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A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
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A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
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A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
Audiobook11 hours

A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal

Written by Ben Macintyre

Narrated by John Lee

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

4/5

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Currently unavailable

Currently unavailable

About this audiobook

Master storyteller Ben Macintyre's most ambitious work to date brings to life the twentieth century's greatest spy story.

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. And nobody thought he knew Philby like Nicholas Elliott, Philby's best friend and fellow officer in MI6. The two men had gone to the same schools, belonged to the same exclusive clubs, grown close through the crucible of wartime intelligence work and long nights of drink and revelry. It was madness for one to think the other might be a communist spy, bent on subverting Western values and the power of the free world.

But Philby was secretly betraying his friend. Every word Elliott breathed to Philby was transmitted back to Moscow-and not just Elliott's words, for in America, Philby had made another powerful friend: James Jesus Angleton, the crafty, paranoid head of CIA counterintelligence. Angleton's and Elliott's unwitting disclosures helped Philby sink almost every important Anglo-American spy operation for twenty years, leading countless operatives to their doom. Even as the web of suspicion closed around him, and Philby was driven to greater lies to protect his cover, his two friends never abandoned him-until it was too late. The stunning truth of his betrayal would have devastating consequences on the two men who thought they knew him best, and on the intelligence services he left crippled in his wake.

Told with heart-pounding suspense and keen psychological insight, and based on personal papers and never-before-seen British intelligence files, A Spy Among Friends is Ben Macintyre's best book yet, a high-water mark in Cold War history telling.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateJul 29, 2014
ISBN9780553397895
Unavailable
A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal
Author

Ben Macintyre

Ben Macintyre is a columnist and Associate Editor on The Times. He has worked as the newspaper's correspondent in New York, Paris and Washington. He is the author of nine books including Agent Zigzag, shortlisted for the Costa Biography Award and the Galaxy British Book Award for Biography of the Year 2008, the number 1 bestseller Operation Mincemeat and, most recently, the Richard & Judy Book Club selection, Double Cross. He lives in London.

