A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
Ratings27
Average rating4.1
15
Ratings27
Average rating4.1
Kim Philby was the greatest spy in history, a brilliant and charming man who rose to head Britain's counterintelligence against the Soviet Union during the height of the Cold War, while he was secretly working for the enemy. Nobody thought he knew Philby like Nicholas Elliott, Philby's best friend and fellow officer in MI6. But Philby was secretly betraying his friend. Every word Elliott breathed to Philby was transmitted back to Moscow, along with those of James Jesus Angleton, head of the CIA.
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I won this book on Goodreads and I wasn't very familiar with Kim Philby or the Cambridge Spy Ring before starting the book. The book is non-fiction but Ben Macintyre's has a storytelling writing style that increased my enjoyment of the book. In brief, Kim Philby, along with a handful of college friends all working for MI5 and MI6 during WWII were in fact spying for the Soviets. Philby is probably the most successful and most highly placed spy ever to have been uncovered on either side of the Iron Curtain and his spying lead not only to strategic wins for the Soviet Union but to the deaths of countless agents and pawns that he felt were a danger to the USSR. But the real story here is about his friendships and the way that he manipulated some very powerful people in both MI6 and the CIA. According to him, it was his ability to compartmentalize that allowed him to repeatedly betray his close friends while earning their unwavering loyalty. That is the part of the story that was most upsetting to me and made this book one that I couldn't put away easily. He considered himself as true to the ideals of Communism above all else but it seemed at many times that the high of getting one over on all these powerful people was the real draw for him. He's a cold, unfeeling, and I thought, unlikable person but a compelling character all the same. Fans of spy books and the Cold War period of history will especially enjoy this book.
Instead of focussing solely on Philby and attempting to argue the traitor's psychology, Macintyre weaves a story of Philby and the ‘friends' (it seems unlikely that Philby's narcissism allowed him to view anyone as a friend) whom he cheated and betrayed in the name of the Soviet despots. Focussing thus makes the story all the more interesting. We'll never know the full extent of Philby's betrayal, but we do get to learn of some of the close relationships he ruined thus telling more of a story of the man than the countless numbers he sent to their deaths.
Macintyre is a good writer but his material here feels a little thin. Rather than a conventional biography, this is more a biography of relationships. It also feels like most of the information has been developed from few sources.
