Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America (Yale Nota Bene)
by John Earl Haynes, Harvey Klehr
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Book Summary Information
Author: Harvey Klehr, John Earl HaynesEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2000-08-11
ISBN: 0300084625
Number of pages: 504
Publisher: Yale University Press
Book Reviews of Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America (Yale Nota Bene)
Book Review: Great research, but somewhat moralistic
Summary: 3 Stars
Informative, though reads a little like a phonebook. The all-too-often repeated pattern: so-and-so -- name, birthdate, birthplace, education -- became a Soviet agent, and passed such and such secrets (and so on for about hundred times). Motives of individual agents are seldom explored (though the final chapter has important insights into the "why" of agent work), while the authors rush to make moralistic judgments: so and so betrayed his country, so and so committed treachery, how many lives would have been saved had the Soviets not learned of US military or atomic secrets!
The argument that Stalin would have been much more circumspect and cooperative if he had not obtained a bomb in 1949 is not convincing in the light of what is now known of his foreign policy behavior; indeed, Stalin's apprehension of US military superiority only made him more stubborn and adamant in the face of perceived American pressure.
Was MaCarthy right about the communist conspiracy? This book shows that some of his allegations were justified, though not his paranoia.
The book makes the argument that US security was lax, allowing spies to penetrate all government agencies and even the Manhattan project. Indeed, US efforts to penetrate the Soviet atomic project came to nothing, and recent research shows that Stalin took much greater care to preserve his own secrets. But so what? The US was not a police society, and hopefully never will be; if Venona is a testament to the success of the NKVD in the US, then it is also a testament to the resilience of democracy. It is a testament to the futility of secrecy and a powerful argument for greater governmental openness.
Great reference book, it even has a list of all US agents deciphered by Venona. The authors also make a very good use of the Russian archives, especially those of the Comintern, though their research in this area is a little dated and will hopefully be improved by other enthusiasts.
Summary of Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America (Yale Nota Bene)
With this new volume, John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr build upon their groundbreaking work in The Secret World of American Communism and solidify their reputations as the foremost historians of Soviet espionage in America. In Venona, they provide a detailed study of how the United States decrypted top-secret Communist cables moving between Washington and Moscow. This account, based on information unavailable to researchers for decades, reveals the full extent of the Communist spy network in the 1940s. At least 349 citizens, immigrants, and permanent residents of the United States had a covert relationship with Soviet intelligence agencies, among them Harry White (assistant secretary of the treasury in FDR's administration and the Communists' highest-ranking asset) and State Department official Alger Hiss, whose association with the Soviets had been hotly debated since the moment he was first publicly accused in 1948."The Soviet assault was of the type a nation directs at an enemy state," write Haynes and Klehr. They go on to suggest that Venona's code-breaking "indicated that the Cold War was not a state of affairs that had begun after World War II but a guerilla action that Stalin had secretly started years earlier." Moreover, "espionage saved the USSR great expense and industrial investment and thereby enabled the Soviets to build a successful atomic bomb years before they otherwise would have." Haynes and Klehr deliver what is at once a real-life spy thriller and a vital piece of scholarship. A grand achievement. --John J. Miller
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