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Rating: 4.157407095238096 out of 5 stars
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  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Harold Adrian Russell “Kim” Philby is probably the best-known double agent in modern history. An esteemed member of Britain’s upper class, he became enchanted with communism while he was at Cambridge University in the 1930s. At that time, the Soviet Union was an ally of England since they were both fighting the Nazis. Through the old boy network, Philby reached powerful positions in the British secret service and, over the years, took advantage of those connections to feed the Soviets secret information that resulted in the deaths of hundreds of British and American members of the intelligence community and their contacts around the world.His father, St. John Philby, Arab scholar, explorer, writer, troublemaker, and demanding father, lived in Middle East and converted to Islam. He once advised his son “If you feel strongly enough about anything you must have the guts to go through with it no matter what anyone might think.” Philby lived by that advice. Philby said, “I have always operated on two levels, a personal level and a political one. When the two have come into conflict, I have had to put politics first.”Philby’s reputation as a drunk and boor were overlooked because he was good company. When he came under suspicion for being a double agent, many of his friends, particularly in the intelligence departments, protected him because they didn’t believe he was a traitor. They never realized that while they shared information with him, he didn’t reciprocate. Particularly hard hit was Nicholas Elliott, his best friend from college days and also a member of MI6. Hitler had not intended to go to war with Britain, and little effort was made to prepare the ground for a German invasion....When so-called invasion spies poured into Britain, ill-trained and under equipped, they were duly and swiftly rounded up. Some were imprisoned, a handful were executed, but a number were recruited as double agents....This was the embryo of the Double Cross system.By the end of World War II, as the Nazi threat lessened, the fear of Soviet espionage revived. While there was a system in place to combat the communist menace before the war, the war and the alliance with the Soviets diverted attention from the threat. By 1944, the Brits realized that they had been penetrated by communists. It was the start of the cold war.Philby was abetted because of the feud between MI5 and MI6. He was involved with and friends with people from both agencies, as well as the CIA in the US where he became the head of the British Intelligence in DC in 1949. He worried that he would be exposed because of some Soviet defectors, such as Anthony Blunt, Don Maclean, and Guy Burgess, but his friends trusted and supported him. They included British foreign secretary Harold Macmillan. They didn’t believe he could be a double agent. One of them, CIA Chief of counterintelligence James Angleton “never recovered from betrayal and launched a mole hunt that inflicted huge damage on the CIA.” Eventually, Philby was able to escape to Russia, possibly with the aid of the British government which wanted to avoid the embarrassment of a trial coming soon after that of another double agent.A SPY AMONG FRIENDS provides a wide, but shallow, description of Philby and his friends, family, and government higher ups. It does not, however, go look beneath the surface. It doesn’t ask why Philby and his friends from Cambridge became so enthralled with communism and defended it despite activities such as the purges under Stalin. It doesn’t ask why the ship that took him to Russia just happened to be in the harbor at the time.I gave the book 3 stars because I found the information interesting, the book well-written, on the whole (there were repetitions), and provided a picture of the effects of Philby’s actions including how he duped almost everyone with whom he came into contact.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    “I was asked about him, and I said I knew his people,” and with that Harold Adrian Russell aka Kim Philby passed his security check on the personal word of Valentine Vivian, deputy head of the Secret Intelligence Service aka MI6, and started on his legendary career as a double agent.My impression of the British Empire is that, for a long time, it ran on the cheap and its administrators were often picked via nepotism and allowed a great deal of flexibility. (That element of nepotism was a large resentment on the part of the rebels in the American Revolution.) That method worked for a long time. But the career of Kim Philby shows its downside.Macintyre assures us "this is not another biography of Kim Philby . . . it is an attempt to describe a particular sort of friendship that played an important role in history."There are a lot of biographies of Philby. I myself have read three, but there are several in this book’s bibliography that I’ve never heard of much less read. Philby himself, when he died in 1988, had a bookshelf full of them in his Moscow apartment.This is