Try a word association quiz with the phrase “Cold War,” and
the first two responses that are almost certain to come to the mind of the
general public are “paranoia” and “McCarthyism,” which is practically a synonym
for paranoia. The common assumption, thanks to decades of public school
indoctrination and the influence of leftist intellectuals, is that the Cold War,
at least in its early decades, was all about suspicious Republicans fearing a Red
under every bed and blacklisting innocents in Hollywood. But a recent book (the
paperback edition hits bookshelves next month), lays out the historical
evidence for massive Communist penetration of our government beginning in the
New Deal era, increasingly rapidly during World War II, and afterward leading
to gaping breaches of national security and the betrayal of free-world
interests.
Contrary to the notion that domestic Communists were simply
harmless, misguided idealists, Stalin’s Secret Agents: The Subversion of
Roosevelt’s Government by M. Stanton Evans and Herbert Romerstein shows
that widespread government infiltration by Soviet spies sabotaged our foreign policy
and molded the post-WWII world in favor of the Soviet Union. Evans, the author
of eight previous books including the controversial revised look at Joseph
McCarthy called Blacklisted by History, is a former
editor of the Indianapolis News, a Los Angeles Times columnist, and a
commentator for the Voice of America. Romerstein is a leading Cold War expert,
formerly head of the Office to Counter Soviet Disinformation at the U.S.
Information Agency from 1983 until 1989, who has served on the staff of several
congressional committees including the House Intelligence Committee.
The early Cold War spying which resulted in the theft of our
atomic secrets, radar, jet propulsion, and other military systems was serious
enough, but that wasn’t the major issue. “The spying,” as the authors put it,
“was handmaiden to the policy interest,” which was by far the leading problem.
As President Franklin Roosevelt’s health and mental ability waned, covert Communist
aides exerted pro-Soviet influence on U.S. policy, which was reflected in
postwar discussions by the Big Three powers about the new shape of the world. The
policy impact of such deceptive influence on the part of Soviet agents
was to turn Western influence and
support against the anti-Communist forces and in favor of their Red opponents,
as U.S. and other Allied leaders based decisions on false intelligence from
pro-Soviet agents. The effects were calamitous for the cause of freedom, as
numerous countries were thus delivered into the hands of Stalin and his
minions.
The three leaders – FDR, Churchill, and Stalin – “would
ultimately decide what political forces would prevail where and the forms of
government to be installed in formerly captive nations, including those in
alignment with the victors.” Unfortunately, at that time “seeking Soviet
‘friendship’ and giving Moscow ‘every assistance’ summed up American policy [in
meetings] at Teheran and Yalta, and for some while before those meetings.”













