Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information EARLY COLD WAR SPIES Communism was never a popular ideology in America, but the vehemence of Amer- ican anticommunism varied from passive disdain in the 1920s to fervent hostility in the early years of the Cold War. Nothing so stimulated the white-hot anticommu- nism of the late 1940s and 1950s more than a series of spy trials that revealed that American Communists had cooperated with Soviet espionage against the United States and had assisted in stealing the technical secrets of the atomic bomb as well as penetrating the U.S. State Department, the Treasury Department, and the White House itself. This book reviews the major spy cases of the early Cold War (Hiss-Chambers, Rosenberg, Bentley, Gouzenko, Coplon, Amerasia, and others) and the often-frustrating clashes between the exacting rules of the American criminal justice system and the requirements of effective counterespionage. John Earl Haynes is a 20th-Century Political Historian in the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress, Washington,D.C. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota. He is the author or editor of four books: Calvin Coolidge and the Coolidge Era: Essays on the History of the 1920s (editor, 1998); Red Scare or Red Menace? American Communism and Anticommunism in the Cold War Era (1996); Communism and Anti-Communism in the United States: An Annotated Guide to Historical Writings (1987); and Dubious Alliance: The Making of Minnesota’s DFL Party (1984). Harvey Klehr is the Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Politics and History at Emory University in Atlanta. He received his Ph.D. from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. He is the author of five books, Communist Cadre: The Social Back- ground of the American Communist Party Elite (1978); The Heyday of American Communism: The Depression Decade (1984); Biographical Dictionary of the Amer- ican Left (1986); Far Left of Center: The American Radical Left Today (1988); and The Amerasia Spy Case: Prelude to McCarthyism (1996). He was honored with the Emory Williams Distinguished Teaching Award from Emory College in 1983. Haynes and Klehr have jointly coauthored five books: In Denial: Historians, Com- munism and Espionage (2002); Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America (1999); The Soviet World of American Communism (1998); The Secret World of American Communism (1995); and The American Communist Movement: Storming Heaven Itself (1992). In addition, their articles have appeared in scholarly journals including International Newsletter of Communist Studies, Film History, American Communist History, Journal of Cold War Studies, Labor History, Labour History Review, and Problems of Post-Communism,aswell as in such journals of opinion as Commentary, the New Republic, New York Review of Books, Wall Street Journal, American Spectator, and the Weekly Standard. © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information CAMBRIDGE ESSENTIAL HISTORIES Series Editor Donald Critchlow, Saint Louis University Cambridge Essential Histories is devoted to introducing critical events, periods, or individuals in history to students. Volumes in this series emphasize narra- tive as a means of familiarizing students with historical analysis. In this series leading scholars focus on topics in European, American, Asian, Latin American, Middle Eastern, African, and world history through thesis-driven, concise vol- umes designed for survey and upper-division undergraduate history courses. The books contain an introduction that acquaints readers with the historical event and reveals the book’s thesis; narrative chapters that cover the chronology of the event or problem; and a concluding summary that provides the historical interpretation and analysis. Volumes also include a bibliographic essay. © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information Early Cold War Spies The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics JOHN EARL HAYNES Washington, D.C. HARVEY KLEHR Emory University © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo, Delhi, Tokyo, Mexico City Cambridge University Press 32 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10013-2473, USA www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9780521674072 © John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr 2006 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 2006 Reprinted 2008, 2011 A catalog record for this publication is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Haynes, John Earl. Early Cold War spies : the espionage trials that shaped American politics / John Earl Haynes, Harvey Klehr. p. cm. – (Cambridge essential histories) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-521-85738-4 (hardback) – ISBN 0-521-67407-7 (pbk.) 1. Spies – Soviet Union – History – 20th century. 2. Espionage, Soviet – History – 20th century. 3. Trials (Espionage) – United States – History – 20th century. 4. Communism – Soviet Union – History – 20th century. 5. Anti-communist movements – United States – History – 20th century. 6. United States – Politics and government – 1945–1953. I. Klehr, Harvey. II. Title. III. Series. UB271.R9H388 2006 364.1´31–dc22 2006002127 ISBN 978-0-521-85738-3 Hardback ISBN 978-0-521-67407-2 Paperback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information John Earl Haynes To my son Joshua Harvey Klehr To Mickey and Marilyn Steinberg, my father-in-law and mother-in-law, with love, admiration, and gratitude © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information Contents Series Editor’s Foreword page xi 1 Introduction: Early Cold War Spy Cases ..............1 Early Cold War Spy Trials 3 AWord about Trials and History 6 Spy Trials and McCarthyism 7 Politics of the Early Cold War 8 2 The Precursors ..............................23 Amerasia: The First Cold War Spy Case 25 Gouzenko: A Canadian Spy Case with American Repercussions 48 3 Elizabeth Bentley: The Case of the Blond Spy Queen .................................60 The Silvermaster Group 66 The Perlo Group 67 The Trials of William Remington 73 Venona and Bentley’s Vindication 82 The Bentley Case: A Conclusion 88 4 The Alger Hiss–Whittaker Chambers Case ............92 Whittaker Chambers 93 Alger Hiss 97 Dueling Testimony 99 The Slander Suit, the Baltimore Documents, and the Pumpkin Papers 103 The Grand Jury 107 The First Hiss Trial 120 ix © in this web service Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 978-0-521-67407-2 - Early Cold War Spies: The Espionage Trials That Shaped American Politics John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr Frontmatter More information x Contents The Second Hiss Trial 124 Chambers after the Trial 130 Hiss after the Trial 132 The Historical Argument 132 5 The Atomic Espionage Cases ....................138 Klaus Fuchs: The Background 139 Theodore Hall: The Background 142 Rosenberg and Greenglass: The Background 143 J. Robert Oppenheimer and Communists at the Berkeley Radiation Laboratory 146 The Red Bomb and the Postwar Trials 151 J. Robert Oppenheimer after the Manhattan Project 177 The Trials of Rudolf Abel and Morris and Lona Cohen 182 6 Judith Coplon: The Spy Who Got Away with It