My Review of Bojan Pancevski's "The Nord Stream Conspiracy"

 Sabotage in the Baltic

On September 26,2022, a team of six Ukrainian divers blew up the $20 billion Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline that lied 80 meters below the surface in the very dark and very polluted Baltic Sea at a cost of about $250,000. The 760-mile pipeline stretched from Russia to Germany and was to supply cheap gas for German industry. In this remarkable feat of investigative journalism Wall Street Journal reporter Bojan Pancevski tells us the story as to how the operation came together and the police work in Germany to uncover the source of the sabotage.

 

The operation was conceived shortly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It was put together by an off-the books operation of former SBU (Ukraine CIA) and GUR (Ukraine military intelligence) called The Start-Up. In order to protect their identities, the author calls the two leaders The General and the Colonel, respectively. They are high enough in the bureaucracies to get things done even though at time they were officially retired and later in jail. The purpose of the operation was to cut off the dollars that Putin received from selling natural gas to the West that fed his war machine.

 

Pancevski uses many aliases for the leading characters in his book. The most interesting is Freya, a woman in her late 30’s who in a former life graced the cover of an erotic magazine. She is full of spunk, and it was her who actually placed the charges that blew up the pipeline. 

 

Because much of the action took place on German territory, the German Federal Police became involved. Here we follow The Chief Inspector engage in the extraordinary nitty-gritty police work to piece together what happened and to ultimately name the Ukrainians involved in the plot. For example, a speed camera in Germany caught the license plate of an automobile used by the Ukrainians. Piece-by-piece the Chief Inspector solves the crime. However, when seeking help from Poland, he was turned down because Poland rightfully viewed the Ukrainians as heroes deserving of medals.

 

The author gives a great deal of background on the entire Nord Stream endeavor. Despite U.S. opposition, Germany’s need for cheap gas over-rode the strategic imperative of not funding Russia. Indeed, once Putin understood that his invasion would not stop the flow of gas, he green—lit the Ukrainian invasion. He was wrong in that assumption. The pipeline represented a massive outlet for Gazprom, Russia’s leading gas producer. The German-Russian relationship on gas was more than cozy as Pancevski notes that former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroder ends up on the Gazprom board. Did someone say payoff?

 

We also discover the CEO of Nord Stream was Mattias Warnig. Early in his career he was member of the Stasi, the East German secret police and later became a good buddy of Putin. It just shows how important Germany’s lust for cheap gas was and Angela Merkel was no exception.

 

We also learn that much of the Ukraine Army is funded privately with individual oligarchs and businesses putting up money for individual units. That is how The Start-up was funded. Furter Voldamyr Zelensky is not quite the boy scout his press portrays him and his former deputy Andry Yermak participated in more than his share of corruption. Nevertheless, that while both The General and The Colonel expected Zelensky to flee after the invasion, he did not. Lastly, we learn that the CIA station in Kiev was and is very active and there are American boots on the ground training Ukrainians how to use U.S. equipment. My guess is, not mentioned in the book, the special forces were and are on temporary duty to the CIA giving Washington deniability.

 

Bojan Pencevski has written a nonfictional spy thriller that gripped me throughout reading his book. We witness unbelievable human courage on the part of the Ukrainians and excellent police work on the part of the Germans. It should be a leading candidate for the major book awards!

Ukraine Goes on the Offensive

 Shulmaven has been commenting on Russo-Ukraine War since 2014 when the Russian “green men” seized Crimea. (See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2014/03/the-ukraine-what-is-to-be-done.html ) The all-out Russian invasion began in February 2022 and if we date the war’s start to then, the Russo-Ukraine War is now longer than the fighting in World War I. Similar to World War I, the battlefield has been stalemated since the end of 2022 with a “no-man’s land” in the east separating the forces and on ongoing Russian drone/missile blitz on Ukrainian cities in the West.

 

However, of late, Ukraine has gone on the offensive with drone and missile attacks reaching into the heart of Russia. Both Moscow and St. Petersburg have witnessed the war coming home. More important, Ukraine has taken out more than 25% of Russia’s oil refining capacity triggering gasoline rationing that Putin was forced to admit last week.

 

Under severe wartime conditions Ukraine has built up the capacity to mass produce long range drones and missiles. What we are witnessing in Ukraine is a revolution in military affairs where ground forces have become immobilized by the fear of drone attacks and that swarms of low-cost drones can overcome Russia’s sophisticated air defenses. No region in European Russia is safe and perhaps we will soon see Ukraine set ablaze the west Siberian oilfields, a course I have long advocated.

 

Russia is now in a box. Instead of their once thought of inevitable victory, it is now slowly losing the war. Putin will have to accept this reality or attempt to widen the War into Poland or the Baltic states. His goal would be to force NATO into pressuring Ukraine to accept its demands. Of course, this high risk strategy could very well bring NATO directly into the war with unknowable consequences.

 

NATO is meeting in Ankara, Turkey next week. I am sure Ukraine will be a major topic of conversation. Given Ukraine’s battle-tested army and its advanced weapons production capabilities, it would seem to me that NATO needs Ukraine more than Ukraine needing NATO. It wouldn’t surprise me that while the meeting is in progress, Ukraine will launch its largest air assault on Russia to date.

My Review of Odd Arne Westad's "The Coming Storm: Power, Conflict......"

 War Clouds on the Horizon

In a previous blog I noted that we are living in a prewar era analogous to the runup to the start of World War II. (See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2023/11/reliving-1930s-part-5.html ) Here Yale historian and global affairs professor Odd Arne Westad argues that a more appropriate analogy would be that of the prewar period approaching World War I. In many respects his argument parallels that of Graham Allison’s Thucydides Trap where the rise of China is inducing fear in the United States that has the potential to make war inevitable. ( See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2017/08/my-amazon-review-of-graham-allisons.html ) Instead of the Balkans being the hotspot in the pre-1914 world, today we China-Taiwan, Israel-Palestine, Russia-Ukraine, and Pakistan-India. Anyone of which that could put the great powers in play.

 

In the pre-World War I era it was the rise of Germany that was threatening Britain, but Westad goes further by stating the bipolar world of the Cold War is over, and, in fact, we are now living in a multi-polar world with many strong regional actors such as India, Türkiye, Brazil and Iran.  He further analogizes that Russia is the Austria-Hungary of our day by being China’s junior partner. Similar to our time, the pre-World War I era was characterized by rising nationalism and a growing dissatisfaction with globalism. Fear and resentment were the motivating forces of the era. Sound familiar? 

