Russian Roulette: How British Spies Thwarted Lenin's Plot for Global Revolution - Hardcover

Milton, Giles

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1620405687 ISBN 13: 9781620405680

Publisher: Bloomsbury Press, 2014

Synopsis

In 1917, a band of communist revolutionaries stormed the Winter Palace of Tsar Nicholas II-a dramatic and explosive act marking that Vladimir Lenin's communist revolution was now underway. But Lenin would not be satisfied with overthrowing the Tsar. His goal was a global revolt that would topple all Western capitalist regimes-starting with the British Empire.

Russian Roulette tells the spectacular and harrowing story of the British spies in revolutionary Russia and their mission to stop Lenin's red tide from washing across the free world. They were an eccentric cast of characters, led by Mansfield Cumming, a one-legged, monocle-wearing former sea captain, and included novelist W. Somerset Maugham, beloved children's author Arthur Ransome, and the dashing, ice-cool Sidney Reilly, the legendary Ace of Spies and a model for Ian Fleming's James Bond. Cumming's network would pioneer the field of covert action and would one day become MI6.

Living in disguise, constantly switching identities, they infiltrated Soviet commissariats, the Red Army, and Cheka (the feared secret police), and would come within a whisker of assassinating Lenin. In a sequence of bold exploits that stretched from Moscow to the central Asian city of Tashkent, this unlikely band of agents succeeded in foiling Lenin's plot for global revolution.

About this title

About the Author

Giles Milton is the author of many books including the international bestsellers Nathaniel's Nutmeg and Big Chief Elizabeth. His other titles include The Riddle and the Knight: In Search of Sir John Mandeville, Samurai William: The Englishman Who Opened Japan, and Wolfram: The Boy Who Went to War. His website is www.gilesmilton.com and he tweets at @SurviveHistory. He lives in London.

From Booklist

Replete with cloak-and-dagger details, this account of British espionage against the Bolshevik government centers on agents sent to Russia by MI6 spymaster Mansfield Cummings. Including the most famous of them in spy history, Sidney Reilly, Milton traces their aliases and activities in revolutionary Russia in the years 1917–21. While their objectives—procuring political and military information about the radical regime—frame Milton’s narrative, its substance revels in the world of the undercover operative. Milton depicts them undergoing Cummings’ peculiar recruitment techniques, learning about ciphers and invisible inks, and devising cover names and disguises. Once in place, their adroit evasions of capture by the Bolshevik’s secret police propel Milton’s lively accounts. Much of the action occurs in Petrograd, Moscow, and Tashkent, in Central Asia, from where the Communists attempted to foment a revolution in India. Its detection underlies the subtitle’s claim that these spies stopped Lenin’s global revolution (in reality, he pulled back in 1921 for several reasons, including the Red Army’s defeat in Poland). Whatever the actual impact the espionage had on political events, Milton’s vivid presentation of them will entertain aficionados of intelligence. --Gilbert Taylor

About this edition

• Publisher: Bloomsbury Press
• Publication date: 2014
• ISBN 10: 1620405687
• ISBN 13: 9781620405680
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 400