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88 of 94 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Extraordinary--Substantive History--Real World Good Stuff, May 24, 2003
This book is a fine read, and to my surprise, the contributions from The New York Times are quite worthwhile. In essence the primary author, Milton Beardon, wrote the core of the book, on his experiences with the Soviet Division in the Directorate of Operations at the CIA, and in Afghanistan and Pakistan driving the Soviets in Afghanistan, and then journalist James Risen filled in the gaps with really excellent vignettes from the other side. The two authors together make a fine team, and they have very capably exploited a number of former KGB and GRU officers whose recollections round out the story. This is not, by any means, a complete story. At the end of thise review I recommend five other books that add considerable detail to a confrontation that spanned the globe for a half-century. Yet, while it barely scratches the surface, this book is both historical and essential in understanding two facts: 1) Afghanistan was the beginning of the end for USSR and
2) CIA made it happen, once invigorated by President Ronald Reagan and DCI William Casey It may not be immediately apparent to the casual reader, but that is the most important story being told in this book: how the collapse of the Soviet effort in Afghanistan ultimately led to the collapse of Soviet authority in East Germany, in the other satellite states, and eventually to the unification of Germany and the survival of Russas as a great state but no longer an evil empire. There are two other stories in this book, and both are priceless. The first is a tale of counterintelligence failure across the board within both the CIA and the FBI. The author excels with many "insider" perspectives and quotes, ranging from his proper and brutal indictment of then DCI Stansfield Turner for destroying the clandestine service, to his quote from a subordinate, based on a real-world case, that even the Ghanians can penetrate this place. He has many "lessons learned" from the Howard and Ames situations, including how badly the CIA handled Howard's dismissal, how badly CIA handled Yuchenko, to include leaking his secrets to the press, how badly both CIA and FBI handled the surveillance on Howard, with too many "new guys" at critical points of failure; and most interestingly, how both DCI Casey and CIA counterintelligence chiefs Gus Hathaway (and his deputy Ted Price) refused to launch a serious hunt for Ames and specifically refused to authorize polygraphs across the board (although Ames beat a scheduled polygraph later). The author's accounting of the agent-by-agent losses suffered by the CIA as Howard, Ames, and Hansen took their toll, is absolutely gripping. The second story is that of Afghanistan, Pakistan, and how the anti-Soviet jihad nurtured by America and Pakistan ultimately turned back on both countries. It may help the reader of this book to first buy and read Milt Bearden's novel, "The Black Tulip," a wonderful and smoothly flowing account in novelized terms. From the primary author's point of view, it was Afghanistan, not Star Wars, that brought the Soviet Union to its knees. The primary author provides the reader with really superb descriptions of the seven key Afghan warlord leaders; of the intricacies of the Pakistani intelligence service, which had its own zealots, including one who launched jihad across in to Uzbeckistan without orders; into how the Stingers, and then anti-armor, and then extended mortars (with novel combinations of Geographical Information System computers and satellite provided coordinates for Soviet targets, all 21st century equipment that was quickly mastered by the Afghan warriors) all helped turn the tide. As America continues to fail in its quest to reconstruct the road of Afghanistan, having severely misunderstood the logistics and other obstacles, one of the book's sentences really leaps out: the supply chain to the rebels "needed more mules than the world was prepared to breed." This book is a collector's item and must be in the library of anyone concerned with intelligence, US-Soviet relations, Afghanistan, Pakistan, or Saudi funding of terrorism. It is a finely crafted personal contribution from someone who did hard time in the CIA, and made an enormous personal contribution, in partnership with the hundreds of CIA case officers, reports officers, all-source analysts, and especially CIA paramilitary officers (including Nick Pratt and Steve Cash, forever Marines). A few other books that complement this one: Thomas Allen & Norman Polmar, "Merchants of Treason", Ladislav Bittman, "The Deception Game", Vladimir Sakharov, "High Treason", Victor Sheymov, "Tower of Secrets," and Oleg Kalugin, "The First Directorate." There are many more but these are my favorites.
