Perfect Spy: The Incredible Double Life of Pham Xuan An, Time Magazine Reporter and Vietnamese Communist Agent
By Larry Berman
4/5
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
During the Vietnam War, Time reporter Pham Xuan An befriended everyone who was anyone in Saigon, including American journalists such as David Halberstam and Neil Sheehan, the CIA's William Colby, and the legendary Colonel Edward Lansdale—not to mention the most influential members of the South Vietnamese government and army. None of them ever guessed that he was also providing strategic intelligence to Hanoi, smuggling invisible ink messages into the jungle inside egg rolls. His early reports were so accurate that General Giap joked, "We are now in the U.S. war room."
In Perfect Spy, Larry Berman, who An considered his official American biographer, chronicles the extraordinary life of one of the twentieth century's most fascinating spies.
Larry Berman
Larry Berman has written four previous books on the war in Vietnam: Planning a Tragedy: The Americanization of the War in Vietnam; Lyndon Johnson's War: The Road To Stalemate in Vietnam; No Peace, No Honor: Nixon, Kissinger and Betrayal in Vietnam and Perfect Spy: The Incredible Double Life of Pham Xuan An, Time Magazine Reporter and Vietnamese Communist Agent. He has been featured on C-SPAN Book TV, Bill Moyers' The Public Mind and David McCullough's American Experience. He has been a Guggenheim Fellow and a Fellow in residence at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. He received the Bernath Lecture Prize for contributions to our understanding of foreign relations and the Department of the Navy Vice Admiral Edwin B. Hooper Research Grant. Berman is Professor Emeritus at the University of California, Davis and Founding Dean of the Honors College at Georgia State University. He lives in Atlanta, Georgia.
Read more from Larry Berman
Perfect Spy: The Incredible Double Life of Pham Xuan An, Time Magazine Reporter & Vietnamese Communist Agent Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5No Peace, No Honor: Nixon, Kissinger, and Betrayal in Vietnam Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Zumwalt: The Life and Times of Admiral Elmo Russell "Bud" Zumwalt, Jr. Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsCrooked Bamboo: Inside the Diem Regime and South Vietnam's Tragedy Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Perfect Spy
Related ebooks
Memoirs of a Kamikaze: A World War II Pilot's Inspiring Story of Survival, Honor and Reconciliation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Boris Yeltsin: The Decade that Shook the World Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5America at War since 1945: Politics and Diplomacy in Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsBuddha's Child: My Fight to Save Vietnam Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Mannerheim: President, Soldier, Spy Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Plot to Kill Putin: A Thriller Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Fall of Japan: The Final Weeks of World War II in the Pacific Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5China and Japan: Facing History Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGorbachev: On My Country and the World Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Road to Dien Bien Phu: A History of the First War for Vietnam Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Operation Shakespeare: The True Story of an Elite International Sting Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5On the Trail of Genghis Khan: An Epic Journey Through the Land of the Nomads Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5140 Days to Hiroshima: The Story of Japan's Last Chance to Avert Armageddon Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHanoi's War: An International History of the War for Peace in Vietnam Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Hitler And India: The Untold Story of his Hatred for the Country and its People Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Shadow War: Inside Russia's and China's Secret Operations to Defeat America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Short History of the Vietnam War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Emperor's Codes: The Thrilling Story of the Allied Code Breakers Who Turned the Tide of World War II Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Deng Xiaoping's Long War: The Military Conflict between China and Vietnam, 1979-1991 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRussians Among Us: Sleeper Cells, Ghost Stories, and the Hunt for Putin's Spies Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Operation Whisper: The Capture of Soviet Spies Morris and Lona Cohen Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Long Gray Line: The American Journey of West Point's Class of 1966 Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5A Taste of Freedom: Memoirs of a Taiwanese Independence Leader Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSayeret Matkal: The Greatest Operations of Israel's Elite Commandos Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVietnam War: Why? Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFor the Soul of Mankind: The United States, the Soviet Union, and the Cold War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/515 Stars: Eisenhower, MacArthur, Marshall: Three Generals Who Saved the American Century Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Vietnam: The Necessary War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Strange Defeat Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTiger Trap: America's Secret Spy War with China Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Asian History For You
Shinto the Kami Way Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Embrace Yoga's Roots Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Unit 731: Testimony Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Forgotten Highlander: An Incredible WWII Story of Survival in the Pacific Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of the World's Greatest Nuclear Disaster Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Vory: Russia's Super Mafia Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5No Beast So Fierce: The Terrifying True Story of the Champawat Tiger, the Deadliest Man-Eater in History Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Art of War Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Voices from Chernobyl Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Gulag Archipelago: The Authorized Abridgement Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mao's Great Famine: The History of China's Most Devastating Catastrophe, 1958-1962 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Enemy at the Gates: The Battle for Stalingrad Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Dead Mountain: The Untold True Story of the Dyatlov Pass Incident Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Summary of Caste (Oprah's Book Club): by Isabel Wilkerson - The Origins of Our Discontents - A Comprehensive Summary Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Last Yakuza: life and death in the Japanese underworld Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsVietnam: An Epic Tragedy, 1945-1975 Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Birth of Korean Cool: How One Nation Is Conquering the World Through Pop Culture Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Red Notice: A True Story of High Finance, Murder, and One Man's Fight for Justice Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Gulag Archipelago [Volume 1]: An Experiment in Literary Investigation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Gulag Archipelago [Volume 2]: An Experiment in Literary Investigation Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Romance of the Three Kingdoms Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5To Love and Be Loved: A Personal Portrait of Mother Teresa Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Romanov Sisters: The Lost Lives of the Daughters of Nicholas and Alexandra Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Anarchy: The East India Company, Corporate Violence, and the Pillage of an Empire Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Under the Loving Care of the Fatherly Leader: North Korea and the Kim Dynasty Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Mao Tse-Tung On Guerrilla Warfare Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Helmet For My Pillow [Illustrated Edition] Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Pillow Book Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Perfect Spy
13 ratings2 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5It's always a strange story when a former enemy tries to write about a former enemy. Pham Xuan An was a Communist spy in Saigon during the Vietnam War. However he was also a journalist for Time magazine and he cultivated contacts with both South Vietnamese and Americans. He also got away with it, he was a very good spy. The book seeks to answer how he succeeded and for so long. I think it does provide answers to these questions. The author very much liked his subject and that colours the entire book. I'm not sure if it hurts or helps the book. It very much reads not as history but as a tribute to a dear friend, who it just so happens was an enemy spy. The author asks who is the real Pham Xuan An, I'm happy with the answers presented in the book. A much harder question to answer is why so many of those he betrayed are so ready to forgive.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Fascinating story. I had never heard of this guy. It's an entirely different slant on the familiar story of the disaster in Viet Nam.