Customer Rating: 
Summary: Run-on Sentences
Comment: This book is informative and the author is obviously intelligent. The reading is hard to follow, however. The author makes a great use of run-on sentences. He is constantly interjecting side thoughts within a sentence that makes the use of many commas with some dashes the norm. Sentences greater than an inch in width down a page are quite common. One must reread continuously to try to connect his thoughts. Except toward the end, this is not a light reading book.
Customer Rating:
Summary: A Classic of Tradecraft
Comment: No need to repeat what is covered below. Christopher Felix is the pseudonym of James McCargar who was a field agent in the late 40s. He was still active in the community when this book was originally published way back when. Then it was one of the few reality based accounts by an American about the postwar era when the Red juggernaut was slowly rolling up eastern Europe.
I still find it of interest and it proves how little tradecraft has changed, just the tools that are used.
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Summary: An excellent introduction into espionage
Comment: Christopher Felix's A Short Course in the Secret War provides the reader with an excellent introduction into the little known world of international espionage. As a reviwer noted earlier, the first part of the book outlines what spycraft is and is not, what the theory of intelligence work is, and how it is practiced. Pay close attention, as the vocabulary used and techniques discussed are put into practice later in the book.The second half of the book details Felix's work as an operations officer (i.e. "spy") in Hungary at the end of the Second World War. Here the glamourous and mundane work of espionage is recounted in an almost casual manner, as are the daily challenges and frustrations the author experienced while working there.
There are litterally hundreds of books written on the subject - yet in my opinion, A Short History is among the best. The writing is clear and lucid, and captivates the reader's attention; the material related is all first hand, and while a little dated, the lessons taught are relevant and comprehensive. A must read for anyone interested in learning more about the real practice of intelligence gathering.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Great Book
Comment: A great read, just great. Absolutely fantastic.
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Summary: A study of principals and a first hand experience.
Comment: The author divides the book into two parts. The first examines some of the principals governing secret opperations generally. Here he clarifies what secret opperations are, what they are not, and what the language surrounding them means. He describes the rules of the game and how things work. This section is interesting, informative, and fun to read. In the second part of the text the author recounts his own experience opperating in eastern Europe. His experience occured shortly after the Second World war before the Soviets had complete control over what would later become the Communist Block. The author's experiences and decisions offer the reader an opportunity to critically apply what he learned in the first part of the book. They will also keep the reader up very late. The author's experience takes the reader into a country on the verge of Communist take-over. The reader sees the world through the eyes of a spy. The author has edited the text to reflect post-Soviet realities. The changes are appropriately relegated to footnotes. The principals and the experience described are not relevant only to one time or place. Change only the names of the countries and the book might have been written yesterday. The writing style is almost casual, editorial in style. The author treats the reader like a partner in a conversation. This reviewer found the book engaging, disarming, disturbing, and, most of all, fascinating. Highly recomended.
