Intelligence In The Cold War What Difference Did It Make

Intelligence was a major part of the Cold War, waged by both sides with an almost warlike intensity. Yet the question 'What difference did it all make?' remains unanswered. Did it help to contain the Cold War, or fuel it and keep it going? Did it make it hotter or colder? Did these large intelligence bureaucracies tell truth to power, or give their governments what they expected to hear? These questions have not previously been addressed systematically, and seven writers tackle them here on Cold War aspects that include intelligence as warning, threat assessment, assessing military balances, Third World activities, and providing reassurance. Their conclusions are as relevant to understanding what governments can expect from their big, secret organizations today as they are to those of historians analysing the Cold War motivations of East and West. This book is valuable not only for intelligence, international relations and Cold War specialists but also for all those concerned with intelligence's modern cost-effectiveness and accountability. This book was published as a special issue of Intelligence and National Security.

In recent years the importance of Signals Intelligence (Sigint) has become more prominent, especially the capabilities and possibilities of reading and deciphering diplomatic, military and commercial communications of other nations. This growing awareness of the importance of intelligence applies not only to the activities of the big services but also to those smaller nations like The Netherlands. For this reason The Netherlands Intelligence Association (NISA) was recently established in which academics and (former and still active) members of The Netherlands intelligence community work together in order to promote research into the history of Dutch intelligence communities.--

In recent years the importance of Signals Intelligence (Sigint) has become more prominent, especially the capabilities of reading and deciphering diplomatic, military and commercial communications of other nations. This work reveals the role of intercepting messages during the Cold War.

Intelligence was a central element of the Cold War and the need for it was expected to diminish after the USSR's collapse, yet in recent years it has been in greater demand than ever. The atrocities of 11 September and the subsequent "war on terrorism" now call for an even more intensive effort. Important questions arise on how intelligence fits into the world of increased threats, globalization and expanded international action. This volume contains the recent work on this subject by Michael Herman, British intelligence professional for 35 years and Oxford University academic. It compares intelligence with other government information services, and discusses the British intelligence system and the case for its reform. It also addresses the ethical issues raised by intelligence's methods and results: "do they on balance make for a better world or a worse one?". Other chapters explore a wide range of intelligence topics past and present, including the transatlantic relationship, the alliance strategies of Norway and New Zealand, Mrs Thatcher's "de-unionization" of British Sigint, and personal memories of the British Cabinet Office in the 1970s. Michael Herman argues for intelligence professionalism as a contribution to international security and for its encouragement as a world standard. The modern challenge is for intelligence to support international cooperation in ways originally developed to advance national interests, while at the same time developing some restraint and international "rules of the game", in the use of intrusive and covert methods on its traditional targets. The effects of 11 September on this challenge are discussed in a thoughtful afterword.

Strategic Intelligence in the Cold War and Beyond looks at the many events, personalities, and controversies in the field of intelligence and espionage since the end of World War II. A crucial but often neglected topic, strategic intelligence took on added significance during the protracted struggle of the Cold War. In this accessible volume, Jefferson Adams places these important developments in their historical context, taking a global approach to themes including various undertakings from both sides in the Cold War, with emphasis on covert action and deception operations controversial episodes involving Cuba, Chile, Nicaragua, Vietnam, Poland, and Afghanistan as well as numerous lesser known occurrences. three Cold War spy profiles which explore the role of human psychology in intelligence work the technological dimension spies in fiction, film and television developments in the intelligence organizations of both sides in the decade following the fall of the Berlin wall Supplemented by suggestions for further reading, a glossary of key terms, and a timeline of important events, this is an essential read for all those interested in the modern history of espionage.

"This volume examines intelligence services since 1945 in their role as knowledge producers. Intelligence agencies are producers and providers of arcane information. However, little is known about the social, cultural and material dimensions of their knowledge production, processing and distribution. This volume starts from the assumption that during the Cold War, these core activities of information services underwent decisive changes, of which scientization and computerisation are essential. With a focus on the emerging alliances between intelligence agencies, science and (computer) technology, the chapters empirically explore these transformations and are characterised by innovative combinations of intelligence history with theoretical considerations from the history of science and technology and the history of knowledge. At the same time, the book challenges the bipolarity of Cold War history in general and of intelligence history in particular in favour of comparative and transnational perspectives. The focus is not only the Soviet Union and the United States, but also Poland, Turkey, the two German states and Brazil. This approach reveals surprising commonalities across systems: time and again, the expansion and use of intelligence knowledge came up against the limits that resulted from intelligence culture itself. The book enriches our global understanding of knowledge of the state and contributes to a historical framework for the past decade of debates about the societal consequences of intelligence data processing. This book will be of much interest to students of intelligence studies, science and technology studies, security studies and International Relations"--

Two veteran intelligence agents, one from the CIA and the other from the KGB, join together in an unprecedented collaboration to trace the activities of the two intelligence agencies at the start of the Cold War in postwar Berlin. UP.