It was so refreshing to read a book, not about a KGB agent inside British or American Intelligence, but about a former Eastern European spy providing Soviet intelligence to the Americans. Agent Sniper appears thoroughly researched, and is well-written in smooth, easy-to-read prose. Goleniewski is a fascinating character and I was captivated by the details of his life, including his wilder claims.

My only gripe is that I'm not sure why he is continually referred to as being mad/insane. Did he really believe he was the Tsar's son or was that purely an attempted cash-grab? Maybe I just missed the details in the book, but that never felt clear. I'm a little leery of mental disorder diagnoses that come from journalists, not psychiatrists. Just because behavior is abnormal to the author (and I agree that Goleniewski does seem unhinged) doesn't mean that person has a diagnosable mental illness.

A well researched retelling of one of the most important and effective counter-intelligence spies of the Cold War. This historical work was rich with detail and kept the reader on the edge of their seat.

Sincere thanks to NetGalley and St Martins Press for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

I was invited to read and review this book by Net Galley and St. Martin’s Press. I accepted because I do love a good spy story, and there aren’t many of them being published at this time. Tim Tate has had a long, illustrious career as a documentary filmmaker and as an author, but is new to me.

So, when I began reading and found my attention wandering, I thought it was a personal problem. Too many distractions. I tried again, and when that didn’t go well, I procured the audio version and listened to it while I prepared dinners during the week. Eventually, I threw in the towel and admitted that this is simply not an engaging book. The topic sounds fascinating, but just as a gifted, dedicated author can spin dull material to gold, so can an indifferent one tell an electrifying spy story in a way that leaves the reader checking the page numbers and the clock—is this thing over yet?

It's not all bad news: the research here is top drawer. For the researcher, this book has use, although I would caution the uninitiated into reading carefully, because history is always politically charged. Every fact that is included, and every fact that is not; the interpretation; the language used, all give a biased account, even when a researcher and writer is endeavoring to be as balanced as possible. I don’t care for this writer’s interpretation, which makes him sound like a hardened right winger, but I have no doubt that the facts that he uses are accurate ones.

Then we come to the audio, and I must wonder why, if we’re primarily dealing with the CIA and its agents, we have a narrator with a clipped English accent (and a few pronunciations that sounded very odd to me,) telling the story. I found it disorienting, but if this had been a more engaging story, I would have overlooked it.

Ultimately it comes down to wordsmithery, and I didn’t find much of it. Those interested in dabbling in this genre would do better to read Ben McIntyre and Tim Weiner.

This book is for sale now.

This nonfiction book read like a thriller and movie which isn’t surprising as it was about a real life spy. Who started on the side of the Russians and then defected to the US. But not completely sure he did. Which goes to the question can you really trust a spy?

For more reviews and bookish posts visit: https://www.ManOfLaBook.com

Agent Sniper: The Cold War Superagent and the Ruthless Head of the CIA by Tim Tate tells of Michał Goleniewski, a Polish agent who volunteered to spy for the CIA. Mr. Tate id a British documentary film-maker, and a bestselling author.

The subject of Agent Sniper: The Cold War Superagent and the Ruthless Head of the CIA by Tim Tate is an agent working for the Polish Intelligence services and the KGB. Michał Goleniewski has decided that he can no longer support the regime he is serving. Calling himself “Sniper”, Goleniewski started feeding the American Intelligence Services valuable information.

Over the course of three years, Sniper has passed loads of quality intelligence, identify moles in America, England, Sweden, Israel, and other countries. Once the Soviets were onto the fact that someone is passing information to the West, Goleniewski fled. Leaving his wife and three kids, he showed up at the US Embassy in Berlin with his mistress.

At first, the CIA welcomed Goleniewski, who kept on giving accurate information. However, politics, fiefdoms, egos, and incompetency got in the way. CIA director James J. Angleton had his own defector, Antoliy Golitsyn, who he considered more reliable, despite not being placed as high as Goleniewski.

Insisting that other defectors were fakes, Goleniewski fell out of favor, a vicitim to foe, and friendly, disinformation campaigns, as well as with it his status and financial support. Becoming paranoid, Agent Sniper became delusional making outrageous claims, such as being Tsarevich Aleksei, son of the last Tsar.

This is a fascinating book, trying to find the truth from a world built on lies. Question the odd choice of the CIA to cut Sniper loose despite the excellent, reliable, and truthful information he was providing.

