Amazon.com: Customer reviews: The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War

Reviewed in the United States on September 23, 2018

A truly superb work of true life spy craft. Other reviewers have more than adequately outlined the content of this work. I will just comment on my continued amazement at how during the Cold War so many liberals in the West were Soviet apologists blaming the West for all the world's problems. In the UK particularly, so many in the Labour Party took money from Moscow while undermining democratic institutions. The Soviet Union was a hell hole from beginning to end. How anyone could support it in any way is inexplicable.

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Splendid history & a gripping read

Reviewed in the United States on October 14, 2018

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The Spy and The Traitor is touted in its subhead as "the greatest espionage story ever told." That isn't just publisher hype. The real events and the story of Oleg Gordievsky, KGB officer and diplomat reads like something from a John LeCarre or Robert Ludlum story...except it's true and marvelously documented. Raised by a father and older brother who both served devotedly and unquestioningly in the KGB (dad worked through Stalin's purges and survived in the KGB's precursor agency). Loyalty to the service then would seem to be a given--betraying the agency and its million members (you read that right) would be like sabotaging the family's business. Yet events and history continue to flummox human expectations.

First the invasion of Hungary, then the erection of the Berlin Wall (which Gordievsky was present to see) and finally the brutal crushing of the Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia all drove this KGB officer further and further away from the party. Exposure to the West in Copenhagen and later in London provided a first hand taste of liberty and freedom. It served as the final push into the eager and eternally grateful arms of his M16 handlers. The double agent provided them with not merely a trove of concrete information but invaluable insight into the workings of the KGB and planning of the Soviet Leadership. It is no exaggeration to say Gordievsky was our Kim Philby. The details of these meetings, contacts, "drops", etc. and how spies operated from the end WWII until the dissolution of the Soviet empire is fascinating and novelistic in the telling. Gordievsky's escape or "exfiltration" from the USSR by M16 is nothing short of breathtaking--a Bourne Identity moment.

Best of all though is the historical and moral context that gives readers a perspective of events' meanings. Ben McIntyre is a masterful storyteller and detailed chronicler. He thoroughly but concisely points out the import and value of Grodievsky's insights--particularly warning the Brits and thereby the Americans that the Soviet leader Yuri Andropov genuinely believed the West was intent upon a first nuclear strike. Appreciating that paranoia can be as perilous as animus, first Thatcher and then Reagan worked to assuage Soviet fears. It was Gordievsky who prepped both sides for successful summits in the 80s and it was he who counseled wisely to neither disband nor include the USSR in the SDI or Star Wars initiative. Rather, ratchet up the pressure and they would go bankrupt trying to keep up, which is precisely what happened.

Gordievsky certainly didn't single handedly end the cold war--there were dozens of events and officials who played a significant role. But Oleg Gordievsky was surely in the first rank of those who made a valuable contribution earning the appreciation of Reagan, Thatcher, the CIA, M16 and yes, QEII (the monarch, not the ocean liner). Best of all, McIntryre doesn't put a patriotic gloss on his subject's behavior. What Gordievsky did was of enormous benefit to democracy and the West but it destroyed his marriage, implicated his wife and children as well as family and friends who all paid some price for his defection. In short, his actions both saved and ruined lives and the choices he made can be rightfully regarded as both morally defensible and appalling or enraging to those who knew him. Unsurprisingly, his marriage failed and most Russian friends regard him with disdain and disgust. In the western intelligence community he is a hero.

This is terrific, important history and a wonderfully well-told tale. Enjoy!

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Dave Gibbs

Ben Macintyre - the LeCarre of Non-Fiction

Reviewed in the United States on September 18, 2018

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I thought I had read all the important main books on the Cold War, but Ben Macintyre comes through and gives us a true life narrative of one of the West's greatest heroes - Oleg Gordievsky. A man who helped, particularly the UK, inform the goings on of the KGB and all the Boris and Natasha's and helped hasten the end of that nasty politik.

This would be best read in the autumn on a train in the UK. Knowing that something good came out of all this, after all. Ben Macintyre probably will be sitting behind you. He has your back covered.

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Mrs. Thatcher's Spy

Reviewed in the United States on October 10, 2018

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It is not for nothing that John Le Carre noted in a front cover blurb “the best true spy story I have ever read.” Ben Macintyre’s biography of KGB Colonel and MI6 spy Oleg Gordievsky reads like a novel. His description of Gordievsky’s exfiltration from Moscow by MI6 under the watchful eyes of the KGB has all the hallmarks of a tension-packed Hollywood spy drama and that alone is worth the price of the book.

The story begins with Gordievsky growing up as the son of a KGB general who becomes disillusioned with life under Soviet communism. He follows in his father’s footsteps and is recruited by the KGB. He is initially stationed in Denmark and there he is willingly recruited by MI6. As he rises in the KGB bureaucracy he become ever more important to the British. Along the way he marries, divorces remarries and has two daughters.

Where Gordievsky enters history is when he becomes a senior political officer in the KGB’s London rezindentura in the early 1980s. While there he reports to his MI6 handlers that the Soviets actually believed that the United States was going to launch a first strike on the Soviet Union. So paranoid is KGB head and future general secretary Yuri Andropov that he sets up Operation RYaN to find evidence of plans for a first strike. As in most bureaucracies the KGB spies produce such evidence thereby exacerbating his paranoia. The same thing happened with the CIA when it was ordered to look for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq twenty years later.

