The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War

by Ben MacIntyre

Paperback, 2019

Status

Available

Call number

327.12092

Collection

Publication

Penguin (2019), Edition: 01, 384 pages

Description

Biography & Autobiography. History. Politics. Nonfiction. HTML:NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ? The celebrated author of Double Cross and Rogue Heroes returns with his greatest spy story yet, a thrilling Americans-era tale of Oleg Gordievsky, the Russian whose secret work helped hasten the end of the Cold War. ??The best true spy story I have ever read.???JOHN LE CARR? Named a Best Book of the Year by The Economist ? Shortlisted for the Bailie Giffords Prize in Nonfiction If anyone could be considered a Russian counterpart to the infamous British double-agent Kim Philby, it was Oleg Gordievsky. The son of two KGB agents and the product of the best Soviet institutions, the savvy, sophisticated Gordievsky grew to see his nation's communism as both criminal and philistine. He took his first posting for Russian intelligence in 1968 and eventually became the Soviet Union's top man in London, but from 1973 on he was secretly working for MI6. For nearly a decade, as the Cold War reached its twilight, Gordievsky helped the West turn the tables on the KGB, exposing Russian spies and helping to foil countless intelligence plots, as the Soviet leadership grew increasingly paranoid at the United States's nuclear first-strike capabilities and brought the world closer to the brink of war. Desperate to keep the circle of trust close, MI6 never revealed Gordievsky's name to its counterparts in the CIA, which in turn grew obsessed with figuring out the identity of Britain's obviously top-level source. Their obsession ultimately doomed Gordievsky: the CIA officer assigned to identify him was none other than Aldrich Ames, the man who would become infamous for secretly spying for the Soviets.  Unfolding the delicious three-way gamesmanship between America, Britain, and the Soviet Union, and culminating in the gripping cinematic beat-by-beat of Gordievsky's nail-biting escape from Moscow in 1985, Ben Macintyre's latest may be his best yet. Like the greatest novels of John le Carré, it brings readers deep into a world of treachery and betrayal, where the lines bleed between the personal and the professional, and one man's hatred of communism had the power to change the… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member aadyer
A very good, gripping account of a very impressive individual who gave at great personal cost, his life to an ideal. Told in a forthright and well paced manner, this complex story is adroitly handled by the author who's writing style is easy to follow and intriguing. A well balanced character
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portrait as well as an account of amazing agent running and a nail biting escape mission, this is espionage writing at its best. Recommended.
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LibraryThing member RandyStafford
For once, the subtitle on this one is not an exaggeration. The only other contenders I can think for “greatest espionage story of the Cold War” would be those of Oleg Penkovsky and, of course, Kim Philby who Macintyre also wrote a book about.

Like Penkovsky, Oleg Gordievsky was a Soviet
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intelligence officer who was a double agent for the West. Like Philby, Gordievsky made a daring escape to be with the country he secretly served. In Philby’s case, though, it was the considerably easier task of smuggling himself out of Lebanon and to the Soviet Union. Gordievsky was smuggled out of Moscow while he was under surveillance.

I certainly have not read every espionage memoir or case history ever written, but I’ve read a fair number, and Macintyre’s book is simply the best book on a spy case I’ve ever read. Macintyre not only has a nice turn of phrase but also delves into the psychology of the spy. This is a book that examines the complex motives – more complicated than the acronym MICE (money, ideology, compromise, and ego) would suggest – of the spy, and their intimate relationships with the case officers who “run” them. Macintyre shows the KGB and MI6 and the CIA as bureaucracies full, to varying degrees, of time servers, those psychologically unsuited for the work, and, of course, the usual bureaucratic tendency to bury failure or shift blame for it.

And he talks about the high personal cost Gordievsky paid for his defection to the West.

Yet, it’s also full of specific details like how to shake surveillance on the street or how the KGB elaborately secured access to their archives or how a KGB car could be spotted by its incomplete washing.

Macintyre, of course, had the advantage of being able to interview his subject. Gordievsky is still alive and has written his own memoir. Macintrye also interviewed those in the three intelligence services who worked with Gordievsky as well as his ex-wife.

Macintyre even gets away with something that I normally don’t like. He repeats himself at times. To be precise, he repeats himself like a novelist to develop his themes.

