Spies: The Epic Intelligence War Between East and West

Written by Calder Walton

Narrated by Dugald Bruce-Lockhart

Foreign Policy Best Book of 2023
Foreign Affairs Best Book of 2023

The “riveting” (The Economist), secret story of the hundred-year intelligence war between Russia and the West with lessons for our new superpower conflict with China.

Spies is the history of the secret war that Russia and the West have been waging for a century. Espionage, sabotage, and subversion were the Kremlin’s means to equalize the imbalance of resources between the East and West before, during, and after the Cold War. There was nothing “unprecedented” about Russian meddling in the 2016 US presidential election. It was simply business as usual, new means used for old ends.

The Cold War started long before 1945. But the West fought back after World War II, mounting its own shadow war, using disinformation, vast intelligence networks, and new technologies against the Soviet Union. Spies is a “deeply researched and artfully crafted” (Fiona Hill, deputy assistant to the US President) story of the best and worst of mankind: bravery and honor, treachery and betrayal. The narrative shifts across continents and decades, from the freezing streets of St. Petersburg in 1917 to the bloody beaches of Normandy; from coups in faraway lands to present-day Moscow where troll farms, synthetic bots, and weaponized cyber-attacks being launched woefully unprepared West. It is about the rise and fall of Eastern superpowers: Russia’s past and present and the global ascendance of China.

Mining hitherto secret archives in multiple languages, Calder Walton shows that the Cold War started earlier than commonly assumed, that it continued even after the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991, and that Britain and America’s clandestine struggle with the Soviet government provided key lessons for countering China today. This “authoritative, sweeping” (Fredrik Logevall, Pulitzer Prize­–winning author of Embers of War) history, combined with practical takeaways for our current great power struggles, make Spies a unique and essential addition to the history of the Cold War and the unrolling conflict between the United States and China that will dominate the 21st century.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
• Release date: Jun 6, 2023
• ISBN: 9781797161105

Calder Walton

Calder Walton is one of the world’s leading scholars of intelligence and national security. A historian at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, he received a doctorate in history from Trinity College, Cambridge, where he also helped to write MI5’s authorized hundred-year history. He is general editor of the three-volume Cambridge History of Espionage and Intelligence. His previous book, Empire of Secrets, won the Longman-History Today Book of the Year award. His research has appeared in leading academic journals and in print and broadcast media on both sides of the Atlantic. He lives in Cambridge, Massachusetts, with his wife and son, who teaches him the true nature of subterfuge.

Reviews for Spies

[Mike Dunham · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Structured and sounds like a university course. That’s fine, if you’re interested in that approach. Not what I was looking for.

[Dorian Liepmann · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Just a great book about the history of espionage between Russia and the West. Uses a lot of recently released sources from both sides and the author clearly interviewed many of the players.

[Yoni Kampf · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Brilliantly written and beautifully read. Best book this year 2023

[Donna · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

How many audiobooks could rise from 3 or 4 stars to 5+ if only the narrator/narration was right?

[dojohns · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This would’ve been a five star review, except when the writer loses his freaking mind over Trump derangement syndrome at the end of the book. It’s a sad state of affairs when so-called journalist cannot tell both sides of the story. I would recommend the book except with a big Asterixregarding his TDS.