This is one place, however, where the book falls short. There really isn’t a good answer of the CIA’s treatment of Goleniewski, for instance. Many of the files are, as per the author, are still classified, and his treatment remains a puzzle even after 350+ pages.

The book is an interesting piece of the Cold War, an espionage/cautionary tale of what happens when grey people living in a grey world start believing their own lies. Some of the book was certainly dry, but the excellent research – of available materials – is undeniably a tremendous achievement.

This is an exhaustively researched, well-written history. Unfortunately, I had difficulty becoming engaged. Undoubtedly a me problem. #AgentSniper #NetGalley

I received an advance reading copy (arc) of this book from the publisher and NetGalley.com in return for a fair review. They say 'truth is stranger than fiction' and in the case of author Tim Tate's 'Agent Sniper', this nonfiction book rivals even the best spy novel or action adventure story. Just who was Agent Sniper? Well as far as we know, he was a Polish spy by the name of Michael Goleniewski. He began sending letters to J. Edgar Hoover during the Cold War, but his correspondence was intercepted by the CIA. For several years, he smuggled over 100 rolls of microfilm and thousands of documents from Communist Europe into the hands of the CIA. He also identified moles who were working in U.S. and British government jobs. When he believed his superiors were on to him, he suddenly decided to leave his wife and children and defect to the United States taking his German mistress with him. From there, his story grows even more complicated as American and British intelligence scramble to uncover the traitors. It came to a point when no one knew whom they could trust from the top brass on down. Most bizarre of all was the claim Goleniewski made to be heir to the Russian throne--Aleksei Romanoff. His ultimate dissent into madness shrouded his allegations of espionage and Russian royalty with questions. Tate did a fine job telling a very complicated story. If you fancy, a good spy story with a lot of twists and turns--this one just may be for you. Just remember...I warned you...truth is stranger than fiction.

This was a very informative book and well researched. I learned a lot about this topic which was my goal as i was not very knowledgeable about it at all. And learning about this particular person, the Sniper, we particularly interesting. My main critique would be how very dry it was. If was very difficult to read for very long. #netgalley #agentsniper

The Cold War Superagent and the Ruthless Head of the CIA

This is the story of one of the Cold War’s most effective counter-agents Michal Goleniewski, cover name Sniper. Citing from declassified sources and British and American materials the author details the amazing career of a lieutenant colonel in Poland’s intelligence service and KGB spy who defected to the US in 1961.

This is well-researched but tedious Cold War espionage saga that exposed more than 1600 Soviet bloc spies operating undercover in the West after WW11. From April 1958 to December 1960 Gloleniewski risked his life to smuggle thousands of top-secret Soviet bloc intelligence and military documents and in 1961 with the Polish agents hard on his heels he made a dramatic defection across divide Berlin. To the CIA, he was one of the West’s most valuable counterintelligence sources and the best defector the CIA ever had. But CIA chief James Angleton believed that the Soviet spy was passing bogus leads and distrusted him. By the end of 1963 Goleniewski was abandoned by the US Government and the CIA reneged on its agreement to pay and protect him and secretly briefed journalists that he had lost his mind. But what is the truth...In the final 100 pages; Mr. Tate chronicles 30 years of bizarre behavior until the sniper’s death in 1993 and alternates his narrative with the dysfunctional CIA behavior thus revealing fascinating dirt from the early years of the Agency.

Although filled with riveting facts the account is told with a dry tone and without cinematic punch or thrilling scenes. It is overflowing with minutia details and extensive use of quotes. The pace slows down in the later years after the Sniper’s defection and I found what came next less interesting but in all, this is an account that will arouse our curiosity...

Agent Sniper is the reading of textbook material by a master storyteller. The detail, the information, the sequence ..... it's all there ...... but presented in a very interesting manner. This isn't just any spy story because there are so many layers to peel away. The author has put a lot of research and time into the accuracy while also adding his opinion and insight. An exceptional lesson in history.

Agent Sniper is the US publication of Tim Tate’s extensive account of Agent Michal Goleniewski (British version is titled The Spy Who Was Left Out in the Cold).

As Tate notes, spies are typically chosen for the profession due to being deeply disgruntled for various reasons. Goleniewski was certainly no exception. While he had on the surface an ordinary family with a wife and three children, he was living a double life both in work and on a personal level. He had an East German mistress and worked for the KGB and Polish UB while secretly sending a wealth of information to the US.

