The Spy Next Door: The Extraordinary Secret Life of Robert Philip Hanssen, the Most Damaging FBI Agent in U.S. History [Hardcover]

Elaine Shannon (Author), Ann Blackman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 2, 2002

A shocking, fascinating account of one of the greatest espionage scandals of our time. Ann Blackman and Elaine Shannon reveal the truth about Robert Hanssen and his 15 years of exceptionally destructive espionage. They brilliantly explore why Hanssen decided to betray his family, his church and his country, and how he got away with it.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

The focus of this intriguing story is Robert Hanssen, an unassuming man here labeled "the most damaging FBI agent in U.S. history." Pretending to be a religious family man who hated communism, Hanssen used his top-secret clearance to gain information on the activities of FBI agents and double agents in Moscow secrets he leaked to the Soviets over the years for a total of $470,000. His betrayal is linked to the execution of at least three U.S. spies. Only a plea bargain saved him from a death sentence. Drawing on information gathered from more than 150 interviews with Hanssen's friends, neighbors, colleagues, lawyers, professors, classmates, roommates, psychiatrists, and priests, Time reporters Shannon and Blackman provide an in-depth analysis of a hypocritical man consumed with possessing power over others. Vise's The Bureau and the Mole provides greater context for Hanssen's eventual downfall. Recommended for criminal justice collections and large public libraries. Tim Delaney, Canisius Coll., Buffalo
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

The story of FBI special agent Bob Hanssen was told in David Vise's The Bureau and the Mole [BKL D 15 01], and now the story of this spy extraordinaire is retold, this time by two Time magazine reporters. In February 2001, Hanssen was arrested as a double agent for Russian intelligence after what turned out to be the biggest sellout of U.S. national security secrets in the long history of the FBI. The version of the story presented here is based on extensive interviews, many with people who have not spoken about Hanssen before, and the emphasis is on how the FBI tracked a mole, found out who he was, and laid a trap for him. Interesting, too, is the authors' account of FBI culture under J. Edgar Hoover and the differences and similarities in post-Hoover days. Calling Hanssen the "quintessential suburban dad," the authors relate how this seemingly innocuous and, frankly, rather boring man transformed himself into "one of the most damaging spies ever to work against the United States." Having access to intelligence and counterintelligence and making the decision to sell what he knew time and time again was, apparently, a way for this chronic "outsider" to exert power. The two books taken together cover every detail and nuance of the case. Buy wherever the first one proved popular. Brad Hooper
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Little, Brown and Company; First Edition edition (January 2, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0316718211
• ISBN-13: 978-0316718219
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (28 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,288,545 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The best by far!, February 8, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: The Spy Next Door: The Extraordinary Secret Life of Robert Philip Hanssen, the Most Damaging FBI Agent in U.S. History (Hardcover)

I just finished the two Hanssen books, this one and The Bureau and the Mole, and there is no comparison. I heard a lot from Vise on the radio, but his book is essentially a quickie padded with psychobabble guessing about Hanssen's thoughts and motives. Vise has a few sexy stories and fills around them with chapters of inexplicable praise for Louis Freeh, who must have helped Vise a lot to get such favorable treatment himself when he was being drummed out of the FBI. The Spy Next Door, on the other hand, is carefully researched and beautifully written. The authors work hard trying to explain why anyone with Hanssen's all-American background would commit such heinous crimes, but in the end, they refuse to speculate, laying out what they learned (a lot) and stopping before they go too far. It's a sad tale, but an important one. An easy read, too. Highly recommended.

20 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Latest Spy . . . . But Probably Not the Last, February 3, 2002

By 

William Holmes "semloh2287" (Portland, OR USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Spy Next Door: The Extraordinary Secret Life of Robert Philip Hanssen, the Most Damaging FBI Agent in U.S. History (Hardcover)

Shannon and Blackman have written an interesting book about the career of Robert Philip Hanssen, the FBI "mole" who was arrested in February 2001 for spying for the KGB and its successors.

The authors' prose is clear and crisp, and in the end they settle for a "just the facts, ma'am" approach to the story. The book discusses Hanssen's childhood, education, career with the FBI, religious convictions, sexual fantasies, as well as the secrets he betrayed. Hanssen emerges as a study in contradictions: a vocal anti-Communist who spies for the Soviet Union; a devout Catholic who sells vital secrets to an atheist government; an apparent prude who patronizes a stripper and posts odd fantasies about his sex life on the Internet.

