The American position on Russia during the First World War was defined by the same idealism that guided our relations with other countries. Woodrow Wilson and American leaders had hailed the Revolution of March 1917 as an expression of the true spirit of Russia, a harbinger of democracy. The Bolshevik revolt and the civil war that followed were, in their eyes, only temporary disturbances. Still, the growth of the new democracy would only prosper if the Russians could restore order to their beleaguered land. In this book Linda Killen examines a hitherto neglected instrument of American policy in Russia-the Russian Bureau of the War Trade Board. With support from the administration, the bureau was established by Congress in October 1918 as a public corporation with a fund of $5 million to facilitate trade between Russia and America, for government and business leaders thought that the Russians could be helped to resolve their problems with the income from trade. The bureau was also to assist in two areas essential to trade, stabilizing the currency and restoring the transportation system. With the signing of the peace treaty, however, the bureau as a wartime agency was dissolved in June 1919 and its work assigned to the State Department. As one of the first American attempts at foreign aid, the bureau's program was necessarily tentative, but Linda Killen shows that, as a specific case, the bureau offers an instructive example. It reveals a widespread ignorance of Russian affairs both in government and in business circles. More importantly, it demonstrates the fatal weakness of an idealistic policy that was blind to political realities. Perhaps, the bureau's most tangible "accomplishment" came when its $5 million were finally transferred to the Trans-Siberian Railroad to purchase new equipment. Yet, ironically, it was the hated Bolsheviks who benefitted from this aid when they seized Siberia and used the new equipment to restore the rail line to efficient operation. This detailed study of the Russian Bureau sheds new light on a turbulent and tragic area of American diplomacy. Unfortunately, the democratic Russia that Wilson sought to help may never have existed except in his mind and never came to be.
Surveying the expanding conflict in Europe during one of his famous fireside chats in 1940, President Franklin Roosevelt ominously warned that "we know of other methods, new methods of attack. The Trojan horse. The fifth column that betrays a nation unprepared for treachery. Spies, saboteurs, and traitors are the actors in this new strategy." Having identified a new type of war--a shadow war--being perpetrated by Hitler's Germany, FDR decided to fight fire with fire, authorizing the formation of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) to organize and oversee covert operations. Based on an extensive analysis of OSS records, including the vast trove of records released by the CIA in the 1980s and '90s, as well as a new set of interviews with OSS veterans conducted by the author and a team of American scholars from 1995 to 1997, The Shadow War Against Hitler is the full story of America's far-flung secret intelligence apparatus during World War II. In addition to its responsibilities generating, processing, and interpreting intelligence information, the OSS orchestrated all manner of dark operations, including extending feelers to anti-Hitler elements, infiltrating spies and sabotage agents behind enemy lines, and implementing propaganda programs. Planned and directed from Washington, the anti-Hitler campaign was largely conducted in Europe, especially through the OSS's foreign outposts in Bern and London. A fascinating cast of characters made the OSS run: William J. Donovan, one of the most decorated individuals in the American military who became the driving force behind the OSS's genesis; Allen Dulles, the future CIA chief who ran the Bern office, which he called "the big window onto the fascist world"; a veritable pantheon of Ivy League academics who were recruited to work for the intelligence services; and, not least, Roosevelt himself. A major contribution of the book is the story of how FDR employed Hitler's former propaganda chief, Ernst "Putzi" Hanfstengl, as a private spy. More than a record of dramatic incidents and daring personalities, this book adds significantly to our understanding of how the United States fought World War II. It demonstrates that the extent, and limitations, of secret intelligence information shaped not only the conduct of the war but also the face of the world that emerged from the shadows.
It is never possible to return literally to times and events of the past. Even places revisited will not be the same as they were. But we can, at least to some extent, go back in our minds. In trying to capture some of the past and record for posterity my lifetime of adventures, I find that my memory has been stretched more than I thought possible. The mind is a funny thing, and time is slippery stuff, but someone has said that we remember more than we think we do; that years after the fact, one day things fall into place and we say, "Ah yes, I remember that well.
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