While his letters are addressed to FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, the CIA intercepts his correspondence before it reaches the FBI. He wanted to send them to the FBI because he knew the structure of the CIA was poor and even more so, the CIA had moles within its ranks. In fact, uncovering traitors seems to be one of Sniper’s primary motivations for reaching out to Hoover. He wrote that he was well aware he would die if he was found out. Obviously, if it were possible to know exactly why Sniper decided to become a double agent, the book would have additional layers and be even more interesting. However, that is an impossible task, as either it was never documented by Sniper or if it was, it remains highly classified by the CIA, as well as MI6 (Polish intelligence released many of the documents that provided the bones of the book for Tate).

The risk with becoming a double agent is there is not only certainty that if you are found out, you will die, but there is also virtually no certainty in what awaits you on the other side. A common perception is that the CIA is a brilliant intelligence agency, and it certainly has become a well-oiled organization, but Tate’s recounting of events shows that it took quite some time to work out the kinks, that early on there were plenty of mistakes. Of course, he sheds light on the details of the rampant Soviet moles within the organization during the 1950s. With Sniper’s help and through refinement over time, such incidences became the exception. It’s worth mentioning that James Jesus Angleton’s involvement had a deleterious effect on Sniper. Angleton was notorious for his deep paranoia which is to be expected of any high-ranking member of the agency. That said, Tate shows that even a masterful intelligence operative like Angleton made huge instinctual mistakes. His biggest mistake was with Kim Philby, which is mentioned here and thoroughly documented elsewhere (A Spy Among Friends being a popular example). However, another huge mistake was Angleton’s trust in double agent Golitsyn which later affected Sniper’s standing with the U.S.

Of course, as Tate documents, Sniper didn’t help himself either. The CIA cut him off only a few years after his defection. This was at least partially due to the fact that he claimed to be a descendant of the Romanov royal family, Tsarevich Alexei. According to Tate, he eventually went completely insane, not unheard of among deeply paranoid high-level spies. In all, Sniper identified more moles than any other defector in CIA history.

A Real Life Cold War Spy Tale

The tale begins with a package received by the American Embassy in Bern, Switzerland. The cover letter asked that the enclosed package be forwarded to J. Edgar Hoover. The choice of Hoover at the FBI was deliberate. Agent Sniper, otherwise known as Lt. Col. Michal Goleniewski, being a Soviet agent, knew the CIA had been infiltrated by Russian agents. However, it took three years for Goleniewski to be actively recruited and then the CIA was the contact.

Goleniewski as head of the Polish espionage service spied on the Poles and sent the information back to Moscow. Although it isn’t explained in the book, he somehow became disenchanted with the communists and decided to sell his services to the US instead. Over the years, Goleniewski provided extremely useful information to the CIA, but eventually the Russians were aware of his activities and he had to escape to the American Embassy in Berlin with his mistress.

The first half of the book is the story of Goleniewski’s activities as a spy. It is well researched, well paced and very entertaining if you enjoy spy stories. The second half of the book is equally well researched, but much drier. It is the story of his increasingly troubled relations with the CIA. He eventually became mentally disturbed calling himself the heir to the Russian throne, Aleksei Romanoff.

Unlike James Bond stories, this one doesn’t have a happy ending, but it is a realistic, detailed picture of spy-craft during the cold war and a behind the scenes look at Washington politics in the espionage world. If you’re interested in the cold war and particularly espionage, this is well worth reading.

I received this book from St. Martin’s Press for this review.

Free ARC from NET GALLEY

Set in the 1950's a true life thriller that makes you wonder how we didn't kill everyone back in the day

Golienewski’s story is a reminder then and now that in human relationships and more so in the area of HUMINT nothing stays the same and if you are the smartest one in the room you are probably just lonely and not smart.

In a time of prima donnas and 'work management" comes a story of death and deception that was a pleasure to read.

Real people, real sacrifice, this is a great one!!

A fascinating well written book that kept my interest from beginning to end.If you enjoy reading hidstory book about spying this is an excellent read.#netgalley #st.Martins press

In 1958 an American embassy received a package from someone who identified himself as Heckenschuetze (Sniper). A letter requested that the enclosed intelligence be forwarded to FBI Director Hoover, fearing the infiltration of Soviet moles in the CIA. However, for almost three years it was the CIA that handled communication with their agent in place. When Russia received notice of a mole in 1961 Sniper took actions to defect to the West through Berlin. Identified as Lt. Col. Michal Goleniewski, he was also known as Herr Kowalski, Roman Tarnowski, Franz Roman Oldenburg, Martin Cherico and later identified himself as Aleksei Romanoff, heir to the Russian throne. He had provided a significant amount of information identifying spies who had infiltrated American and British Intelligence as well as a member of Ben Gurion’s inner circle in Israel and a high ranking Swedish naval officer.

