FACES OF BETRAYERS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP75-00001R000400100054-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: November 11, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 8, 1999
• Sequence Number: 54
• Publication Date: November 29, 1964
• Content Type: NSPR

CPYRGHT
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THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW
Sant iTJ proved Fo 1AS?'C1A6-kFAS1,
THE NEW MEANING OF TREASON. By
Rebecca West. 374 pp. New York: The
Viking Press. $6.95.
CPYRGHTBy SIDNEY HOOK
in the title of this revised and
expanded edition of Rebecca
West's now-classic study' of the Eng-
lish wartime Fascist traitors, first
published here in 1947. The "new"
meaning of treason refers mainly to
Communist postwar betrayals of trust
whose roots go back to the prewar pe-
riod. It differs from the treason of the
William Joyces and the John Amerys
in its more pronounced ideological
character, the form its apostasy takes
-espionage and conspiracy on an
organized scale beyond the capacities
of most Fascist groups-and by the
superior types of personality, and in-
telligence involved.
With rare courage and indepen-
dence of judgment, Miss West gives
us a complex, nuanced and highly
knowledgeable account of a dreadful
phenomenon that inspires, in many
minds, an aversion so deep as to pre-
vent understanding. She believes that
the new forms of treason in a ther-
monuclear age constitute a vastly
greater danger to the peace and sur-
vival of the open society than previ-
ous varieties. This is not only be
cause of their grave menace to secu-
rity at. a time when the sudden death
of cultures is possible. To some de-
gree, danger also lurks in the meas-
ures a free society may be goaded
into accepting when, in frenzied re-
action to laxness in its security sys-
tem, it hunts for scapegoats and par-
alyzes its own defense with an im-
possible quest for total security.
7 Freedo --,"'dii8 ter r1f e. -_Q6tliiQ ie te
willful blindness of those who dismiss
the whole subject as inconsequential.
In reading her deft probing of the
inner life of the creatures of the
feeling that she would make a won-
derful biographer of the damned. Hers
guided tour of the Inferno would be
worth the pains of the descent. No
matter how evil or vile an individual t
may appear to be, despite our revul-
sion she makes us see him through
her wise and compassionate eyes as
Rebecca West.
still a credible, sometimes a pitiable,
fellow-human.
the United States had alread
She takes the starch out of the
self-righteousness of the virtuous
who, by avoiding all political risk
have escaped all political temptation.
And she does this without being
maudlin or sentimental, without get-
ting trapped in the sophisms of sub-
y
pledged its aid to the Soviet Union
to repel the Nazi invasion.).
Rebecca West restricts her story
primarily to the Soviet espionage
rings in Great Britain. She spells out
in detail why in an age of modern
scientific weapons and total war,
jective, moral relativism. She writes treason has consequences unimagin-
with a noble indignation against those able in the days of conventional war-
who confuse heresy with conspiracy, fare. She shreds into nothingness the
with humor and scorn against the . arguments-whoi;e echoes were also
slackness and stupidity in whose pro- heard here-in extenuation of the
tective shadow treason flourishes. guilt of Communist scientists who be-
Pervading the whole book is a buoy- trayed their trust.
ant and refreshing common sense so First it was asserted that there
notably absent in the very clever peo- were no "secrets" in science-this,
pie she writes about. despite the elaborate precautions to
To those inclined to scoff at the
gravity of the problem of ideological
espionage, the extraordinary public
tribute recehtiy paid to Richard Sorge
in the Soviet press should be instruc-
tive. A,s a rule the Kremlin preserves
an impenetrable silence about the
triumphs of its espionage agents. But
Sorge's services were so great that
unwonted posthumous honors were
bestowed on him. It was he who had
ferreted out (through the German
Embassy in Tokyo) not only the date
of the Nazi invasion of Russia-dis-
regarded by Stalin-but the news of
the Japanese decision to strike at the
United States and not the Soviet
Union, as well as the approximate
date' of Pearl Harbor.
distinctive about her study is its pro- This information, accepted by the
found psychological insight, its cool Kremlin as reliable because events
analysis of the "philosophy" of ideo- had confirmed his prior dispatches,
logical treason, of the rationalizations enabled Stalin to save Moscow from
of those who extenuate it-and of the Hitler by transferring troops origi-
nally stationed in Siberia to with.
Mr. Hook, who teaches pMiosop y stand expected Japanese attack. (The
U NDOUBTEDLY there are indi-
viduals who are better informed
than Rebecca West about the tech-
niques, stratagems and organizational..
structure of the Soviet espionage
apparatus, ? whose web of subversion
embraces the entire world. What Is
Hitter wi
hattan Project from the Nazis but
news of its very existence. Then it
was alleged that the infoizna ion
transmitted was of purely scientific
character having no bearing on weap-
ons; the truth was It concerned proc-
esses and inventions central to the'
technology of weapons. : When this
was established, the claim was made
that the scientists had been moved to
purloin atomic secrets only to enable
the Soviet Union to combat Hitler.
The truth was that they had trans-
mitted most of the information after
the defeat of Nazism.