almost a dual biography of Philby and his best friend and professional associate in British Intelligence, Nicholas Elliott.Elliott was the man, Macintyre insinuates, that let Philby bolt from Beirut in 1963 to his master since 1934, the Soviet Union. Philby was forced to resign from MI6 in 1952 after he fell under suspicion of being a spy after Soviet agents Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess, a friend of Philby’s, exfiltrated from Britain to the USSR to avoid arrest. Better that Philby go to Russia than an embarrassing trial be held or that the suspicions of the FBI be confirmed: that Philby had been a spy while stationed in Washington D.C. and pumped his friend James Jesus Angleton, head of the CIA’s counterespionage efforts, for all his secrets.It was only one of many betrayals Philby committed during his life. The number of men killed directly by his deceit directly numbers in the thousands, most of them guerillas the British and United States governments tried to infiltrate into Soviet controlled Europe.He betrayed his family, his friends, his country, and his class. He was a master of deceit and committing deception thrilled him. While many claimed – Eliot not among them, that they had always suspected Philby even before he showed up in the USSR, even before 1952, Macintyre makes it clear that Philby’s charm and geniality fooled them all. (YouTube clips of Philby’s 1955 press conference in his mother’s apartment after he was publicly accused of espionage give some sense of his charm.)The only people that seemed to have suspected him. One was his second wife Aileen, a former department store detective and a mentally disturbed woman given to setting fires and self-mutilation and a former department store detective. The second was the seemingly duplicitous Flora Solomon who claims to have always known that Philby was a communist when he tried to recruit her for Soviet espionage in 1935. Conveniently, she forgot to mention this when Philby was publicly under suspicion in 1955, and only mentioned it in 1962 when she complained about Philby’s anti-Israeli bias during his job as a reporter – he was back on the MI6 payroll in 1956 with cover as a journalist. She seems to have motivated, despite being a British citizen, more by Israeli security than British security and, possibly, may have wanted revenge of Philby’s treatment of her friend Henrietta.It was Eliot that brought Philby back into intelligence work – at least for the British. It wasn’t that there weren’t people, after 1951, who continued to suspect Philby. They worked in MI6, MI5, and the FBI, but Eliot’s friendship and Philby’s charm and connections – and the lower- class origins of his accusers in MI5 – got him back in.It was that “I know his people” attitude that protected a spy who left, in his early career working for the Soviets, plenty of evidence to be suspicious of before hiring him.Philby wasn’t a double agent during all this time. The surveillance attendant on the suspicion of him meant the Soviets made no contact, offered no assistance to him from 1952 to 1955, and he did not actively pass intelligence on to the Soviets from 1952 to 1956.Macintyre doesn’t pull any punches about the ideology that was Philby’s lodestar. It was always communism, in its theoretical depiction of a just and good life and not practice, that Philby served. His alleged anti-fascism didn’t prevent him from revealing a group to the Soviets a group of anti-Hitler plotters who were also anti-communists. They were liquidated when the Soviets took over part of Germany. His respect for his cultured KGB controllers didn’t stop him from serving the Soviets when they were recalled and executed in purges.There are a surprising number of celebrities and or their fathers that show up here. Peter Ustinov’s family was a noted British intelligence agent. Mile Copeland, father of musician Stewart Copeland, hung out with Philby in Beirut. (The documentary The Spy Who Went Into the Cold interviewed another of Miles’ sons who claimed his father was there to keep an eye on the suspicious Philby. Macintyre doesn’t buy that the CIA suspected him.) Ian Fleming puts in an appearance too.And there are a few pages on the strange affair of Buster Crabb, a British frogmen who died mysteriously in 1956 on a reconnaissance mission to spy on Soviet ships visiting Portsmouth. It was an operation run by Eliot even though he had been strictly forbidden by Prime Minister Anthony Eden to do so, and it may have been a loose word by Eliot to Philby that tipped the Soviets off and led to Crabb’s death at their hands.The book concludes with an interesting afterword by John le Carre who talks about a conversation Eliot had with him towards the end of his life. Eliot seemed to want to unburden himself about his relationship with Philby, his old friend.One mystery is whether Philby, before fleeing Beirut, ever confessed to his old friend. How much did he really admit in the written “confession” he prepared? When advising KGB trainees, Philby would always tell them when, under interrogation, to never confess.All in all, a well-written, highly readable biography of Philby and look at the social connections that so long enabled his treachery. My only complaint is that I wish that Macintrye would have tagged more of the events with specific dates. The index is quite complete, and there are lots of photos.