 

My problem with Westad’s book is that he doesn’t offer real solutions, but who can, to the U.S.-China antagonism and for the regional hotspots. Because the book was written prior to the current Iran War, which has the potential for a great power conflict, Westad doesn’t have much to say.  There is also little discussion on the current revolution in military affairs involving drones and artificial intelligence which is greatly influencing the diplomatic chessboard. That said, if pre-World War I is the appropriate analog, we are in for trouble.

 

NATO: R.I.P., b.1949 - d. 2026?

NATO is dead, or in the process of dying. NATO was born when the United States stood alone militarily and economically as the West's  power while Europe was weak. Europe is no longer weak, but it certainly acts that way. If if it had the will, Europe would be capable of defending itself. Hence the founding predicate of NATO no longer holds.

The proximate cause of NATO's demise was President Trump's announcing his willingness to seize Greenland by force from NATO ally Denmark earlier this year, (See:Shulmaven: Donnie Does Davos* and Mayhem in Minneapolis ) his failure to consult on his war plans to attack Iran, and most important the the obstruction of NATO allies Spain, France and Italy to deny their respective airspaces to the U.S. Air Force's efforts to to attack Iran. Indeed they even denied access to the U.S. air bases in those countries. It is one thing for them to be passive, it is far another thing to actually obstruct the U.S. military. 

It is not as if NATO has no skin in the game in the Persian Gulf. Indeed their economies are suffering far more from the rise in the price of oil than the U.S. I don't know what, if anything, President Trump will say tonight on NATO, but the clock is ticking on its demise. Further it will require congressional approval for the United States to withdraw from NATO. Of course, the only winner in this will be Russia's Putin

Venezuela: Too Early to Tell

Much has been written about the rendition of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro to the United States to stand trial on drug trafficking and arms smuggling charges. We have had predictable reactions from the Right hailing it as successful operation to remove an anti-American  dictator and from the Left attacking it as a throwback to the Yanqui Imperialism of the early 20^th Century that will lead to a quagmire.

 

To me, it is far early to tell how it will turn out. What we do know is that Maduro was an evil dictator who tortured and murdered his people with abandon and the country has a heavy presence of Russian, Chinese, Iranian, and Cuban forces. Thus, Venezuela represented a threat to U.S. security. Whether the threat is imminent or not is an open question. We also know that Venezuela possesses the largest oil reserves in the world, but much of it consists of tar sands which is costly to produce and that the oil fields are operating in a dilapidated condition causing oil production to drop from three million barrels a day to just under a million barrels a day over the past 20 years.

 

We are far from being reassured by Trump talking about oil and not talking about a return to democracy. Indeed, the entire security apparatus of the Maduro state remains intact. We do not know to what degree Vice President and now President Delcy Rodriguez will cooperate with Trump. She has given off very mixed signals, and we don’t know where the army will end up. We can surmise that given the intelligence that was available to the U.S military, it is likely that someone on the inside is working for us. Who that person or persons are, and their future role will be critical in the days ahead.

 

Trump is opting for stability over democracy. That may work in the short run, but if there aren’t any plans for elections after six months this whole adventure could go south very quickly. It is obvious that the Democratic Opposition would win an election; they did so under Maduro’s control. The question is whether or not the Maduro security apparatus will allow an election to take place and if it does take place will they allow the winner to be seated. Before rushing to judgement let’s give it some time for events to play out.

 

Outside of Venezuela both China and Russia are looking on. They too can make similar moves in the Taiwan straits or the Baltic States, respectively.

Some Thoughts on Trump's National Security Strategy

Earlier this week the Trump Administration released its updated National Security Strategy. (See: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2025/12/2025-National-Security-Strategy.pdf ) Needless to say that given the howls that went up, it was far from being universally applauded, especially in Europe. Europe is rightly concerned that the era of having a NATO umbrella over the continent is over. However, given earlier commentaries coming from Vice President Vance, in particular, the document should not come as a surprise. Trump’s policy of selling out allies and cozying up to adversaries is all there in black and white.

I have three preliminary thoughts on the strategy. First, it is harkening back to the America First of 1939-1941. It focuses in on hemispheric security to the exclusion of Europe and just has America First leader Charles Lindbergh was open to a modus vivendi with Nazi Germany, here we have America open to a condominium with Putin’s Russia. It certainly does not bode well for Ukraine and for that matter Israel. Further, the strategy puts policy muscle behind Trump’s Caribbean buildup against Venezuela. To the Trump Administration Latin America is now part of an American economic zone.

Second, there is the strong smell of Yalta in the document. Instead of Roosevelt and Stalin dividing up Europe, we now have Trump, Putin and especially Xi dividing up the world into spheres of interest. The glue holding the deal together is economic self-interest. Where Taiwan fits into this over the longer term is very ambiguous.

Third, there are some hard policy realities behind the document. Europe has the ability to defend itself against Russia; it only lacks the will. Russia remains bogged down in Ukraine after more than three years of war indicating it is not as strong as once thought. If Ukraine can hold its own against Russia, so too can a much larger Europe.

What perhaps pissed off Europe the most was that the document called out its “civilization decline.” Unfortunately, that is the reality, and Europe has to recognize that advanced welfare states cannot run a policy of open borders without severe consequences. Simply put, in a generation Europe will not be the Europe of history. Net net, the policy calls for the U.S. to be an offshore balancer with respect to the world outside of Latin America. (See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2025/08/my-review-of-andrew-lamberts-no-more.html )

Trump, Putin, and Ukraine: Part 2

Last week we wrote up what we thought was a successful conclusion to the Trump-European-Ukraine meeting in Washington D.C. ( See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2025/08/trump-putin-and-ukraine-now-comes-hard.html ) Unfortunately, little did we realize that Trump and his hapless special ambassador Steve Witkoff, and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, were played for suckers by Putin. Put bluntly, Putin did not agree to security guarantees from the Europeans to be coordinated by the United States. Putin wants all of the Donbass and no European troops in Ukraine.  

So what is to be done now? The U.S. and Europe should step up arms shipments to Ukraine and greenlight Ukrainian attacks deep into Russia. In addition both the U.S. and Europe should sanction Russia to the max. The attacks have already begun with Russia's energy infrastructure now under long range attack. Gas lines are now forming in Russia. In addition, as we have argued in the past, Ukraine should set ablaze the Russian oilfields in Western Siberia. The path to a negotiated settlement requires Russia to feel real pain putting the ball in Trump's court. Hopefully that will happen.   

