Secret Alliances

Europe, 1940. Nazi forces sweep across the continent, with A British invasion likely only weeks away. Never before has a resistance movement been so crucial to the war effort. In this definitive appraisal of Anglo-Norwegian cooperation in the Second World War, Tony Insall reveals how some of the most striking successes of the Norwegian resistance were the reports produced by the heroic SIS agents living in the country's desolate wilderness. Their coast-watching intelligence highlighted the movements of the German fleet and led to counter-strikes which sank many enemy ships – most notably the Tirpitz in November 1944. Using previously unpublished archival material from London, Oslo and Moscow, Insall explores how SIS and SOE worked effectively with their Norwegian counterparts to produce some of the most remarkable achievements of the Second World War.

Even though the United States was still officially at peace prior to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, it was secretly devising a chain of intelligence-sharing alliances with future allies in the impending war in the Pacific. This work is divided into four sections, which bring together bits and pieces of often isolated details about the intelligence alliance, allowing readers to gain a sense of how it came to exist, how it functioned and what were its limitations, often severe. Section One discusses the efforts of the Washington, Hawaii and Philippines units in breaking all cryptographic systems used by foreign powers. Section Two covers the roles of Canada and Australia, the secondary powers of the British commonwealth, the Dutch East Indies and China, the secondary independent powers, and other players in the Allied effort. Section Three concentrates on other covert intelligence sharing in London, Hawaii and the Philippines. Section Four ends the text with a discussion of the suppression and their revelation of the role of Great Britain.

This award-winning study traces the shifting relations between Israel, Iran, and the U.S. since 1948—including secret alliances and treacherous acts. Vitriolic exchanges between the leaders of Iran and Israel are a disturbingly common feature of the news cycle. But the real roots of their enmity mystify Washington policymakers, leaving no promising pathways to stability. In Treacherous Alliance, U.S. foreign policy expert Trita Parsi untangles to complex and often duplicitous relationship among Israel, Iran, and the United States from 1948 to the present. In the process, he reveals shocking details of unsavory political maneuverings that have undermined Middle Eastern peace and disrupted U.S. foreign policy initiatives in the region. Parsi draws on his unique access to senior American, Iranian, and Israeli decision makers to present behind-the-scenes revelations that will surprise even the most knowledgeable readers: Iran’s prime minister asks Israel to assassinate Khomeini; Israel reaches out to Saddam Hussein after the Gulf War; the United States foils Iran’s plan to withdraw support from Hamas and Hezbollah; and more. Treacherous Alliance not only revises our understanding of the recent past, it also spells out a course for the future. An Arthur Ross Book Award Silver Medal Winner A Choice Magazine Outstanding Academic Title

Super-smart Julian Calendar thinks starting junior high at a new school will mean he can shed his nerdy image-but then he meets Ben and Greta, two secret scientists like himself! The three form a secret club, complete with a high-tech lair. There, they can work to their hearts content on projects like the Stink-O-Meter, the Kablovsky Copter, and the Nightsneak Goggles. All that tinkering comes in handy when the trio discovers an evil scientist's dastardly plan to rob a museum. Can three inventors, armed with their wacky creations, hope to defeat this criminal mastermind?

THE SECRET ALLIANCE is the story of the rescue of more than two million Jews from Eastern Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East since World War II. It is the dramatic--and largely unknown--account of the numerous "exoduses" made possible by a remarkable clandestine alliance initiated from Palestine by Shaul Avigur, the mysterious chief of the original Mossad, and Joseph J. Schwartz, the imaginative leader of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. THE SECRET ALLIANCE reveals the vast covert intelligence-and-rescue network the Joint financed and the Mossad set in motion to organize immigration operations which led, argues Tad Szulc, to the birth of the State of Israel.

Prior to the Six-Day War, Israel was a darling of the international left, vocally opposed to apartheid and devoted to building alliances with black leaders in newly independent African nations. South Africa, for its part, was controlled by a regime of Afrikaner nationalists who had enthusiastically supported Hitler during World War II. But after Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories in 1967, the country found itself estranged from former allies and threatened anew by old enemies. As both states became international pariahs, a covert—and lucrative—military relationship blossomed between these seemingly unlikely allies. Based on extensive archival research and exclusive interviews with former generals and high-level government officials in both countries, The Unspoken Alliance tells a troubling story of Cold War paranoia, moral compromises, and startling secrets.

Military alliances drive international politics. They embody conflict and cooperation among states and shape the international political landscape. Despite the profound effect alliances have on the course of international politics, many gaps remain in our understanding of their formation, continuance, and cohesion. In this book, Patricia Weitsman introduces a comprehensive theory that unifies current ideas about alliances and examines the relationship between threat and alliance politics under conditions of both war and peace. Examining military alliances before and during World War I, Weitsman provides a new interpretation of the politics of the great powers of this period. She reveals that states frequently form alliances to keep peace among the allied countries, not simply to counter shared external threats. Though alliances may be perceived by others to present a unified and threatening front, countries often face significant threats from within their own alliances. It is this paradox that underscores Weitsman's theory: although alliances are frequently forged to sustain peace, they may, in fact, increase the prospects of war.

This volume investigates secret diplomacy with the aim of understanding its role in shaping foreign policy. Recent events, including covert intelligence gathering operations, accusations of spying, and the leaking of sensitive government documents, have demonstrated that secrecy endures as a crucial, yet overlooked, aspect of international diplomacy. The book brings together different research programmes and views on secret diplomacy and integrates them into a coherent analytical framework, thereby filling an important gap in the literature. The aim is to stimulate, generate and direct the further development of theoretical understandings of secret diplomacy by highlighting ‘gaps’ in existing bodies of knowledge. To this end, the volume is structured around three distinct themes: concepts, contexts and cases. The first section elaborates on the different meanings and manifestations of the concept; the second part examines basic contexts that underpin the practice of secret diplomacy; while the third section presents a series of empirical cases of particular relevance for contemporary diplomatic practice. While the fundamental conditions diplomacy seeks to overcome – alienation, estrangement and separation – are imbued with distrust and secrecy, this volume highlights that, if anything, secret diplomacy is a vital, if misunderstood and unfairly criticised, aspect of diplomacy. This book will be of much interest to students of diplomacy, intelligence studies, foreign policy and IR in general.