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Kim Philby looked like the perfect spy for MI6 all through the second World War and into the Cold War, but what he hid from friends such as Nicholas Elliott and James Angleton was that he was actually a Soviet spy - and a very good one at that.This true story reads like a novel, and what sets it apart from the many spy accounts, including of Philby himself, is Macintyre's focus on Philby's friendships, particular with Elliott who grew up in with a similar background and Angleton, Philby's protegee American who worked for the CIA. This was a fascinating account showing how impossible it is to truly know another person.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I found the book interesting but not gripping. There are no twists and turns, only developments, if that makes any sense. You start the book knowing that Philby was a spy, and by the end you have that knowledge plus all the names and dates. I found it interesting mainly knowing the story made up a lot of source material for 'Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy'.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is the story of one of the most notorious Soviet spies the world has ever known, Kim Philby. Recruited by Soviet agents before WWII, Philby continued to provide information about Western intelligence activites in London, the Middle East and Washington thru the late 50's. As other spies were captured or defected on both sides, he was able to survive several different investigations where he was suspected of being a double agent, until his friend and fellow British agent confronted him in Beruit in 1963. Seeing the end in sight, Philby then defected to the Soviet Union, avoiding capture.A fascinating story of the history of spycraft during the Cold War, with shades of Ian Fleming and John LeCarre. LeCarre was a field agent in MI5 and MI6 in Germany and was exposed by Kim Philby. Philby the other spies in the Cambridge Ring were inspirations for his seminal novel Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.7/10S: 1/7/15 - F: 1/21/16 (15 Days)
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A Spy Among Friends was the first non-fiction, factual, account I had read about Kim Philby even though he has featured in countless fictional spy stories, or the spy has been based on Philby. I enjoyed several things about the book. First was the exceptional writing. It was highly readable and entertaining. As well, there were supporting notes about almost everything in the book. Second was the approach. Instead of making Philby the central character you learn of his history through his friends, especially Nicholas Elliott (his possibly best friend and the man that eventually obtained Philby's confession) and James Jesus Angleton, of the CIA.Spycraft, being what it is, keeps a person from sharing knowledge and experiences with others but between themselves information was often shared. After the confession of Philby, Elliot and Angleton realized how badly they had been deceived and how much information they had shared with Philby. Information that had made its way back to Moscow and had cost many their lives. The betrayal of the friendship hurt Elliott and Angleton immensely. I also appreciated the many photographs of the people involved which made the story so much more interesting.Excellent book!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Extremely well-written with (apparently) extensive research about a really interesting piece of history. It gets a little slow in the middle during descriptions of all of the operations that failed probably because of Philby, but then quickly picks up. I really enjoyed listening to this book.
  • Rating: 1 out of 5 stars
    1/5
    This book was neither "heart pounding" nor "a high water mark". Rather, I couldn't get started and the basement dried up. I listened to about a quarter of the eleven hour tome and it just didn't click. After i heard for the fourteenth time that Philby was an affable, communist, good ole boy with an upper crust education---I deleted the file. DNF.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is not the spyware prefer (that would be World War II) but a friend recommended it and I am glad I read it. It is as revealing about a certain upper class of Brits as it is about Philby. Very well written.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Well-written, well-read, hard to imagine a more linear plot.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Just excellent. And, terrible, terrible story. Fits right in with "Legacy of Ashes." Incompetence and idiocy.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Philby is probably one of the best known and notorious spies in history. For decade he kept his ideological master in Moscow fed with top secret intelligence, from his reporting in the Spanish Civil war and form the moment that he gained access to the most exclusive club in England, MI6.