My Review of Tim Bouverie's "Allies at War"

 A Menage of Convenience

 

Historian Tim Bouverie has written a follow-on to his “Appeasement…” (See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2019/07/my-amazon-review-of-tim-boveries.html ) with an exhaustive history of the Roosevelt-Churchill-Stalin alliance of World War II. After Stalin’s dalliance with Hitler fell apart in June 1941 he joined up with Churchill. Although Roosevelt supplied Britain with lend-lease aid, he didn’t become a full partner until the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Bouverie recounts in great detail the diplomacy involved in keeping the alliance together where, to say the least, the war aims of the three parties differed.

 

I will not recount here what has already been written about the big wartime conferences in Casablanca, Tehran, and Yalta. What I found most interesting was how Churchill’s dealings with Vichy France, Spain, and Iraq in 1940 and 1941 was of great strategic import. To back up a bit in 1936 British Foreign Secretary Samuel Hoare teamed up with French Prime Minister Pierre Laval in a failed scheme to appease Mussolini in Ethiopia. Moving ahead to 1940 we found Hoare working brilliantly as ambassador to Spain to keep Spain out of Axis hands while Laval worked for the Nazi’s has a high official in Vichy France.

 

In response to Vichy, Churchill acted boldly in sinking a good portion of the French fleet off the coast of Algeria to keep it out of the hands of Germany. The U.S. policy towards Vichy was far more muddled. (See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2021/12/my-amazon-review-of-michael-neibergs.html )

 

Simultaneously Churchill had big troubles in the middle east where a pro-axis coup in Iraq threatened its oil supplies. Churchill deployed his over-stretched army in Egypt and Palestine to over-turn the coup and remove Vichy authorities from Syria. (See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2019/06/my-amazon-review-of-john-broichs-blood.html ) All the while London was being blitzed and Britain’s position in Egypt was under threat.

 

As the war was winding down the early fissures of the Cold War came to the fore. Although Bouverie does not think the Cold War was inevitable, I would tend to disagree. He doesn’t give much weight to the removal of the more pro-Western Maxim Litvinov from his ambassadorial post in Washington and similarly the removal of Ivan Maisky from London in 1943 with more hardline officials. To me that was a major tell. Once Stalin achieved the initiative on ground in 1942 his war aim was to seize eastern Europe to establish a buffer from Germany. Bouverie is correct in stating that Churchill and Roosevelt at Yalta could do little to alter the facts on ground.  The combination of the Soviet army along with the success of its spy services made the Soviet Union a clear winner at enormous cost of World War II. ( See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2021/06/my-amazon-review-of-sean-mckeekins.html )  That in turn set the stage for the Cold War.

 

Tim Bouverie has written an important book about diplomatic history. There is much here to study, and he demonstrated that although the parties had different war aims they succeeded in destroying the Hitlerite regime.

My Review of Shaun Walker's "The Illegals"

“The Americans” in Real Life

 “The Americans” was a hit TV show from 2013-2018 where it portrayed the daily life of two Soviet illegals and their two children as they worked their spy craft against America. Here Guardian reporter Shaun Walker delves into the history of Soviet illegals from Lenin to Putin. Indeed, before the revolution, Lenin himself was illegal in Britain. Because the in the early days Soviet Russia was a pariah state, there only way of obtaining intelligence on the West was through the use of illegals. As the Soviets obtained embassies, they integrated the work of the illegals with spies working under the cover of being embassy officials.

In this deeply researched book, which included interviews with former illegals in Russia and his use of the Mitrokhin files Walker puts together a history of Russia’s use of this method of espionage. He uses several case studies that would include Dmitry Bystrolyotov, Stalin’s Romeo and “Baron von Hohenstein.” To me the most fascinating spy was Iosif Grigulevich who was involved in a failed attempt to assassinate Trotsky and later as Teodoro Castro became a Costa Rican diplomat,

 Castro was ordered by Stalin, against the wishes of the KGB to assassinate Marshall Tito. Stalin’s death intervened and the order was never carried out. Who knows what the consequence would have been had he succeeded.

 Americans first learned of the Soviet illegal operation with the arrest of Rudolf Abel in 1957. Posing as an artist, Abel worked as a courier for other Russian spies operating in the country. In 1962 he was exchanged for the U-2 pilot, Francis Gary Powers. That is how high the Soviets valued him.

 In 2010 the American public learned of a roundup of 10 illegals in Boston and New York who ranged from being a high-end realtor to a Kennedy School graduate. It was their arrest that became the basis for the TV series. They were caught be- cause the CIA had an informant high in the SVR, the international intelligence service of Russia.

 In the 1970’s Putin watched the “Stierlitz” show on Russian television. That hit show featured the work of illegals in the West. Apparently, that made enough of an impression on him to become a KGB agent, and the rest is history. As president Putin stepped up the illegal program.

As depicted in the TV show, despite all of the training, the pressure on families was significant.  Many broke under the pressure of the job and the need to maintain there new identity. Indeed, there is a scene where an illegal in labor was fearful of blurting out Russian language expressions for pain.

 By 2016 it became apparent that through social media identities could be created in an instant Those social media identities have been used to great effect ever since to create discord in the West, especially during American elections. Thus, going forward the Russian need for illegals might be lessened.

 Shaun Walker has presented to us a very readable book on the underworld of the use of illegals in spy craft. He also demonstrates how asymmetrical the use of illegals is. It is much easier to create an illegal in America than it is in Russia. Given that asymmetry the Russians will continue to use them.

SHAME

I never felt so ashamed for my country than I did yesterday when I watched President Trump bully Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the oval office in front of a worldwide television audience. In Trump’s mind Zelensky was guilty of not kissing his ass so Trump stood foursquare for Putin’s aggression in Ukraine and in the process seemed to abandon the Western Alliance. I really should not have been surprised because his administration threw Ukraine under the bus at the Munich Security Conference two weeks ago. (See: https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2025/02/trump-and-new-hitler-stalin-pact.html) 

As I noted then what Trump is doing is not appeasement, but rather he has made the U.S. a co-aggressor with Putin’s Russia. This will end badly with China being the only real winner. If there is a small silver lining here it will be to rouse Europe from its slumber by forcing a massive increase in its hitherto inadequate military expenditures.

