War of Shadows

October 19, 2020
Journalist Gorenberg (The Unmaking of Israel) explores the battle for North Africa and the Middle East during WWII in this richly detailed yet somewhat impenetrable history. Weaving Middle Eastern politics with the history of cryptography, profiles of Allied and Axis codebreakers, and technical descriptions of battlefield campaigns, Gorenberg at times bites off more than he can chew. The story culminates in Erwin Rommel’s ill-fated drive into Egypt in the summer of 1942, despite waning supplies and a lack of military support. Gorenberg reveals that Rommel based his plans on cables sent by Bonner Fellers, military attaché at the U.S. embassy in Cairo, that were intercepted and deciphered by Italian and German spies using U.S. military code books and cipher tables stolen from a consul’s office in Rome. But the information, which was colored by Fellers’s frustrations with British military leaders, drew Rommel into a disastrous defeat at the Second Battle of El Alamein. Gorenberg gathers a wealth of intriguing material, but occasionally loses the thread of the narrative amid the jumble of military acronyms and the large cast of characters. This deeply researched account is best-suited to WWII completists.

December 1, 2020

During the Second World War, Axis and Allied forces engaged in total warfare on many fronts. In this latest work, Gorenberg (The Unmaking of Israel) examines the intelligence war in the Middle East. The story begins in early 1942 and carries through 1943 when Allied forces finally drove the Axis from the North African theater. Gorenberg does well in adding snippets of the larger war in order to keep the Middle East situation in context. The ongoing conflict between Erwin Rommel's German and Italian Afrika Korps and Claude Auchinleck's, and later Bernard Montgomery's, British 8th Army provides the immediate backdrop for the primary events. Gorenberg discusses the significance of Polish codebreakers that cracked Germany's advanced Enigma system and the roles various British, German, American, Italian, Hungarian, and Egyptian agents played in code breaking and intelligence operations. He includes the treatment of Jews in the Middle East, mentioning how early reports of mass executions in Europe were met with disbelief even among the Jewish community. The book concludes with brief summaries of the postwar lives of the story's major players. VERDICT A solid analysis of how espionage impacted an important theater, this book should appeal to anyone interested in World War II history, particularly intelligence operations.--Matthew Wayman, Pennsylvania State Univ. Lib., Schuylkill Haven

Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from October 15, 2020
A veteran historian and journalist pulls together many historical threads in this portrait of the "battle for the Middle East...one of the critical fronts of World War II." Gorenberg, a winner of the National Jewish Book Award who has been covering Middle Eastern affairs for more than 35 years, begins with a vivid portrait of Cairo in July 1942, its air dense with smoke from burning diplomatic documents, the streets packed with fleeing vehicles. Axis forces under Gen. Erwin Rommel had crossed the border and seemed unstoppable. Maj. Bonner Frank Fellers, America's military attach� in Cairo, reported the news to Washington along with a description of British forces and his opinion that they were on the verge of collapse. Rommel also read Fellers' report; he had been reading them since America entered the war. The author then rewinds the clock to the British countryside in 1939. Unlike the film The Imitation Game, Gorenberg delivers historically accurate and fascinating descriptions of Bletchley Park as a collection of smart, workaholic men and women that included a sprinkling of geniuses. They produced not one but many breakthroughs regarding the constantly changing Axis codes. Assigned to read decrypts to discover spies, one expert noticed that Rommel was receiving useful information from a source in Cairo. More digging pointed to the American military attach�. It turned out that the efficient Italian intelligence service routinely rifled the unguarded embassy safes in Rome, so American codes were no secret. Once they were changed, Rommel began complaining of the quality of his intelligence, and the British continued to eavesdrop. Gorenberg's gimlet eye reveals a remarkably unheroic Rommel, unimaginative British generalship, know-it-all American leadership, and a delightful cast of colonial officials, family, unhappy Egyptian royalty, Arab nationalists, adventurers, and even two bumbling Nazi spies out of central casting. The author also includes a helpful cast of characters, divided by country, and a list of relevant intelligence and security agencies. Sure to be among the year's best histories of World War II.

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