read book Secret Wars written by Austin Carson and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2020-06-09 with total page 342 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Secret Wars is the first book to systematically analyze the ways powerful states covertly participate in foreign wars, showing a recurring pattern of such behavior stretching from World War I to U.S.-occupied Iraq. Investigating what governments keep secret during wars and why, Austin Carson argues that leaders maintain the secrecy of state involvement as a response to the persistent concern of limiting war. Keeping interventions “backstage” helps control escalation dynamics, insulating leaders from domestic pressures while communicating their interest in keeping a war contained. Carson shows that covert interventions can help control escalation, but they are almost always detected by other major powers. However, the shared value of limiting war can lead adversaries to keep secret the interventions they detect, as when American leaders concealed clashes with Soviet pilots during the Korean War. Escalation concerns can also cause leaders to ignore covert interventions that have become an open secret. From Nazi Germany’s role in the Spanish Civil War to American covert operations during the Vietnam War, Carson presents new insights about some of the most influential conflicts of the twentieth century. Parting the curtain on the secret side of modern war, Secret Wars provides important lessons about how rival state powers collude and compete, and the ways in which they avoid outright military confrontations.

Surprise, Kill, Vanish

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Publisher : Little, Brown
ISBN 13 : 0316441406
Total Pages : 560 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (164 download)

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Book Synopsis Surprise, Kill, Vanish by : Annie Jacobsen

Download or read book Surprise, Kill, Vanish written by Annie Jacobsen and published by Little, Brown. This book was released on 2019-05-14 with total page 560 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From Pulitzer Prize finalist Annie Jacobsen, the untold USA Today bestselling story of the CIA's secret paramilitary units. Surprise . . . your target. Kill . . . your enemy. Vanish . . . without a trace. When diplomacy fails, and war is unwise, the president calls on the CIA's Special Activities Division, a highly-classified branch of the CIA and the most effective, black operations force in the world. Originally known as the president's guerrilla warfare corps, SAD conducts risky and ruthless operations that have evolved over time to defend America from its enemies. Almost every American president since World War II has asked the CIA to conduct sabotage, subversion and, yes, assassination. With unprecedented access to forty-two men and women who proudly and secretly worked on CIA covert operations from the dawn of the Cold War to the present day, along with declassified documents and deep historical research, Pulitzer Prize finalist Annie Jacobsen unveils -- like never before -- a complex world of individuals working in treacherous environments populated with killers, connivers, and saboteurs. Despite Hollywood notions of off-book operations and external secret hires, covert action is actually one piece in a colossal foreign policy machine. Written with the pacing of a thriller, Surprise, Kill, Vanish brings to vivid life the sheer pandemonium and chaos, as well as the unforgettable human will to survive and the intellectual challenge of not giving up hope that define paramilitary and intelligence work. Jacobsen's exclusive interviews -- with members of the CIA's Senior Intelligence Service (equivalent to the Pentagon's generals), its counterterrorism chiefs, targeting officers, and Special Activities Division's Ground Branch operators who conduct today's close-quarters killing operations around the world -- reveal, for the first time, the enormity of this shocking, controversial, and morally complex terrain. Is the CIA's paramilitary army America's weaponized strength, or a liability to its principled standing in the world? Every operation reported in this book, however unsettling, is legal.

The Covert Sphere

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Publisher : Cornell University Press
ISBN 13 : 0801465478
Total Pages : 303 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (14 download)

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Book Synopsis The Covert Sphere by : Timothy Melley

