books
the origins of fbi counterintelligence
as the world prepared for war in the 1930s the united states discovered that it faced the real threat of foreign spies stealing military and industrial secrets and that it had no established means to combat them . into that breach stepped j. edgar hoover and the fbi . although the fbis expanded role in world war ii has been well documented few have examined the crucial period before pearl harbor when the bureaus powers secretly expanded to face the developing international emergency . former fbi agent raymond batvinis now tells how the bureau grew from a small law enforcement unit into americas first organized counterespionage and counterintelligence service.batvinis examines the fbis emerging new roles during the two decades leading up to americas entry into world war ii to show how it cooperated and competed with other federal agencies . he takes readers behind the scenes as the state department and hoover fought fiercely over the control of counterintelligence and tells how the agency combined its crime fighting expertise with its new wiretapping authority to spy on foreign agents . based on newly declassified documents and interviews with former agents batviniss account reconstructs and greatly expands our understanding of the fbis achievements and failures during this period . among these were the bureaus mishandling of the 1938 rumrich griebl spy case which hoover slyly used to broaden his agencys powers ; its cracking of the duquesne espionage case in 1941 which enabled hoover to boost public and congressional support to new heights ; and its failure to understand the value of soviet agent walter krivitsky which slowed bureau efforts to combat soviet espionage in america . in addition batvinis offers a new view of the relationship between the fbi and the military cites the crucial contributions of british intelligence to the fbis counterintelligence education and reveals the agencys ultra secret role in mining financial records for the treasury department . he also reviews the early days of the top secret special intelligence service which quietly dispatched fbi agents posing as businessmen to south america to spy on their governments . with an insiders knowledge and a storytellers skill batvinis provides a page turning history narrative that greatly revises our views of the fbi and also resonates powerfully with our own post 9 11 world .
paperback university press of kansas 2009 isbn13 9780700616534 isbn10 0700616535
abridged n isbn 13 9780700616534 number in series 1 number of pages 332 publisher univ pr of kansas release date 62135769600000