The Greatest Plot in History

323 Pages·1977·25.871 MB·English

by  Ralph de Toledano

THE GREATEST PLOT
in
HISTORY
Books by RALPH de TOLEDANO
FRONTIERS OF JAZZ
SEEDS OF TREASON
SPIES, DUPES AND DIPLOMATS
DAY OF RECKONING (a nOVel)
NIXON
LAMENT FOR A GENERATION
THE GREATEST PLOT IN HISTORY
THE WINNING SIDE
THE GOLDWATER STORY
RFK: THE MAN WHO WOULD BE PRESIDENT
AMERICA, I-LOVE-YOU
ONE MAN ALONE RICHARD NIXON
CLAUDE KIRK: MAN AND MYTH
LITTLE CESAR
J. EDGAR hoover: THE MAN IN HIS TIME
HIT AND run: the RISE AND FALL? OF RALPH NADER
LET OUR CITIES BURN
THE GREATEST PLOT
in
HISTORY
by
RALPH TOLEDANO
de
\E RLINGTON HOUSE-PUBLISHERS
NEW ROCHELLE, NEW YORK
Copyright © 1963, 1977 by Ralph de Toledano
AH rights reserved. No portion of this book may be
reproduced without written permission from the
publisher except by a reviewer who may quote brief
passages in connection with a review.
Second edition
MANUFACTURED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Selections from Men and Decisions by Lewis L. Strauss, copyright
©
1962 by Lewis L. Strauss and the Lewis L. Strauss Literary Trust,
are reprinted by permission of Doubleday & Company, Inc.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
De Toledano, Ralph, 1916-
The greatest plot in history.
Includes index. —
1. Espionage, Russian United States. 2. Atomic
bomb. I. Title.
UB271.R9D38 1977 327'.12'0947 76-54290
ISBN: 0-87000-371-2
—
New
Preface to the Edition
In a recent book,* a minor playwright and storyteller now turned
pundit delivers himself of some opinions on the case of atom spies
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. With a great show of impartiality
he casually admits that the Death House Letters written by the
Rosenbergs to each other during their incarceration at Sing Sing
—
were doctored by the Communist Party and with the expertise
he no doubt gained at New York's Stage Delicatessen, David
Zane Mairowitz dismisses the charges against them:
Even if the Rosenbergs were guilty in some degree, the massive
frame-up, railroading, and sentencing they suffered was out of all
proportion to their alleged spy operation. The idea that the Soviets
would entrust a big-time network to such obvious small-fry as these
taxes credibility. The A-Bomb sketches made by [David] Green-
glass and produced as damaging evidence were primitive and
could not give any idea of the bomb's mechanism. Julius's use of
two halves of a Jell-O box to link agent to agent was the gesture
of a thorough amateur Finally master spies are rarely caught.
. . .
Because the writer of that paragraph is a dilettante in matters
of espionage and nuclear science, it may seem like attacking a gnat
with a howitzer to rebut them. But since those words reflect
perfectly the knee-jerk reaction of certain citizens to the Rosenberg
Case, they warrant analysis.
* David Zane Mairowitz, The Radical Soap Opera. Avon Books, New
York.
PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION
vi
The facts then:
1. The trial of the Rosenbergs was conducted under an incan-
descentillumination providedby the media and by the international
Communist apparatus. The conviction of the Rosenbergs was re-
viewed by a U.S. Court of Appeals in New York known for its
meticulous devotion to the Bill of Rights. It was further sustained
by the Supreme Court. The trial was debated ad infinitum and, in
the views of some, ad nauseam. Books were written and polemics
launched, but none of them adduced one iota of evidence to prove
that the Rosenbergs were "framed" or "railroaded." The finality
of the death sentence can be challenged, but it in no wise impinges
on the guilt or innocence of the Rosenbergs. And to argue that
there was a conspiracy against the Rosenbergs requires the indict-
ment of President Truman and the entire federal establishment. By
now, certainly one of the conspirators would have spoken out.
2. An innocent man does not hide behind the Fifth Amendment
whenhis life is at stake, as both the Rosenbergs did when they were
on trial.
3. The A-Bomb sketches produced by David Greenglass may
have seemed "primitive" to those with but a high school knowledge
of physics. But expert witnesses at the trial demonstrated that they
were invaluable in any attempt to reproduce American nuclear
weapons.
4. The use of halves of a Jell-O box, or any similar piece of
cardboard irregularly cut, was not the "gesture of a thorough
amateur" but standard operatingprocedure for identification among
—
espionage agents as anyone but an amateur would know. At the