Tim Tate takes the reader through Sniper’s revelations, but he also explores the early years of post-WWII espionage, the rivalries between the FBI and the CIA and the suspicions and paranoia that later paralyzed the intelligence community’s ability to function in the 1960s. Agent Sniper is a fascinating display of behind the scenes actions that showed courage and loyalty, but also treachery. While Tate’s exploration of the intelligence community is often gripping, there were also several sections that were somewhat dry. This is a book that is well worth reading for fans of history or for those looking for the background stories behind the Cold War. I would like to thank NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for providing this book for my review.

4 stars

A well researched biography on a high profile soviet block defector I hadn’t read about before! Golienewski played an important role in early-cold war counter espionage, & had a tragic ending. I really enjoyed & learned from this account.

[What I liked:]

•This book is thoroughly researched, & the writer notes when accounts conflict or information is unavailable (many documents pertaining to Sniper haven’t been declassified by the US & UK governments).

•It’s interesting seeing how the interpretations of the Polish UB (Soviet-era intelligence agency) on Sniper & his activities intersect & sometimes conflict with those of the CIA, MI5, & MI6.

•Gee, I knew James Jesus Angleton got paranoid in his later years & made several strategic mistakes as head of the CIA because of it, but Golienewski’s story is a painful case study on just how horribly he got things wrong. It’s very illuminating how the writer uses Sniper’s story to illustrate the tensions & dynamics between US & UK intelligence, & even within factions of the CIA itself.


[What I didn’t like as much:]

•The pace of the book slows in the second half, after Sniper’s defection. This isn’t the fault of the writer, it’s just that the subjects later years, while interesting, aren’t as exciting as his career as an agent in place.

CW: infidelity, mistreatment of prisoners, mental illness

[I received an ARC ebook copy from NetGalley in exchange for my honest review. Thank you for the book!]

Bonus quote, from one of Sniper’s anonymous letters addressed to “Herr Direktor” J Edgar Hoover while he was still behind the iron curtain:

“…I will be forcibly included in the ranks of singing angels if there is the slightest negligence on your part in maintaining the proper cover. As is generally known, such a summons is connected with a certain operation called ‘being stood against the wall’”.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for allowing me to read Agent Sniper. Wow! This is an explosive and tragic story of the Soviet defector, Michal Goleniewski. He was a valuable asset who descended into madness. This is an expertly researched and so well written book, you won't be able to put it down.

Author Tim Tate’s subject is “Sniper,” an agent in the KGB and Polish intelligence services, who defected to the US and identified dozens of Communist Bloc spies who had infiltrated the British, German and American intelligence services and governments. In the late 1950s, while still working for the KGB and Polish UB, Michał Goleniewski gave reams of Polish and Soviet secrets to the US. When he learned that one of the moles he identified as being in MI6 (the famous George Blake) had told his Soviet handlers that the Americans had a well-placed informant in Poland, Goleniewski knew it was time to get out. He left his Russian wife and three children, picked up his young East German mistress, and they went to the US Embassy in Berlin. Fortunately for Goleniewski, this was 1961, a couple of years before the Berlin Wall went up, so no heroics were required for him to defect.

The unfortunate thing about being a spy seems to be that it makes you mentally and emotionally unstable. The stories are legion. Agent Sniper—a/k/a Michał Goleniewski. a/k/a Roman Tarnowski, a/k/a Jan Roman, a/k/a Herr Kowalski, a/k/a Franz Roman Oldenburg and, finally, a/k/a Aleksei Nicholaevich Romanoff, claimant to be the surviving son of the Last Tsar of Imperial Russia—is a case in point. He had decided when he first started turning over information, that he would send it to the FBI, because he knew the CIA was riddled with KGB moles. Unfortunately for him, the CIA intercepted his letters, so it wasn’t long before the KGB and Polish UB were alerted.