This may not only be the greatest Cold War spy case. It’s got almost all the possible complications: double agents in the CIA, MI6, and the KGB; rivalry between American and British intelligence; bureaucratic snafus; truth serum interrogation; and, of course, that daring exfiltration.

But Gordievsky did something no other spies got to do. He not only advised America to continue with the Strategic Defense Initiative because the Soviet economy could not counter it. He also stage managed, through covert briefings, both sides of the famous meeting between Margaret Thatcher and Mikhail Gorbachev, the one where the British Prime Minister declared Gorbachev was a “man we can do business with”.

Gordievsky was born to the KGB. His father served in it. His brother was a KGB illegal who worked to suppress the Czechoslovakian Revolution and Gordievsky’s first thoughts of rebellion, his first overtures to Western intelligence services, was motivated by that revolution while he was stationed in Denmark. His first marriage was to a fellow KGB agent.

Since I knew the broad outlines of the Gordievsky case already and had heard Macintyre talk about his book, the chapter most engrossing for me, the part of the story I was unfamiliar with, was “Cat and Mouse” when Gordievsky, under suspicion of being a double agent based on information provided the KGB by CIA officer Aldrich Ames, returns to Moscow and the fear and anxiety of the surprisingly legalistic KGB attempts to prove his guilt or get a confession.
A theme of Macintyre’s book is the mirror images of Ames and Gordievsky, both spies and traitors. There is a fascinating encounter between the men and Gordievsky’s impressions of the man who, unknown to him, almost got him killed.

But Ames is far from the only intriguing character we meet in the KGB, MI6, and the CIA. Plenty of them are quoted about their impressions of Gordievsky and their thoughts on his case though many of the British characters are not identified under their real name.

Several black and white and color photographs are included as well as maps relevant to Gordievsky’s escape.
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LibraryThing member k6gst
This is the story of the KGB colonel, defector-in-place, and M.I.6 spy Oleg Gordievsky, and particularly about the astounding British/Danish mission to exfiltrate him from Moscow through Finland after the K.G.B. started to suspect him.

The traitor in the title is Aldrich Ames, the moral cretin that
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gave him up to the K.G.B. for money, but very little of the book is about Ames. (Of course Gordievsky was a traitor too, but, as William Buckley once put it, equating people like Ames and Gordievsky “is the equivalent of saying that the man who pushes an old lady into the path of a hurtling bus is not to be distinguished from the man who pushes an old lady out of the path of a hurtling bus: on the grounds that, after all, in both cases someone is pushing old ladies around.”)

Also, here’s a fun tip on how to determine if the Volga GAZ-3102 following you is in fact the K.G.B. The K.G.B. car wash apparently has some defect that keeps the brushes from reaching all the way across the hood, so every car that goes through it has an identical triangular patch of dirt in the middle of the hood. Look for it.
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LibraryThing member ericlee
Was Michael Foot, leader of the British Labour Party, a Soviet agent? Was Jack Jones, head of the country's largest trade union, one as well? According to KGB officer Oleg Gordievsky, they both were. (Foot's code name was 'boot'.) Reaction among today's Labour leadership to Ben MacIntyre's latest
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bestselling book has been as expected. Jeremy Corbyn tweeted that 'Smearing a dead man, who successfully defended himself when he was alive, is about as low as you can go'. Perhaps.

There are non-fiction books that are described as 'thrilling', but this is the rare case of one that actually is, even if it turns out that Gordievsky was wrong about Foot and Jones. By the first page of the book you realise that Gordievsky is going to wind up safely in Britain after years of secretly spying for the west, and yet the long and detailed account of his exfiltration from the USSR in the mid-1980s is full of tension and suspense. A fascinating story, extremely well told.
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LibraryThing member PDCRead
A man dressed in a drab grey suit standing in a street corner in the middle of Moscow looking like the other citizens passing him by would have been almost unnoticeable, but because he was holding a plastic bag from the British supermarket, Safeway, for the people looking out for him he stood out
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like a beacon. He was not a regular Soviet citizen, he was a senior KGB officer and he had just activated his escape plan. He now had to hope that his signal had been noticed by those who needed to see it and not by those that were hunting for him.

