The Amerasia spy case
Subtitle: prelude to McCarthyism
By: Harvey Klehr & Ronald Radosh.
Contributors: Radosh, Ronald.
Publisher: University of North Carolina Press
Published: 1996
Place of publication: Chapel Hill
Language: eng
Number of pages: 266
Subjects: Amerasia; Espionage -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Internal security -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Anti-communist movements -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Communism -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Press and politics -- United States -- History -- 20th century; United States -- Relations -- China; China -- Relations -- United States
Description: The Amerasia affair was the first of the great spy cases of the postwar era. Unlike the Hiss or Rosenberg case, it did not lead to an epic courtroom confrontation or the imprisonment or execution of any of the principals, and perhaps for this reason, it has been largely ignored by historians. Harvey Klehr and Ronald Radosh provide a full-scale history of the first public drama featuring charges that respectable American citizens had spied for the Communists.

It is a story with few heroes, many villains, and more than a few knaves. In June 1945, six people associated with the magazine Amerasia were arrested by the FBI and accused of espionage on behalf of the Chinese Communists. But only Philip Jaffe, editor of Amerasia, and Emmanuel Larsen, a government employee, were convicted of any offense, and their convictions were merely for unauthorized possession of government documents.

Klehr and Radosh are the first researchers to have obtained the FBI files on the Amerasia case, including transcripts of wiretaps on the telephones, homes, and hotel rooms of the suspects, and they use this material to re-create the actual words and actions of the defendants.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.