James J. Angleton, CIA head during much of the Cold War, was famously paranoid, but tended to trust all the wrong people, like the Cambridge Spy Ring’s Kim Philby, for example. Angleton had his own pet defector, Golitsyn, who claimed that all other defectors were fakes. According to Tate, although Golitsyn didn’t perform well on the tests of whether he was a legitimate defector (versus a KGB-sent diversion), he didn’t have a particularly good position in the KGB before his defection (unlike Goleniewski), and Golitsyn’s information didn’t pan out anywhere near as well as Goleniewski’s, Angleton accepted Golitsyn, together with his insistence that other defectors were fakes.

As a result, Goleniewski fell out of favor with the CIA within three years of his defection to the US, and the support he relied on was stopped. He became paranoid himself, and delusional. This is when he began making the lunatic claim that he was actually the Tsarevich Aleksei, son of the last Tsar. He probably thought it was a good way of making money, since Russian emigrés loved to support people claiming to be Alexei or the Tsar’s daughter Anastasia, and there was ostensibly a cache of hundreds of millions in inheritance awaiting the Tsarevich Alexei.

Despite his mental and emotional instability, one thing Goleniewski had was a phenomenal memory. He was able to provide encyclopedic information about Soviet and Polish intelligence, and identify many traitors in the western intelligence services. It’s odd that the CIA decided to cut him off, considering how much good information he provided, but the CIA doesn’t come off well at all in this book. Unsurprising to anyone who has read much about the agency during the Cold War, they are bumblers, full of internal fighting, and riddled with Soviet moles. Still, Tate maybe overplays his hand against Golitsyn and for Goleniewski; it’s just hard to believe that the CIA could be quite as wrongheaded as he paints them in the G-versus-G issue. Tate is a bit hamstrung by the fact that most of the intelligence agencies’ files on Goleniewski remain secret, but having unresolved this central puzzle of exactly what lay behind Goleniewski’s treatment left me feeling unsatisfied by the history.

While this is an interesting look at a little-known bit of Cold War espionage history, Tate also isn’t the best storyteller. He has a whole raft of riveting facts, but he tends to present them in a dry way. He could take a lesson from Ben Macintyre about how to turn history into a tale as thrilling as an adventure/spy novel.

This book has so many details that you understand it is well researched. If you like a very detailed non fiction book based on spy and espionage, this book is for you.

I felt overwhelmed with the details. May be I was expecting a quick read rather than too many details.

Agent Sniper by Tim Tate
1st off, I think this is an excellent book to add to one’s library if you are interested in non-fiction espionage. The complete story of Michal Goleniewski aka Agent Sniper. Goleniewski was a Polish intelligence officer wwhose primary job was as a double agent to spy on the Polish Intelligence Agency for the KGB. Married to a Russian woman with three children, he would seem to be a stable character and not likely to cause trouble. However, what came first I am not sure, (1) matrimonial problems or (2) philosophical issues with the communist system. Mr. Tate does not answer this issue. But Goleniewski ends up with an East German woman, transferring documents to the US which he thinks is the FBI but instead is the CIA as well as transferring funds from the Polish Agency to support his mistress in East Berlin.
Eventually the Soviets or the Polish Intelligence Agency become aware and he is able to escape with his mistress through the US Embassy in Berlin. This happens about 8 months before the Berlin Wall is built.
Now in the US he is able to detail the number of Western Intelligence people who are in fact working for the Soviets. Perhaps the most significant person he reveals is George Blake. There are many others as well and Mr. Tate does a very good job of describing many of these cases which will be familiar to one who is interested in this field. If there was one case, I wish he would have given more information on was Col. Stig Wennerstrom a quadruple spy!
Trouble finally occurs when James Angleton head of the Counter Intelligence Dept within the CIA begins to question everything about the intelligence provided by Sniper. This results in the CIA reneging on their contract with Sniper essentially giving him no way to earn a living in the US while the Polish and Soviet Intelligence Agencies are trying to track him down to kill him.
Goleniewski mentally breaks and believes he is the lost son of the last Czar of Russia! It is all downhill from there and for me this part was less interesting but also frustrating that the US did this to him.
If there was one area, I wish Mr. Tate could have provided more explanation it would have been the reasoning into Sniper choosing to spy on the Soviets and the Poles. And why the Russians and Poles did not see the breakdown in his home life and mistress and embezzling money. I know this is hard to impossible to do but it would have made this book a must won and read. As it is, this is a great addition to anyone who enjoys non-fiction espionage.