When intelligent, highly educated and well respected experts in their field make statements that are on their face inaccurate, something is wrong. This is the case with Harvey Klehr and John Earl Hayes; leaders in Soviet research.
In 2014 Harvey Klehr wrote:
"In our more than twenty years of archivally based research on Soviet espionage in America, we have uncovered ample documentation of Soviet intelligence obtaining American technical, military, and diplomatic information but very little indicating successful policy manipulation."
This was written in response to Diana West’s contention that the Roosevelt administration was infiltrated by countless Communists who directed U.S. policy to a large extent. Klehr’s conclusion was seconded by John Hayes:
“Soviet manipulation of American policy - which by the way Soviet intelligence agencies didn’t do that. They were into intelligence, not policy manipulation. And there are sensible reasons for that—but that’s another question.”
I wrote to Dr. Klehr and provided him a copy of my manuscript. I asked him to provide feedback:
From: JR DIETRICH
Date: Saturday, June 27, 2015 at 6:00 PM
To: Harvey Klehr
Subject: The Morgenthau Plan: Soviet Influence on American Postwar Planning
Harvey Klehr PhD
I am working on a third edition of my book, The Morgenthau Plan: Soviet Influence on American Postwar Planning (Algora Publishing). It is a revisionist work that has been cited in several works dealing with the postwar period. I am providing you with a copy in the hope that you will have the time to read it and provide feedback. Any work dealing with a complex subject usually contains errors. I would appreciate it if you could point them out to me before publication. Thank you, John Dietrich
Dr. Klehr responded:
From: polshk@emory.edu
To: dietrichjohn@msn.com
Subject: Re: The Morgenthau Plan: Soviet Influence on American Postwar Planning
Date: Tue, 30 Jun 2015 15:21:52 +0000
Dear Mr. Dietrich:
Thank you for sending me a copy of the next edition of your book on the Morgenthau Plan. I wish I had the time to read through it, but I have an unusually busy schedule over the next few months and will have to apologize for my inability to do so.
Harvey Klehr
I then wrote Dr. Klehr to request he clarify his statement that Soviet agents did not have much influence on American policy:
From: JR DIETRICH <dietrichjohn@msn.com>
Date: Wednesday, July 1, 2015 10:56 AM
To: Harvey Klehr <polshk@emory.edu>
Subject: RE: The Morgenthau Plan: Soviet Influence on American Postwar Planning
Dr. Klehr,
I understand your inability to review my book. These are exciting times and there is a lot to be done. I cite your work several times in my book and have read almost everything you have published. It is extremely valuable work. The premise of my book is that the Soviet had a great deal of influence on U.S. postwar planning. Therefore, I do not understand your quote: "In our more than twenty years of archivally based research on Soviet espionage in America, we have uncovered ample documentation of Soviet intelligence obtaining American technical, military, and diplomatic information but very little indicating successful policy manipulation." I would appreciate it if you could elaborate. Regards, John Dietrich
Dr. Klehr responded:
Re: The Morgenthau Plan: Soviet Influence on American Postwar Planning
Klehr, Harvey
Wed 7/1/2015, 4:51 PM
Thanks for the kind words about my books. The point of our comment was that we have not seen anything in Russian archives indicating that someone like White got told to try to manipulate policy. I am no expert on the Morgenthau Plan but my guess is that it was White acting on his own.
There are countless examples of people commenting on Soviet influence on American policy, including from Klehr and Haynes themselves. They have provided a clear picture of how valuable White was to his Soviet handlers:
The KGB mentioned that White offered advice concerning how far the Soviets could push the United States on abandoning the Polish government-in-exile [which was hostile to Stalin] and assured the Soviets that U.S. policy-makers, despite their public opposition, would acquiesce to the USSR's annexation of Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania. White was also a senior adviser to the U.S. delegation at the founding conference of the United Nations in San Francisco in May 1945. During the negotiations on the UN charter he met covertly with Soviet intelligence officers and provided them with information on the American negotiating strategy. He assured the Soviets that "Truman and Stettinius want to achieve the success of the conference at any price" and advised that if Soviet diplomats held firm to their demand that the Soviet Union get a veto of UN actions, that the United States "will agree."
David Reese, Harry Dexter White’s biographer commented:
But during 1936 an “elite group,” composed of promising officials who were expected to rise in the government service, was detached from this parent group (the Ware group). Its paramount objectives at that time were “power and influence” rather than active espionage. Certain people not in the Ware group had been added to the “elite group,” and one of these was Harry Dexter White.
He further wrote, “the power to influence policy has always been the ultimate purpose of the Communist Party’s infiltration.
General Lucius Clay, military governor, U.S. Zone, Germany, 1947-49, commented:
In a 1974 interview with Richard McKinzie of the Truman Library General Clay was highly critical of the Civil Affairs Branch. Clay stated: “We certainly went in there with a great number of people who were either members of the Communist party or tended in that direction. This was not the place nor the time for them. It did create some problems that took a long time to correct. Many of these men had come to us on Treasury teams. We ran into a tremendous opposition on the part of the Treasury if we attempted to change or remove any of these people.” The Civil Affairs Branch was filled by people recruited by Harry Dexter White.
Chief Special Agent Guy Hottel sent a memo in March 1946 memo to J. Edgar Hoover:
It has become increasingly clear in the investigation of this case that there are a tremendous number of persons employed in the United States government who are Communists and strive daily to advance the cause of Communism and destroy the foundations of this government. . . . Today nearly every department or agency of this government is infiltrated with them in varying degree. To aggravate the situation they appear to have concentrated most heavily in those departments which make policy, particularly in the international field, or carry itt into effect. . . . Such organizations as the State and Treasury departments, FEA, OSS, WPB, etc.
Wikipedia provides the following information on Lauchlin Currie:
Lauchlin Currie was also assigned to expedite the American Volunteer Group (Flying Tigers), in which U.S. military pilots were released for combat under Claire Chennault, an adviser to the Chinese Air Force against Japan. Currie also organized a large training program in the United States for Chinese pilots. In May 1941, he presented a paper on Chinese aircraft requirements to General George C. Marshall and the Joint War Board. The document, accepted by the Board, stressed the role of an air force in China could play in defending Singapore, the Burma Road, and the Philippines against Japanese attack. It also pointed to its potential for strategic bombing of targets in Japan itself. These activities, together with Currie's work in helping to tighten sanctions against Japan, are said to have played a part in provoking Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.
Soviet intelligence had a word for efforts to influence the foreign policy of other nations:
Active measures: Active measures was a Soviet term for the actions of political warfare conducted by the Soviet security services to influence the course of world events, "in addition to collecting intelligence and producing politically correct assessment of it". Active measures ranged "from media manipulations to special actions involving various degrees of violence". They were used both abroad and domestically. They included disinformation, propaganda, counterfeiting official documents, assassinations, and political repression, such as penetration in churches, and persecution of political dissidents. Active measures included the establishment and support of international front organizations; foreign communist, socialist and opposition parties; wars of national liberation in the Third World; and underground, revolutionary, insurgency, criminal, and terrorist groups. The intelligence agencies of Eastern Bloc states also contributed to the program, providing operatives and intelligence for assassinations and other types of covert operations.
It is obvious the Soviets and their agents attempted to manipulate U.S. policy. Scholars damage their credibility by claiming the opposite. Whittaker Chambers wrote, “The power to influence policy has always been the ultimate purpose of the Communist Party’s infiltration. It was much more dangerous, and, as events have proved, much more difficult to detect, than espionage, which beside it was trivial, though the two go hand in hand.”
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