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In this landmark work, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ted Morgan examines the McCarthyite strain in American politics, from its origins in the period that followed the Bolshevik Revolution to the present. Morgan argues that Senator Joseph McCarthy did not emerge in a vacuum--he was, rather, the most prominent in a long line of men who exploited the issue of Communism for political advantage. In 1918, America invaded Russia in an attempt at regime change. Meanwhile, on the home front, the first of many congressional investigations of Communism was conducted. Anarchist bombs exploded from coast to coast, leading to the political repression of the Red Scare. Soviet subversion and espionage in the United States began in 1920, under the cover of a trade mission. Franklin Delano Roosevelt granted the Soviets diplomatic recognition in 1933, which gave them an opportunity to expand their spy networks by using their embassy and consulates as espionage hubs. Simultaneously, the American Communist Party provided a recruitment pool for homegrown spies. Martin Dies, Jr., the first congressman to make his name as a Red hunter, developed solid information on Communist subversion through his Un-American Activities Committee. However, its hearings were marred by partisan attacks on the New Deal, presaging McCarthy. The most pervasive period of Soviet espionage came during World War II, when Russia, as an ally of the United States, received military equipment financed under the policy of lend-lease. It was then that highly placed spies operated inside the U.S. government and in America's nuclear facilities. Thanks to the Venona transcripts of KGB cable traffic, we now have a detailed account of wartime Soviet espionage, down to the marital problems of Soviet spies and the KGB's abject efforts to capture deserting Soviet seamen on American soil. During the Truman years, Soviet espionage was in disarray following the defections of Elizabeth Bentley and Igor Gouzenko. The American Communist Party was much diminished by a number of measures, including its expulsion from the labor unions, the prosecution of its leaders under the Smith Act, and the weeding out, under Truman's loyalty program, of subversives in government. As Morgan persuasively establishes, by the time McCarthy exploited the Red issue in 1950, the battle against Communists had been all but won by the Truman administration. In this bold narrative history, Ted Morgan analyzes the paradoxical culture of fear that seized a nation at the height of its power. Using Joseph McCarthy's previously unavailable private papers and recently released transcripts of closed hearings of McCarthy's investigations subcommittee, Morgan provides many new insights into the notorious Red hunter's methods and motives. Full of drama and intrigue, finely etched portraits, and political revelations, Reds brings to life a critical period in American history that has profound relevance to our own time.… (más)
Reds must certainly be the most detailed history ever written of communist espionage in the United States and the country's legal and political responses to it. This six-hundred page book covers the topic from the military intervention of the US and allies against the Bolsheviks following WWI to the actions (largely illegal) of the FBI against civil rights and anti-war protests of the 1960's culminating in the false narratives about "Weapons of Mass Destruction" that led to the Iraq war. The author relies quite a bit on the recently declassified "Venona" files -- decoded messages from Soviet agents to and from Moscow during the era. The title's sub-heading is "McCarthyism in Twentieth Century America". While the book certainly gives a complete and fascinating look and the rise and fall of McCarthy, the story covers all the history of Soviet espionage including infiltration of the labor movement, the use of "front" organizations, spy rings passing along atomic secrets and much more.
There are several takeaways from Morgan's work. The Soviets did achieve considerable penetration of American institutions, particularly in the 1930's and 40's. Many labor unions were communist controlled and there was much interest in communism in universities and the arts. There were, in fact, spies in high positions of government who actively collaborated with Russian intelligence. Alger Hiss was unquestionably in the service of the Soviets as were other officials, some quite close to the seats of power, i.e. Roosevelt, Acheson, et. al. The Rosenberg's were fully engaged in seeking and passing along atomic secrets, though the death sentences for them (especially Ethel) were out-of-proportion to the penalties given to others. It also seems that the impact of espionage was fairly limited, except in the case of atomic secrets. Nonetheless, one is struck by the extent of sympathy for communism especially in light of the rigidity of Moscow toward its American adherents and the depredations inflicted by Stalin that were known from the late 30's on. The intellectual currents that gave rise to the attraction of communism are not given much attention in this work.
