Spying in the United States began during the Revolutionary War, with George Washington as the first director of American intelligence and Benedict Arnold as the first turncoat. The history of American espionage is full of intrigue, failures and triumphs—and motives honorable and corrupt. Several notorious spies became household names—Aldrich Ames, Robert Hanssen, the Walkers, the Rosenbergs—and were the subjects of major motion pictures and television series. Many others have received less attention.
This book summarizes hundreds of cases of espionage for and against U.S. interests and offers suggestions for further reading. Milestones in the history of American counterintelligence are noted. Charts describe the motivations of traitors, American targets of foreign intelligence services and American traitors and their foreign handlers. A former member of the U.S. intelligence community, the author discusses trends in intelligence gathering and what the future may hold. An annotated bibliography is provided, written by Hayden Peake, curator of the Historical Intelligence Collection of the Central Intelligence Agency.