Spies in the Vatican: Espionage & Intrigue from Napoleon to the Holocaust (Modern War Studies) (Hardcover)

~ David Alvarez (Author)
Key Phrases: papal ciphers, conciliazione ufficiosa, papal secretariat, Soviet Union, Papal States, United States (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

A professor of politics at St. Mary's College of California and author of a study of WWII-era codes, Alvarez emphasizes diplomatic relations throughout much of this carefully considered blend of Vatican and intelligence history, though he does detail the careers of several spies and works in some cryptology. The opening chapter details the Vatican's cooperation with European monarchies against burgeoning revolutionary movements, as well as depicting the Italian police commissioner who spied on the pope for the Italian crown. The creation of an intelligence department in the Vatican by Umberto Benigni takes Alvarez to the beginnings of WWI, which found the nation courting Italy through the Vatican (Italy joined the Allies in mid-1915); the German spy Valente cuts a noteworthy figure here. After WWI, the Vatican covertly supported the Russian Orthodox Church against the newly founded Soviet Union. The Vatican's relations with Fascist Italy under Mussolini included the pope's support of anti-Nazi German resistance activities; Alvarez also recounts the activities of German agent Father Michael in staid tones. The best WWII story concerns Alexander Kurtna, a convert from the Russian Orthodox Church who studied at the Vatican and became a Soviet spy in 1940. As a double agent working for the Germans, Kurtna was arrested by the Italians, who thought he was only a Soviet agent, in 1942. Freed by the Germans in 1943, he worked for the Soviets while posing as a German agent in 1944, was arrested by the Italian government now allied with the Allies, released and ended up in a Soviet labor camp. The book's last section proposes that Allied governments knew of the Holocaust earlier than the Vatican did, a stance counter to most recent scholarship. While the title and subtitle indicate "trade book," most of the discussion builds on a footnoted case; casual readers will have to pick through to the few thrills.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

This well-documented study covers two centuries of espionage in the Vatican, including the Catholic Church's supposedly far-reaching intelligence network. Alvarez counters the popular perception of a powerful secret organization by arguing that the Church has little staff, expertise, funds, equipment, or even desire to participate actively in the secret world. The 19th century saw what was perhaps the Church's most active intelligence efforts, as it was beset by deadly political turmoil, threats against the Popes, and the elimination of the Papal States. In fact, most of the espionage activity seems to have involved other governments trying to ferret out what international policies the Popes would follow, but the Church's small, tight, close-mouthed bureaucracy has been its best defense. Naturally, the Vatican's controversial actions during World War II have garnered the most public interest, a period Alvarez covered in Nothing Sacred: Nazi Espionage Against the Vatican, 1939-1945. The author concludes that the Vatican recognizes its limitations and depends on the kindness of others for information and protection. This reviewer hopes for a similar volume on the postwar years. Suitable for the espionage collections of all libraries. (Index not seen.)-Daniel K. Blewett, Coll. of DuPage Lib., Glen Ellyn, IL
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: University Press of Kansas (October 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0700612149
• ISBN-13: 978-0700612147
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #1,014,785 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Well worth the read, January 6, 2003

By A Customer

Amazon Verified Purchase

Professor Alvarez has done his homework, although I do believe his presentation on how the Vatican has conducted its intelligence does not actually reflect the sometime morbid tone Vatican efforts sometimes undertook. I believe Profesor Alvarez could have been more helpful with the issue of the Croatians and the Vatican as to the terrible treatment of members of the Jewish faith there is concerned in WW II, and the terrible conduct that some clergy exhibited in Croatia. The Professor would have been well advised to look more into the role of members of the Sovereign Military Order of St. John Hospitaller, as some of its membership in WWII was of deep significance and use to the Vatican's overall intelligence attempts to understand and combat Facism and Nazism.

Alvarez has done yeoman work in sifting through mountains of material, and I congratulate his effort. For all interested in understanding how wrong Stalin was when he asked "How many legions has the Pope?", read Spies in the Vaticam. One may be surprised.

5 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Breaks with Conventional Wisdom; Provocative; Incomplete, July 26, 2003

By	Robert D. Steele (Oakton, VA United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)

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This is quite an extraordinary work. It seeks to correct the impression, held by Allen Dulles, many world leaders, and myself, that the Vatican, as with other select religious organizations like B'Nai Brith, is a world-class intelligence network.

Although the book spends as much time discussing efforts by the Italians, Germans, and others to penetrate the Vatican, as it does discussing the Vatican's mixed and often non-existent intelligence and counterintelligence capabilities, on balance this is an extremely good personal effort, based on some unique documents and research, and it can be regarded as a cornerstone for any future research into Vatican intelligence.

The book suggested to me three "big" ideas that need to be considered by every national intelligence service:

1) Structure and capabilties are needed to study religious intelligence and counterintelligence. Renegade mid-level drop-outs from the specified religious order should be identified and leveraged as required. Taking the Muslim brotherhood as an example (see Robert Baer's new book, SLEEPING WITH THE DEVIL), it is absolutely unforgivable and unprofessional of both the US Department of State and the Central Intelligence Agency to have been prevented from studying the fundementalist and extremist religious movements in Arabia from the 1970's forward. Bottom line: we need to have relgious "orders of battle" and a clear understanding of what this important international player has in the way of capabilities and perceptions.

2) Secure communications make a very important contribution to candor and accuracy. Perhaps the most interesting part of the author's story can be found in his many annecdotes about how lack of a secure communications system led to self-deception, fantasy, conspiracy, and inaccuracy. The author is also quite credible in discussing the mediocrity of most Papal cryptographic systems, the lack of manpower and resources for improving this, and the negative results that came about because of a lack of a reliable and truly trusted communications system.

3)Finally, while the author does not cover Vatican betrayals of its own people through the Inquisition, of Muslims through the Crusades, and of Jews during the Holocaust, it is clear from this book that for all its limitations, the Catholic Church is an important global player whose local nuncios and bishops and priests and lay personnel can and should be legally and ethically leveraged for sounder understandings across many cultural divides. I would go so far as to resurface Richard Falk's 1970's idea about a world council of peoples and religions, with a twist: each Foreign Ministry must establish a separate Bureau of Religious Understanding, and devote considerable resources to studying and interacting with religious organizations (and cults, although these can be dealt with on a confrontational law enforcement basis).

Religons are one of the seven tribes of intelligence (the others are national, military, law enforcement, business, academic, and NGO-media). The author has made a very important contribution here (albeit with no help from the publisher--the index *stinks*). This book is highly recommended for adult students of intelligence, for policy makers, for religous leaders, and for citizens interested in how their religious affiliation could be legally employed (or illegally abused) in the pursuit of a global information society.

2 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars I only made it through Chapter One, November 6, 2003

By A Customer

I got this book from the library and was pretty excited to start reading it. It's possible that most of the book is great, but I won't find out as I struggled to make it through the first chapter before returning it. That chapter is filled with nothing but long lists of "this guy did that" and "another guy did something else" that was boring, disconnected and pretty repetitive.

I guess it's possible the author felt he had to lay down the foundation for the rest of the book, but the first chapter was absolutely brutal to read.

If you're interested in the book, I'd suggest you skim (or even skip) the first 40 pages or so.