Lamphere, Robert J., and Tom Shachtman. The FBI-KGB War: A Special
Agent's Story. New York: Random House, 1986. New York: Berkley, 1986. [pb] New Ed., with Post-Cold War Afterword. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1995. [pb] Lamphere, Robert J., and Tom Shachtman. The FBI-KGB War: A Special
Agent's Story. New York: Random House, 1986. New York: Berkley, 1986. [pb] New Ed., with Post-Cold War Afterword. Macon, GA: Mercer University Press, 1995. [pb]
Petersen calls The FBI-KGB War "a particularly revealing first-hand account of counterintelligence operations in the United States during the 1940s and 1950s." Miller, IJI&C 1.3, agrees, finding it a "masterful presentation of the reality of counterespionage activities," and "strongly recommends" it.
To Powers, NYRB (13 May 1993) and Intelligence Wars (2004), 295-320, the book is the "best account of th[e] still fragmentary story [of the Venona material].... Lamphere's book adds much important information to the stories of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg,... Klaus Fuchs,... and of the Soviet spy ring which included Donald Maclean, Guy Burgess, and Kim Philby."
Cram says Lamphere tells the "story about breaking the KGB ciphers during World War II and the resulting consequences of that achievement in the struggle against Soviet espionage and subversion." This "otherwise excellent history" is marred by the "egregious error" of accepting Pincher's tagging of Hollis as a Soviet agent. The author discusses Hoover's "vengeful actions" against the early CIA and liaison with it. "Although this book has a few errors and the story has perhaps been gilded a bit by Lamphere, it nevertheless remains one of the best histories of US counterintelligence."
According to Surveillant 4.4/5, the 1995 edition includes a 27-page Afterword where Lamphere "reviews the KGB-FBI wars using the latest releases from KGB and U.S. archives." Commenting in an article published in 2003, Robarge, Studies 47.3/fn.4, says that this "remains the best book on the FBI and counterintelligence."
For a report on some of the difficulties Lamphere experienced in publishing his book, see George Lardner, Jr., "Ex-Agent's Spy Book Tests Secrecy," Washington Post, 27 Oct. 1977, A1.
Lowenthal,
Max. The Federal Bureau of Investigation. New York: Sloane, 1950. London: Turnstile, 1950.
Hannant, I&NS 6.4/732/fn. 8, refers to Lowenthal's as a "pioneering study of the FBI,... [which] contains more than any other about the Bureau's security screening efforts."
Lynum,
Curtis O. The FBI and I: One Family's Life in the FBI During the Hoover Years. Pittsburgh, PA: Dorrance, 1988.
According to Surveillant 1.3, Lynum had a "26 year FBI career." Here, he discusses "criminal cases..., domestic intelligence reporting requirements, Hoover's formation in 1941 of a Secret Intelligence Service within FBI to run covert operations and deep-cover operations (primarily in Mexico and South America), Norwegian spy ships, and German counterespionage."
McCague,
James. FBI: Democracy's Guardian. New Canaan, CT: Garrard, 1974. [Petersen]
Messick,
Hank. John Edgar Hoover. New York: Davis McKay, 1972. [Petersen]
Morros, Boris. My Ten Years as a Counterspy. New York: Viking, 1959.
According to Pforzheimer, Studies 6.2 (Spring 1962), Morros was first an agent for Soviet intelligence and then worked for 10 years as a double agent for the FBI.
Munves,
James. The FBI and the CIA: Secret Agents and American Democracy. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1975. [Wilcox]
Nash,
Jay Robert. Citizen Hoover: A Critical Study of the Life and Times of J. Edgar Hoover and His FBI. Chicago: Nelson-Hall, 1972. [Petersen]
Ollestad,
Norman. Inside the FBI. New York: Lyle Stuart, 1967.
Petersen: "Critical."
O'Reilly, Kenneth.
1. "Adlai E. Stevenson, McCarthyism, and the FBI." Illinois Historical Journal 81 (Spring 1988): 45-60. [Jeffreys-Jones]
2. "The FBI and the Origins of McCarthyism." Historian 45 (1983): 372-393. [Jeffreys-Jones]
3. "Herbert Hoover and the FBI." Annals of Iowa 47 (1983): 46-63. [Jeffreys-Jones]
4. Hoover and the Un-Americans: The FBI, HUAC, and the Red Menace. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 1983.
5. "Racial Matters": The FBI's Secret File on Black America, 1960-1972. New York: Free Press, 1989. [Jeffreys-Jones]
6. "The Roosevelt Administration and Black America: Federal Surveillance Policy and Civil Rights during the New Deal and World War II Years." Phylon 48 (1987): 12-45. [Jeffreys-Jones]
Overstreet,
Henry, and Bonaro Overstreet. The FBI in Our Open Society. New York: Norton, 1969.
According to Pforzheimer, this book covers from the early days of the FBI to the late 1960s. One section "focuses on early criticisms of the Bureau.... On balance, the book favorably portrays the FBI." However, the "more intense criticism of the Bureau and its leadership" came after publication of this book.
Powers,
Richard Gid.
1. G-Men: Hoover's FBI in America's Popular Culture. Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1983.
2. Secrecy and Power: The Life of J. Edgar Hoover. New York: Free Press, 1987.
Petersen calls Secrecy and Power "a well-researched ... biography that is critical of Hoover." It has a "good bibliography." O'Reilly, Policy Studies Journal 21.3, says this is the "first serious post-FOIA study but also the first revisionist one." Hoover's is a "'profoundly ambiguous' historic legacy." For Bresler, I&NS 4.1, "Powers' definitive work is a valuable insight into a career that may never again be duplicated even in its broadest outline."
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