The First Counterspy: Larry Haas, Bell Aircraft, and the FBI’s Attempt to Capture a Soviet Mole

Journalist Pickut and Haas, the daughter of Bell Aircraft engineer Larry Haas, deliver a tantalizing if dubious espionage saga based on the elder Haas’s involvement from 1945 to 1947 in an FBI counterespionage campaign to expose Soviet spy Andrei Schevchenko. Citing records from the House Un-American Activities Committee, FBI transcripts, and CIA files declassified in 1995, the authors relate how Schevchenko “seduced” Haas and Bell Aircraft librarian Leona Franey into sharing classified information on jet-propulsion technology, not realizing that he was already under surveillance by the FBI. Straining credulity, the authors describe clandestine meetings in swanky hotels (“Watchers were everywhere, or so it seemed to Larry now that he was watching for people trying not to look like they were watching him”), hard-talking FBI agents, and a White House meeting during which President Harry Truman issued Haas a fake passport and orders to kill Schevchenko. In one of the book’s most dramatic sections, Kay Haas, now in her 80s, recalls being kidnapped by Soviet agents as a child. It’s a rousing tale, though there is no evidence (other than stories Haas told his family and friends) to back up the most colorful claims. Still, espionage fans willing to leave their skepticism at the door will savor the wild ride. (May)