BBC. "The Cambridge Spy Ring." 10 Sep. 1999. [http://news.bbc.co.uk]A substantial amount of new material bearing on the activities of Soviet spies in Britain was carried by the Electronic Telegraph, beginning on 10 Jan. 1998, under the title "How Britain Was Betrayed: The KGB's Story." The material published by theTelegraph is "[b]ased on KGB files released for The Crown Jewels by Nigel West and Oleg Tsarev and supplemented by additional research of material in the KGB archives."
BBC. "The Cambridge Spy Ring." 10 Sep. 1999. [http://news.bbc.co.uk]
Reviews careers and treachery of the Cambridge Five.
Boyle,
Andrew. The Climate of Treason: Five Who Spied for Russia. London:
Hutchinson, 1979. The Fourth Man: The Definitive Account of Kim Philby, Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean and Who Recruited Them to Spy for Russia. New York: Dial, 1979. Rev. ed. London: Coronet, 1980. New York: Bantam Books, 1980. [pb]
Petersen calls this "a solid overview of the case," although Pforzheimer opines that the "use of the word 'Definitive' in the sub-title of this book is at best an exaggeration." Chambers categorizes The Climate of Treason as "perhaps one of the best books on the Cambridge Five. Well written. I enjoyed it immensely." Constantinides recommends reading the revised version, which actually names Blunt as the "Fourth Man."
Cram recommends the book, "despite its numerous errors of fact and interpretation, because it is a good read on the Cambridge spies." Publication of the book forced the exposure of Anthony Blunt. It is "far superior to John Costello's long-winded Mask of Treachery." However, Boyle makes "a grotesque and inexplicable error" when he points to an atomic scientist, codenamed "Basil." "Unsubstantiated claims about Basil's identity tend to downgrade the credibility of Boyle's work."
Carver,
George A., Jr. "The Fifth Man." The Atlantic 262 (Sep.
1988): 26-28.
The author is a former CIA official.
Cecil,
Robert. "Legends Spies Tell." Encounter, Apr. 1978, 9-17.
Rocca and Dziak: "A pithy corrective to some of the more indulgent myths surrounding the Soviet agents Philby, Burgess and Maclean."
Deacon,
Richard [Donald McCormick]. The Cambridge Apostles: A History of Cambridge University's Elite Intellectual Secret Society. New York: Farrar, Straus, 1986. [Wilcox]
Kerr, Sheila. "KGB Sources on the Cambridge Network of Soviet
Agents: True or False?" Intelligence and National Security 11,
no. 3 (Jul. 1996): 561-585.
This is a review article encompassing Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions; Modin, My Five Cambridge Friends; Borovik, The Philby Files; and Sudoplatov(s) and Schecter(s), Special Tasks. However, the article's analytical content makes it worthwhile reading on its own. According to the author, the "main problem is that we cannot check these books against the KGB's archives.... These sources tend to confirm each other although there are some minor points of disagreement. This mutual dependance rather than independence serves the goals of KGB disinformation and as such decreases the historical value of these sources."
Mann,
Wilfrid Basil. Was There a Fifth Man? Quintessential Recollections. Oxford: Pergamon, 1982.
Rocca and Dziak: "Chapter X ... is an effective critique" of Andrew Boyle's The Climate of Treason. There are "[m]any additional insights into the Philby, Maclean, and Burgess cases."
Mather,
John Sidney, ed. The Great Spy Scandal. London: Daily Express, 1955.
Rees,
Gorowny. A Chapter of Accidents. London: Chatto & Windus, 1972.
New York: Library Press, 1972.
Wilcox: "Account of the Kim Philby, Guy Burgess & Donald Maclean spy scandal."
Rees,
Jenny. Looking for Mr. Nobody: The Secret Life of Gorowny Rees. London:
Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1994.
The author is Gorowny Rees' daughter. Aldrich, I&NS 11.3, views Gorowny Rees as "an intriguing figure," given his literary and intellectual background, his service as an SIS officer, and his friendship with Guy Burgess and Anthony Blunt. His daughter's search for the answer to the question of whether her father was a Soviet spy took her to Oleg Tsarev who told her that "Rees had been recruited in a vague way by Burgess in 1937 and had briefly 'co-operated' with Soviet intelligence, but was not properly considered to be an agent."
Smith, Michael. "KGB Files Reveal Clue that Broke British Spy Ring."
Telegraph (London), 2 Oct. 1996. [http://www.telegraph.co.uk]
"The intercepted KGB messages that detail Moscow's dealings with the British spies Kim Philby, Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess were released by GCHQ" to the Public Record Office on 1 October 1996. "The move was forced on the Cheltenham spy base by the Americans, who released on to the Internet the results of Operation Venona, the top-secret project to decipher Moscow Centre's communications with its foreign stations....
"It was not until 1949 that the Venona team managed to break into the messages from New York to Moscow containing the information provided by Maclean, who was identified by the cover name Homer.... [T]he FBI concluded that any one of 6,000 people might have been Homer.... [S]lowly, MI5 narrowed down those names to a handful of people who would have had access to the top-secret exchanges between London and Washington.
"Then in April 1951, the Venona cryptanalysts found the vital clue in one of the messages. For part of 1944, Homer had had regular contacts with his Soviet control in New York -- using his pregnant wife as an excuse. The names had been narrowed down to just one -- Donald Maclean. Tipped off by Philby, who had access to the Venona material, he fled to Moscow with Burgess."
Sutherland,
Douglas. The Fourth Man: The Story of Blunt, Philby, Burgess and Maclean.
London: Secker & Warburg, 1980. The Great Betrayal: The Definitive
Story of Blunt, Philby, Burgess and Maclean. New York: Times Books,
1980.
Clark comment: Sutherland believed that the revelations with regard to Blunt settled the issue of the scope of the Cambridge ring. We know today that this was not the case.
Constantinides says the author "offers very little that is new, much speculation, and a number of mistakes."
Teagarden, Ernest M.
"The Cambridge Five: The End of the Cold War Brings Forth Some Views
from the Other Side." American Intelligence Journal 18, no.
1/2 (1998): 63-68.
The author examines a number of the post-Cold War versions from both Russian and Western writers of how the Cambridge Five came into being and operated. He notes that agreement is lacking on such a basic issue as how each member was recruited. It also seems clear that their reporting was not always accepted on its face by the Soviet intelligence leadership. There was, in fact, a "distrust of the Five that always seemed to be just below the surface." The three defectors among the group "were under constant surveillance" from the KGB.
West, Rebecca.
Much of what West does in her works on treason stands up well, especially from a philosophical point of view, even after so many years.
1. The Meaning of Treason. New York: Viking, 1946. London: The Reprint Society, 1952.
2. The New Meaning of Treason. New York: Viking, 1964. [pb] Rev. ed., 1967.
Constantinides finds this work "marked by the penetrating analysis and writing ability for which the author is famous." She provides "discerning judgments on the traitors and their motives." To Taylor and Snow, I&NS 12.2/116/fn.1, West's "epilogue in both volumes is a good introduction to the concept of ideological treason."
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