    Philby was a charmer. He made friends easily, was well connected and had what seemed to be almost limitless confidence. His entry into MI6 was effortless, the vetting process comprising of the deputy head of MI6 saying that he knew his people. And he was in.

    Philby and Nick Elliot, another rising star in the service, became close friends. They worked well together and spent long evenings in gentlemen's club strengthening their relationship. Philpy also formed a friendship with Angleton, who was to become chief of counter intelligent of the CIA. They shared every secret because of that trust. And Philby told Moscow everything. He was posted to Washington after the war and cultivated the people of the American network there. But things were starting to move against hime. He was one of a number of spies who had been requited in Cambridge in the 1930's and after some defections the net was closing in on Maclean. Philby tipped him off that they were after hime, and he defected with Burgess over a weekend as the MI5 watchers didn't work at weekends!

    The Americans were also starting to have their doubts about him after a series of Albanion operations were rounded up almost immediately. He returned to London with question marks over his loyalty, but with his charm on full managed to deflect suspicion following interrogation. He was accused in Parliament, and did a famous press conference, still used today for MI6 training purposes, where almost everything he said was a lie.

    He was asked to leave the service and ended up doing some little bits of journalism, but he was running out of cash. The Russians stepped into help, but in the background Nick Elliot was looking to return him to the service. And after short period he managed it. Philby would be based in Beruit, supposedly working for the Observer but finding intelligence for MI6 and of course the Soviets. But the net was closing in once again and this time the evidence was damming. In 1963 Elliot confronts him in an apartment in Beruit and extracts a form of confession from Philby, but no apology. Short after this meeting he defects to Moscow.

    Macintyre has concentrated on the personal side in this book. He writes in detail about the way that Philby was able to move with in the intelligence services, cultivating friendships in MI6 & MI5 and in the CIA too. He describes how the American started to have their suspicions and were more shocked by the UK response that he could never do that as he was a member of the establishment. It was quite scary that when MI5 were investigating him that MI6 closed ranks to protect a colleague.

