Description
Book SynopsisIn 1998, Chief Historian of the Foreign Office Gill Bennett was commissioned by Foreign Secretary Robin Cook to get to the bottom of a mystery that had haunted the Labour Partyand British politics more generallyfor over seventy years. This is the story of what she discovered.
Trade ReviewA suspenseful and illuminating peek behind the veiled layers of secrecy underlying Western and Soviet intelligence operations * FOREWORD Reviews *
Authoritative, absorbing, scrupulously researched. * Tony Barber, The Financial Times *
In her vivid account of her bid to ascertain the real origins of the Zinoviev epistle, Gill Bennett provides many fascinating new details of this tangled episode. * The Economist *
In an age of "fake news", when the Zinoviev Letter continues to be used as shorthand for establishment skulduggery, historians have an important role in separating myth from fact, even if many of those facts are, frustratingly, far from clear. This book is a timely addition to that cause. * Giles Udy, The Times *
A well-written, scrupulously researched and argued account of an enduring mystery that neatly illustrates the haphazard interactions of politics, bureaucracy and history. In the absence of further new evidence, this book is as close as we're likely to get to a definitive account. * Alan Judd, The Spectator *
[A] superb book, a compelling mixture of history, anecdote and historiography ... Bennett tells a story that could have been a plot from an Ealing comedy, featuring a motley crew of retired services types and chancers, cynical Foreign Office mandarins, inept politicians, intriguing Bolsheviks and dispossessed White Russians ... [a] careful and scrupulous study. * Simon Heffer, Literary Review *
A fascinating book. * Paul Donnelley, The Express *
Bennett does an excellent job of weaving the complicated subplots, scandals and tales of incompetence into an engrossing narrative. * Dan Lomas, International Affairs *
This is an excellent analysis of a subject of perennial interest. It repays the attention of anyone interested in interwar British politics and intelligence, as well as the wider, fascinating, and occasionally murky world of the postrevolutionary Russian diaspora. It is a significant work. * Andrew Thorpe, Journal of Modern History *
Bennett's story is fascinating. * Duncan Bowie, Chartist *
This is a substantial and authoritative history of one of the most controversial and long-lasting items of "fake news" ever published. * Ian Mitchell's Book Recommendations *
Did Gill Bennett, the Miss Marple of secret service archives, have a premonition when setting out to write this fascinating book, that current events would shape its market? The Zinoviev Letter has the lot - possible subversion of a Western democratic election, forged documents, fake news, clandestine networks and an array of characters straight out of Central Casting. The ultimate mystery of who wrote the 1924 letter, which was read round the world, still remains. But Gill Bennett's account is the closest we have got so far to finding out who did what, with what and for whom. * Lord Peter Hennessy *
A brilliant, gripping dissection of the most famous 'fake news' in twentieth-century Britain and its dramatic impact on relations with Russia, British politics, and the intelligence services. * Christopher Andrew, Emeritus Professor of Modern and Contemporary History, University of Cambridge, and author of The Secret World: A History of Intelligence *
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations List of Abbreviations Introduction: The Impact of the Zinoviev Letter on British Politics 1: One Version of the Truth 2: In Search of the Red Letter 3: Enquiries and investigations, 1924-1925 4: The Plot Thickens, 1928-1929 5: The Philby Effect, 1960-1970 6: New Labour, New Investigation, 1998-1999 7: So Who Wrote the Zinoviev Letter, and Does it Matter? Conclusion: Good Conspiracy Theories Never Die Appendix: The Text of the Zinoviev Letter Notes Note on Archival Sources and Bibliography Picture Acknowledgements Index
