Gus Russo

Eric Dezenhall

The thrilling story of two Cold War spies -- CIA case officer Jack Platt and KGB agent Gennady Vasilenko -- and their improbable friendship at a time when they should have been anything but. In 1978, CIA maverick Jack Platt and KGB agent Gennady Vasilenko were new arrivals on the Washington, DC intelligence scene, with Jack working out of the CIA's counterintelligence office and Gennady out of the Soviet Embassy. Both men, already notorious iconoclasts within their respective agencies, were assigned to seduce the other into betraying his country in the urgent final days of the Cold War, but instead the men ended up becoming the best of friends-blood brothers. Theirs is a friendship that never should have happened, and their story is chock full of treachery, darkly comic misunderstandings, bureaucratic inanity, the Russian Mafia, and landmark intelligence breakthroughs of the past half century. In BEST OF ENEMIES, two espionage cowboys reveal how they became key behind-the-scenes players in solving some of the most celebrated spy stories of the twentieth century, including the crucial discovery of the Soviet mole Robert Hanssen, the 2010 Spy Swap which freed Gennady from Soviet imprisonment, and how Robert De Niro played a real-life role in helping Gennady stay alive during his incarceration in Russia after being falsely accused of spying for the Americans. Through their eyes, we see the distinctions between the Russian and American methods of conducting espionage and the painful birth of the new Russia, whose leader, Vladimir Putin, dreams he can roll back to the ideals of the old USSR.

The Last Great Spy Story of the Cold War

Best of Enemies

Harry Moses

November 22, 1963. A policeman’s wife was fetching their sick child from school. A young shoe store manager had no idea what lay in wait for him that day. A future president was tending to his farm. A future vice president was standing on the steps of his college library. A Georgetown student was looking forward to playing the piano for the president when he returned to Washington, DC, that evening. A future movie star was attending his second-grade art class. Then the news rang out across airwaves, through telephone lines, and by word of mouth, plunging the country into shock and sorrow. It’s hard to imagine how the last fifty years would have unfolded if President John F. Kennedy had lived. Would Vietnam have dragged on until 1974? Would Nixon have come into power? It’s difficult to say—but, combining evocative archival images with the unique, first-person stories of those who lived through it, Where Were You? says what the history books can’t and offers a fresh look at what was, what is, and what might have been since that fateful day. In the two-hour NBC documentary event that this volume accompanies, special correspondent Tom Brokaw interviewed people close to the tragedy as well as former heads of state, politicians, authors, journalists, performers, musicians, and more. He asked them five simple questions, starting with: Where were you? Together, their words paint a rich and moving picture of a hopeful nation torn asunder by grief. It will remind those who lived it of a pivotal moment in American history, and it bears witness for all who follow.

America Remembers the JFK Assassination

Where Were You?

The never-before-told story of the great Chicago crime family called The Outfit. It is a common misperception that all the true-life organized crime stories have been written. Yet perhaps the most compelling gangster tale is one that has been, until now, too well-hidden. This is the story of the Outfit: the secretive organized crime cartel that began its reign in prohibition-era Chicago before becoming the real puppet master of Hollywood, Las Vegas, and Washington D.C. The Outfit recounts the adventures and exploits of its bosses, Tony 'Joe Batters' Accardo (the real Godfather), Murray 'The Camel' or 'Curly' Humphreys (one of the greatest political fixers and union organizers this country has ever known), Paul 'The Waiter' Ricca, and Johnny Rosselli (the liaison between the shadowy world and the outside world). Their invisibility was their strength, and what kept their leader from ever spending a single night in jail. The Outfit bosses were the epitome of style and grace, moving effortlessly among national political figures and Hollywood studio heads-until their world started to crumble in the 1970s. With extensive research including recently released FBI files, the Chicago Crime files of entertainer Steve Allen, first-ever access to the voluminous working papers of the Kefauver Committee, original interviews with the members of the Fourth Estate who pursued the Outfit for forty years, and exclusive access to the journals of Humphrey's widow, veteran journalist Gus Russo uncovers sixty years of corruption and influence, and examines the shadow history of the United States.

The Role of Chicago's Underworld in the Shaping of Modern America

The Outfit

The thrilling story of two Cold War spies, CIA case officer Jack Platt and KGB agent Gennady Vasilenko -- improbable friends at a time when they should have been anything but. In 1978, CIA maverick Jack Platt and KGB agent Gennady Vasilenko were new arrivals on the Washington, DC intelligence scene, with Jack working out of the CIA's counterintelligence office and Gennady out of the Soviet Embassy. Both men, already notorious iconoclasts within their respective agencies, were assigned to seduce the other into betraying his country in the urgent final days of the Cold War, but instead the men ended up becoming the best of friends-blood brothers. Theirs is a friendship that never should have happened, and their story is chock full of treachery, darkly comic misunderstandings, bureaucratic inanity, the Russian Mafia, and landmark intelligence breakthroughs of the past half century. In BEST OF ENEMIES, two espionage cowboys reveal how they became key behind-the-scenes players in solving some of the most celebrated spy stories of the twentieth century, including the crucial discovery of the Soviet mole Robert Hanssen, the 2010 Spy Swap which freed Gennady from Soviet imprisonment, and how Robert De Niro played a real-life role in helping Gennady stay alive during his incarceration in Russia after being falsely accused of spying for the Americans. Through their eyes, we see the distinctions between the Russian and American methods of conducting espionage and the painful birth of the new Russia, whose leader, Vladimir Putin, dreams he can roll back to the ideals of the old USSR.

