Shevchenko, Arkady N. Breaking with Moscow. New York: Knopf, 1985.
Shevchenko, Arkady N. Breaking with Moscow. New York: Knopf, 1985.
Pforzheimer notes that Shevchenko defected in 1978 from his position as UN Under Secretary General, after three years as a CIA agent-in-place. This is an "excellent and important book, certainly one of the best of recent defector memoirs." He makes many "valuable comments on the roles of the KGB and GRU.... Beyond this, Shevchenko presents a worthwhile study of Soviet policy and how it is made."
In connection with the Shevchenko defection, see Judy Chavez, Defector's Mistress: The Judy Chavez Story (New York: Dell, 1979).
Shevchenko died at his home in Bethesda, MD, on 28 February 1998. See David Stout, "Arkady N. Shevchenko, 67, A Key Soviet Defector, Dies," New York Times, 11 Mar. 1998, A20 (N).
[Russia/SovDefectors]
Sheymov, Victor. Tower of Secrets: A Real Life Spy Thriller. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1993. New York: HarperSpotlight, 1994. [pb]
Clark comment: Sheymov was a senior officer in the Eighth Chief Directorate, which was responsible for the security of KGB cipher communications.
Surveillant 3.4/5 notes that Sheymov was "one of the few, if not the only, 8th CD officer to defect." He presents a "radically different view" of the KGB "from that expressed by Vladimir Kuzuchkin ... and to a lesser extent that of Oleg Gordievsky." This is "splendid reading and a positive contribution to the literature." Kruh, Cryptologia 18.1, comments that Tower of Secrets "reads like a spy novel with all the elements of intrigue, murder, romance, and clandestine meetings. This one, however, is real, with professional spycraft and intelligence techniques."
For Prados, I&NS 9.4, Sheymov tells a "story of ... growing disillusion and final break with the Soviet system.... The details of Sheymov's preparations for defection ... are of some interest as examples of tradecraft." The book is "less satisfactory as an espionage memoir than it is as a defector account.... [It] does not provide any comprehensive picture of the KGB or its operations." To Bates, MI 10.1, Tower of Secrets is "at times amateurish." Nevertheless, it is "a good story, easy to read, and filled with detailed information about the KGB and how it operated."
Kahn, WIR 13.2, sees this defection story as "wonderfully told." An appendix of organizational details of the Eighth Chief Directorate "is useful" but offers only "a few generalities about Soviet cryptology." The lack of footnotes and an index is a negative. Some scholars may object to the book's "remembered conversations," but Sheymov "reports only conversations at which he was present.... [T]his fast-paced, personality-packed book ... evokes [a] vanished world well."
See Fred L. Schultz and Scott E. Belliveau, "An Interview with Victor Sheymov, Author of Tower of Secrets," U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings, Oct. 1993, 40-43.
See also Ben Fenton, "Ex-KGB Major Leads US War against Hackers," Electronic Telegraph, 9 Jun. 1999, which reports that Sheymov has founded a "cybersecurity" company and "is patenting a new device to thwart hackers."
[Russia/SovDefectors][c]
Shiber, Etta. Paris Underground. New York: Scribner, 1943.
Wilcox: "Account of Paris Underground during World War II, resistance, covert operation and counterintelligence."
[WWII/Eur/Fr/Resistance]
Shibilski, Daniel P. [TSgt/USAF] "Future of Air Force Intelligence." U.S. Naval Institute Proceedings 132, no. 2 (Feb. 2006): 48-51.
After the 1991 Gulf War, "the Air Force merged the targeting career field with intelligence operations.... The merger of two completely different skills caused significant problems.... Analytical ability waned as the focus of intelligence shifted.... [Today, t]here are virtually no area or country experts within the Air Force.... It would behoove the Air Force to start paying more attention to long-range predictive analysis as well as creating a cadre of experts."
[MI/AF/00s]
Shiels, Frederick L. Preventable Disasters: Why Governments Fail. Savage, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 1991.
Seymour: "Israel's October Surprise: The 1973 War as a Case Study of a Preventable Disaster, pp 17-54."
[Israel/YomKippur]
Shields,
Henry S. A Historical Survey of U.S. Naval Attachés in Russia, 1904-1941. Washington, DC: Defense Intelligence School, 1970. [Petersen]
[MI/Attaches/Interwar & WWI; MI/Navy/Overviews]
Shipler, David K. "A Resignation Eases but Doesn't End Strains Over the Pollard Spy Episode." New York Times, 31 Mar. 1987. [http://www.nytimes.com]
"Strains in the Israeli-American relationship appear to have been eased, but not eliminated, by the announcement [on 30 March 1987] that the Israeli Air Force colonel accused of recruiting an American naval intelligence analyst as a spy was resigning as commander of a major Israeli air base.... The Israeli colonel, Aviem Sella, was indicted on charges of espionage by a Federal grand jury, but is not expected to return to the United States."
