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    The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB
    The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB
    The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB
    Audiobook19 hours

    The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB

    Written by Milton Bearden and James Risen

    Narrated by Christopher Lane

    4.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    A landmark collaboration between a thirty-year veteran of the CIA and a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, The Main Enemy is the dramatic inside story of the CIA-KGB spy wars, told through the actions of the men who fought them.

    Based on hundreds of interviews with operatives from both sides, The Main Enemy puts us inside the heads of CIA officers as they dodge surveillance and walk into violent ambushes in Moscow. This is the story of the generation of spies who came of age in the shadow of the Cuban missile crisis and rose through the ranks to run the CIA and KGB in the last days of the Cold War. The clandestine operations they masterminded took them from the sewers of Moscow to the back streets of Baghdad, from Cairo and Havana to Prague and Berlin, but the action centers on Washington, starting in the infamous "Year of the Spy"--when, one by one, the CIA’s agents in Moscow began to be killed, up through to the very last man.

    Behind the scenes with the CIA's covert operations in Afghanistan, Milt Bearden led America to victory in the secret war against the Soviets, and for the first time he reveals here what he did and whom America backed, and why. Bearden was called back to Washington after the Soviets withdrew from Afghanistan and was made chief of the Soviet/East Euro-pean Division--just in time to witness the fall of the Berlin Wall, the revolutions that swept across Eastern Europe, and the implosion of the Soviet Union.

    Laced with startling revelations--about fail-safe top-secret back channels between the CIA and KGB, double and triple agents, covert operations in Berlin and Prague, and the fateful autumn of 1989--The Main Enemy is history at its action-packed best.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateSep 11, 2018
    ISBN9781543680058
    The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB
    Author

    Milton Bearden

    A thirty-year veteran of the CIA’s clandestine services, Milt Bearden was chief of the Soviet/East European Division at the time of the collapse of the Soviet Union. As CIA chief in Pakistan, he supplied the Afghan freedom fighters who overthrew the Soviets. He received the Donovan Award and the Distinguished Intelligence Medal, the CIA's highest honor. He is featured in the Discovery Channel's Secret Warriors and the BBC's Covert Action. He was born in Oklahoma and spent his childhood in Washington State, where his father worked on the Manhattan Project. He served in the Air Force before joining the CIA in 1964 and currently lives outside Washington, D.C., with his French-born wife.

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    Reviews for The Main Enemy

    4.5/5

    98 ratings8 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Interesting, good narration, excellent presentation about US and Soviet offensive/defensive intelligence techniques.
    • 4/5
      A splendid book that covers an important phase in both American and Russian histories.
    • 4/5
      Enjoyed the blow by blow account of many of the incidents described in the book. It also helped fill in some holes in my knowledge of Cold War history during that time. Too bad I was a high school student at the time, with little awareness of the tremendous significance of what was unfolding.
    • 4/5
      Very interesting if not extremely long winded. They could have cut the book in half and it would have served the same purpose.
    • 5/5
      Put. Role. Of. The. CIA. And. KGBIn. A. Historical pPerspective
    • 5/5
      If you like history, you WILL really enjoy this book. I know I did.
    • 4/5
      It's a bit daunting at first trying to remember all the Russian names, never mind all the American names and secret spy code names, and to keep track of all the connections. But once you get used to the rhythm of the book it is a thrilling series of episodes in the recent history of KGB and CIA espionage. I keep thinking about where I was and what I was doing, while all these secret events were taking place far away, since the exact dates and times are provided. An inside look at the last days of the Soviet Union and beyond.
    • 4/5
      Beardon was a high level operator in anti-soviet CIA operations 1985-6. This detailed account is based in part on interviews with his opposite numbers in the KGB in preperation for this book. Then he was in charge of CIA covert operations in Afghanistan. James Risen is a lead reporter at the New York Times reporting on military affairs. I assume he kept Beardon honest.