Espionage
Everyone who was anyone in Russia was spied on – including Stalin
In 1972,Vasili Mitrokhin oversaw the transfer of thousands of documents in the KGB archives and secretly noted the atrocities they revealed - though Stalin’s file was mysteriously empty
From the early 1930s we knew what Hitler’s intentions were – so why were we so ill-prepared?
Intelligence provided by William de Ropp made the situation painfully clear, but the British political establishment, determined on peace, wilfully ignored the warnings
Heroes of the Norwegian resistance
Among many fascinating characters is Gunnar Waaler, a double agent who passed on intelligence to the British while posing as an enthusiastic member of Quisling’s police force
A war of words: circulating forbidden literature behind the Iron Curtain
For decades, the CIA smuggled works by George Orwell, Hannah Arendt, Czeslaw Milosz and many others into the Soviet bloc in a battle for hearts, minds and intellects
Inside the Unholy See: the infiltration of the Vatican by foreign powers
Yvonnick Denoël reveals how, since the mid-20th century, a scandalous number of priests have acted as communist moles
A mole in the CIA: The Seventh Floor, by David McCloskey, reviewed
McCloskey’s latest thriller is well written and tautly paced, but we feel so little connection with the suspect agents that the eventual unmasking of the mole is an anticlimax
The lure of the spy novel
Anniversaries. Back in mid-December 1998, 26 years ago to the month, we wrapped my first (and probably only) feature film…
South Asia in a time of the breaking of nations
Avinash Paliwal’s gripping tale of espionage opens in 1949, with newly independent India, Pakistan and Burma racked by rivalries in one of the most intricately partitioned areas on Earth
The ambassador’s daughter bent on betrayal
When the young Martha Dodd arrived at the American embassy in Berlin in 1933 she cared nothing about politics. By the time she left four years later, she was a committed Soviet spy
The spy who came back from retirement: Karla’s Choice, by Nick Harkaway, reviewed
Given a new lease of life by John le Carré’s son, George Smiley gets embroiled in a murky affair involving the Circus’s key Stasi asset and a missing Hungarian literary agent
The spy with the bullet-proof Rolls-Royce
Stationed in Paris from 1926 to 1940, the wealthy, debonair ‘Biffy’ Dunderdale, often seen as a model for James Bond, was also a supremely effective intelligence officer
An accidental spy: Gabriel’s Moon, by William Boyd, reviewed
Having chanced to interview the Congolese politician Patrice Lumumba shortly before his assassination, a travel writer finds himself targeted by British Intelligence
Cold War spying had much in common with the colonial era
Influenced by Kipling’s Kim, early CIA officers combined a love of overseas adventure with a whiff of imperial paranoia, says Hugh Wilford
The circus provides perfect cover for espionage
As he flew his plane between circus acts across Germany in the 1930s, Cyril Bertram Mills gained vital aerial intelligence about the Nazis’ rearmament programme
An Oxford spy ring is finally uncovered
Charles Beaumont’s warped group, recruited by an eccentric fellow of Jesus College, seems all too plausible. Other thrillers from Celia Walden and Matthew Blake
The thrill of the chase
The novelist himself admitted that his infidelities ‘produced a duality and tension that became a necessary drug for my writing’
Scent and smoke and sweat
The world would never be quite the same again after we first glimpsed the casino of Royale-les-Eaux at three in the morning, says Philip Hensher
A secret sisterhood
Many thousands of women acted as messengers, radio operators and double agents behind enemy lines in both world wars. Here, these resilient and resolute pioneers are retrieved from the mists of history
Barefaced lies
Mark Hollingsworth describes how the KGB became the world’s most industrious conspiracy-theory factory, with its agents of influence dedicated to sowing maximum confusion
On the run in Russia
Owen Matthews concludes his magnificent KGB trilogy, and there’s a thrilling debut from David McCloskey, a former CIA Middle East specialist
Secret assignations
Adam Sisman on the private life of John le Carré, revealed in letters and a kiss-and-tell
Smoke and mirrors
I go back and forth on tobacco companies. On the one hand, they are merchants of death. On the other,…
A phoenix from the ashes
‘Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind.’ Albert Einstein’s deft avoidance of the question put to…
The slow horses gather pace
Reviewers who make fancy claims for genre novels tend to sound like needy show-offs or hard-of-thinking dolts. So be it:…
A fine finale
Literary estates work to preserve a writer’s reputation — and sometimes milk it too. The appearance of this novel by…