The reactions to communist activity in America followed two lines, both of which were excessive in their application but nonetheless quite effective. Both lines of response betrayed core American ideals of justice (due process) and fairness. The Smith Act made it a crime to advocate violent overthrow of the government and, perhaps more significantly, was accompanied by a requirement of loyalty oaths for all manner of public employment. While relatively few persons, given the vast numbers of people reviewed, were actually disqualified the chilling impact of this draconian measure was devastating, especially to persons who in years past had naively dabbled with leftist organizations. Beyond its "witch hunt" aspect, the Smith Act very effectively brought about the demise of the Communist Party USA. From its zenith in the 30's the party through the persecution of criminal authorities had become a shadow of itself by the 1950's.
The second line of attack against Reds was political. Very early on, the House Un-American Affairs Committee (HUAC) pursued leftists by publicly exposing them in hearings. While to a great degree effective this method was grossly unfair, often exposing people to their ruin for activities that occurred many years past and that had resulted in no danger to the country. Occasionally the work of the committee did produce actual spies, such as Hiss, who were prosecuted and jailed for contempt or perjury. The book gives attention to the committee's campaign against Hollywood in the 1940's and 50's. I found the author's treatment of this odious public shaming somewhat odd. He correctly asserts that the writers and actors dragged before the committee made things worse for themselves by their overly histrionic resistance, but he misses the point that the committee's aim was not to punish them legally (except where perjury could be suborned) but to ruin them for their associations. The committee made a spectacle of browbeating well-known personages to openly "name names" when, in fact, the connections to communist organizations of those to be publicly revealed was already known. The author concludes sensibly that the influence that writers, film makers and actors could have had on spreading the communist's gospel was, in any real sense, very minimal.
The story of McCarthy's rise and fall is quite riveting, a Shakespearian tragedy to be sure. McCarthy was hugely ambitious and motivated overwhelmingly by an insatiable need for self-advancement. (The author covers his early career as a district judge where McCarthy showed considerable compassion for those appearing before his court. He also details McCarthy's strange attack on the prosecution of war criminals for the infamous Malmadey massacre.) McCarthy latched on to the growing pubic paranoia about communist infiltration emerging in the late 40's and 50's, heightened by the Soviet's acquisition of the atomic bomb and the invasion of South Korea in 1950. His approach was to make wild claims of communists under every bed and to savagely attack anyone, including his Senate colleagues, who opposed his methods. His viciousness has few parallels in modern times. Morgan goes into extensive and fascinating detail about McCarthy's moment in the sun. What is equally interesting is how in view of his outrageous behavior he was able to intimidate into silence those who were repulsed by his tactics and behavior. It really was his own self-destructiveness culminating in the Army-McCarthy hearings that led to his collapse. Certainly the national near hysteria about the perceived threat of the Soviet Union that supplied the electricity that he exploited. And, a most interesting element of McCarthy's war on communists in government is that by the time of his hearing the actual communist spy apparatus was almost entirely defunct, done in by the Smith Act and judicial prosecution of communists. The national attention drawn by his pursuit of a communist Army dentist and low-level clerical workers affirms the national extreme fear of the Soviet Union.
Morgan devotes considerable space to the history of the FBI's involvement in rooting out and countering espionage rings and leftist "fellow travelers" of the communist movement. J. Edgar Hoover became obsessed with the danger he felt Reds presented to the country. Beyond pursuing actual spies, this led to his determination that the civil rights movement and, later, the student protest movement, were communist driven. Hoover, like McCarthy, was riding on the wave of fear and revulsion of the Soviet Union and this enabled him to stay influential with presidents and leading legislators for decades. It also led to overtly illegal counterintelligence tactics against purported opponents that are a blot on our history.
The author concludes with an analysis of how this anti-Red mania led to Nixon's sanction for illegal actions against those who opposed his policies. In fact, it was Nixon's disdain for the FBI's reluctance to go along that produced the notorious "plumbers" outfit that ultimately brought about Nixon's fall. Ending his story in mid-2003, Morgan delves into the manipulation of truth by the Bush administration that turned the horror of the 9/11 attacks into the non sequitur of the Iraq war.