In the aftermath of Trump’s bullying, I was nauseated to watch his sycophants cheer him on. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent and Senator Lindsay Graham all belong in the hall of shame. Trump wanted a cabinet of suck-ups; he certainly has one.

 

My Review* of Sergey Radchenko's "To Run the World: The Kremlin's Bd.........."

 The Rise and Fall of Soviet Foreign Policy

 

Johns Hopkins professor Sergey Radchencko has given us a deeply researched and encyclopedic book on Soviet foreign policy from 1944 – 1991 from the point of view of the Soviet leadership. He gets into the heads of Stalin, Khrushchev, Brezhnev, Gorbachev, and their foreign policy minions. The Soviet leadership faced the tension among three incompatible goals of maintaining its revolutionary ideology, the need for security and its search for legitimacy among the nations, especially the United States.

 

He starts off with Stalin as the ultimate European focused leader whose “percentages agreement” with Churchill in late 1944 opened the way for Soviet control over Eastern Europe. He argues that Stalin did not initially want to Sovietize the Eastern Europe economies until he witnessed the failure of the French and Italian Communist parties to win electorally in the mid-1940’s. I don’t really buy that because the hardening of the Soviet position occurred while the war was still going on. Further, Radchenko fails to mention the Duclos letter to the American Communist Party in April 1945 criticizing its softness which signaled a hardening of the Soviet position worldwide.

 

What Stalin envisioned in 1945 was that Russia, as in 1815, would be part of a new Concert Europe that would run the continent. Hence Soviet power would be viewed as legitimate. Russian actions in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Berlin soon stripped away any sense of legitimacy, and in response NATO was formed. What I found fascinating was that anglophiles in the foreign ministry, Maksim Litvinov (ex-foreign minister and ambassador to the U.S.) and Ivan Maisky (ex-ambassador to the U.K.) played leading roles in developing Stalin’s European policies.

 

In Asia Stalin did not believe that Mao would succeed and for a time played the nationalists off against Mao’s communists. Mao accepted Stalin’s leadership as a junior partner. He would not feel such obedience under Khrushchev. In Iran Stalin was very cautious and he withdrew his forces from northern Iran thereby selling out the local communists who supported him.

 

Khrushchev was far more reckless. In Europe he ignited a Berlin Crisis, n caused a nuclear war over missiles in Cuba, and was an early supporter of Third World revolutionaries. Russian influence had to be reckoned with throughout the world. All the while the Soviets were building up their missile and nuclear capabilities in a direct challenge to the United States. This was crucial to Khrushchev because he sensed the unfairness of the United States having military bases surrounding the Soviet Union while he couldn’t have bases close to the United States. Hence, the big play in Cuba.

 

Khrushchev’s 1956 speech denouncing Stalin sent ripples throughout Communist Parties around the world triggering revolts in Poland and Hungary. While Chairman Mao respected Stalin, he had no such respect for Khrushchev and hence the long simmering Chinese jealousy towards Russia began to boil.

 

The split with China would widen to even include military action and a break in diplomatic relations with the Soviets and the opening of relations with the U.S. after the Nixon visit in 1972.  In 1978 Deng Xiaoping took power and embarked China on a capitalist road to prosperity. His goal was modernization, but as early as 1982, after he realized that the U.S. would stand by Taiwan, China gradually began its drift back towards Russia. In fact, two weeks before the 1989 Tiananmen massacre China resumed diplomatic relations with Russia. Thus, it should not be surprise to see Putin’s Russia and China cozying up in recent years.

 

In 1964 Brezhnev replaced Khrushchev and simultaneously accelerated the nuclear arms race and sought détente with the United States. In making arms deals with Nixon, Brezhnev at once lowered the risk of a nuclear holocaust and achieved the legitimacy he sought from the United States. One of the most powerful vignettes in the book is that Radchenko recounts that at the height of the 1973 Yom Kippur War Nixon was asleep and drunk and Brezhnev was zonked out on sleeping pills. The decision over war and peace was thus made by Kissinger and Andropov.

 

Brezhnev’s failing health later in the 1970’s was emblematic of sclerosis seizing up in the Soviet economy. Even allowing for Soviet gains in Africa, Soviet power was falling under the weight of its weakening economy. That economy would be put to the test with Reagan’s military buildup in the early 1980’s. Simply put the Russian leadership went into panic mode fearing they could not keep up. If you learn one thing from this book, it is that Reagan’s foreign and defense policies brought the Soviets to their knees.

 

Gorbachev tried to turn things around with his glasnost and perestroika, but the Soviets were too far gone. To ease the pressure on the economy he made a series of arms control deals with Reagan and Bush thereby legitimizing his country and he cut loose Eastern Europe because the economy could no longer afford to subsidize its satellites.

 

Gorbachev was a proponent of the Gaullist notion of a Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals. He called it “Our Common European Home.”  It was too late. Radchenko notes that there were discussions about limiting NATO’s reach in Eastern Europe. However, not commitments were reduced to writing and thus under Clinton NATO expanded to the borders of Russia.

 

One last point the Soviet Union had two diplomats who were survivors, and they appear throughout the book. Andrei Gromyko was a power from 1945-1988 and Anastas Mikoyan was a major player from 1935-1966. It was though them that Soviet foreign policy has continuity and historical memory. Radchenko has written an important book, and it will be useful in gaining insights into how Putin’s policies are both a continuation and a departure from the history he has outlined.

*- I am engaged in a dispute with Amazon about my ability to post reviews on their site. Amazon alleges that I have gone afoul of their community guidelines. Amazon is very difficult to communicate with so dear readers if you have a way of weighing in with Amazon, please do.

My Amazon Review of David Sanger's "New Cold Wars: China's Rise, Russia's Invasion....."

Pre-War, Not New Cold Wars

 

New York Times national security correspondent David Sanger is way too close to his sources, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, which is both an advantage and a disadvantage. It is an advantage because Sanger puts us behind the scenes to give us a very real sense of the diplomatic events of the past four years, especially the tick-tock of America’s warning to the world about the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.  It is a disadvantage, because instead of being a clear-eyed reporter, he was sucked into the world views of Sullivan and Blinken, an apologia, if you will.  He buys into the idea that we will give enough aid to prevent a Russian win, but not enough to allow for a Ukraine victory.