time of the Rosenberg trial, I questioned American and foreign
intelligence agents on this subject, and they all agreed that it was a
telling piece of evidence.
5. Master spies are frequently caught. The Japanese arrested
and executed Richard Sorge, one of the greatest Soviet spies of
World War II. Ronald Seth's Encyclopedia of Espionage cites
case after case of the arrest of master spies.
PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION
vii
6. Julius Rosenberg was not the "obvious small-fry" or the little
man caught in the vortex of war that propagandists have attempted
to portray. A 1955 report of the Senate Permanent Investigations
Subcommittee, prepared by chief counsel Robert F. Kennedy,
stated:
The Rosenberg spy ring successfully penetrated the Army Signal
Corps and related private establishments [doing classified work
for the Army]. This espionage ring took and obtained secrets from
the Army Signal Corps and transmitted them to the Soviet Union.
According to the Kennedy report, the Rosenberg spy ring had
wide ramifications and was, two years after the execution of Ethel
and Julius, "on the basis of available evidence" probably still
operating. One of the top Soviet agents in the scientific field was
Harry Gold, Klaus Fuchs' "contact," who worked directly and
closely with the Rosenbergs, an index of their importance to the
Soviet apparatus.
And the evidence is still coming in. When Scotland Yard and
MI-5 arrested master spies Gordon Lonsdale and the Krogers,
Peter and Helen, in London, they discovered that all three had
workedwith the Rosenbergs in past years. The Lonsdale apparatus
was uncovered in 1961, however, eight years after the execution
of the Rosenbergs. What MI-5 learned of the Rosenberg com-
plicity in the Lonsdale master group was turned over to the FBI
where it simply went into the file of closed cases.
Since then, the FBI has opened up the many thousands of pages
of the Rosenberg file, under the compulsion of a Freedom of Infor-
mation Act suit filed by friends of the couple. Though these friends
had argued for years that this disclosure would give them the proof
of a frame-up, it has resulted in just the opposite. A minute study
of the file disclosed only that David Greenglass, when first ques-
tionedby the FBI, attempted to shield his wife and the Rosenbergs.
Klaus Fuchs led the way to Harry Gold, though reluctantly.
Gold led the way to Greenglass. Greenglass led the way to the
—
PREFACE TO THE NEW EDITION
viii
Rosenbergs. That is how an espionage apparatus is apprehended
and broken up. Had the Rosenbergs talked, as small-fry spies
always do, more of the cancer of Communist espionage would
have been cut out. But the Rosenbergs were too important to be
—
allowed to speak and too fanatically devoted to Communism
and the Soviets made sure that they remained silent. There was
enough of thatfanatical devotion to make the task relatively simple,
although once or twice Julius seemed to be on the verge of crack-
ing.
Whether or not the Rosenbergs were "small-fry" has litde to do
with the deadliness of their contribution. David Greenglass was a
small cog inboth the A-Bomb project and the espionage apparatus.
Yet he added significantly to the Soviet Union's store of knowledge
and saved the Russians time and money in the construction of their
own bomb. The master spy would be ineffectual if he did not have
his agents, important and otherwise, funneling information to him.
The record of the Rosenberg contribution is there, and nothing
has surfaced, despite the prodigious efforts of their defenders, to
cast doubt on the testimony of witnesses who testified in open
— —
court and suffered long prison sentences for their pains about
the activities of Ethel and Julius.
The orchestrated protests, the books and articles depicting the
Rosenbergs as idealistic victims of the cold war, and all the para-
phernalia of international propaganda have little to do with the
thrust of this book. The Rosenbergs were but part of one of the
greatest espionage campaigns ever mounted by the Soviet Union.
It ranged from New York to Chicago, from Philadelphia to
Tennessee, from Los Alamos to the Cal Tech radiation laboratory
in Berkeley, from Canada to England. It took in famous scientists,
academicians, Army lieutenants, the most skilled of Stalin's spies
—
in the United States, small-fry and big fish a cross section of all
those who worked on the A-bomb.
The Soviets penetrated every major scientific installation work-
ing on the bomb. Through the courtesy of the Lend-Lease Ad-