This is a very long read, but well worth the time. Although one might not agree on every conclusion drawn, the history is exhaustively well-researched and his treatment of the events and players admirably well-balanced. ( )
Información procedente del conocimiento común inglés.Edita para encontrar en tu idioma.
The premise of this book is that the Cold War began in 1917, with the Bolshevik Revolution. -Preamble
On July 30,1914, posters went up in Russian cities ordering reservists from the ages of nineteen to forty-three to report to their barracks. -The Russian Revolution Through American Eyes, Chapter 1
In this landmark work, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Ted Morgan examines the McCarthyite strain in American politics, from its origins in the period that followed the Bolshevik Revolution to the present. Morgan argues that Senator Joseph McCarthy did not emerge in a vacuum--he was, rather, the most prominent in a long line of men who exploited the issue of Communism for political advantage. In 1918, America invaded Russia in an attempt at regime change. Meanwhile, on the home front, the first of many congressional investigations of Communism was conducted. Anarchist bombs exploded from coast to coast, leading to the political repression of the Red Scare. Soviet subversion and espionage in the United States began in 1920, under the cover of a trade mission. Franklin Delano Roosevelt granted the Soviets diplomatic recognition in 1933, which gave them an opportunity to expand their spy networks by using their embassy and consulates as espionage hubs. Simultaneously, the American Communist Party provided a recruitment pool for homegrown spies. Martin Dies, Jr., the first congressman to make his name as a Red hunter, developed solid information on Communist subversion through his Un-American Activities Committee. However, its hearings were marred by partisan attacks on the New Deal, presaging McCarthy. The most pervasive period of Soviet espionage came during World War II, when Russia, as an ally of the United States, received military equipment financed under the policy of lend-lease. It was then that highly placed spies operated inside the U.S. government and in America's nuclear facilities. Thanks to the Venona transcripts of KGB cable traffic, we now have a detailed account of wartime Soviet espionage, down to the marital problems of Soviet spies and the KGB's abject efforts to capture deserting Soviet seamen on American soil. During the Truman years, Soviet espionage was in disarray following the defections of Elizabeth Bentley and Igor Gouzenko. The American Communist Party was much diminished by a number of measures, including its expulsion from the labor unions, the prosecution of its leaders under the Smith Act, and the weeding out, under Truman's loyalty program, of subversives in government. As Morgan persuasively establishes, by the time McCarthy exploited the Red issue in 1950, the battle against Communists had been all but won by the Truman administration. In this bold narrative history, Ted Morgan analyzes the paradoxical culture of fear that seized a nation at the height of its power. Using Joseph McCarthy's previously unavailable private papers and recently released transcripts of closed hearings of McCarthy's investigations subcommittee, Morgan provides many new insights into the notorious Red hunter's methods and motives. Full of drama and intrigue, finely etched portraits, and political revelations, Reds brings to life a critical period in American history that has profound relevance to our own time.
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There are several takeaways from Morgan's work. The Soviets did achieve considerable penetration of American institutions, particularly in the 1930's and 40's. Many labor unions were communist controlled and there was much interest in communism in universities and the arts. There were, in fact, spies in high positions of government who actively collaborated with Russian intelligence. Alger Hiss was unquestionably in the service of the Soviets as were other officials, some quite close to the seats of power, i.e. Roosevelt, Acheson, et. al. The Rosenberg's were fully engaged in seeking and passing along atomic secrets, though the death sentences for them (especially Ethel) were out-of-proportion to the penalties given to others. It also seems that the impact of espionage was fairly limited, except in the case of atomic secrets. Nonetheless, one is struck by the extent of sympathy for communism especially in light of the rigidity of Moscow toward its American adherents and the depredations inflicted by Stalin that were known from the late 30's on. The intellectual currents that gave rise to the attraction of communism are not given much attention in this work.
