Stalins Spy: Richard Sorge And The Tokyo Espionage Ring

Stalins Spy: Richard Sorge And The Tokyo Espionage Ring

Product Description Provides a compelling study of the life and career of Richard Sorge, who entered Soviet intelligence in 1920 and led a life of espionage for the Russians in the Tokyo Spy Ring, where he was embraced by the Germans as a Nazi journalist. Amazon.com Review Dr. Richard Sorge, writes British journalist Robert Whymant, deserves to be considered one of the most successful spies in modern history. The grand-nephew of a close comrade of Karl Marx, Sorge became an active member of the German Communist Party after being wounded in World War I. Having moved to Moscow, he then worked in the Soviet intelligence service, returning to Germany in the early 1930s. Securing work as a journalist after passing himself off as a supporter of the Nazi regime, Sorge traveled to China and then to Japan, where he became a confidant of German and Japanese businessmen and diplomats. The information he gathered from these contacts he sent on to Moscow. He eventually recruited a small circle of Japanese and European associates, and his spy ring operated successfully under the noses of the redoubtable Japanese secret service. Despite the reliability of his reports, Whymant notes, Sorges intelligence was often dismissed--as when he warned that the Germans were planning to invade the Soviet Union. When the Germans did indeed invade, however, his stock rose, even if Stalin doubted Sorges assurances that the Japanese would not join their German allies in attacking eastern Russia. The Japanese finally arrested Sorge in 1941, and three years later he was hanged for espionage, along with most of his confederates. Whymants gripping account makes a powerful case for their being regarded as heroes in the antifascist cause. --Gregory McNamee From Library Journal Richard Sorge, the quintessential Soviet master espionage agent, assembled a spy ring in Japan from 1933 to 1941. The Tokyo Espionage Ring had access to the highest levels of the German and Japanese governments and was able to transmit invaluable information about Axis military and diplomatic initiatives around the world, especially those perceived as having an impact on the Soviet Union. Sorges brilliant information-gathering expertise was not always appreciated by his Moscow handlers, including Stalin himself. Whymant captures Sorges human side: his weaknesses for women and alcohol and his pervasive loneliness. Sorges stubborn hope that Moscow would intervene to save him from execution by the Japanese because of his loyalty to the Soviet cause is both poignant and pathetic, given the Soviet policy of refusing to acknowledge its spy networks. This may be compared with Gordon W. Pranges Target Tokyo: The Story of the Sorge Spy Ring (LJ 9/1/84), which has a more authoritative historians style, albeit a lively one. Recommended for academic and larger public libraries.?Stephen W. Green, Auraria Lib., Denver Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. From Kirkus Reviews The most careful assessment to date of one of the most successful spy rings ever. The career of Richard Sorge, the son of a German father and a Russian mother, was filled with paradox. He fought bravely in the German army during the First World War and was wounded three times. He became a committed communist after the war, but his wounds served to inoculate him from the suspicions of the German officers among whom he worked as a journalist in Tokyo from 1933 to 1941. His Soviet spy ring, using both Japanese and Germans, was often better informed than the German Embassy, which leaned heavily on his expertise, the ambassador even allowing him to use the embassy code books. He warned the Soviet Union of the impending German attack, almost to the day, only to have his warning regarded by Stalin as a provocation. He was almost ludicrously indiscreet in his conversation, was frequently drunk, and even seduced the ambassadors wife, but the sheer recklessness of his conduct served