    A very well written book about the most treacherous spy in history.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A detailed look into the life of Kim Philby... the notorious British spy who avoided detection for many years. It was interesting to read how the "old boys network" worked (and I am sure - still works) in certain circles of the British and American Intelligence community!
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Absolutely one of the best biographies I've ever read, and about one of the most fascinating and mysterious individuals of the past 150 years. It still is really hard for me to believe it was always ideology, willfully ignoring the reality of Stalin's Soviet Union, but there you have it. I can't imagine how disillusioned he must have felt upon arriving in Moscow knowing he would be there the rest of his life... Additionally, it's almost incomprehensible to consider the massive damage done to the CIA, the USA and its Russian efforts over a period of decades simply due to his friendship with one man...
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Highly detailed and brilliantly told, Ben Macintyre again cleverly distils an enormous amount of information, and weaves it into a cohesive, gripping account. Both entertaining and educational, John Lee narrates the journey splendidly.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A fascinating story how the most famous and destructive spy of all time managed to elude detection by both British and American intelligence agencies for decades. A James Bond-like tale of the notorious Philby. By the way, he knew Ian Fleming, author of Bond. The story becomes more compelling as the narrative unfolds, right up to Philby's ultimate defection to the Soviet Union. A defection which was probably done with the assent of the British to save them the embarrassment of acknowledging Philby's penetration of their highest ranks in MI 6. If you are in for spy lore, add this to your reading list.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Fascinating story about Kim Philby, the British aristocrat who was a soviet spy. This is so well written and such a compelling story about Philby and his contemporaries, Nicholas Elliot and James Angleron. Philby is from the right crowd, Eton and Cambridge and embraces communism early in his academic career. He becomes a soviet spy and for years remains undetected because he's from the right family and school. He's a charming man who easily befriends all types of people who are quite willing to share their secrets, not knowing he's passing them to the soviets. He's likely responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people because of his double crosses. The story follows his life from academia through to his defection to the Soviet Union and relates his marriages, heavy drinking and partying with friends from MI6, MI5, the CIA and the FBI. Although a few people had suspicions about his spying, no one could actually pin him down u til 1963. The rivalries between the various spy agencies and their ineptness is quite alarming. The KGB found it difficult at first to believe his revelations because it was so easy for him to penetrate the British secret service.Great book.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This is a readable, interesting book that seems to compile and retell the highlights of other works in the genre, rather than reflect much original research or reporting. But it has a decent sense of outrage.I've read many books about the Cambridge spy ring; for me the value of this one is how it lays bare the execrable nature of not just Kim Philby but also the "good guys." It exposes the intelligence establishment of the time as a reflection, and victim, of Britain's insular and superficial class system. To the modern eye, the service seems dominated by rich bros who stagger drunkenly from adventure to adventure on dad's dime with neither supervision or accountability. Except these "adventures" implicate real people and real political and military issues, and "dad" is the government, and ultimately its citizens. It's appalling, really.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Did we actually have any secrets? It was said that "Loose lips sink ships", in this case well lubricated ones liquidated lives as Kim Philby was planning operations and then making sure that they failed. His charm, the fact that he belonged to the right clubs, had gone to the right schools and came from the proper class made his treason unthinkable and invisible to his "friends". Very scary. I had heard of Philby and his Cambridge friends but didn't know the specifics, just that his actions were catastrophic for Western intelligence. This book also gives you look inside the intelligence culture of the time which I found very interesting.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Brilliant description of how it was that Philby was able to conceal his true colours for so long and details of the personalties and the environment in which he worked over the years.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Six-word review: Supreme deceiver never known by anyone.Extended review:A thumping good read, I'd call it, even more so than expected: suspenseful, surprising, and engrossing. The mystery and intrigue surrounding Cold War master spy Kim Philby, some of which will never be unraveled, possess depths of complexity that would probably be scoffed at in fiction as simply too implausible. While appearing to be a talented, dedicated, and indeed brilliant officer in British intelligence, he covertly and very effectively served the cause of communism for thirty years. One of the paradoxes of his story is that he had to be good enough to keep his position in counterintelligence while systematically foiling the operations mounted against the communists.What I was not expecting was a moving and ultimately tragic story of a man who was addicted to secrecy and deception as much as to the prodigious consumption of alcohol. It seems that Philby was constitutionally incapable of having an honest relationship with anyone. In the midst of a nonstop social whirl, he was profoundly isolated by his hidden life. Ironically, the only people he never betrayed--the Soviets--were the only ones who never fully trusted him. Key members of British and American intelligence organizations, including his closest lifelong friend Nick Elliott, trusted him absolutely. Neither side believed that a gentleman of his character, class, and background could do what he had done. I remember hearing Kim Philby's name in the news when I was a youngster. His final unmasking came in 1963, followed by his defection to Moscow. At the time I was too unaware of world events to grasp a fraction of the significance of those revelations, but even if I had, it would have been minor compared with the true extent of the consequences of his crimes, some of which have only lately come to light. It is no exaggeration to say that this one man dramatically altered the course of modern Western history.Even now Philby remains a figure of unending controversy. As Macintyre says in his preface:"Presented with conflicting accounts, different viewpoints, and divergent recollections, I have had to make judgments about the credibility of different sources and choose which of the many strands of evidence seem to run closest to reality . . . This book does not purport to be the last word on Kim Philby. Instead, it seeks to tell his story in a different way, through the prism of personal friendships, and perhaps arrive at a new understanding of the most remarkable spy of modern times."I've never been a reader of espionage novels, but I am interested in the themes of truth and identity that inevitably come up in fact-based spy literature. This compelling account will probably send me off after other work by Ben Macintyre.The only fault I have to find with this book that is essentially historical in nature is how frequently the author mentions events by day and date without the year. With so many narrative threads to follow, and especially with some movement forward and backward in time, I lost track numerous times. It would have been worth some risk of redundancy to make sure the reader could remain oriented to sequences and temporal relationships.One final note: I think there is an error in the transcription of Philby's famous 1955 press conference (and it looks like an error that might have proceeded from a common typo--namely, "not" for "now"). The author reports (page 195) an interview comment by Edwin Newman: "That implies that you have spoken to communists unknowingly and not known about it." I listened to that portion of the interview myself several times--it was easily found on YouTube--and believe it says, more sensibly: "That implies that you have spoken to communists unknowingly and now know about it." Perhaps this line will appear differently in a future printing.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal by Ben Macintyre is a book that is not to be missed. Rather than another biography of Kim Philby, Macintyre digs deeper and shows the reader both sides to Philby, the outgoing nice guy, and the deeper, darker side of a spy and traitor. Philby quickly worked his way up the ranks of MI6 and unbeknownst to his friends at MI6 or his friends in the CIA, Philby was telling everything they told him to Moscow. What would prompt such an intelligent young man to decide to become a traitor and a defector, to give up all he knew, and what would become of his best friend and colleague and MI6 and to his friend in the CIA when the truth comes out that their friend and colleague gave everything they said to Moscow in the height of the Cold War? Well researched and masterfully written A Spy Among friends reads like a psychological espionage thriller and is a book I found myself unable to put down.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    How on earth did he get away with it for so long?!