 

In 2014 after Russia’s invasion of Crimea, I noted that this would the start of something big and both the U.S. and Europe would have to respond forcefully. (See:  Shulmaven: The Ukraine: What is to be Done )However, both the E.U. and the Obama White House accepted Russia’s aggression as a fait accompli. Thus, too me it was no surprise that given the lack of will in the West, that Putin would sooner or later go in for the kill.

 

 

If you want to put dates on the start of the new cold wars between the United States and Russia and China, you can start at the 2007 Munich Security Conference where Putin decisively separated himself from the West. In the case of China, you can use Chairman Xi’s 2013 address to the Communist Party where he girded the party cadre to prepare for the struggles ahead. Simply put, the whole policy framework that brought China into the global economy was a failure. In both cases Russia and China returned to their dictatorial roots with Putin viewing himself as the “new Tsar” and Xi as the “new Mao.” (See: Shulmaven: My Amazon Review of Fiona Hill and Clifford Gaddy's " Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin")

 

Sanger rightly spends much time on the ongoing cyber war with both Russia and China being aggressors attacking both governmental and private web sites. It is here where such private companies as Microsoft, Google and Palantir play leading roles in defense of our country. We also can’t forget Elon Musk’s StarLink system initially saved the day in Ukraine.

 

Sanger picks up on Sullivan’s industrial policy views where the U.S. is now in the business of subsidizing America’s chip production. Because computer chips are at the core of both the modern economy and defense hardware, it makes little sense to import most of our chips from abroad, especially where the bulk of those chips come from very vulnerable Taiwan. (  Shulmaven: My Review* of Chris Miller's "Chip War: The Fight for the World's Most Critical Technology") Indeed, in the new Cold War, Taiwan is the new Berlin.

 

Sanger is too casual in his discussion of the new Russo-Chinese alliance that was formed at the Beijing Olympics in 2022 where the two partners stated their relationship was “without limits.” Hello, this foreign policy nightmare happened on the Biden Administration’s watch.  If Kissinger got credit for splitting the Soviets from China, shouldn’t the Sullivan/Blinken team get the blame. Within days Russia invaded Ukraine.

 

What is wrong with Sanger’s book is that he does not discuss defense policy. If we are in new Cold Wars with Russia and China, our stagnant defense budget certainly does not reflect that. Biden in his 2023 State of the Union address called attention to Franklin Roosevelt’s 1941 address discussing how dangerous our world has become. However, he did not mention that a week before Roosevelt called for America to become “the arsenal of democracy.”  ( See:  Shulmaven: President Biden's State of the Union: Strong on Form Weak on Substance) The defense budget would quadruple in the following year.  Similarly, Biden has yet to make the equivalent of the 1947 Truman Doctrine speech and Sanger has not reported any national security council memorandum equivalent to the 1950 NSC-68 which called for “a massive build-up of conventional and nuclear weapons.”

 

Sanger hardly discusses Iran and North Korea who are objectively aligned with Russia and China, a serious omission. It seems to me the world is a far more dangerous place than the new cold wars that Sanger suggests that are now with us. To me, we are in a far more dangerous pre-war period that we are ill-prepared to deal with it. (See: Shulmaven: Shulmaven Anticipates Hal Brands Foreign Affairs Article on Pre-WW II and Today)

For the full amazon Review see: Pre-War, Not New Cold Wars (amazon.com)

 

 

Joe "No Win" Biden

President Biden has done it again. He doesn’t believe in winning. Just as at the start of the Russia-Ukraine War when the Biden provided enough aid to prevent Ukraine’s defeat, but not enough for Ukraine to win, it now appears he is doing the same thing with respect to the Israel-Hamas War. Last night he announced on CNN that the U.S. will stop the shipments of offensive military aid to Israel should it invade the heart of the Hamas stronghold of Rafah. He also has suspended the shipment of 3500 bombs and thousands of artillery shells.

 

To be sure civilian casualties have been high in the Gaza War, but it is in the nature of the Hamas enemy who cares little about the death of its own people. To them every casualty makes Israel look bad in the eyes of the world. Thus, it is in their interests to increase the body count. When facing an enemy like this, what choice does Israel have?

 

If Biden thinks that will hasten the cease fire negotiations with Hamas, he is sorely mistaken. Hamas will continue to play its waiting game in the hopes that Israel will cave under U.S. pressure. Meantime more Israeli hostages will die in captivity, and it will likely make Hezbollah more aggressive in the north. Remember those bombs and artillery shells are needed to defend Israel in the north.

 

All Biden’s actions will do is to prolong the wars in Ukraine and Gaza. The quicker Hamas is defeated in Gaza the quicker the war will end. Never forget that Hamas is the aggressor. ( See: Shulmaven: Hamas Aggression Must be Punished ) A partial arms embargo on Israel is perhaps one of the most counter-productive things Biden has done. Selling out an ally does not do Biden proud and his action will have consequences around the world, especially in Taiwan.

Shulmaven Anticipates Hal Brands Foreign Affairs Article on Pre-WW II and Today

In an article entitled "The Next Global War: How Today's Regional Conflicts Resemble the Ones that Produced World War II" on January 26th in Foreign Affairs, Hal Brands, the Kissinger Distinguished Professor of Global Affairs at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, wrote as follows See:https://www.foreignaffairs.com/united-states/next-global-war) :

"World War II was the aggregation of three regional crises: Japan’s rampage in China and the Asia-Pacific; Italy’s bid for empire in Africa and the Mediterranean; and Germany’s push for hegemony in Europe and beyond. In some ways, these crises were always linked. Each was the work of an autocratic regime with a penchant for coercion and violence. Each involved a lunge for dominance in a globally significant region. Each contributed to what U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt, in 1937, called a spreading “epidemic of world lawlessness.” Even so, this wasn’t an integrated mega-conflict from the outset."

and:

"The parallels between this earlier era and the present are striking. Today, as in the 1930s, the international system is facing three sharp regional challenges. China is rapidly amassing military might as part of its campaign to eject the United States from the western Pacific—and, perhaps, become the world’s preeminent power. Russia’s war in Ukraine is the murderous centerpiece of its long-standing effort to reclaim primacy in eastern Europe and the former Soviet space. In the Middle East, Iran and its coterie of proxies—Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, and many others—are waging a bloody struggle for regional dominance against Israel, the Gulf monarchies, and the United States. Once again, the fundamental commonalities linking the revisionist states are autocratic governance and geopolitical grievance; in this case, a desire to break a U.S.-led order that deprives them of the greatness they desire. Beijing, Moscow, and Tehran are the new “have not” powers, struggling against the “haves”: Washington and its allies.