In the world of smoke and mirrors that constitutes the fragmented world of the intelligence agencies, the truth is often stranger than fiction and often way beyond that. No one would have thought that pillars of the establishment would have spied for the Russians, but when Philby and his cohorts defected it was realised that your background was not a passport to trust. The same logic could have been applied to Oleg Gordievsky. His father and brother were KGB officers and staunch supporters of the regime but he carried a secret that not even his KGB wife knew. For the past eleven years, he had been a spy for MI6.

In this book, Macintyre takes us right through Gordievsky's life, from his earliest days in the KGB, his realisation that the regime that he worked for did not suit his growing liberal outlook the horror he experience when he was there when the Berlin Wall went up. He has his first contact with MI6 in the early 1970s when he was based in Denmark. For MI6 it seemed too good to be true and they took a while to realise that he was not going to be a double agent, but he was for real and had a genuine and personal reason for passing on the information that he did. As he rose in the rank he managed to get a posting to the UK, ideal for MI6 as they could meet him under much more relaxed circumstances. That was until he was recalled to Moscow suddenly, he knew he had been betrayed, but he didn't know just by who or how much.

MI6 knew that things were not right and set about implementing the escape plan that they had codenamed Pimlico to snatch Gordievsky right from under the noses of the KGB and spirit him across the border to freedom.

The book is pieced together from a series of interviews that Macintyre has completed with the people involved in his unique case. The actual files concerning Gordievsky are still secret and I guess that they will remain that way for a long time. It reads like an actual spy thriller most of the time, including a stunning ending as they try to get him out of the Soviet Union. Gordievsky is still alive and well and living under an assumed name somewhere in the home counties. Given the reach of the FSB, his home is under 24-hour surveillance. One countries spy is another countries traitor, but from the accounts in here, it could be said that he helped stop nuclear war and bring about the demise of the totalitarian state. Another stunning book from Macintyre. 4.5 stars
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LibraryThing member creighley
One of the great st spy stories yet, this is the tale of Oleg Gordievsky, the Russian whose secret work helped hasten the end of the Cold War.
LibraryThing member drmaf
Simply one of the best spy thrillers I have raid - and its a non-fiction book! Oleg Gordievsky was the highest ranking KGB officer to spy for the British. A full colonel in the Soviet Union's feared secret service, his decision to betray his country was made from the highest of motives, a desire to
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see Russia freed from the crushing burden of totalitarianism. For more than a decade he spied for MI6, producing absolute gold from the very peak of Soviet intelligence. He was such a valuable source that the British refused to identify him even to the CIA. Ironically this led to his downfall, as the CIA, in an astoundingly childish fit of pique, decided to discover his identity. Unfortunately one of the men they entrusted with was the thoroughly corrupt Aldrich Ames, who had already agreed to spy for the Soviets purely because he wanted money to live the sort of lifestyle he thought he deserved. Ames discovered Gordievsky's identity and passed it on the KGB and suddenly the spy's days were numbered - unless he could be extracted from the USSR under the eyes of the most comprehensive security system in the world. A select team activate an escape plan they had formulated years before. What follows is one of the best spy capers you'll read about - and its all true. It is up there with the best Le Carre has written, and its literally thrill a minute, as the team meets with Gordievsky near the Finnish border and in a operation timed to the second with many moments of breath-holding suspense smuggle him safely to Norway. In the end Gordievsky was sentenced to death in absentia and the death sentence remains in force despite the fall of the Soviet Union, so he now lives with round the clock security. The reason he is still in danger becomes obvious when it is revealed that one of the KGB officials embarrassed by Gordievsky's escape was a young officer named Vladimir Putin, and its seems certain that as long as he lives he will be a target for a vengeful Russia. Absolutely wonderful book, one of the most compelling and suspenseful true-life spy books you will ever read. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
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LibraryThing member bostonbibliophile
A fascinating and page-turning account of Cold War espionage. I have to admit it's not my favorite Macintyre book, only because I am such a huge fan of Double Cross, but Gordievsky's story is one everyone should read.
LibraryThing member annbury
A great read. Well-written.
LibraryThing member breic
An amazing story. It reads like a spy thriller, but with more blunders on both sides. Also, Macintyre doesn't miss the bigger picture. He does a good job covers the details of Gordievsky's spying, the effects of his spying on Western relations with the USSR, and how it fell apart thanks to Ames.
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This was all new to me.
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LibraryThing member ikeman100
Very interesting and well written. Another piece of the SPY puzzle from the Cold War. As usual this author delivers. If you like true SPY stories then this is one not to miss.
LibraryThing member streamsong
Oleg Gordievsky, working as a double agent for Russia’s KGB and Britain’s MI6 gave the west a clear window into not just Cold War Russian secrets, but how the Russian government thought and worked. His efforts helped defuse a nuclear escalation, during an exercise that the West under President
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Ronald Reagan considered a war game, but was taken as a serious threat to the Russians. It’s frightening to think that a misunderstanding could have caused Cold War politics to escalate to the brink of a nuclear war – and US citizens were – and still are - so unaware of it.

