This book is the secret history of spies, and intelligence, during the Cold War. Drawing on a wealth of previously classified intelligence archives, in multiple countries and languages, it reveals how Western and Eastern governments used spies, sabotage, subversion, and information warfare to battle each other during the conflict that dominated the twentieth century.

Far from being a closed historical chapter, however, it shows that conflict’s ghosts are still alive. Whether Britain, America, and other Western governments like it or not, in fact they are already engaged in a new clandestine struggle with Russia. This is not really a new Cold War, but instead part of a much longer-term conflict between Western powers and Russia - the Long Cold War - in which intelligence services are again at the frontline.

As a work of Applied History, this book sets out stark warnings for Western countries amid this century’s great power competition, especially between the United States and China. It provides grand strategy lessons from the world’s first super-power competition for the new one currently underway - what to expect, how it can be won, how to avoid past mistakes, and how to avoid it escalating into a catastrophic hot war.