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The Service: The Memoirs of General Reinhard Gehlen by Reinhard Gehlen. Book review by Anonymous
Germany, memoir of General Reinhard Gehlen, Chief of BND,
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CIA HISTORICAL REVIEW PROGRAM |
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RELEASE IN FULL |
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2 JULY 96 |
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INTELLIGENCE IN RECENT PUBLIC LITERATURE
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| THE SERVICE: THE MEMOIRS OF GENERAL REINHARD GEHLENT. By Reinhard Gehlen. (World Publishers, New York, 1972. 386 pages.) |
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| THE GENERAL WAS A SPY: THE TRUTH ABOUT GENERAL GEHLEN AND HIS SPY RING. By Heinz Hoehne and Herman Zolling. (Coward, McCann and Geoghegan, New York, 1972. 347 pages.) |
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| GEHLEN, SPY OF THE CENTURY. By E. H. Cookridge. (Hodder and Stoughton, London, 1971. 402 pages.) |
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| NICHT LAENGER GEHEIM: ENTWICKLUNG, SYSTEM UND ARBEITSWEISE DES IMPERIALISTISCHEN DEUTSCHEN GEHIEIMDIENSTES. By Albrecht Charisius and Julius Mader. (Secret No Longer: Development, Organization and Methods of the Imperialistic German Secret Service. Deutscher Militaerverlag, [East] Berlin, 1969. 632 pages.) |
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| In April 1968, after some 22 years as chief of the West German intelligence service and 48 years altogether of public service, Lieutenant General Reinhard Gehlen retired as President of the Federal Intelligence Service (BND).* He was accurately described as the doyen of western intelligence chiefs. Whatever was thought of Gehlen-and he had many enemies-he was by this time quite well known throughout the world, so it is not surprising that his retirement has occasioned no less than four books. |
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| The first to appear, in May 1969, was the East German effort Nicht Laenger Geheim. The other three were published in their German editions within a few weeks of each other during the fall of 1971. Nicht Laenger Geheim and The General Was a Spy are tendentious and inaccurate; the Cookridge book is inaccurate; none of them is worth reading. Gehlen's book The Service has many faults, a lot of which are inherent in such a book, but for any officer assigned to Germany |
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| * From 1942 until 1945 Gehlen was theater G -2 for the Russian front. As the war ended, he assembled his people and his files and, after capture by the U.S. Army, offered his organization to the U.S. Since the Army knew very little about the USSR and since the Cold War had begun, his offer was accepted. After some months of delay the Gehlen Organization, as it was called, was sponsored by the U.S. Army as an intelligence collection and evaluation organization against Communist. targets, principally the Soviet forces in East Germany. The U.S. Army retained this trusteeship until 1949, when CIA assumed it. In 1956 the Bonn government took over and the Gehlen Organization became the BNll. |
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Posted: May 08, 2007 08:35 AM
Last Updated: May 08, 2007 08:35 AM
Last Reviewed: May 08, 2007 08:35 AM
