The Mitrokhin Archive II: The KGB in the World - Softcover

Andrew, Christopher

4.06

540 ratings by Goodreads

9780140284881: The Mitrokhin Archive II: The KGB in the World

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0140284885 ISBN 13: 9780140284881

Publisher: Penguin, 2006

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The second sensational volume of 'One of the biggest intelligence coups in recent years' (The Times)

When Vasili Mitrokhin revealed his archive of Russian intelligence material to the world it caused an international sensation. The Mitrokhin Archive II reveals in full the secrets of this remarkable cache, showing for the first time the astonishing extent of the KGB's global power and influence.

'The long-awaited second tranche from the KGB archive ... co-authored by our leading authority on the secret machinations of the Evil Empire' Sunday Times

'Stunning ... the stuff of legend ... a unique insight into KGB activities on a global scale' Spectator

'Headline news ... as great a credit to the scholarship of its author as to the dedication and courage of its originator' Sunday Telegraph

'There are gems on every page' Financial Times

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Review:

Derived from 30,000 top-secret files of the KGB's Foreign Intelligence Service, The Mitrokhin Archive has sparked controversy in Whitehall and Fleet Street. It has also made Melita Norwood--Britain's grandmother-spy--an overnight media celebrity. This huge book is the result of a collaboration between Vasili Mitrokhin, a former senior officer of the Soviet Foreign Intelligence Service, and Christopher Andrew, Professor of Modern and Contemporary History and Chair of the Faculty of History at Cambridge University.

Mitrokhin defected to the UK in 1992, bringing with him notes and classified files he had smuggled out of the Soviet foreign intelligence archives. The authors reveal that Norwood was more highly valued by the Soviets as a spy than the more famous Kim Philby. She passed on technical information that had enabled the Russians to build their own atomic bomb. As an employee at the British Non- Ferrous Metals Research Association, she passed on top- secret files on the Tube Alloys (atomic bomb) project. But Norwood was not alone in being approached to spy for the Soviets--others were MPs Tom Driberg and Raymond Fletcher. The book also records a misguided attempt at recruiting Sir Harold Wilson.

The soviets may have been masters at collecting intelligence, but The Mitrokhin Archive shows their inability to interpret the information they received. It's an exhaustive but riveting read--and there's a promise of a second volume. --Susan Sheph

Synopsis:

"The Mitrokhin Archive II" reveals for the first time the full extent of the KGB's global penetration, exposing its operations in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East. For a quarter of a century the KGB believed that the Third World was the arena in which it could win the Cold War. 'The world,' claimed Moscow, 'was going our way.' This book discloses the KGB's secret contacts with a series of world leaders, among them Castro, Allende, Nasser, Saddam Hussein and Mengistu, as well as with terrorist hijackers and communist parties around the globe. It also shows the enormous resources devoted, with varying degrees of success, to trying to determine the course of events in countries as different as India (the main force for KGB active measures in Asia) and Afghanistan (where the KGB took the lead in the Soviet invasion). The revelations range from the shocking to the absurd - Soviet agents assessing the spread of their great rival, Chinese communism, by counting the changing number of Mao Zedong posters in Africa - and take the story all the way to the disintegration of the Eastern Bloc.

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