cover image Tiger Trap: America's Secret Spy War with China

Tiger Trap: America's Secret Spy War with China

David Wise, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, $28 (304p) ISBN 978-0-547-55310-8

Wise (Spy) leads readers into the "the wilderness of mirrors that is counterintelligence" for this history of Chinese espionage against the U.S. He reveals how Chinese intelligence has used ethnic Chinese in the U.S. to penetrate American counterintelligence and steal American nuclear weapons data. While Wise explores a spectrum of Chinese spying efforts, from Sun-Tzu's The Art of War to cyberspies, he homes in on two sensational cases, code-named Parlor Maid and Tiger Trap, that epitomize their tactics. Parlor Maid was the colorful Katrina Leung, a Chinese-American double agent who slept with her FBI handlers while stealing their secrets, and Tiger Trap refers to the FBI's operation to expose China's moles inside America's nuclear weapons labs. Wise's conclusion is sobering—"China's spying on America is ongoing, current, and shows no sign of diminishing"—and his book is a fascinating history of Chinese espionage that should appeal to a diverse readership. (June)