Download or read book The Covert Sphere written by Timothy Melley and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2012-11-15 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In December 2010 the U.S. Embassy in Kabul acknowledged that it was providing major funding for thirteen episodes of Eagle Four—a new Afghani television melodrama based loosely on the blockbuster U.S. series 24. According to an embassy spokesperson, Eagle Four was part of a strategy aimed at transforming public suspicion of security forces into something like awed respect. Why would a wartime government spend valuable resources on a melodrama of covert operations? The answer, according to Timothy Melley, is not simply that fiction has real political effects but that, since the Cold War, fiction has become integral to the growth of national security as a concept and a transformation of democracy. In The Covert Sphere, Melley links this cultural shift to the birth of the national security state in 1947. As the United States developed a vast infrastructure of clandestine organizations, it shielded policy from the public sphere and gave rise to a new cultural imaginary, "the covert sphere." One of the surprising consequences of state secrecy is that citizens must rely substantially on fiction to "know," or imagine, their nation’s foreign policy. The potent combination of institutional secrecy and public fascination with the secret work of the state was instrumental in fostering the culture of suspicion and uncertainty that has plagued American society ever since—and, Melley argues, that would eventually find its fullest expression in postmodernism. The Covert Sphere traces these consequences from the Korean War through the War on Terror, examining how a regime of psychological operations and covert action has made the conflation of reality and fiction a central feature of both U.S. foreign policy and American culture. Melley interweaves Cold War history with political theory and original readings of films, television dramas, and popular entertainments—from The Manchurian Candidate through 24—as well as influential writing by Margaret Atwood, Robert Coover, Don DeLillo, Joan Didion, E. L. Doctorow, Michael Herr, Denis Johnson, Norman Mailer, Tim O’Brien, and many others.

Isaac and Isaiah

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Publisher : Yale University Press
ISBN 13 : 0300195346
Total Pages : 352 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (1 download)

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Book Synopsis Isaac and Isaiah by : David Caute

Download or read book Isaac and Isaiah written by David Caute and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2013-08-06 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rancorous and highly public disagreements between Isaiah Berlin and Isaac Deutscher escalated to the point of cruel betrayal in the mid-1960s, yet surprisingly the details of the episode have escaped historians’ scrutiny. In this gripping account of the ideological clash between two of the most influential scholars of Cold War politics, David Caute uncovers a hidden story of passionate beliefs, unresolved antagonism, and the high cost of reprisal to both victim and perpetrator. Though Deutscher (1907–1967) and Berlin (1909–1997) had much in common—each arrived in England in flight from totalitarian violence, quickly mastered English, and found entry into the Anglo-American intellectual world of the 1950s—Berlin became one of the presiding voices of Anglo-American liberalism, while Deutscher remained faithful to his Leninist heritage, resolutely defending Soviet conduct despite his rejection of Stalin’s tyranny. Caute combines vivid biographical detail with an acute analysis of the issues that divided these two icons of Cold War politics, and brings to light for the first time the full severity of Berlin’s action against Deutscher.

The Quiet Americans

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Author :
Publisher : Anchor
ISBN 13 : 0385540469
Total Pages : 722 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (855 download)

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Book Synopsis The Quiet Americans by : Scott Anderson

Download or read book The Quiet Americans written by Scott Anderson and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2020-09-01 with total page 722 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the bestselling author of Lawrence in Arabia—the gripping story of four CIA agents during the early days of the Cold War—and how the United States, at the very pinnacle of its power, managed to permanently damage its moral standing in the world. “Enthralling … captivating reading.” —The New York Times Book Review At the end of World War II, the United States was considered the victor over tyranny and a champion of freedom. But it was clear—to some—that the Soviet Union was already seeking to expand and foment revolution around the world, and the American government’s strategy in response relied on the secret efforts of a newly formed CIA. Chronicling the fascinating lives of four agents, Scott Anderson follows the exploits of four spies: Michael Burke, who organized parachute commandos from an Italian villa; Frank Wisner, an ingenious spymaster who directed actions around the world; Peter Sichel, a German Jew who outwitted the ruthless KGB in Berlin; and Edward Lansdale, a mastermind of psychological warfare in the Far East. But despite their lofty ambitions, time and again their efforts went awry, thwarted by a combination of ham-fisted politicking and ideological rigidity at the highest levels of the government.