[SpyCases/U.S./Pollard]
Shipley, Peter. Hostile Action: The KGB and Secret Soviet Operations in Britain. London: St Martin's, 1989. New York: St Martin's, 1990.
Surveillant 1.1 says that the author "documents well the activities and the response of the British authorities to the perceived dangers." For Kerr, I&NS 7.4, this "general yet lively historical survey" is "a useful contribution to scholarship" on Soviet active measures. The author's central thesis is that "from Lenin to Gorbachev, there has been more continuity than discontinuity in the strategic aims, tactics and methods of Soviet hostile action against Britain." However, Shipley's assessment of Soviet propaganda efforts "exaggerates the effect or success of the propaganda."
[Russia/SovSpies/Gen; UK/SpyCases/Gen]
Shipman, Tim. "CIA Spies Recruiting Record Number of British Pakistani Informers." The Standard (Hong Kong), 5 Jan. 2009. [http://www.thestandard.com.hk]
According to security sources in Washington and London, the CIA "is recruiting and handling a record number of informers in the British Pakistani community with the tacit agreement of the British government.... Intelligence from CIA informers has helped thwart more than one terrorist atrocity on British soil."
[CIA/00s/09; Terrorism/00s/09; UK/PostCW/00s/09]
Shirley, Edward G. (pseud., Reuel Mark Gerecht)
1. "Can't Anybody Here Play This Game?" The Atlantic Monthly, Feb. 1998, 45 - 61.
The pseudonymous Shirley savages the CIA's Directorate of Operations (DO), describing, in the words of the lead blurb to the article, "a corrosive culture in which promotion-hungry operatives collect pointless intelligence from worthless foreign agents."
When he stays within the timeframe that he was with the CIA (by his account from 1985 to 1993), Shirley's narrative can be accepted as a version of the "truth" as seen, heard, and interpreted by one individual. Even there, however, much of what he says resembles the generalized bitching that goes regularly in almost any organization. More important is that when Shirley strays beyond his firsthand experience, an event which occurs often, especially in remarks about how matters have transpired since his departure, little credibility can be given to his remarks. It is extremely doubtful that he has the kind of access that would allow any sort of meaningful criticisms of present policies and procedures.
Combined with the general lack of commonsensical judgment clearly shown in his book, Know Thine Enemy, Shirley's whining in this article leaves me very pleased that he has found employment outside the national security structure.
Two anonymous letters, similarly critical of the DO, are published in the May 1998 issue of The Atlantic Monthly, together with a response from Shirley. See http://www.theatlantic.com.
2. "CIA Needs Reform, Not New Missions." Wall Street Journal, 19 Nov. 1998, 22.
The author favors an Operations Directorate that is smaller, elite, more covert, and remote from politically motivated missions like its involvement in the Wye River Accords. DCI Tenet's success in getting new funding for the CIA allows it to avoid reform.
3. Know Thine Enemy: A Spy's Journey Into Revolutionary Iran. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1997.
Clark comment: This book is not about intelligence, but about a purported private clandestine trip from the Turkish-Iranian border to Teheran and back by a former (and clearly disgruntled) CIA employee.
However, as Chambers notes, "intelligence does play an important part as one of the sub-topics of the book. Particularly, it deals with two dilemmas with solutions that Shirley did not like and that played roles in his decision to leave the CIA. One revolved around the question of whether the case officer should be a generalist or a specialist [he favors the specialist argument], and the other was around the problem of freedom of action of case officers" (with Shirley on the side of greater freedom of action for officers in the field). Click for CHAMBERS' full review of this book.
Peake, History 26.4, suggests that a "book on intelligence written under a pseudonym should make one cautious, especially when no reason for hiding is given and no sources to support the story are provided." He also notes that the book's "subtitle just is not accurate."
As a former CIA Operations Officer, Chapman, IJI&C 10.4, has some real problems with Shirley's account: "If an agent gave me a report such as this book, my inclination would be to deep-six it in a burn bag, pay off the agent, and never see him again. Is this stuff for real?" Beyond that, the reviewer finds it difficult to believe the picture of contemporary Iran painted by Shirley -- one where everyone hates the mullahs and loves Americans. Chapman clearly feels that there is some larger goal behind the production of a book seemingly designed to further a new U.S. opening to Iran.
[CIA/C&C/DO]
Shirreff, David. Bare Feet and Bandoliers: Wingate, Sandford, the Patriots and the Part They Played in the Liberation of Ethiopia. London: Ratcliffe, 1995.
[UK/WWII/Africa]
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