It was then urged that the acts of
treason were episodes inspired by a
misguided idealism for a good cause.
-somewhat like "stealing flowers
from a park to give to patients in a'
hospital." The truth was that most
of the traitors were members of the
Communist party of long standing.
These were men who had remained
loyal to the Kremlin during the Nazi-
Soviet Pact, when Stalin was helping
en
ll~h
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aaanaa.
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CPYRGHT
exchange for our U-2 pilot,
Franbis Gary Powers. Until
war is outlawed by a world
authority, all nations must em-
ploy such agents for their own
tivists, had nothing to do with
the vicissitudes of the Krem-
.lin's foreign policy. Most were
"true believers" for whom
Stalin could do no wrong.
Miss West recognizes the
fundamental difference be-
tween the spy and the traitor.
The spy is an enemy soldier
behind our lines, doing a pro-
fessional and dangerous piece
of work-like the captured
Russian spy, Col. Rudolf Abel,
whom we traded to Moscow in
MORE interesting differ- I HE merit of Miss West's
ence appears between Fascist fascinating book is that she
traitors and Communist traitors. focuses attention on the gen-
The first, as a rule, were de- eral questions' involved and
clared and open enemies of the_ sometimes obscured by the
-free society. They were Quis- dramatic events she describes.
lings. Temperamentally and In- . One of them is: How can an
tellectually, most of them were open society defend itself
incapable of acting as espionage against a secret,, conspiratorial
agents burrowing silently into ' society in a time of interna-
strategic places in order to un- tional tension and ideological
dermine free society while pro- hostility? She compares the
fessing allegiance to it. Com- }situation to a body whose
munist espionage agents, on the healthy cells are attacked by
other hand, were sustained more others. When unchecked, we
by their ideology than by their call it a case of cancer. I do
personal resentments. In virtue i not believe the analogy is appo-
of their intelligence, their site. An open society can tol-
milieu, status and access to' erate many secret societies. It
their courage and respect them , strategic information and per- depends on the kind they are.
for the totality of their sacri- sonnet, they are depicted as They are dangerous only when
fice. But a traitor in a de- .,~ much more dangerous than the controlled by a foreign power
mocracy is a man who has Fascist traitors, who were an dedicated to the destruction of
turned against his own coun-
try and culture, his friends and
colleagues, in behalf of a totali-
tarian regime which would de-
stroy the very freedoms from
which he has benefited.
He introduces the poisons of
doubt and mutual suspicion so
that the distinction between
honest error and calculated
a free society. Whether secret
or open, Communism has never
been a domestic problem.
Nonetheless, Miss West is
right in denying that our choice
Is between tolerating Com-
munist conspiracy, no matter
how harmful, and sacrificing
our own liberties in the attempt i
to curb subversion. This is an
absurd antithesis. Almost every
case of ideological espionage
which has come to light -- and
many obviously have not -
could have been quietly pre-
vented by intelligent security
measures. Most of the discov-
eries of Communist espionage
In the West we owe not to the
workings of our own protec-
tive agencies but to defectors
from Communism whose recep-
tion is such that it is not likely
to encourage others. Prevention,
not punishment after the horse
Is stolen, is the key. And one
of the important operating
maxims of prevention is a prin-
ciple enunciated by Roger Bald-
win, former head of the Amer-
ican Civil Liberties Union: "A
superior loyalty to a foreign
government disqualifies a citi-
zen from service to our own."
It doesn't of course, disqualify
him from the protection of the
Bill of Rights.
demands which flow from the this kind. Unless they are given What stands out In most ,
character of modern security, power by "respectable" ele- shocking relief from Miss Weal's
It requires some training to ments, as in Germany, they are book is her indictment of the
know what and how' to steal. destroyed by their own paranoia. British security system. Her ac-
count of the Burgess and Mac-
Lean incidents, the story of
Fuchs, Bruno Pontecorvo and
Harold Philby, would' be ia-
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and eccentrics.
Of William Joyce, who was
the toughest and most intelli-
gent ` of the Fascist traitors,
it is reported he demanded
"that any social evening he
spent with his friends, even the
quietest, should end with
the singing of the National An-
treason is gradually eroded and them." (He must have been kin
the community changed "into a to an American jingoist who
desert haunted by fear." " wanted to divorce his wife be-
Morally, there is a double case cause she wouldn't get up from
against him, "If a state gives the marriage bed to stand at
a citizen protection, it has attention when strains of "The
claims to his an^?iance," All - Star-Spangled Banner" came
the more au when,.as in the case through the window.) Many
of Klaus Fuchs, it has given people who thought Joyce was
him a refuge from persecution. vile believed he should not have
Even if a citizen refuses the been hanged. Joyce himself,
protection of a democratic state however,' according to Miss
he may have a right to rebel West, denied he was vile "but
but not to conspire secretly, thought England was right in
He is not absolved from the . hanging him." One of his fol-
duties and the. basic decencies ! lowers- who had helped Joyce
of moral life. with his broadcast scripts, a
What emerges from Rebecca Pilot officer in the R.A.F., sen.
