Review: Bridge of Spies by Giles Whittell

 I've been reading several books about the U-2 incident, Francis Gary Powers, and the incident's effect on U.S. policy.  Fallout from the debacle was considerable. Khrushchev was eager to spend less on the military. He wanted to bring the fruits of capitalism, washing machines, etc. to the USSR, and they would not be able to if military spending continued apace. The Summit with Eisenhower was coming up, and he and Eisenhower (who had his own suspicions and pressure from the "military-industrial complex" he was to warn about) both wanted to cool things down. When Power's plane was shot down, the Russian's suspected the flight was a deliberate provocation to prevent the Summit. Indeed, after that the pressure on Khrushchev increased. Kennedy had been elected on a bogus missile gap charge, and he was also anxious to prove he "had balls."  So it's not unreasonable to suggest that the Berlin Wall and moving missiles to Cuba were a direct result of pressure on Khrushchev to be tougher on the U.S.  

I just had to read this book after seeing Tom Hank's brilliant performance in the eponymous movie (a must-watch.) The movie focuses primarily on the role of James Donovan, Abel/Fischer's, lawyer, while Whittell's excellent book looks at events from the perspectives of other participants: Powers' wife, his relatives, espionage in the fifties and sixties, the technology of the U-2, and Vogel, the East German lawyer, who played a key role in getting not just Powers exchanged but also Fred Pryor, a PhD economics student who got caught up in East Berlin just as the wall was going up.

A depressing feature of the book is the information that defense in both countries had an interest in keeping the Cold War alive since they profited from it greatly.  The book also points out the need for accurate intelligence to help make informed decisions, although here, that intelligence was made available by the U-2, but its use was thwarted by the incident because of pressures from the military.

The technology has changed dramatically since then, more importantly, we no longer need pilots for our intelligence-gathering aircraft. Satellites, drones, and cyber warfare are far more important. Spy satellites are able to discern minute details of anything on Earth from their orbits high above Earth. Whether all that raw information is processed and used properly and without undue influence is another matter.

A fascinating, page-turner of a book.