Bridge of Spies

Bridge of Spies:
An important Chapter
of the Cold War

Bridge of Spies is written by Giles Whittell, who is the author of several books about different topics, including Lambada Country (hardcover 1992, paperback 1993), Extreme Continental (1996), and Spitfire Women of World War Two (2008).

The subtitle – A True Story of the Cold War – is misleading, because this is not a story of the cold war. A story of the cold war must cover the whole period from the beginning (ca. 1945) to the end (ca. 1990). This book covers only a chapter of the cold war, although a very important one, which had wide-ranging consequences for most of the world for many years to come.

The text on the back cover begins like this:

“Bridge of Spies is a gripping true story of three men: the spies exchanged between the Soviet Union and America on Berlin’s Glienicke Bridge on February 10, 1962.”

This is not quite accurate: only two of the three men were exchanged on Glienicke Bridge on that day. The third person crossed from East Berlin to West Berlin via Check Point Charlie, the legendary crossing point between East and West.

The text on the back cover continues as follows:

“Rudolf Abel, a Soviet spy, who was a master of disguise; Gary Powers, an American [pilot] captured when his spy plane was shot down; and Frederic Pryor, a young American doctor mistakenly identified as a spy and captured.”

Again, this is not quite accurate: the first man, the Soviet spy, was known as Rudolf Abel, but his real name was William Fisher. The third man, the young American, was not a doctor but a student at the Free University of West Berlin, who was working on a Ph. D. in economics.

Fortunately, the book is much better than this. I suspect the publisher (and not the author) is responsible for the misinformation printed on the back cover.

Whittell traces the lives and careers of the three men, who never knew and never met each other (except for the fact that Fisher and Powers passed each other on the Glienicke Bridge on 10 February 1962, when the exchange took place).

The book is well written and well researched (for one exception, see below). It is based on published sources and interviews with several persons who were involved in the case and who are still alive today. One of the three men, Frederic Pryor, is still alive, and the author managed to get an interview with him as well.

The key event, the pivotal moment, in this account took place on 1 May 1960 when Soviet military forces shot down the U2 spy plane in which Powers was flying.

Powers was extremely unlucky on that day, because his route took him over the only base in the USSR which had some missiles which might be able to take down the U2 plane.

[He was, however, extremely lucky to survive a fall from about 70,000 feet above the ground.]

The Soviet military personnel were extremely lucky on that day. They fired three missiles. Two of them failed to get anywhere, but the third one not only went up into the sky but it managed to hit the U2.

Before we get this far, Whittell gives us a lot of background information about the cold war during the 1950s and 1960s. We hear about the Soviet Sputnik launched in 1957 and we hear about the missile gap.

Many observers in the US (and in the west) claimed there was a missile gap, meaning the USSR had more missiles than the US: “We must catch up or face destruction!” Some of the people who made this claim probably believed it, while others knew it was not true, but they said it anyway for political reasons. The missile gap was an excellent justification if you wanted divert more resources to the military.

The truth is – as the author explains several times – that there was no missile gap, or rather there was a missile gap, but it was the other way around: the US had more missiles than the USSR.

Pictures taken by the U2 spy plane documented this fact. The only important area in which the USSR had a first was with the Sputnik. But the results of the U2 flights were kept a secret for many years.

I like this book. I do not have much to complain about. I noticed only two misprints and only one serious mistake:

There is a misprint on page 40: “has wife” should be “his wife.” There is another misprint on page 63: “June 3” - looking at the context I think it should be “July 4.”

The serious mistake is found on page 211 where Whittell mentions “the musings of an obliging Danish Supreme Court justice, Christian Wilhelm Hargens.”

According to Whittell, this person praised the Soviet court, which sentenced Powers to ten years in prison. Think about it for a moment: Denmark was, and still is, a member of NATO. Is it likely that a Danish Supreme Court justice would make a public statement in which he praised a Soviet court for its verdict? No, it is not.

Two things are wrong here:

(1) The middle name of this person is Vilhelm, not Wilhelm.

(2) This person was a lawyer, but never a Supreme Court justice, who had visited the USSR back in 1933. He returned as a convinced communist. It is not surprising that he would praise the Soviet court system for its fairness.

It is a shame Whittell did not check his sources for this piece of information one more time. If he had, he could have avoided an embarrassing mistake.

As stated above, this mistake is an exception, and it will not disturb my general conclusion:

Whittell has written a fascinating account about an important chapter of the cold war. If you are interested in modern history – in particular the history of the cold war – I am sure you will like this book.

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Giles Whittell,
Bridge of Spies:
A True Story of the Cold War,

Simon & Schuster (2011), 274 pages

 

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Five photos and two newspaper clippings from 1962 when the famous spy exchange took place.
This collage is on display in the Black Box next to Check Point Charlie in Berlin.

Glienecker Brücke in 1962 when the famous spy exchange took place

John F. Kennedy (US president 1961-1963) visited West Berlin on 26 June 1963.

Kennedy ended his speech in West Berlin with the famous words:
"I am proud to say: Ich bin ein Berliner."

West Berlin, 26 June 1963.
Driving past Brandenburger Tor, sitting in the car from the left:
John F. Kennedy, Willy Brandt, and Konrad Adenauer.

Ronald Reagan (US president 1981-1989) visited west Berlin on 12 June 1987. In his speech he addressed the leader of the USSR directly when he said: "Mr. Gorbachev! Tear down this wall." This improvised statement was not in his official speech, but it quickly became a famous quote.

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See also my blog: Potsdam: Glienecker Bridge

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