    Ben Macintyre's latest book answers this question and more in an accessible, enjoyable and informative way.

    Philby's deceit of MI6 is well known, but the book details more the deceit of his friends and particularly his friend and colleague in SIS, Nicholas Elliot.


    I find the The Philby case and indeed the whole of the Cambridge 5 fascinating in that the "old boy network" of MI6 just couldn't comprehend that that one of their own (i.e of their class & upbringing) would spy for another country, which led to Philby being able to continue for so long.

    A fascinating read for anyone interested in espionage, the cold war and political motivation.

  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A very interesting look at the Philby affair from the point of view of his friends. Philby comes across as very clever, very drunk and very disloyal to both his friends and his country.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I received this book as part of the member review program. This book started pretty slowly, discussing Philby's early years and education, but eventually becomes very interesting and delves into his double life as a spy. Not the kind of book I would usually pick for myself, but I did enjoy it.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    No one likes to admit they have been utterly conned. The truth was simpler, as it almost always is: Philby was spying on everyone, and no one was spying on him, because he fooled them all.After reading one of Ben Macintyre's previous books and enjoying it I immediately requested this book on NetGalley when I saw that it was being offered. There have been other books that have discussed Kim Philby and his role as a double agent, but this book is really unique as it concentrates on Philby's friendships with not only his fellow double agents but also with the men he deceived.I haven't read much about Kim Philby so it was interesting getting to learn more about him. One thing that I really love about Macintyre's books is that he includes a great sense of humor with the history that he discusses so that you are informed and amused at the same time. He always manages to find some eccentric and humorous people to spotlight throughout the book (I especially loved learning that someone was actually named Engelbertus Fukken).I was amazed that no one caught on to what Philby was doing for so long. His friend Nicholas Elliot (who worked for MI6) came across as having a poor sense of judgment and being needlessly reckless. It was surprising how so many people could have been blinded by Philby's charisma.I just gobbled this book right up. I would definitely recommend this book if you are looking for a new angle to the Kim Philby story or if you are looking for a book that provides history in a lively, sometimes humorous, way. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the galley.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    So I won this book months ago and due to life and everything else, I really lagged on getting started on this book. Shame on me for that because this ended up being one heck of a book. I loved loved LOVED it!! A fascinating true story of a double agent who fooled so many. So good was he at his craft that when outed, many refused to believe it! I really enjoyed how the author, Ben Macintyre, injected humor into all this espionage and double crossing. I really enjoyed being able to get a close look at the friendship between Philby and his close friend, Nicholas Elliott. Bottom line, it's an exciting and thrilling page-turner of a book! If espionage and back-stabbing and double crossing mixed with humor is what you are looking for in a book, you have found it in "A Spy Among Friends:Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal" DISCLOSURE: I received a complimentary copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I liked this book exploring the double life of Kim Philby. Ben Macintyre goes into great detail about the events leading up to and following Philby's decision to become a double agent. Although it's a non-fiction book, at times it read like a fiction novel, very enjoyable but also interesting.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This is a fascinating story and the most amazing aspect is that it is true. It has all the ingredients of the most intriguing spy fiction, and clearly offered much of the context of classics such as John le Carre's 'Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy' which features the intrepid quest behind the scenes to uncover the mole working at the heart of the British intelligence community.Everyone now knows the name of Kim Philby, perhaps the most infamous of traitors, but it was only from reading this book that I appreciated the extent of his deception and, indeed, the crushing reluctance of many of those counter-espionage officers investigating him to believe that he might actually be guilty. Of course, knowing that Philby fled from Beirut to Moscow in January 1963, it is easy with the benefit of hindsight to add additional weight to the circumstantial evidence against counting against Philby. Yet viewed at any time that circumstantial evidence should have been sufficient to secure his isolation from anyone in the espionage community, even if it was deemed insufficient to warrant public prosecution.Philby was suspected, and questioned intensely, following the sudden departure of his former associates Donald MacLean and Guy Burgess in 1951, but he kept his nerve and retained his freedom.Macintyre's approach is an unusual one, emphasising Philby's thirty year friendship with fellow MI6 officer Nicholas Elliott. Throughout the period in which Philby was being most ferociously castigated Elliott remained loyal, adamantly defending his friend's patriotism and loyalty.My one cavil about the book was Macintyre's writing style which slumped below prosaic to the point of mundanity. Written by anyone with a feel for words this would have been a rattling good read. As it was, the subject matter, and Macintyre's detailed research still give us a very gripping book.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Kim Philby is probably the most recognized spy name of virtually all time. A a part of the Oxford educated elite, he was apparently a brilliant and charming man who headed Britain's counterintelligence efforts against the Soviet Union while he was at the same time spying for the Soviet Union. What's hard to get my head around is that MI6 or 5 or whatever agency it was knew they had high level spies--and they even ferreted out a few. Some suspicion fell on Philby, and he was bounced from the service but not hanged for a spy. However, his best friend Nicholas Elliot and fellow officer in MI6 would not hear a word against Philby and gets him rehired at the agency. Astounding.The British seem absolutely blinded by class.What makes this book different from previous bios of Philby, is Macintyre's focus on the friendship of Philby and Nicholas Elliott. Elliott is betrayed multiple times by Philby, but somehow, I can garner little sympathy for Elliott. He was doing a favor for one of his class, and yet Philby, a now longtime communist, was no longer of his class.