Freemantle, Brian. KGB: Inside the World's Largest Intelligence Network. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1982.
Rocca and Dziak: "Marred by serious factual errors."
Hingley, Ronald. The Russian Secret Police: Muscovite, Imperial Russian and Soviet Political Security Operations. London: Hutchinson, 1970. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1971.
Pforzheimer reports that Hingley covers from Ivan the Terrible to the 1970s. Although he adds "no new insights or interpretations," the book is "well written" and "provides good background reading." Rocca and Dziak say that this book "is generally reliable and is one of the few works available covering such a broad time frame."
Knight, Amy. The KGB: Police and Politics in the Soviet Union. London: Unwin Hyman, 1988. Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1990. Revised ed. Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1990.
Mapother, IJI&C 3.1, says this book is a "scholarly enquiry" that "provides illuminating insights into the organization and development of the KGB." Commenting on the revised edition, Surveillant 1.1 notes the addition of a "new epilogue covering 1987-1989."
Levytsky, Boris. Uses of Terror: The Soviet Secret Police, 1917-1970. London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1971. New York: Coward, McCann & Geoghegen, 1972.
Rocca and Dziak: "Should be used with caution."
Lewis, Donald. Sexpionage: The Exploitation of Sex by Soviet Intelligence. New York: Harcourt Brace, 1976.
Constantinides: Although the operational use of sex is a legitimate topic for research, this book "can only be described as a potpourri of fact, rumor, and speculation."
Mennevee. Roger. Les Services Secrets Soviétiques: Evolution et Méthodes d'Action (1917-1957). Paris: Les Documents Politiques, Diplomatiques et Financiers, 1957.
Pforzheimer, Studies 6.2 (Spring 1962), identifies this as "a compilation from the monthly issues of Les Documents Politiques, Diplomatiques et Financiers, which chronicles disclosures of Soviet espionage activities" around the world.
Metzl, Lothar. "Reflections on the Soviet Secret Police and Intelligence Services." Orbis 18, no. 3 (Fall 1974).
Noel-Baker, Francis. The Spy Web: A Study of Communist Espionage. London: Batchworth, 1954.
Pforzheimer, Studies 6.2 (Spring 1962), notes that this work includes "the wartime Sorge case in Japan, the Canadian affair, the Vavoudes group in Greece, and the Andersson case in Sweden."
Popov, Georgii K. The Tcheka: The Red Inquisition. London: Philpot, 1925.
Richelson, Jeffrey
T. Sword and Shield: The Soviet Intelligence and Security Apparatus.
Cambridge, MA: Ballinger, 1986.
NameBase: "Political science professor Jeffrey Richelson is one of the few writers who treats the topic of Soviet intelligence with the detached thoroughness that it ultimately deserves.... Each of the[] 12 chapters has an average of 70 endnotes, frequently citing authors who are academic specialists on some aspect of the Soviet system."
Romerstein, Herbert, and Stanislav Levchenko. The KGB against the "Main Enemy": How the Soviet Intelligence Service Operates against the U.S. Lexington, MA: Lexington, 1989. [Chambers]
Rositzke, Harry. The KGB: The Eyes of Russia. Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1981.
For Rocca and Dziak, this book's "lack of documentation and some debatable assertions ... limit [its] utility."
Seth, Ronald. Unmasked: The Story of Soviet Espionage. New York: Hawthorne, 1965.
Kirkus Reviews calls this a "short course in the history of Russian espionage." However, "there are no hints at the sources. In spite of these enigmas, this book will interest the spy-novel readership with its plethora of fact."
Solovyov, Vladimir.
"Knowing the KGB." Partisan Review 49 (1982): 167-183.
Rocca and Dziak: "A most insightful, monitory appraisal."
Solovyov, Vladimir, and Elena Klepikova. Behind the High Kremlin Walls. New York: Dodd,
Mead, 1986.
A Publishers Weekly (1986) review notes that "[l]ike all gossip, this is hard to credit with certainty, especially since many of the sources relied on by Solovyov and Klepikova, former Russian journalists now living in Manhattan, are in the Soviet Union. Still, the authors ... seem to have access to reliable informants and there is much here to intrigue Eastern Europewatchers."
Thomas, Paul.
Le KGB en Belgique. Brussels: Editions J.M. Collet, 1987.
Huygens, IJI&C 2.3, describes this book as a "brief overview," that gives a "case by case exposé, usually too short, describing about twenty espionage affairs." To Stengers, I&NS 5.3, the book is "a competent [journalistic] compilation of Belgian and foreign press material.... Belgian spycatchers mainly belong to a civilian secret service, the Sûreté de l'Etat, about which Thomas gives some information."
Tsybov, C.I., and N.F. Chistyakov. Front Taynoy Voyny [The Front of Invisible War]. Moscow: Voyenizdat, 1964.
Cited in Schecter and Deriabin, The Spy Who Saved the World (1992).
U.S. Library
of Congress. Congressional Research Service. Soviet Intelligence and
Security Services. 2 vols. Washington, DC: GPO, 1972-1975. [Petersen]
Wise, David, and Thomas B. Ross. The Espionage Establishment. New York: Random House, 1967. London: Jonathan Cape, 1968. New York: Bantam Books, 1968. [pb]
Clark comment: This work garnered widespread attention when it was published, basically because it provided in a popular format information that many people had not previously seen. The authors discuss the espionage systems of the Soviet Union, Great Britain, the United States, and China, and present some relatively interesting material on Soviet illegals.
Pforzheimer says the book's "section on the CIA is weak; however the chapter on the British intelligence services reveals considerably more than had previously been published. Comments on the Chinese intelligence services and activities are of little or no value." The absence of source citations and a bibliography bothers Constantinides, but he still finds that the sections on the Soviet Union and Great Britain "are marked by some good material."
Wolin, Simon,
and Robert M. Slusser, eds. The Soviet Secret Police. New York: Praeger, 1957. London: Methuen, 1957. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1964.
Pforzheimer says this is "one of the better books on the Soviet intelligence and security services and a 'core' book essential to further study of the subject."
Wolton, Thierry.
Le KGB en France. Paris: Bernard Grasset, 1986.
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