Two of these challenges have already turned hot. The war in Ukraine is also a vicious proxy contest between Russia and the West; Russian President Vladimir Putin is buckling down for a long, grinding struggle that could last for years. Hamas’s attack on Israel last October—enabled, if perhaps not explicitly blessed, by Tehran—triggered an intense conflict that is creating violent spillover across that vital region. Iran, meanwhile, is creeping toward nuclear weapons, which could turbocharge its regional revisionism by indemnifying its regime against an Israeli or U.S. response. In the western Pacific and mainland Asia, China is still relying mostly on coercion short of war. But as the military balance shifts in sensitive spots such as the Taiwan Strait or the South China Sea, Beijing will have better options—and perhaps a bigger appetite—for aggression."

Shulmaven wrote last November (Shulmaven: Reliving the 1930's - Part 5 ), in far more concise prose, something very similar to Brand's core idea. We are gratified that our thoughts are very similar to that of such a distinguished scholar of global strategy as Professor Brands.  Indeed we recently reviewed his most recent book on strategy. (See: Shulmaven: My Amazon Review of Hal Brands' Ed. "The New Makers of Modern Strategy...." ) Our thoughts of last November are highlighted below and if anything our view has been amplified by last week's U.S. response to a drone at attack on a Jordan base that killed three Americans.

"We started this series in March 2014 ( Shulmaven: Reliving the 1930s)  with Putin taking Crimea and using his proxies in eastern Ukraine and the last one was in April 2017 with  Trump’s and Obama’s vacillation in Syria in 2013 and 2017. ( Shulmaven: Reliving the 1930s - Part 4) With this blog I go further in that I now believe that we are no longer in the Post-Cold War Era, but rather we are now in what future historians will call a pre-war era.

 

Instead of facing the Berlin-Rome-Tokyo Axis we now face the Russia-China-Iran North Korea Axis We see this new axis playing out in Ukraine, Gaza, and the Taiwan Straits. All the signs were there in the 1930’s with Japan invading Manchuria in 1931 and the heart of China in 1937; Italy invading Abyssinia in 1935, and Germany reoccupying the Rhineland in 1936. However, it was not until 1938 that they were taken seriously."

My Amazon Review of Yaroslav Trofimov's "Our Enemies Will Vanish: The Russian Invasion and Ukraine's....."

Ukraine at War

 

The Wall Street Journal’s Yaroslav Trofimov is the best war reporter in the business. Here, in a very personal account, Trofimov covers the first year of Ukraine’s fight against the Russian invaders that began on February 24, 2022.  To Trofimov the war is very personal as he was born and grew up in Kyiv. The places he knew as boy were now targets of Russian bombs and missiles. Indeed, Trofimov was in Kyiv when the shooting started.

 

As a reporter he was present at the major battles of the war starting with Russia’s failed air assault on Hostomel Airport. Had that attack succeeded the war would have been over in weeks. At great personal risk he covered Ukraine’s initial counterattack from the Kyiv front which pushed back the Russian forces. Indeed, while I was following the war from afar, I witnessed on YouTube a perfectly executed ambush of Russian tank forces. I was far away and safe; Trofimov was up close and many times he was at great personal risk.

 

Trofimov takes us to the battles Izyum, Kharkiv and Kherson where once great cities were leveled to the ground by artillery and drone attacks. Much of the success of the Ukrainian army can be attributed to the West supplying Javelin antitank missiles and the HIMARS mobile rocket system. To be sure Ukraine was grateful for the western aid, but in many cases, it was too little too late. Trofimov argues, and I agree, that had the West gone all in from the beginning Ukraine would have won the war in a year. Had the aid come earlier the meatgrinder of Bakhmut would have likely been avoided where Ukrainian forces battled it out with Yevgeny Prigozhin Wagner Group of criminals.

 

Aside from covering the war in the field, Trofimov interviews Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and army chief Valeriy Zaluzhy. And he covers the arrival of the various European heads of state that show up in Kyiv to offer moral support and additional arms,

 

Trofimov is correct in viewing the start of the war in 2014 with Russia’s takeover of Crimea. I argued then that it was a wake-up call for the West. ( See: Shulmaven: The Ukraine: What is to be Done ) Unfortunately, that warning was unheeded and now after much devastation the war enters its third year. Where are the promised F-16 fighter jets? Ukraine still waits.

 

Trofimov gave us his first draft of history with his Wall Street Journal stories. This book represents the second draft and hopefully there will soon be a third draft that ends with a Russian retreat from all Ukrainian territory. 

For the full Amazon URL see: Ukraine at War (amazon.com)

Sleepwalking on the Road to Perdition

 With Trump's 12 point victory over Nikki Haley last night in New Hampshire, it seems that we are getting the 2024 election that most Americans did not want. You can't argue that America is a forward looking country with two octogenarians vying for the presidency. Trump is looking backward to the 1950's where he grew up and to the 1930's antecedents to his America First ideas, while Biden is still stuck in 1970's industrial policy time warp and the extreme cultural liberalism of the1972 McGovern campaign which has been adopted by most of the Democratic Party. 

Meantime the world has become more dangerous by the day with the new axis of evil consisting of China, Russia and Iran threatening U.S. interests around the world. While both candidates will likely focus on domestic issues, it is important to note policy mistakes in the domestic area can be reversed with subsequent elections, foreign policy mistakes are not so easily reversible. This is especially true with the wrecker caucus Republicans holding up much needed aid to Ukraine and Israel. (See: Shulmaven: Crunch Time for Ukraine, Israel and the Border ) If Biden were to show some leadership he should make a deal on the Border with the Republicans and get that issue behind him. If not, my guess is that the Republicans will sweep in November.

Further Biden has to get out of his sleepwalking mode and, if he is capable, he has to run an all-out campaign a la 1948 Harry Truman against the do nothing Congress. However, that "if" is a BFD, as Biden would say. To continue the Truman analogy, Biden should give an all-out speech calling for a big increase in the defense budget to deal with the axis of evil. Otherwise I fear that we would be sleepwalking on the road to perdition.

2024: Volatile Politics, Volatile Markets and the Fed Joins CREEP

Shulmaven did not cover itself in glory in 2023. (See: Shulmaven: 2023: Another Year of Living Dangerously ) We got much of it wrong:

* The economy did not enter a recession.