Eventually, Gordievsky’s identity was ferreted out by US CIA agent Aldrich Ames who betrayed him o the Russians. This necessitated Gordievsky’s escape from Moscow, leaving his wife, children and aging mother behind. The escape plan was a paper-thin shot-in-the- dark that could have been foiled at many steps. Even MI6 thought it was probably doomed to failure.

Engrossing and enlightening book that reads like a fast-paced thriller. A real page turner.
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LibraryThing member Eyejaybee
This book tells the story of Oleg Gordievsky, a KGB officer who, after suffering one disillusionment too many, allowed himself to be turned as a double agent for MI6. His story is fascinating, not just because of the scope and wealth of the information he yielded to MI6, but also because it
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involved an unprecedented ‘exfiltration’ exercise to remove him from the Soviet Union once his position had become too dangerous.

Ben Macintyre has written many books on this and similar subjects, and always undertakes extensive and detailed research. I do, however, always find with his books that he seems to have a relentless capacity to render potentially thrilling subjects rather mundane. I don’t know if it is a consequence of his rather pedestrian prose, or simply that his extensive familiarity with his subject matter leaves him unaware of how exciting it might seem to those less well versed in the area.

I enjoyed the story, but almost found myself thinking, ‘Well, so what?’ throughout, when I should have been thinking, ‘Wow!’.
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LibraryThing member brenzi
This is the story of KGB secret agent Oleg Gordievsky, who was turned by MI6 during the Cold War and escaped from Russia in 1985, leaving behind his wife and three children to deal with the KGB on their own. That's a simplification of course but you can see what I'm thinking. He left Russia, in a
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daring escape because they were onto him (to a certain degree) and he knew they would eventually get him and kill him. Of course his wife had no idea that he had been turned and had no idea that he had escaped.

That said, Gordievsky was instrumental in the espionage that was used by the West in revealing much of the information that we have about the KGB and their methods so he is revered by the espionage community. The audio of this book was excellent and the part that detailed his escape was heart pounding. Highly recommended.
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LibraryThing member Vicki_Weisfeld
A pal of John Le Carré, Ben Macintyre brings the novelist’s gift for writing compelling characters and page-turning narrative to the nonfiction realm. This book, subtitled “The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War,” is based on the defection to Britain of KGB operative Oleg Gordievsky,
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and it provides at least as many thrills as the best espionage novel.
Gordievsky, raised in a family where working for the KGB is the family business, becomes disenchanted with Soviet hypocrisy. Posted to Denmark, he has a tantalizing taste of what life is like when lived outside a surveillance society. A British MI6 agent, working in Copenhagen under classic diplomatic cover, notices him and several modest bits of outreach are made by the two of them, but nothing comes of it. Gordievsky, however, sees his future and when he returns to Moscow, works at becoming accepted into the KGB’s English-language training program. Finally, he succeeds. After a few years, he’s posted to London.
Then the connection is made, and over at least a dozen years, he secretly works for MI6.
The intelligence he provides and particularly his insights into the Soviet mindset are pivotal in the late Cold War era, and he provides significant background for Margaret Thatcher’s meetings with Soviet leaders. His advice helps her craft proposals they can accept. It’s vital and thrilling diplomacy, all accomplished well out of public view.
I especially enjoyed the intriguing nuggets of tradecraft Macintyre drops as he follows Gordievsky’s twisting path. That level of detail is just one feature inspiring confidence in the narration and investment in the protagonist’s fate.
Throughout his years spying for Britain, Gordievsky is, of course, acutely aware that Soviet paranoia is ever on the lookout for leaks and traitors. MI6 is so protective of him, they do not even reveal his identity to the Americans. Good thing, too, because the head of counterintelligence in the CIA at the time—Aldrich Ames—is himself a double agent. Ames ultimately betrays more than two dozen Western spies inside Soviet intelligence, effectively signing their death warrants. His motive? Money.
Every so often, Gordievsky and his family are required to return to the Soviet Union for a term of months or years. This is the normal rotation to prevent personnel from becoming too attached to their place of posting. In case he comes under suspicion while inside the Iron Curtain, MI6 prepares an elaborate escape plan. No one is truly confident this plan can work, least of all Gordievsky. A breakdown at any point will be disastrous.
But once Ames fingers him, they must give it a try, and that whole episode is a real nail-biter.
Macintyre’s book won the 2019 Gold Dagger for nonfiction, an award sponsored by the UK Crime Writers’ Association. John Le Carré calls it, “The best true spy story I have ever read.”
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LibraryThing member alanteder
Spy vs. Traitor
Review of the Random House Audio audiobook (Sept. 2018) released simultaneously with the original hardcover edition

