Ebook The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB, by James Risen

Ebook The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB, by James Risen

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The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB, by James Risen

Ebook The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB, by James Risen

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Review

ADVANCE PRAISE FOR THE MAIN ENEMY"Risen, the journalistic outsider, and Bearden, the clandestine insider, have combined their insight and knowledge to give us a compelling account of the last fierce days of Cold War machinations between Soviet and American intelligence. This is history very up close and very personal.” --Seymour M. Hersh"Fascinating stuff . . . an inside view of a complex world . . . it doesn't get any better than this. It's great." --Robert De Niro"Some study war from an armchair; others through field glasses. The best go into the firing line. Milt Bearden of the CIA was one of those. For those of us who recall the Cold War, this is fascinating stuff. For those who are too young, read and learn."--Frederick Forsyth, author of The Day of the Jackal and The Dogs of War

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From the Inside Flap

A landmark collaboration between a thirty-year veteran of the CIA and a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist, The Main Enemy is the dramatic inside story of the CIA-KGB spy wars, told through the actions of the men who fought them.Based on hundreds of interviews with operatives from both sides, The Main Enemy puts us inside the heads of CIA officers as they dodge surveillance and walk into violent ambushes in Moscow. This is the story of the generation of spies who came of age in the shadow of the Cuban missile crisis and rose through the ranks to run the CIA and KGB in the last days of the Cold War. The clandestine operations they masterminded took them from the sewers of Moscow to the back streets of Baghdad, from Cairo and Havana to Prague and Berlin, but the action centers on Washington, starting in the infamous "Year of the Spy"--when, one by one, the CIA’s agents in Moscow began to be killed, up through to the very last man.Behind the scenes with the CIA's covert operations in Afghanistan, Milt Bearden led America to victory in the secret war against the Soviets, and for the first time he reveals here what he did and whom America backed, and why. Bearden was called back to Washington after the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan and was made chief of the Soviet/East Euro-pean Division—just in time to witness the fall of the Berlin Wall, the revolutions that swept across Eastern Europe, and the implosion of the Soviet Union.Laced with startling revelations--about fail-safe top-secret back channels between the CIA and KGB, double and triple agents, covert operations in Berlin and Prague, and the fateful autumn of 1989--The Main Enemy is history at its action-packed best.From the Hardcover edition.

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Product details

Mass Market Paperback: 592 pages

Publisher: Presidio Press; Reprint edition (August 31, 2004)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 0345472500

ISBN-13: 978-0345472502

Product Dimensions:

4.2 x 1.3 x 6.9 inches

Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review:

4.3 out of 5 stars

99 customer reviews

Amazon Best Sellers Rank:

#29,803 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

This fascinated me on 2 levels. First, a thru-the-keyhole view of what life is like for agents in 'denied' areas, e.g., Moscow, and 2nd an insider's take on history as it was made.I never understood, until I read this book, why the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. All I could think was "Oh, are you SERIOUS?? THAT'S what they thought??"Think you want to live your Walter Mitty dream and become a CIA agent? Yeah, me too. I got over it. Fast.Beardon is a wonderful raconteur but he lived it, some people died and not all of them physically. This is not entertainment. It is history in literal flesh and blood. At the end, when he tells the fascinating story of meeting his Russian counterparts after the wall fell, it's hard to remember that these were the people who put bullets in the heads of people we were responsible for.And guess what? Walker, Howard, Ames, Hanson - it's an incomplete list. There's another one out there. They know it. They just can't quite......

I do understand that this book had to be vetted by the CIA and so therefore it probably omits things that are still considered to be classified. That being said, I found it to be thoroughly interesting. If nothing else I came away with the impression that the CIA and KGB were like opposing football teams that beat the bejeezus out of each other on the field and yet have great respect for each other. I was also surprised to see how much communication there could be between the two. While they might have seen each other as mortal enemies, they also behaved with each other on the basis of professionalism. Whether or not it really was that way, I don’t know. But that’s the impression this book left with me. All-in-all, I recommend this book to anyone who wants a glimpse into how the CIA really operated. I give it 4 stars instead of 5 simply because I suspect that some things need be left unsaid.

At 536 pages, this reads like a novel covering the years 1985-1992, from CIA spy-versus-KGB spy, to Berlin Wall removal and USSR breakup, which dissolves the KGB. With Bearden as the CIA inside man and Risen as the journalist filling in gaps and KGB insiders filling in on the Russian side this book is difficult to put down. Traitors defect from both sides until there is little accomplished and both sides are tuning into CNN to get updates to the Russian collapse in early 1990's. Describing the 9 year Russian debacle in Afghanistan, along with US and Pakistan involvement is a major part of the book and also a major reason for Russia's bankruptcy. Bearden describes in some detail with real names how the CIA and KGB ran spies, dead drops, recruitment of opposing agents and a lot of other detail in the spy game. The biggest disappointment is how long it took to find the three main US traitors, Aldrich Ames, Robert Hanssen and Edward Howard with a fourth possible still unknown.

I must disclose that I am only 50% through this book and rate it five stars at this point. As a former counter-intelligence agent with the U. S. Army during the mid-50's, I have been, and always will be, very interested in the intelligence game between the U. S. and Russia.. At this point in the book, I definitely assess the content to be factual, i. e. a true account of what went on during the Cold War with respect to intelligence gathering, disinformation dissemination, propaganda, and decision-making both sides. Many mistakes were made by both governments and their intelligence agencies. The book also gives you an accurate insight into how Russia became involved in the Afghanistan war and our response to it. An ongoing conflict to this day as you know. I look forward to finishing the book and likely will do a follow up review at that time. I predict I will still rate it five stars and recommend the read at this time.Have finished the book. As predicted in my initial review above, overall I rate this book as an Amazon 5-star read. Among many other things, it gives you factual insight into the Berlin Wall, its subsequent destruction, the failure of Russia's invasion of Afghanistan, and the fall of the Soviet Union. A fascinating historical account of the intelligence game that went on between the United States and Russia during the Cold War.

This is an excellent work...almost too good! It seems that at the end of the Cold War, CIA rather naively agreed to the publishing of this book - which features operational details which had they been written about only 5 years earlier, would have earned a jail sentence. I couldnt help thinking as I turned its pages that the SVR/FSB also really enjoyed reading this book - heck, they even allowed Bearden to use the digraph/crypts of the assets! like GTTophat, etc. Apparently Bearden was one of those officers who sort of "lost it" at the end of the Cold War - a professional, Russian speaking officer that suddenly became a polyanna type the minute the Cold War ended.....The Russians were going to be our friends, kumbaya......I guess he kind of ignored about 1000 years of Russian history. And now, of course, we have seen the reversion to the mean with good old Russia.......

Rarely can an autobiographic author get out of their own way and accept some help. It is also rare that a co-author, even a knowledgeable one can preserve the authenticity of the stories participants. The authors were able to accomplish both in this story. They used good judgement as to the right level of detail to promote understanding without becoming tedious. I am not in the intelligence field, but I was able to appreciate the characters and stories. The authors seemed to resist the urge to sensationalize, be too proud or too humble in a way that would reduce their credibility. If the topic is of interest, I highly recommend this book. I would liken it to a Michael Shaara work in the sense that it is factual, but reads like a novel.

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