*Stocks did not trade in a broad range of 4200-3300 and instead approached its all-time high of 4800.

*Bitcoin didn't collapse to below $10,000 and and instead more than doubled to over $40,000.

*Trump was not a spent force and he now seems cruising towards nomination.

* The market has yet to recognize we have entered a new 13-year cycle.

We got a few things right:

*The Fed remained on the warpath for much of the year and wage gains remained solid.

*10-Year Treasury yields stayed above 4% for much of the year. Coincidentally  the yield ended where it stated at 3.9%

* Ukraine struck deep into Russia with missiles and sabotage as global tensions remained high.

Now, in the spirit of being often wrong and never in doubt here are my views for 2024:

* With the S&P 500 trading just below its all-time high and the VIX index at 12, I believe 2024 will be year of high volatility coming from volatile international and domestic politics. Think 1968.

* The stock market appears to be ignoring the warning of former Secretary of Defense and CIA Director Robert Gates where he noted in the November/December issue of Foreign Affairs "The United States now confronts graver threats to its security than it has in decades, perhaps ever."

* In retaliation for attacks on Ukraine's power plants, Ukraine will set ablaze several of Russia's prize West Siberian oilfields.

* Israel will defeat Hamas sufficiently to declare a victory and by yearend Saudi Arabia will be on track to join the Abraham Accords. (See: Shulmaven: Hamas Aggression Must be Punished)

*Domestically all of the signs point to a Trump victory for the Republican nomination and his victory in November, hardly a confidence building eventuality. Nevertheless, I am not yet predicting a Trump victory; I think it is a 50/50 call as of today.

* The Fed will do whatever it takes to avoid a recession in 2024. Their recent pivot is a step in that direction.  Objectively the Fed will join the Committee to Re-Elect the President. (CREEP, the name of Nixon's campaign in 1972.) As a pillar of the establishment and fearful of its independence, the Fed will effectively be all-in for Biden. Thus the Fed will plant the seeds for a very problematic 2025.

* Core CPI will likely run at a 2-2.5% rate in the first half, but accelerate to a 3% run rate by yearend. As a result the yield on the 10-Year Treasury will once again be north of 4%. In keeping with my view that we are in a new 13-year economic cycle, wage growth will remain solid.

* In this environment the S&P 500 should trade in a broad range of 5000-4200, approaching both ends more than once during the year, with the VIX exceeding 30 at least once during the year. Consistent with the past month, the S&P 493 will outperform the Magnificent Seven.

Reliving the 1930's - Part 5

We started this series in March 2014 ( Shulmaven: Reliving the 1930s)  with Putin taking Crimea and using his proxies in eastern Ukraine and the last one was in April 2017 with  Trump’s and Obama’s vacillation in Syria in 2013 and 2017. ( Shulmaven: Reliving the 1930s - Part 4) With this blog I go further in that I now believe that we are no longer in the Post-Cold War Era, but rather we are now in what future historians will call a pre-war era.

 

Instead of facing the Berlin-Rome-Tokyo Axis we now face the Russia-China-Iran North Korea Axis We see this new axis playing out in Ukraine, Gaza, and the Taiwan Straits. All the signs were there in the 1930’s with Japan invading Manchuria in 1931 and the heart of China in 1937; Italy invading Abyssinia in 1935, and Germany reoccupying the Rhineland in 1936. However, it was not until 1938 that they were taken seriously.

 

In terms of economic policy protectionism was the order of the day in the 1930’s and we now witness the Biden Administration continuing and amplifying Trump’s protectionist trade policies. Although Biden’s trade policies conflict, he remains a committed internationalist. However, the Republican Party is reverting to its 1930’s form with its America First withdrawal from the world.

 

At home America’s college campuses look like prewar Germany where in many cases it is no longer safe for Jews to walk freely to class. Although anti-Zionism has always been a cover for antisemitism, recent events have ripped off all of its pretentions of being anti-Israel while still liking Jews. Nevertheless, unlike the 1930’s, Jews in America have more to fear from the Left than from the Right when the Father Coughlin’s of the world ruled the airwaves.

 

Further unlike the 1930’s when America had real leadership under Franklin Roosevelt, today’s divided government is challenged by a Putinista faction in the Republican Party that is implicitly allied with the new axis of evil. Be warned the clock is ticking.

  

My Amazon Review of Alan Philps' "The Red Hotel: Moscow 1941, The Metropol Hotel......."

A Failure of Journalism 

We last ran into the Metropol Hotel in Amor Towles’ “A Gentleman in Moscow.” (See:        My Amazon Review of Amor Towles' "A Gentleman in Moscow")  Here we revisit the hotel as the home of foreign journalists covering the Eastern Front during World War II. We meet such stalwarts Quentin Reynolds, Margaret Bourke-White, Walter Kerr, Cyrus Sulzberger, and Edgar Snow among others. They are all there to cover the war under the very strict hands of Soviet censorship. Hence, for the most part, they have become organs of Soviet Propaganda.

 

The journalists are aided by a corps of female interpreters who in addition to there nominal duties are there to spy, influence and sometimes perform sexual services for mostly male reporters. One of those interpreters was Nadya Ulanovskaya who with her husband Alex are the true protagonists of the book. Both Nadya and Alex as teenagers were revolutionaries in 1917 and, in fact, they met Stalin. After the revolution both move up in nomenklatura and by 1926 they are working as GRU agents in China under the legendary master spy, Richard Sorge. (See: Shulmaven: My Amazon Review of Owen Matthews' "An Impeccable Spy: Richard Sorge, Stalin's Master Agent )

 

By 1932 Alex had moved over to the NKVD and worked as its rezident in New York. In that capacity he recruited Whitaker Chambers who years later would blow the whistle on the Soviet spy ring in the United States. (See: Shulmaven: My Amazon Review of Calder Walten's "Spies: The Epic Intelligence War Between East and West" )

However, by the late 1930’s both are disillusioned with communism and are initially saved from the purges by an old friend from the NKVD. Nadya worked for Australian journalist Godfrey Blunden. She travels with the journalistic crew to see what the Soviets want them to see at the front. The journalists live high on the hog while all of Russia is starving. Author Alan Philps gives us a great sense of the fear in Moscow as Hitler’s armies approached as the journalist were evacuated further east.