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13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Spy vs Spy in thrilling "Main Enemy, October 18, 2003
by Richard Sale, UPI Terrorism Correspondent The U.S.-Soviet war of spies was essentially a war about "denied areas" -- breaching those inner circles of government secrecy whose existence is existence is essential to national security and military supremancy. For both sides, this meant recruiting defectors in place -- agents with access to denied areas and who were spotted, conditioned, recruited and trained to betray their countries' vital information. (Sometimes they volunteered.) Since government's do not act on a single piece of information, an agent's production must be sustained over a signficant period of time, and it should go without saying that the value of the information is go reat that the recruiters will hazard almost any risk to get it. This brutal war of brains is the subject of a new classic of intelligence literature by Milt Bearden, a true CIA legend, and James Risen, a first-rate reporter on intelligence for the New York Times. Called, "The Main Enemy," the book opens in 1985, when the FBI and the CIA had suffered a series of disatrous losses among the Russians they had recruited. It is with intense disquiet that the reader comes to realize that top U.S. assets are one by one coming under the dominion of a dark power. Within a space of 15 months, like night lights in a distant village winking out, two dozen priceless Soviet spies working for America are recalled to Moscow, interrogated, and many shot in the back of the head in a KGB prison including a 65-year-old Russian grandfather Gen. Dmitri Polyakov or "TOPHAT," of the agency's and FBI's most irreplaceable and beloved sources. The book is built around a rough chronology of Bearden's career, which poses a narrative problem mainly because right in the middle of the spy hunt for moles, Bearden is pulled out of Washington and made head of CIA operations in Afghanistan to bolster anti-Soviet mujahideen fighters there. This is an arresting section of the book in which we view one colorful tableaux after the next. After the Russians are defeated Bearden returns to Washington and to his dismay finds that the probe for the mole who caused the losses is continuing but has lost its focus and become feeble. The climax comes when a CIA investigator helps to uncover Aldrich Ames, an agency traitor arrested in Februrary 1994. By 1990, communism had collapsed but questions about the mole remained. Many were answered when FBI agent Robert Hanssenis finally uncovered.But Bearden still believes that another extraordinary effective U.S. traitor is still at large and doing damage, and he sets out his case. It is a gripping book of extraordinary sweep and signifcance. In putting it together, Bearden and Risen have produced a work of the first distinction.
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17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
The CIA KGB Game, February 19, 2004
This is the story gathered through hundreds of interviews with both US and USSR players of the battle between the CIA and KGB in the closing days of the Cold War, 1985 through the collapse of the Soviet Union. Part I, Year of the Spy tells of the efforts to "turn" KGB agents, Government officials and high-ranking military and subsequent contacts by their American controllers. We're told of the constant surveillance of embassy officials, the training of new agents, tricks for eluding tails. Surprising to me was the involvement of spouses who often accompanied the agents on "runs" or otherwise aided the agents. In training there would be surprise arrests that would seem real to the agents, they would include a roughing up by FBI agents. The test for the agent was to hold back his CIA connection.
Starting in 1985 a string of our moles were arrested by the KGB. Despite ridicule of James Jesus Angleton whose paranoia about moles inside the CIA was legend, it appeared now that his paranoia was well-placed.
The luring of moles, their exchanges of money and information at drop points are covered from both sides. For example meticulous planning has gone into a "run," i.e., CIA meeting with a KGB agent to exchange money, needs, information. The story is told by the US agent arriving at the drop site, having shaken his KGB tail; the same story is then told by KGB officials who are setting him up and the capture of the spy (a scientist in this case).
Almost at the same time, June '85, Aldrich Ames was meeting in DC with his Russian handler, delivering to him the name of every spy he knew. He did this because John Walker, US Navy man, had been arrested in May as a Russian spy. Ames feared Walker had been fingered to the FBI by someone in the KGB that the CIA had previously "turned." He didn't want the same fate.
In their recruitment efforts the CIA always had to be on the alert for "dangles." These were spies trying to be double agents. Some of the Russians turned for money, some for ideology, a hatred for the Communist system. Edward Lee Howard was a CIA agent who was fired by the CIA and who betrayed us out of his anger over what he thought was unfair treatment. He eluded capture and escaped to Russia with help from his wife, his training in eluding tails, and the incompetence of the FBI.
There were constant turf wars between the FBI and CIA which sometimes got in the way.
Robert Hanssen (FBI) started spying in 1979. Among information turned over to the KGB was his revealing to them the spy tunnel under the Soviet embassy in DC.
There were many more tales of recruitment, capture and sometimes execution. Part II, Afghanistan. In December 1979 Russia invaded Afghanistan. They were fearful of the country coming under the sphere of the US, further completing the ring around the USSR.
When the British decided decades earlier to withdraw from Afghanistan, the cost of marching out was horrific, 16,000 men were reduced to 1 left standing
After the loss of 15,000 soldiers, in 1986 Gorbachev decided enough was enough. He wanted to get out, but how to do it without looking like the US in Vietnam or with the costs the British incurred.
US efforts helped Gorbachev reach his decision to exit. We had been pouring in money and arms. The destruction of a huge Russian arms depot was pivotal in firming up his mind as was the introduction of Stinger missiles and advanced anti-tank weapons, both of which produced spectacular results.
They managed the withdrawal at a minimum loss of life. Then began the tribal chiefs dislodging the puppet leader in Kabul and the jockeying amongst themselves for leadership. Part III, Endgame. The story here is the winding down of the Soviet Union, starting with tearing down the Berlin Wall, the role of the East German secret police, STASI and the interplay with the CIA. The dissolution of Reagan's Evil Empire, Hungary, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Rumania and the Baltic states; the fragility of the new Russia and its near fall to reactionary forces, the emergence of Yeltsin. Aldrich Ames was arrested in 1994 after 20 years of spying. A Russian agent provided enough information but no name, enabling the CIA to identify him. A group within the CIA had spent years trying to locate the leak that James Jesus Angleton was sure existed. Robert Hanssen was arrested in 2001 after 22 years of betrayal, his capture also aided by Russian agents. The author Milt Bearden was close to all the activities he recounts. He concluded after a thorough analysis of times and dates that there must be another mole yet to surface within the CIA. I found much of the book exciting. After all, this wasn't fiction; these were real people and events.
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