The reactions to communist activity in America followed two lines, both of which were excessive in their application but nonetheless quite effective. Both lines of response betrayed core American ideals of justice (due process) and fairness. The Smith Act made it a crime to advocate violent overthrow of the government and, perhaps more significantly, was accompanied by a requirement of loyalty oaths for all manner of public employment. While relatively few persons, given the vast numbers of people reviewed, were actually disqualified the chilling impact of this draconian measure was devastating, especially to persons who in years past had naively dabbled with leftist organizations. Beyond its "witch hunt" aspect, the Smith Act very effectively brought about the demise of the Communist Party USA. From its zenith in the 30's the party through the persecution of criminal authorities had become a shadow of itself by the 1950's.
The second line of attack against Reds was political. Very early on, the House Un-American Affairs Committee (HUAC) pursued leftists by publicly exposing them in hearings. While to a great degree effective this method was grossly unfair, often exposing people to their ruin for activities that occurred many years past and that had resulted in no danger to the country. Occasionally the work of the committee did produce actual spies, such as Hiss, who were prosecuted and jailed for contempt or perjury. The book gives attention to the committee's campaign against Hollywood in the 1940's and 50's. I found the author's treatment of this odious public shaming somewhat odd. He correctly asserts that the writers and actors dragged before the committee made things worse for themselves by their overly histrionic resistance, but he misses the point that the committee's aim was not to punish them legally (except where perjury could be suborned) but to ruin them for their associations. The committee made a spectacle of browbeating well-known personages to openly "name names" when, in fact, the connections to communist organizations of those to be publicly revealed was already known. The author concludes sensibly that the influence that writers, film makers and actors could have had on spreading the communist's gospel was, in any real sense, very minimal.
The story of McCarthy's rise and fall is quite riveting, a Shakespearian tragedy to be sure. McCarthy was hugely ambitious and motivated overwhelmingly by an insatiable need for self-advancement. (The author covers his early career as a district judge where McCarthy showed considerable compassion for those appearing before his court. He also details McCarthy's strange attack on the prosecution of war criminals for the infamous Malmadey massacre.) McCarthy latched on to the growing pubic paranoia about communist infiltration emerging in the late 40's and 50's, heightened by the Soviet's acquisition of the atomic bomb and the invasion of South Korea in 1950. His approach was to make wild claims of communists under every bed and to savagely attack anyone, including his Senate colleagues, who opposed his methods. His viciousness has few parallels in modern times. Morgan goes into extensive and fascinating detail about McCarthy's moment in the sun. What is equally interesting is how in view of his outrageous behavior he was able to intimidate into silence those who were repulsed by his tactics and behavior. It really was his own self-destructiveness culminating in the Army-McCarthy hearings that led to his collapse. Certainly the national near hysteria about the perceived threat of the Soviet Union that supplied the electricity that he exploited. And, a most interesting element of McCarthy's war on communists in government is that by the time of his hearing the actual communist spy apparatus was almost entirely defunct, done in by the Smith Act and judicial prosecution of communists. The national attention drawn by his pursuit of a communist Army dentist and low-level clerical workers affirms the national extreme fear of the Soviet Union.
Morgan devotes considerable space to the history of the FBI's involvement in rooting out and countering espionage rings and leftist "fellow travelers" of the communist movement. J. Edgar Hoover became obsessed with the danger he felt Reds presented to the country. Beyond pursuing actual spies, this led to his determination that the civil rights movement and, later, the student protest movement, were communist driven. Hoover, like McCarthy, was riding on the wave of fear and revulsion of the Soviet Union and this enabled him to stay influential with presidents and leading legislators for decades. It also led to overtly illegal counterintelligence tactics against purported opponents that are a blot on our history.
The author concludes with an analysis of how this anti-Red mania led to Nixon's sanction for illegal actions against those who opposed his policies. In fact, it was Nixon's disdain for the FBI's reluctance to go along that produced the notorious "plumbers" outfit that ultimately brought about Nixon's fall. Ending his story in mid-2003, Morgan delves into the manipulation of truth by the Bush administration that turned the horror of the 9/11 attacks into the non sequitur of the Iraq war.
This is a very long read, but well worth the time. Although one might not agree on every conclusion drawn, the history is exhaustively well-researched and his treatment of the events and players admirably well-balanced. (