Hanssen betrayed everything that he claimed was important to him--his wife, his family, his friends, his religion, and his country. But the motive for his horrendous crimes, which he committed over the course of more than twenty years, is anything but clear. I would have loved it if this book had had more to say about the psychology of a spy, but it didn't. How can someone like Hanssen wake up and go to work every morning, knowing what he's risking and what he's done? Why doesn't the contradiction between his public image and his life cause him to break down? Is he able to compartmentalize things, so that the "good" Hanssen can live his life while the "bad" Hanssen" lives a lie? Is he just a sociopath, who doesn't really care about anyone or anything but himself? Maybe the FBI's own behavioral science unit will weigh in on this subject one day, but Shannon and Blackman don't venture down this dangerous trail. For better or worse, they describe "what" Hanssen is without really explaining "why" he is.

Another gap in the book is that, apart from a few generalizations, it doesn't address why the FBI and CIA seem so incompetent when it comes to catching spies (not that the KGB comes off looking a whole lot better). Perhaps the problem is that resources aren't allocated well, or that FBI and CIA personnel aren't trained to recognize the behavioral patterns of a spy--whatever the reason, the book largely leaves that problem to the reader's imagination.

The thing that should really strike you about this book is the realization that, for the last 25 years, there has always been at least one--usually several--moles who are busily selling vital American secrets. And those are just the ones that we know about. There is no obvious reason to think that there aren't just as many spies today as there have been in the last two decades. A book like this cries out for an explanation: what, if anything, are the FBI and the CIA doing to make sure that a disaster like Hanssen doesn't happen again?

32 of 38 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Another Rush Job and It Shows!, January 3, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: The Spy Next Door: The Extraordinary Secret Life of Robert Philip Hanssen, the Most Damaging FBI Agent in U.S. History (Hardcover)

I've been fascinated by the Hanssen spy case since it came to light early last year. Yet it amazes me that three books about Hanssen have already surfaced: this one, Vise's "The Bureau and the Mole," and Havill's "The Spy Who Stayed Out in the Cold." To be blunt, all three are "quicky paperback books" dressed up as serious hardbacks. Anybody who wants to know the whole truth or anything near it is going to have to wait for years for it to come out.

This fact is painfully evident in Shannon and Blackman's book. There are several flaws to it that are evident with just a quick scan (I'm still reading it):

1. Omission: In Vise's equally poor quality book, he states a very important fact, that Hanssen's brother-in-law, a fellow FBI agent, reported him in 1990 as a person living well beyond his means. That is a red-flag indicator that someone in a sensitive job like an FBI counterintelligence specialist (as Hanssen was) may have gone wrong. Incredibly, according to Vise, the FBI did nothing with this tip. Yet a search of the text and index of Shannon and Blackman's book makes no mention of this incident or even the name of the FBI agent who reported him (maybe I missed it, or the authors discounted it, but it should have been mentioned!).

2. Sourcing: Just like Vise, the authors don't deign to detail the "extensive research" that they conducted in the few short months since Hanssen's arrest. Instead, they expect us to take it for granted that their research was great without giving us the bibliography and endnotes that let us test that assumption. I'll give an example. On page 80, Shannon and Blackman state the following about Hanssen's personality:

"He didn't know what [his fellow FBI agents] spoke about when out at the bars and strip clubs, but maybe it was about him --maybe that was all they ever talked about. Hanssen had spent his life pressing his face up against the glass . . . more than anything he wanted power --real power, which to [Hanssen] meant the power to humiliate others."

Now, how do Shannon and Blackman know this? They didn't interview Hanssen (he hasn't even been sentenced yet!!). Are they mind-readers? Somehow, I suspect that this passage is the opinion of a psychiatrist (one of those that they interviewed). What's the harm in saying that in a footnote??

This is surprising to me because Shannon is capable of superb research (I don't know anything about Blackman). I have read her book about the 1985 murder of a DEA agent in Mexico. She took well over two years to write it and included 15 pages of endnotes. Yet the diligence shown in that book is absent in "The Spy Next Door."

3. Style of Research: In their very brief description of sources, the authors state that they made "dozens of written requests" for help from Hanssen's wife, his family, and Mrs. Hanssen's attorney. I'm sorry, but I think that "dozens of written requests" constitute pestering people and is not worthy of journalists of Shannon and Blackman's apparent caliber. After the first few rejections, this duo should have taken the hint and moved on.

I close this review out with the fervent hope that Peter Earley is working on a book about this case. He did the definitive one on Aldrich Ames (arrested in 1994 but the book only came out in 1997). Earley got Ames' cooperation, those of his colleagues, and incredibly some of his Russian handlers. Furthermore, he gives a precise account of his sources by chapter and a bibliography (both of which are sadly lacking in "The Spy Next Door").

To sum up, I'm sorry I bought this book but glad that I at least got it at a steep discount. I wouldn't recommend that anyone shell out the bucks to buy a brand new hardback copy. They should wait a year or two and get the paperback on the remainder shelves.