Spy Catcher: The Candid Autobiography of a Senior Intelligence Officer: Wright, Peter: 8601300362885: Amazon.com: Books

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Spy Catcher: The Candid Autobiography of a Senior Intelligence Officer Hardcover – July 31, 1987

by Peter Wright (Author)

414 ratings

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The former assistant director of MI5 offers an account of British Intelligence, including his work on the Ring of Five and exposing Soviet espionage and the conspiracy to oust Harold Wilson from the office of Prime Minister in the 1970s

Print length

392 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Viking Adult
Publication date

July 31, 1987
Dimensions

20 x 20 x 20 inches
ISBN-10

0670820555
ISBN-13

978-0670820559
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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Viking Adult; First Edition (July 31, 1987)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 392 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0670820555
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0670820559
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.44 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 20 x 20 x 20 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #421,455 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #14,970 in Politics & Government (Books)

Customer Reviews:
414 ratings

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Peter Wright

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Customer reviews

5 star		66%
4 star		19%
3 star		10%
2 star		2%
1 star		3%

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Top reviews from the United States

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I think this book helps explain why Philby really was allowed to run free .

Reviewed in the United States on September 8, 2022

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This book is not just about Philby he is only one actor . Peter Wright spent most of his service finding spies. And also admits that MI5 and MI6 were compromised with many soviet penetrations. The author seems to be honest about that and the way many of his brethren refused to believe the evidence and indicators there was a real internal problem . Wright said an interesting thing.. His family had hard times during the depression . He found it interesting that he never strayed away from faith in his country's Government but the affluent young college men, hardly affected by hardship of the 30s were seduced into the communist myth. The famous Cambridge 5 were not the only problem for the British. The author explains a number of reasons for the distrust the US had for British intelligence. This is somewhat Ironic as the US had its own penetrations. It seems both countries were not as good at spying as they thought.
I think the book is a good look at British and to a degree US intelligence after WW2. It is the first step to understanding how bad we got it and our probable misreading of many facts. One I suspect is Soviet spies got hold of the Government paper suggesting we should stand down the missiles in Turkey and rely on Polaris subs in the Mediterranean to protect the area. Khrushchev learned about this and realized he could leverage Cuba to get the missiles out of Turkey stifling his vocal opponents. The Missiles were outdated so the US wanted them gone.... but didn't want to offend Turkey . ( Which they did in the end fixing the crisis .)
Its a very good book on the subject and I wish I found sooner. I found it well written and always interesting.

One person found this helpful

Publisher@pkipress

Reviewed in the United States on September 17, 2022

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Amazon, soliciting feedback for this review, asks: "What did I use the product for??
Um, it's a book.
I use it for "reading." I apply past training to recognize these black marks on a white background and glean meaning from the way they are placed.

Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2016

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An excellent read. I'm currently wading through the book "Betrayal" by Chapman Pinker in which that author collaborated and engaged in many discussions with Peter Wright (author of this book). It's always darkly humorous when governments kick up a fuss and even ban a book such as this one from publication. There are many scenarios as to why governments do this. Many times it is because there is current and immediate potential scandal/embarassment they are keen to cover up, and causing a ruckus over so-called insider secrets being exposed in a book is an excellent way to remove the spotlight from their own current blunders. It is also incredibly humiliating to governments to admit they have been exposed to stupidity, covering up, blundering and ultimately ignoring the worst types of secret leaking. It is appalling for citizens and therefore taxpayers to read about the excessive amounts of money poured into "counter" espionage work. In the case of this book it is clear that the money was poorly spent since all the secrets so easily and flawlessly leaked to the Soviets (and who knows who else) came from the very head of MI5 himself. This book ostensibly deals with various elements of this type of work over many decades, but ultimately it deals with the fact that Roger Hollis was never outed as the head of a spy ring which did devastating damage to both Britain and the USA. Hollis was clearly the head "leak" and his superiors refused to do the work to prove this, remove him and admit the damage. It is understandable considering Blunt, Burgess, MaClean and the ultimate traitor Philby were all in their recent past. However their inexcusable folly in purposefully (in my opinion) ignoring this type of cover up is laughable in its worst ironic form. We therefore glean from so any books such as these, that all information the citizen can come across, whether from Snowdon etc. regarding government spying is good. It allows accountability which the public was not privy to at the time Hollis was in ultimate power. The hypocrisy of the spies themselves remains an amazing enigma in and of itself. While thriving in comfortable, freedom in Britain and enjoying taxpayer funded lifestyles and retirement, many, including Roger Hollis never left their soft lives for the motherland they so desperately wished to impose on everyone else. Good to know that when Kim Philby was forced to run to the Motherland after he was found out, his life was rather miserable and far from comfortable.