Studená válka, Washington, D.C. Jack „Kovboj“ Platt a Genadij Vasilenko. Agent CIA proti agentovi KGB. Stojí na opačných stranách barikády a verbují špehy, kteří by mohli zradit a vynášet informace. Na první pohled jsou oba nesmiřitelní a tvrdí, na druhou stranu mají v sobě něco, co je spojuje. Jsou v pravém smyslu rebely uvnitř svých špionážních agentur. To je první krůček k tomu, aby navázali nanejvýš nepravděpodobné přátelství. Přátelství bořící předsudky i hranice rozdílných světů. Přátelství mezi nepřáteli. Tento příběh, právem označovaný jako „poslední velký špionážní příběh studené války“, jedinečným způsobem popisuje nejen osudy obou hlavních postav, ale podává rovněž nanejvýš ucelený a realistický obraz o skrytém světě špionáže.

Nejlepší nepřátelé

Henry Hill

In 1980, my life as a 'Goodfella' came to an end...I traded my Brioni and Armani suits for T-shirts and jeans. I became a normal citizen. I became Joe Schmoe,' says Henry Hill, author of GANGSTERS AND GOODFELLAS and subject of WISEGUY, which was the inspiration for the blockbuster film GOODFELLAS.After a quarter of a century of silence, Hill can finally tell us the rest of the story, Gangsters and Goodfellas picks up where Wiseguy left off, taking readers on the crazy ride of Henry's life - hiding out in the Witness Protection Programme, doing prison time for drug charges, testifying in high-profile, heavily guarded mafia trials, leaving his wife and children and eventually ending up in the entertainment business. Including an exclusive selection of photographs from Henry's personal collection, Gangsters and Goodfellas also reveals Henry's lifelong struggle with addiction, his 'business' relationships that have ranged from mob bosses to movie producers and how, through everything, he survived: ' Its been a hell of a journey, and if I hadn't lived it myself, I would never believe it. I survived the mob. I survived the government, now I'm trying to survive Hollywood.

Wiseguys... and Life on the Run

Gangsters and Goodfellas

Humiliated at the Bay of Pigs, John and Robert Kennedy sought desperately to eliminate Castro. Their strategies for overthrowing the Cuban leader were so elaborate and bizarre, they could only engender paranoia. Castro openly threatened to retaliate.Pro-Castro agitator Lee Harvey Oswald learned that Robert Kennedy was personally supervising groups plotting against the Cuban leader. Filled with rage and a sense of destiny, Oswald went to the Cuban embassy in Mexico, announcing he would kill America's president in exchange for sanctuary in Havana. Live By the Sword forces the conclusion that members of the Cuban regime accepted the troubled American's offer. Russo shows that Oswald was indeed JFK's lone assailant, but that after the president's murder, a devastated Robert Kennedy and key officials launched a comprehensive coverup to hide its true causes.Gus Russo, based in Baltimore, Maryland, has reported for acclaimed ABC and PBS documentaries on JFK, and done research for authors Gerald Posner, Seymour Hersh, and Anthony Summers. Exhaustively researched, Live By the Sword ends 35 years of public mistrust and confusion over the Kennedy assassination.

The Secret War Against Castro and the Death of JFK

Live by the Sword

Stephen Molton

A vivid, character-driven narration of the time before, during, and after Kennedy's death, centered on the Kennedys and the Castros, two opposed sets of brothers who collectively authored one of modern history's most gripping chapters.

The Kennedys, the Castros, and the Politics of Murder

Brothers in Arms

This is investigative reporter Gus Russo's most explosive book yet, the remarkable story of the "Supermob"-a cadre of men who, over the course of decades, secretly influenced nearly every aspect of American society. Presenting startling revelations about such famous members as Jules Stein, Joe Glaser, Ronald Reagan, Lew Wasserman, and John Jacob Factor-as well as infamous, low-profile members-Russo pulls the lid off of a half-century of criminal infiltration into American business, politics, and society. At the heart of it all is Sidney "The Fixer" Korshak, who from the 1940s until his death in the 1990s was not only the most powerful lawyer in the world, according to the FBI, but the enigmatic player behind countless twentieth-century power mergers, political deals, and organized crime chicaneries.

Gus Russo

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