West's study of treason in Eng- tenced to W years for an action
land-and she carries her story that could have been interpret
down to the Stephen Ward case ed as a capital offense, burst out
- is the decline of the amateur indignantly: "This just shows
and idealist, who still.had some how rotten this democratic
honor to lose, and Elie growing country is! The Germans would
use of the professional who.' have had the honesty to shoot
knows no other career. This is me!" No democratic society
partly a result of the technical need have great fear of men of
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CPYRGHT
credible were it not based on
the record. Great Britain must
have been under the special
safeguard of Providence to have
survived her security system.
Had Hitler's agents enjoyed the
same free run of Britain's re-
search laboratories and Foreign
Office files, she might not have
survived her greatest ordeal.
The irony of the situation
is that with respect to Bruno
Pontecorvo, a man much abler
than Fuchs, who played a lead-
ing, if not crucial, role in the
development of Soviet (and
Chinese) nuclear weapons, the
case is even worse than she
states. For there is evidence
that Pontecorvo's membership
in the Communist party was
disclosed to American security.
agencies, by a former member
of the same Communist Paris
cell to which Pontecorvo. had be-
longed, at the time ? of his trip
to American and Canadian clear research laboratories
around 1943. This information
was transmitted to English
.security forces ` tong before
Pontecorvo returned to England
.and then disappeared behind the
Iron Curtain with the cumula-
tive results of costly years of
research. This seems to sustain
her conclusion: "It is hard to
avoid the suspicion that some-
one in security knew the truth,
Hitler, Stalin, and Mao had also
known it! It took some time
for the idea to penetrate that
some ties were stronger"than
the old school tie.
Miss West points to a curious
difference between trials of
Communist traitors In Eng-
land and - America. In England
they always confess; in America
they almost never do, no mat-
ter how strong the evidence
against them. This difference
In strategy is adopted by the '
i Communists, according to the
author, because the law in Eng-
land moves quickly, and they
wish, to conceal from the Eng-
lish public the startling facts
about espionage activity. In the I
United States the law, press,
and Congressional committees
make It difficult to conceal
Information. The strategy there-
fore is to exploit. the law's de-
lay, to impugn verdicts of guilt,
and always to charge the Jus-
tice De artment, the Courts and
the F.B I. with legal frame-ups.
It is safe to predict that If
multilateral disarmament con-
tinues, the nuclear test ban. is
extended and Communist poly-
centrism grows, ideological trea-
son may lose its importance.
The economic costs of support-
ing it and countering it must
be fearfully high. Some day,
they may be devoted to better
purposes. Until then survival re-
and the whole truth about Ponte- quires vigilance,
corvo, and decided to ignore it." - The worst thing that can hap-
Miss West's hypothesis that pen in the discussion of the
the Soviet espionage center de- problem is for it to become a-
liberately set out to undermine political football, as it.did in the
the trust of the Americans In McCarthy era. The preeminent
the entire British security sys- concern of. American liberals
tem to prevent cooperation be- has rightly been with the
tween the two countries seems questions of civil rights. Un-
implausible to me. Such an op- fortunately, this was aecom-
eration would be too risky. She panted by a taboo against also
underestimates the extent and considering problems of secur-
effects of natural stupidity made. ity. In consequence, these prob-
more stubborn and spiteful when lems were left to the police or
vanity is wounded. The English military or investment-broker
never understood politics based mind, which seems constitu-
on a Weltanschauung. As In-' tionally incapable of distinguish-
curable empiricists, they knew ? tog between heretics (whose
- bless their hearts! - that criticism Is essential to the
ideologies were all' stuff and health of an open society). and
'nonsense. If only those chaps, Conspirators playing outside the
_...w,.: rules of the game. The cure of
,,thh,abuses ot.a security, system
is neither, a witch-hunt nor a
demand to abolish it-both are
expressions of hysteria-but a
more intelligent system.
THIS book tells part of the
English story. The American
story still remains to be prop-
erly told. It is to be hoped that
someone with Rebecca West's
literary gifts, and Helen Mac-
Innes's expertise and eye for
the problems, will work up the
American source material-
which is both richer and more
disheartening than its English
counterpart.
My chief point of disagree-
ment with Miss West is with
the harshness of her judgment
on the scientific mind in politics
and human affairs. Very few
scientists thought that their ex-
pertness with the ways of things
made them an authority about
the ways of men-especially po-
litical men in the grip of a to-
talitarian ideology. And only a
minuscular element thought that
their scientific achievement ab-
solved them from their moral
obligations or made their trea-
son less odious. The "scientific"
mind in politics Is not the labor-
atory mind with its ethos of
openness and trust that can be
as easily abused by a Com-
munist agent as by a canny
medium bringing reports from
another world.
The scientific mind in politics
is steeped In knowledge of ideas,
personalities, interests and his-
tory. It knows the face of polit-
ical evil and the limits of Real-
poIitik. It knows how to assess
the promises of dictators where
there are no controls on their
performance. It is 'skeptical
without being cynical, and open
to 'evidence of change without
being naive. And it is ' free of
the arrogance of assuming that
scientists know better than their
own democratic fellow-citizens..
'What their best -interests _are.
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