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First published: March 1977. Rare material; first and only printing. Deep red full cloth boards, gilt spine titles, moderate shelf, corner wear. Pages near fine; few w/small orange dots as highlight of passages. Heavy stock beige endpapers. Bind fine, square; hinges intact. Spartan dust wrapper with red titles, light shelf wear; unclipped 3.50 net, protected in new clear sleeve. Rare near fine first edition in same original wrapper. From acknowledgements: "A very considerable amount of research was necessary to check, as possible, the factual statements made Mikhael Lebedev. The Publishers wish to record their special thanks to the librarians and staff of the Birmingham Reference Library; the British Library, London; the Documentation Centre of the Bund, Vienna; the German Institute, London; the Institute of Contemporary History and the Wiener Library, London; the Library of Congress, Washington; the New York Public Library; the Royal Geographical Society, London; the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, London University; and the Press Department of the Soviet Embassy, London. ".also wish to aknowledge the important help from correspondents in Warsaw; Leipzig; Berlin; Freiburg; Milan; Rome; Jerusalem; Tel-Aviv; New Orleans; and Dallas. The Publishers, however, would like to make it clear that none mentioned is in any way responsible for the correctness of the information in this book." From front flap: "In this book Mikhail Lebedev describes his birth and childhood in St. Petersburg, his adolescence and education in Germany, his return to Russia and his years of training for the Soviet Intellligence Service. His education in Germany fits him admirably for his first major assignment there during World War II. He is provided with a suitable 'cover', and works for a time as a junior member of the German General Staff, where he eventually, and quite accidentally, comes into contact with Martin Bormann and his family. Lebedev goes on to explain how he is unmasked as a Russian spy and forced on pain of death to help Bormann, who needs a Russian-speaking aide in order to bring to fruition his long prepared plan to escape in the event of Germany's defeat and Bormann's possible capture by the Russians. With the help of the Nazi underground and an Arab in the service of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Bormann and Lebedev are smuggled out from under the noses of the Allies and taken to Beirut. There Bormann begins to carry out his project of setting up neo-Nazi cells in every possible country with a view to the eventual re-emergence of the German Reich, with himself as the new Fuhrer. It is while Lebedev is engaged on a ludicrous mission to the Ukraine on which Bormann has sent him for this purpose that the author is captured, tried and sent to Siberia for an indeterminate term. By a piece of bureaucratic bungling Lebedev's papers are lost, and with them, the man. Fourteen years later his papers turn up, and his potential usefulness becomes apparent to the Soviet authorities. Lebedev is sent with another agent as watch-dog to find Bormann and report his whereabouts to Soviet Intelligence. When Lebedev suspects that he is walking from the Soviet frying pan into the Grand Mufti's fire, he defects and throws himself on the mercy of his only friend, the Arab Sayeed. With Sayeed's help he is smuggled out of Beirut on a plane for South America, there to join up again with Bormann. But, although he finds the Nazi ring, he does not come face to face with Bormann. Instead he is sent, presumably by Bormann, on a mission to the White Russian colony of Dallas, Texas - a group which has been very active in anti-Castro operations. There, whether by accident or design, Lebedev is caught up in the conspiracy to assassinate John F. Kennedy, as the assistant to the gunman behind the the picket fence - whose shot, Lebedev believes, was the one which destroyed all hope of the President's surviving. Lebedev outwits his 'employers', who seek to silenc.
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