Description
Book SynopsisStalin's American Spy tells the remarkable story of Noel Field, a Soviet agent in the US State Department in the mid-1930s. Lured to Prague in May 1949, he was kidnapped and handed over to the Hungarian secret police. Tortured by them and interrogated too by their Soviet superiors, Field's forced 'confessions' were manipulated by Stalin and his East European satraps to launch a devastating series of show-trials that led to the imprisonment and judicial murder of numerous Czechoslovak, German, Polish and Hungarian party members. Yet there were other events in his very strange career that could give rise to the suspicion that Field was an American spy who had infiltrated the Communist movement at the behest of Allen Dulles, the wartime OSS chief in Switzerland who later headed the CIA. Never tried, Field and his wife were imprisoned in Budapest until 1954, then granted political asylum in Hungary, where they lived out their sterile last years. This new biography takes a fresh look at Field's relationship with Dulles, and his role in the Alger Hiss affair. It sheds fresh light upon Soviet espionage in the United States and Field's relationship with Hede Massing, Ignace Reiss and Walter Krivitsky. It also reassesses how the increasingly anti-Semitic East European show-trials were staged and dissects the 'lessons' which Stalin sought to convey through them.
Trade Review'Sharp's gripping book provides the most detailed account of Noel Field, [whose] journey from a pro-communist Westerner to a pawn in Stalin's Hungarian show trials is unusual and enlightening... invaluable for gaining an insight into one of the many mysteries of the Cold War.' * Budapest Business Journal *
'Stalin's American Spy is a compelling piece of work. It is historically rich, and yet moves along like a novel. Noel Field can be seen as an emblem of the ideology war of the '30s and its lost history. Moving and impressive.' * Robert Dover, author of Learning from the Secret Past: Cases in British Intelligence History *
'This is a superb and original book in a much under-researched area. A fine work of history.' * Gerry Hughes, Lecturer in Military History, Aberystwyth University, and author of Britain, Germany and the Cold War: the search for a European Detente, 1949-1967 *
'This is the first truly authentic, comprehensive and factual analysis in English of the fascinating life of Noel Field, one of the most mysterious figures on Stalin's chessboard of spies, agents and stooges. The author's gripping account is more than a personal biography of a legendary figure. This book is also essential reading for understanding the world of Stalinist show trials and key chapters of the Cold War in Europe.' * Paul Lendvai, journalist and author of Hungary: Between Democracy and Authoritarianism and Austria: New Challenges, Old Demons *