The Spy and the Traitor is the story of KGB defector Oleg Gordievsky and American CIA traitor Aldrich Ames. The tie-in is that it was Ames' betrayals that led to the KGB
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being suspicious of Gordievsky and thus initiating British MI-6's exfiltration plan for Gordievsky and his family from the Soviet Union.

Macintyre tells an excellent story and the dramatic suspense built into the recounting of Gordievsky's escape is worthy of a novel in itself. Gordievsky was sentenced to death in absentia and that sentence has never been rescinded. The fact that it was associates of Vladimir Putin who were blamed for the bungling of the spy catching is all the more chilling in the present day climate (2010-2020s) where rivals and foes of Putin, whether in politics, business or journalism are regularly murdered, poisoned or imprisoned.
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LibraryThing member addunn3
Macintyre extends his knowledge of espionage to the cold war of the 70s and 80s as he tells the history of a Soviet spy who volunteered to help the British,and the West, understand the workings of the KBG. Well written! I would say his best book.
LibraryThing member Ken-Me-Old-Mate
I read another book by Ben MacIntyre and thoroughly enjoyed it. I get quite fascinated with the reality of the Cold War and generally enjoy a good non-fiction read. This book details the life of a Russian spy who worked in the KGB and successfully spied for the English for a very long time. All the
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time reading there is that hollow feeling in the guts that at any moment he will get caught. Full of lots of background info of what was really happening at the time in the global sense.
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LibraryThing member lesleynicol
This book did not "grab" my attention and I did not finish it. Other members of my reading group quite enjoyed it but the subject matter was not interesting to me. MI5 and espionage seem so outdated..
LibraryThing member mysterymax
MacIntyre has written another excellent spy book. It reads like a fiction thriller in places. I imagine it is difficult for someone to young to remember the cold days of the Cold War, to fully grasp what was at stack, and how this one man did a great deal to keep a nuclear war from happening. Putin
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said, "There is no such thing as a former KGB man. Now with Putin's rise to power it is important to understand the psychology of the KGB. Oleg Gordievsky is owed a debt of gratitude by the West. The book is perfect in its research, and dramatic telling of these events.
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LibraryThing member hotblack43
Exciting to read about real spies in little Denmark! And collaborators …
LibraryThing member usuallee
Exciting, vivid real-life spy thriller! Very smoothly written, I'll definitely seek out Macintyre's other books. Narrative nonfiction at its most compelling.
LibraryThing member Brumby18
Excellent read - I found the plot better than bond, the characters richer and braver than any fictionous, and the feeling captured by the author of the participants exceptional. not mental chacolate but food for thought in this turbulent time. read with confidence and concern.
LibraryThing member sinaloa237
Certainly one of the most thrilling books I've ever read. Good thing it is a true story - it would be hardly credible otherwise.
LibraryThing member carolfoisset
Fascinating story! It shed a lot of light on the inside workings of Russian spy work as well as Britians also taught me about several major political events that had lasting impaction the world. Reads like a thriller is totally engrossing and the audio is very well done.

Awards

Crime Writers' Association Awards (Winner — Non-fiction — 2019)
HWA Crown Awards (Longlist — Non-Fiction — 2019)

Language

Original language

English

Original publication date

2018

Physical description

384 p.; 7.8 inches

ISBN

0241972132 / 9780241972137

Barcode

91120000468334

DDC/MDS

327.12092
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