This is about the decoding of Russian spy messages and searching of records
from Russia after the end of the Cold War. It is very long, but I will
summarize highlights.
Harry Hopkins (FDR's advisor who lived in the WH) was indeed the most
significant Rusian agent. Since he was in charge of lend lease and went to
Yalta, Tehran, etc. He had an outsized influence on WW2 and was the major
reason for Russia getting uranium and many nuclear secrets. Oppenheimer was
also in contact with Russian agents an along with other workers on the
Manhattan project leaked important Data.
Anti-semetism was also a big part of the communists spy activities and
purging Jews not only in Russia but in Eastern Europe. Journalist were
targeted to publish "fake news" favorable for the communists. But they were
also a source of intelligence, so some were agents.
Under Truman, many communists labor unions were purged as well as other
progressive organizations that had been set up by the communists. Trump really
started this well before McCarthy, but that said he knew that the New Deal put
a lot of these people in government, so he tried to be quiet about the purge.
He started the loyalty programs and deported many agents and fired many
government worker's, but this was even before McCarthy
I have always been interested in the Harry Hopkins story because of the
trouble my father had in the Nuremberg period with the forced repatriation of
Gen Vlasov's Russian troops that surrendered at Normandy. He was still alive
and working in the White House (no longer living there as he had remarried). I
checked google/wikipedia and it still states that his communist connection has
never been proved. That is not so according to this book.
The OSS was also infiltrated with active communists and many leaks. It is
all a sad story. The Great Depression made communism a legitimate political
view that blossomed in the 30's. It takes a social tragedy to produce an
environment that will tolerate such extreme ideology.
I hope that history is not repeating itself, or rhyming with the past.
Doug Everett