9 people found this helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Big jim

AN INNOCENT VICTIM OF THE SPYCATHERS.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 31, 2017

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As an Englishman who was for years a victim of the dirty tricks department of the British Secret Service, I was delighted to acquire a copy of Spycatcher from my contact in the USA while it was banned in the UK. When the book eventually became available in the UK, I was able to disclose how the Secret Service had interfered with my work as Chairman of British and overseas-based banking and trading companies and tried to ruin me as punishment for refusing to join their organisation as a double agent. I suggest that readers of Spycather should also study the relevant section of RAF LIBERATOR OVER THE EASTERN FRONT available from AMAZON BOOKS.

19 people found this helpful

spagbol

Tedious

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 1, 2021

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Sounds like a badly written and extremely boring Bond book.

One gets the impression that this is how MI5 wish to be portrayed rather than how they ARE.
If it were at all genuine I am sure it would have been stopped and Mr Righton shot.
It was permitted on the basis of satisfying public curiosity. For anyone who can bear to read it, they are made of sterner stuff than I am, and I have read Possession by AS Byatt and The Ragged Trousered Philathropists, which are also extremely long and tedious at times.

I have not finished it yet but I have been bought Christmas books far more interesting.

Doubtless it will travel to all sorts of hospital waiting rooms with me over the years.

2 people found this helpful

Mr.A.Gennard

Dreary detail; not a prosaic masterpiece.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on December 31, 2019

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To like about it is that it was the first time an insider had gone public about MI5 at a time when the Government neither confirmed or denied it existed. To this day I think no other insider has done it without approval. The downside is that it is technical about electronic apparatases and he can repeat himself. He was obsessed that Roger Hollis then head of MI5 was a Soviet double agent; he says less about Harold Wilson which is more what he is remembered for. It's worth reading as it is old now and cheap 2nd hand copies are available. Rather than divulging secrets of how the spooks operate it gives insight into the mentality of Wright and his associates although he left 40-odd years ago so the culture within that world may be very different now.

2 people found this helpful

John Longstaff

Fascinating!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 21, 2017

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Very interesting account of life in MI5 between WW2 until the 1970s. I’m amazed that this book was allowed to be published given the detailed accounts of dozens of (no doubt, ‘top secret’) security operations.

The main thrust of the book is the hunt for spies within the British security establishment. I thoroughly enjoyed it.

The author seems to have had a raw deal by the British government and that manifests itself in some fairly negative commentary which didn’t enhance the book.

Overall very enjoyable and a real eye opener!

9 people found this helpful

Nowun in Partikular

The original 'Snowden'.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on November 3, 2018

Verified Purchase

An excellent read if you're interested in what our intelligence services get up to, and extremely enlightening too - in a scary way!
In my eyes this almost feels like the beginnings of what we now call 'Big Brother', and I was amazed at just what our governments got up to back then. The stories of what MI5 & 6, the CIA and NSA were up to back in post WWII, and carrying on up until the 70s/80s, may +as they certainly did me - shock you (unless of course you're already in the know).

Spycatcher's modern day equivalent would be Snowden, which I can also recommend.
Big Brother really is out there...

4 people found this helpful

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