McCargar, James 1920-2007 (Christopher Felix, James Goodrich

McCargar)

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McCargar, James 1920-2007 (Christopher Felix,
James Goodrich McCargar)
OBITUARY NOTICE—
See index for CA sketch: Born April 20, 1920, in San Francisco (/places/united-states-and-canada/us-
political-geography/san-francisco), CA; died of cancer, May 30, 2007, in Washington, DC. Diplomat,
intelligence o cer, consultant, and author. A former spy for the U.S. Foreign Service during and after
World War II (/history/modern-europe/wars-and-battles/world-war-ii), McCargar later wrote non ction and
ction works about espionage. He earned a B.A. in Russian language (/literature-and-arts/language-
linguistics-and-literary-terms/language-and-linguistics/russian) and civilization from Stanford University
(/social-sciences-and-law/education/colleges-us/stanford-university), and worked for newspapers in
Oakland and San Francisco (/places/united-states-and-canada/us-political-geography/san-francisco), before
joining the Foreign Service in 1942. First serving in Moscow and Vladivostok, he was a liaison with the U.S.
Navy and later was assigned to Santo Domingo during World War II (/history/modern-europe/wars-and-
battles/world-war-ii). Much of his time for the duration was spent in Alaska, however. After the war, he was
assigned to Budapest, Hungary, and he was instrumental in helping scientists and politicians escape the
country as the Soviets took over. Many other assignments followed in the s and s, including posts
as vice consul in Genoa, Italy, chief of the division of Southeastern European A airs in Washington, DC,
and assistant to the vice president, European director of operations, and nally consultant to the president
for the Free Europe Committee. He also was cofounder of Americans Abroad for Kennedy. McCargar left
government service in 1961 to become a freelance writer. Assuming the pen name Christopher Felix, he
published A Short Course in the Secret War (1963; rd edition published under his real name, 1992), which
is still used as a reference by U.S. intelligence o cers, and the spy novel Three-Cornered Cover (1972). A
consultant to the president in Paris and Munich from 1971 to 1976, he returned to active government work
in 1978 as special assistant for international a airs for the Endowment for the Humanities. Leaving this
post in 1982, he continued to write and serve as a consultant for many years. He was a consultant to the
AFL-CIO's Department of International A airs from 1986 to 1995, to the Free Trade Union Institute in
Washington, DC, from 1993 to 1995, and to the U.S. Information Agency in 1998. He was also an editorial
advisor for Interco Press in Washington from 1988 to 1996. McCargar's more recent books include El
Salvador (/places/latin-america-and-caribbean/salvadoran-political-geography/el-salvador) and Nicaragua:
The AFL-CIO Views on the Controversy (1985) and the coauthored Lost Victory: A Firsthand Account of
America's Sixteen-Year Involvement in Vietnam (1989).
OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:
PERIODICALS

Washington Post, June 13, 2007, p. B .

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James Goodrich McCargar)

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