 

Nadya’s luck runs out in 1948 when she is arrested. It seems the KGB figured out that she was the protagonist in a novel Blunden wrote. She spends time in Lubyanka, Lefortovo and the Gulag and serves eight years. She is released early under Khrushchev's general amnesty. I didn’t realize what a big deal that was. Also released were her husband and daughter.

 

She immediately acts as a rebel by being a leader in “samizdat” movement which published previously forbidden tracts. Ultimately, she and her daughter move to Israel.

 

What we learn from Philp’s book is that journalists working under dictatorships cannot really do an honest job. In this case the journalists in Russia lived on their expense accounts, paid no taxes and eagerly awaited writing books that would bring them a royalty stream. To write out of line would mean having their visas revoked. Thus, in no way could they be considered independent. This is a lesson for a reader of reports emanating from Russia, Iran, China, and Palestine. Take all of them with more than a few grains of salt. Witness what happened to Evan Gershkovich now imprisoned in Russia.

 

Alan Philps has done a great service to the memory of Nadya Ulanovskaya and has written a work of history that today’s journalists should not forget.

For the full Amazon URL see: A Failure of Journalism (amazon.com)

 

My Amazon Review of Calder Walten's "Spies: The Epic Intelligence War Between East and West"

 Intelligence Wars

I normally frown on long books, but Calder Walten’s book weighing in at 688 pages is an exception. In this deeply sourced book Walten covers the 100-year East vs. West spy war starting with the formation of the Cheka in 1918 and its nontrivial influence on history. Like it or not the West has been at war with the Russians from the beginning and if you want a later date for the start of the Cold War you can use 1943 with the emergence of the Cambridge Five occupying high posts in the British security services and the atomic spy ring at Los Alamos.

The initial Soviet target was the British, but with the U.S. recognition of the USSR in 1933 the way was open for the NKVD and the GRU to establish outposts in the U.S. via their embassy and consulates and with the formation of AMTORG, the Soviet trading corporation. From this modest beginning came high placed spies including Alger Hiss, Lawrence Duggan Laughlin Currie and Harry Dexter White. And working with the U.S Communist Party, an error in tradecraft, the Soviets recruited the Rosenberg spy ring. Indeed, had Henry Wallace become President his choices for Secretaries of State and Treasury were Duggan and White, respectively making for a true horror show.

For the most part both the U.S. and Britain were oblivious to the Soviet threat through World War II. A case in point is that the atomic spy, physicist, and German communist Klaus Fuchs was cleared by British intelligence. In fact, the British were prohibited from spying on the Soviets and the U.S. OSS was riddled with Soviet Agents. On the U.S. side the one hero in the piece was FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover who was alert to the spying threat. (See: Shulmaven: My Amazon Review of Howard Blum's "In the Enemy's House: The Secret Saga of the FBI Agent and the Code Breaker who Caught the Russian Spies")  Based on the information coming from his spies, atomic spies, Stalin authorized the start of the Soviet nuclear program while the Battle of Stalingrad was going on. Stalin was thinking ahead to the postwar rivalry.

 

As good as Soviet spying was on Britain and the U.S. it objectively failed with respect to Germany because Stalin refused to believe the warnings coming from his intelligence apparatus. He even ignored the clear warnings from his super spy in Japan, Richard Sorge. (See: Shulmaven: My Amazon Review of Owen Matthews' "An Impeccable Spy: Richard Sorge, Stalin's Master Agent )

 

So successful was the Russian spying, especially through to the efforts of Cambridge Five member Kim Philby as MI6 liaison to the CIA, was that Stalin knew about America’s intelligence efforts before President Harry Truman. Indeed, Kim Philby was best buddies with James Angleton, the head of the CIA’s counterintelligence division.

 

This is not to say that the U.S. and Britain were asleep. The U.S. developed Oleg Penkovsky as an asset in Moscow. He was extraordinarily helpful during the Cuban missile crisis by informing Kennedy about the limited number of missiles that were operational in the Soviet Union. The British had Oleg Gordievsky, a high KGB official, who while in London briefed both Gorbachev and Thatcher on the eve of their first meeting in 1985. ( Shulmaven: My Amazon Review of Ben Macintyre's "The Spy and the Traitor: The Greatest Espionage Story of the Cold )  It was also Gordievsky who alerted the West that Russia truly feared that the U.S. was about to launch a preventive war during the Able Archer exercises in late 1983. Reagan took note of that and cooled his hot rhetoric that came from his “Evil Empire” speech earlier that year.

 

Walten also tells of the CIA’s paranoia in fearing nationalist uprisings as the vanguard of a communist revolution in the global south. Big mistakes were made in Asia, Latin America, and Africa. However, he does not that it was the weak Chilean economy and the army and not the CIA who overthrew Allende in 1973. Both the CIA and the KGB were playing cat and mouse with each other in that country.

 

Walten covers far more than spies. Aside from HUMINT, he discusses signal intelligence (SIGINT), electronic intelligence (ELINT) and image intelligence (IMint). I learned that Dr. Edwin Land, the founder of Polaroid, came up with the idea of using high resolution photography that became the basis of first the U-2 spy plane and later satellite imagery. The U-2 that was shot down over Russia in 1959 was accomplished through the use of a proximity fuse that was obtained from the Rosenberg spy ring.

 

I also learned that the dissolution of the Soviet Union did not turn off Russian spying. The KGB reformed as the FSB and the SVR and used such highly placed agents as Aldrich Ames in the CIA and John Walker in FBI counterintelligence. The damage these two caused was incalculable including the fingering of Gordievsky who escaped Russia by the skin of his teeth.  It seems that Clinton did not care about intelligence, but the new Russia plowed ahead. Walten discusses how the War on Terror diverted resources away from Russia and China to the West’s detriment.  Of course, it goes without saying that the Russian security services played a nontrivial role in the 2016 and 2020 elections. However, he does note the U.S. success in calling attention to Russia’s planned invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 which prevented a Russian false flag operation.

 

Walten ends his book with a discussion on China whose Ministry of State Security represents a far greater threat than the KGB/GRU ever represented. China’s espionage is across the board that involves stealing corporate secrets, cyber warfare, SIGINT, and the use HUMINT, in particular involving Chinese nationals in the U.S.  Remember the Russians were never an economic threat; China is thereby defending against its commercial spying critical.

 

Calder Walten’s well-written book is true public service. He highlights the fact that we live in a dangerous world where, as they say, eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.

For the full Amazon URL see: Intelligence Wars (amazon.com)