Spycatcher : the Candid Autobiography of a Senior Intelligence Officer / Peter Wright Hardcover – January 1, 1987

An excellent read. I'm currently wading through the book "Betrayal" by Chapman Pinker in which that author collaborated and engaged in many discussions with Peter Wright (author of this book). It's always darkly humorous when governments kick up a fuss and even ban a book such as this one from publication. There are many scenarios as to why governments do this. Many times it is because there is current and immediate potential scandal/embarassment they are keen to cover up, and causing a ruckus over so-called insider secrets being exposed in a book is an excellent way to remove the spotlight from their own current blunders. It is also incredibly humiliating to governments to admit they have been exposed to stupidity, covering up, blundering and ultimately ignoring the worst types of secret leaking. It is appalling for citizens and therefore taxpayers to read about the excessive amounts of money poured into "counter" espionage work. In the case of this book it is clear that the money was poorly spent since all the secrets so easily and flawlessly leaked to the Soviets (and who knows who else) came from the very head of MI5 himself. This book ostensibly deals with various elements of this type of work over many decades, but ultimately it deals with the fact that Roger Hollis was never outed as the head of a spy ring which did devastating damage to both Britain and the USA. Hollis was clearly the head "leak" and his superiors refused to do the work to prove this, remove him and admit the damage. It is understandable considering Blunt, Burgess, MaClean and the ultimate traitor Philby were all in their recent past. However their inexcusable folly in purposefully (in my opinion) ignoring this type of cover up is laughable in its worst ironic form. We therefore glean from so any books such as these, that all information the citizen can come across, whether from Snowdon etc. regarding government spying is good. It allows accountability which the public was not privy to at the time Hollis was in ultimate power. The hypocrisy of the spies themselves remains an amazing enigma in and of itself. While thriving in comfortable, freedom in Britain and enjoying taxpayer funded lifestyles and retirement, many, including Roger Hollis never left their soft lives for the motherland they so desperately wished to impose on everyone else. Good to know that when Kim Philby was forced to run to the Motherland after he was found out, his life was rather miserable and far from comfortable.

The reason I give this book 5 stars is that the insight it provides into the real secret service work and knowledge of Russia's methods is eye-opening and captivating, though the writing style is relatively dry and uninspired. I read this book last summer (2016) well before there was any rumor about Russian meddling with the US election. The author (a former assistant director of MI5) details the methods, bungling, successes and illegal activities of MI5, the British FBI, with plenty of communication and cooperation with the US secret service agencies through 1975. He also describes Russia's activities and strategies. That's where, over the course of a few hundred pages, I felt like a light switch had turned on and I could see glimpses of Russian meddling in so many ways. You should read the book and make up your own mind. I felt that the author is very credible because he does not shrink from admitting failures and criticizing MI5 which clearly also believing that most of its work was in protection of Great Britain.

This book is not just about Philby he is only one actor . Peter Wright spent most of his service finding spies. And also admits that MI5 and MI6 were compromised with many soviet penetrations. The author seems to be honest about that and the way many of his brethren refused to believe the evidence and indicators there was a real internal problem . Wright said an interesting thing.. His family had hard times during the depression . He found it interesting that he never strayed away from faith in his country's Government but the affluent young college men, hardly affected by hardship of the 30s were seduced into the communist myth. The famous Cambridge 5 were not the only problem for the British. The author explains a number of reasons for the distrust the US had for British intelligence. This is somewhat Ironic as the US had its own penetrations. It seems both countries were not as good at spying as they thought.I think the book is a good look at British and to a degree US intelligence after WW2. It is the first step to understanding how bad we got it and our probable misreading of many facts. One I suspect is Soviet spies got hold of the Government paper suggesting we should stand down the missiles in Turkey and rely on Polaris subs in the Mediterranean to protect the area. Khrushchev learned about this and realized he could leverage Cuba to get the missiles out of Turkey stifling his vocal opponents. The Missiles were outdated so the US wanted them gone.... but didn't want to offend Turkey . ( Which they did in the end fixing the crisis .)Its a very good book on the subject and I wish I found sooner. I found it well written and always interesting.

Amazon, soliciting feedback for this review, asks: "What did I use the product for??Um, it's a book.I use it for "reading." I apply past training to recognize these black marks on a white background and glean meaning from the way they are placed.

Peter Wright's account of his time in MI5 is vivid and shocking! It is a lot to take in--I don't like to set books down, but sometimes you just need to with this one. One of the questions I have to ask myself is--is this real? If it is, then we have no idea what goes on in the world behind the doors of our governments--until we pick up Spycatcher! No movie or TV news could give this kind of detail, unless you'd been apart of it like Mr Wright! The book is dense, and it might be dry for some, but I highly recommend it for those who love spy stories.

Don't know. maybe I didn't give it enough time . I read like 50-60 pages and was pretty bored. Seems informative but not a "thriller"

One of the best spy reading, and if true extreemly reveling. The book is best read by those living through 1960's as then you can follow the history, Ahristine Keeler, Blunt etc and Harold Wilson all come to life in this MI5 & MI6 book.