Cover of Spy Dust: Two Masters of Disguise Reveal the Tools & Operations That Helped Win the Cold War

Spy Dust: Two Masters of Disguise Reveal the Tools & Operations That Helped Win the Cold War

Reviewed & released by the CIA, opening a window on the actual world of espionage—elusive identities, sophisticated gadgetry, triple-think strategies—"Spy Dust" reveals more about US intelligence techniques abroad than most published works of nonfiction. Moscow, 1988—the twilight of the Cold War. The KGB is at its most ruthless & has indisputably gained the upper hand over CIA. No one knows how. Ten CIA agents & double-agents have gone missing in the last three years. They've either been executed or they're unaccounted for. At Langley, several theories circulate as to how the KGB seems suddenly to have become telepathic, predicting CIA's every move. Some blame the defection of Edward Lee Howard three years prior & suspect that more high-placed moles will be unearthed. Others speculate that the KGB's surveillance successes have been heightened by the invention of an invisible electromagnetic powder that allows them to keep tabs on any touching it: spy dust. CIA officers Tony Mendez & Jonna Goeser join to head a team of technical wizards & operational specialists, determined to solve the mystery that threatens to overshadow the Cold War's final act. Working against hostile forces, as well as unfriendly elements within CIA, they devise controversial new operational methods & techniques to foil the KGB, & show the extraordinary lengths to which US intelligence is willing to go to protect a source, then rescue him when his world starts to collapse. At the same time, Tony & Jonna fall in love. During an odyssey that began in Indochina 15 years before & ends in an operation in the heart of the Kremlin's Palace of Congresses, "Spy Dust" catapults readers from the Hindu Kush to Hollywood, from Havana to Moscow, but cannot conclude until its protagonists are wed in rural Maryland. At a time when people have many questions about the role of intelligence services & what's being done in their name, "Spy Dust" gives hope for the espionage battles of the future.

Audience
adult
Length
medium · 306 pages

Click a tag to see books like this one that share it. Point at it (on a phone, tap it) for less of it instead.

Read it? Sign in to help tag it.

Liked Spy Dust: Two Masters of Disguise Reveal the Tools & Operations That Helped Win the Cold War? Here’s where I’d start.

These suit anyone who liked Spy Dust: Two Masters of Disguise Reveal the Tools & Operations That Helped Win the Cold War. Sign in and mark a few books for picks shaped around your own taste.

  1. Confessions of a Spy Shares nonfiction, spy, espionage
  2. The Main Enemy: The Inside Story of the CIA's Final Showdown with the KGB Shares nonfiction, espionage, spy
  3. Spy Handler: Memoir of a KGB Officer: The True Story of the Man Who Recruited Robert Hanssen and Aldrich Ames Shares espionage, nonfiction, spy
  4. Spies: The Rise and Fall of the KGB in America Shares nonfiction, espionage, spy

“People who read Spy Dust: Two Masters of Disguise Reveal the Tools & Operations That Helped Win the Cold War tend to reach for these next.”

  1. The Wizards Of Langley: Inside The CIA's Directorate Of Science And Technology
  2. The Bureau: The Secret History of the FBI
  3. Spycraft: The Secret History of the CIA's Spytechs, from Communism to al-Qaeda
  4. The Widow Spy

“If you want more of the same (history), start with these.”

  1. Operation Whisper: The Capture of Soviet Spies Morris and Lona Cohen
  2. Spymaster: Startling Cold War Revelations of a Soviet KGB Chief
  3. Family of Spies
  4. Spy Wars: Moles, Mysteries, and Deadly Games

“If it was the espionage that hooked you, try one of these.”

  1. A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
  2. The Billion Dollar Spy: A True Story of Cold War Espionage and Betrayal
  3. Betrayal: The Story of Aldrich Ames, an American Spy
  4. Stalin's Englishman: The Lives of Guy Burgess

“These start from a similar idea, even if they go somewhere else with it.”

  1. The Great Game: The Myth and Reality of Espionage
  2. Man Without A Face: The Autobiography Of Communism's Greatest Spymaster
  3. Spy: The Inside Story of How the FBI's Robert Hanssen Betrayed America
  4. The Man with the Poison Gun: A Cold War Spy Story