Charisius, Albrecht, and Julius Mader. Nicht Laenger Geheim: Entwicklung, System und Arbeitsweise des Imperialistischen Deutschen Geheimdienstes [Secret No Longer: Development, Organization and Methods of the Imperialistic German Secret Service]. [East] Berlin: Deutscher Militaerverlag, 1969.
A reviewer for Studies 16.3 (Fall 1972) identifies this an East German production that "has garbage coming out its ears. It is inaccurate, tendentious, and brutally dull." Strangely, the Felfe case is not even mentioned.
Cookridge,
E.H. Gehlen -- Spy of the Century. London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1971. New York: Random House, 1972.
NameBase: "Of the 24 chapters, nine concern Gehlen as a loyal Nazi, one chapter describes the deal with the Americans in 1945-1946, and 14 follow Gehlen's career in West Germany.... The East kept complaining about all the ex-Nazis on Gehlen's staff; in this book Cookridge shows convincingly that 'this was not in fact far from the truth' (page 271)." The reviewer for Studies 16.3 (Fall 1972) calls this work "inaccurate.... It is written in a quite racy style ... and it is chock full of errors."
Crome, Hans-Henning. "The 'Organisation Gehlen' as Pre-History of the Bundesnachrichtendienst." Journal of Intelligence History 7, no. 1 (Summer 2007). [http://www.intelligence-history.org/jih/7-1.html]
Gehlen, Reinhard. Tr., David Irving. The Service: The Memoirs of Reinhard Gehlen. New York: World Publishing, 1972. New York: Popular Library, 1972. [pb]
Clark comment: After a 20-page stage-setting introduction, the next 80+ pages are concerned with World War II. The middle third of the book covers the 1946-1954 period of the "Gehlen organization," which operated under CIA control from 1949 until it was regularized as the Bundesnackrichtendienst (BND) by transfer to the German Federal Republic. The concluding substantive third covers the period from 1954 to Gehlen's retirement in 1968. A final three chapters at the end of the book deal with the future of the world and can be ignored. It would be a good idea to read Gehlen's Memoirs in conjunction with Höhne and Zolling's The General Was a Spy (1972).
Pforzheimer notes that, despite many of the self-serving attributes of such personal recollections, Gehlen's memoirs contain "much of value to the discriminating reader." Petersen labels the book "[a]n incomplete account." Constantinides mentions the disappointment of most reviewers in the book.
A seemingly knowledgeable reviewer for Studies 16.3 (Fall 1972) finds that this memoir "reads easily... The section on Foreign Armies East is perhaps the best part of the book, although it is of interest primarily to military historians." Gehlen mentions by name only well-known figures, otherwise using an alias or similar device; and he "discloses nothing which should not be disclosed."
Höhne,
Heinz, and Hermann Zolling. The General Was a Spy: The Truth About General Gehlen and His Spy Ring. New York: Coward, McCann, & Geoghegan, 1972. Network: The Truth About General Gehlen and His Spy Ring. London: Secker & Warburg, 1972. New York: Bantam Books, 1972. [pb]
According to NameBase, "Hoehne and Zolling's book is based on a series they wrote for Der Spiegel in 1971.... The authors interviewed Org members and drew on personal papers and government documents." Pforzheimer sees this as "a relatively objective description of Gehlen's career and his subsequent fall, although there are some errors in both facts and details." Similarly, Constantinides believes the reader will find the work "objective and accurate in some of its broad conclusions and judgments ... and not so reliable on others and on a number of details."
More harshly, the reviewer for Studies 16.3 (Fall 1972) sees this book as both "tendentious and inaccurate." The book's description of "Gehlen's G-2 career in the German Army is very laudatory," as is "the description of the Gehlen Organization's battle with the East German Service under Wollweber." After that, however, the book is clearly anti-BND. Much of the book "is sheer garbage" and "has far too many errors."
Reese,
Mary Ellen. General Reinhard Gehlen: The CIA Connection. Fairfax, VA: George Mason University Press, 1990.
Simpson, I&NS 8.2: found "much of the text to be poorly researched, poorly footnoted, and at points self-contradictory." NameBase says that "Reese offers the first book about Gehlen that concentrates on the American connection. She interviewed former CIA and Army Intelligence officers, and received 'hundreds' of documents under FOIA from various agencies."
Simpson,
Christopher. Blowback -- America's Recruitment of Nazis and Its Effects on the Cold War. New York: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 1988.
Sinkin, NameBase, says that Simpson "traces the post-World War II recruitment by the U.S. of ... Reinhard Gehlen, and the increasing reliance of U.S. intelligence on the Gehlen organization's estimates of Soviet strengths and intentions. In the critical period from 1945 to 1948, the correct assessments by U.S. military intelligence that the Soviet occupation forces in Eastern Europe were worn out and posed no threat, were supplanted with the Gehlen organization's lie that these same forces were a major military threat posed to invade Germany. The rest is our history, known as the Cold War."
To Mapother, IJI&C 2.4, Blowback "provides more than average curiosity value ... [but] does not achieve clear focus." Simpson's "research is unreliable," although he "does useful research when the mood strikes him, yet even then [he] often contradicts himself.... Nevertheless, his prodigious research churns up information that is new."
Wegener, Jens. "Shaping Germany's Post-War Intelligence Service: The Gehlen Organization, the U.S. Army, and Central Intelligence, 1945-1949." Journal of Intelligence History 7, no. 1 (Summer 2007). [http://www.intelligence-history.org/jih/7-1.html]
Whiting,
Charles. Gehlen: Germany's Master Spy. New York: Ballantine, 1972.
NameBase: "Charles Whiting's book is somewhat sensational in tone and doesn't cite sources.... There are altogether too many exclamation points, along with direct quotes that appear to be added for effect rather than accuracy. Most of the book concerns Gehlen's career in Germany, particularly after the war, rather than his associations with U.S. intelligence."
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