Compounding the problem was that at about the same time in 1983 NATO ordered up its massive Able Archer exercise which was a practice drill to deter a Soviet invasion of Western Europe. To the Russians it looked like a precursor to war. It was Gordievsky who tells the British of the Russian fears who then relay that information to the CIA. Several authors have noted that had not both sides deescalated, nuclear war was on the table. Gordievsky’s information to both
Thatcher and Reagan was influential in bringing about from the de-escalation.

As the Soviet heir apparent, Gorbachev met with Margaret Thatcher in London in 1984. Here Gordievsky’s role is crucial because be briefed both Thatcher and Gorbachev as MI6 spy and KGB political officer on negotiating strategy. The meeting was a big success and Thatcher noted that Gorbachev was a man she could do business with. The end of the Cold War was now more than a pipe dream. Later, after his exfiltration, Gordievsky meets with Reagan to advise him on negotiating strategy for an upcoming meeting with Gorbachev.

But wait, what caused Gordievsky to be exfiltrated from Moscow, especially after he was made the Rezident of the KGB’s London office? In very short form the CIA is jealous of MI6 and wants to know who their source is. They soon find out and his name ends up on the desk of Aldrich Ames who was selling secrets to KGB officers in Washington. His betrayal leads to the death of scores of CIA operatives and sources in Russia and ultimately to the KGB investigation of Gordievsky. In Macintyre’s view Ames is a traitor who sold out his country for big bucks and Gordievsky is an honorable spy seeking to better his country.

This is a great book that I couldn’t put down and I highly recommend it. As an added plus you learn quite a bit of tradecraft.

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T Hoffmann

Outstanding, interesting read; masterfully told story

Reviewed in the United States on October 1, 2018

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It is rare that any book keeps my interest through the entire story, but this is one of them. Because the story is true, it is better than even the best spy novel with made up characters and plot contrivances. Here everything was real and in many instances Oleg's life depended on decisions made by his handlers. The real-life spy dramas are one of my favorite genres. By the end of the book, I really felt sorry for Oleg's wife and daughters, who through no fault of their own, ended up in a nightmare when Oleg left them behind in Russia only to be retrieved 6 years later with disastrous results.

I'll be reading A Spy Among Friends next, which I hear is even better.

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Hammarhead

Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold War

Reviewed in the United States on September 21, 2018

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After a slow start ‘Spy & Traitor’ lives up to its billing. At first I was put off because of all those Russian names, especially the full name for Gord... Once passed that difficulty the remarksble story is one of the best true spy stories I’ve read. Soooo when will they make a movie of this spy vs spy true story ?

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Lan the Answer Man

Not A Spy Among Friends But Still Masterful

Reviewed in the United States on September 29, 2018

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I just finished Ben Macintyre's latest, The Spy and the Traitor, about Oleg Gordievsky, a senior KGB officer who for years spied for MI6 and, for a brief time, became the head of the KGB station in London, the highest ranking Russian spy working for the Brits, before he was outed by events and the American traitor Aldrich Ames.

This isn't of the same calibre as Macintyre's A Spy Among Friends. That's mostly because Gordievsky and his KGB cohorts simply are not as interesting or colorful as Kim Philby and friends. But Macintyre is the master of espionage research and reporting, the John Le Carré of spy non-fiction. I recommend this and anything he writes.

Gordievsky, by the way, is still alive and living under an assumed identity in a London suburb.

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Debra Anderson

Excellent!

Reviewed in the United States on September 27, 2018

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Enjoyed this very much, so engrossing and informative. More suspenseful than any spy novel. The Putin references are quite fascinating and this book is a great reminder of his being once and forevermore a KGB agent with all that entails.

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Paul V. Troy

Too much unnecessary detail.

Reviewed in the United States on January 6, 2020

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The story is very interesting and well researched. Author Macintyre tries to dazzle the reader with an
overwhelming quantity of extraneous and trivial details. This is his writing style and the second of his books
that I have read. Because of this, I will not read any more of his work. This book is too long by about 100 pages.

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Boerseun

Well Researched, Well Presented

Reviewed in the United States on July 3, 2021

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Its almost as if the British learnt something from the KGB, to play the long game like the KGB did with Philby, and masterfully beat the KGB, vindicating the British over the infamous Cambridge Spies. It is clear that Gordievsky's information assisted the west to bring down the house of cards and the USSR unraveled quickly. One difference though between the then then USSR and the West is that Russia today under Putin is no walk over, and it seems that Russia's undermining of western institutions are going strong, clearly showing the democratic fault-lines. Looking at the cold war, battle for the spies then the Soviets did win in the end, the Cambridge 5's damage is lasting and with Brexit behind the UK they have no "genuine" Commonwealth left. Imagine if the British could have left an an Africa without Amin, Mugabe and the corrupt Kenyatta's then perhaps the Commonwealth would have been a family. Britain sadly is now on its own and to survive will basically become an American Vassal.

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