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New Lies for Old
paperback book
420 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
About the author
Anatoliy Golitsyn
21 books10 followersSoviet KGB defector and author of two books about the long-term deception strategy of the KGB leadership.
He was born in Piryatin, Ukrainian SSR. He provided "a wide range of intelligence to the CIA on the operations of most of the 'Lines' (departments) at the Helsinki and other residencies, as well as KGB methods of recruiting and running agents."
He is an Honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) and, as late as 1984, was an American citizen.
Source: Wikipedia
He was born in Piryatin, Ukrainian SSR. He provided "a wide range of intelligence to the CIA on the operations of most of the 'Lines' (departments) at the Helsinki and other residencies, as well as KGB methods of recruiting and running agents."
He is an Honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) and, as late as 1984, was an American citizen.
Source: Wikipedia
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
June 16, 2013
Written in the 1980s by a KGB defector who claimed that long term USSR disinformation strategy against the west was comprised of several thrusts, including:
o Alternating public display of exaggerated strength and exaggerated weakness by the Communist bloc.
o Public disagreement, but private collaboration between Chinese and Soviet Governments and their allies (the scissors strategy).
o Scapegoating of the US as racist, militaristic, and imperialist.
Convincingly evaluated many world events from the 1960s to the 1980s in light of that strategy.
This is very dry reading, but provides worthwhile insight into the mechanisms of international disinformation. Almost 30 years later, some of the patterns identified by this author continue to be recognizable from parties involved in world affairs today.
o Alternating public display of exaggerated strength and exaggerated weakness by the Communist bloc.
o Public disagreement, but private collaboration between Chinese and Soviet Governments and their allies (the scissors strategy).
o Scapegoating of the US as racist, militaristic, and imperialist.
Convincingly evaluated many world events from the 1960s to the 1980s in light of that strategy.
This is very dry reading, but provides worthwhile insight into the mechanisms of international disinformation. Almost 30 years later, some of the patterns identified by this author continue to be recognizable from parties involved in world affairs today.
May 24, 2025
Had some interesting points at the start but as I read further I came to the conclusion this author is either a dishonest actor or not well informed since practically all his takes turned out to be incorrect. The Sino-Soviet split was a legit thing, Russia did actually change after the death of Stalin while Khrushchev was not actually a Stalinist. The Soviets clearly did not have an all encompassing genius strategy of total control since they lost the Cold War. Did some research and this author was highly doubted at the time with J Edgar Hoover, leader of the CIA, thinking he was a fake after he defected from the USSR alongside a few other high up people while he fooled the CIA as an organization for a little bit. Yuri Bezmonov, another Soviet defector almost completely fits the facts of the situation I’ve seen. I gave it three stars since it’s still a competent book and writing is hard.
September 23, 2015
I've read this because of some conspiracy video said that the convergence theory ( Approachment of the West and the East by making the West more socialist and the East more capitalist ) was outlined in it. It is mentioned as an idea of Sakharov and it is predicted that Western Europe will become neutral and socialist.
Golitsyn claims that the Soviet liberalisation was nothing than a tactic to deceive the West and to lessen the meassures the west takes against communism. Also eurocommunism, the Yugo-Soviet split and the Sino-Soviet split were all faked to deceive the west. Some claims are more believable as others.
Golitsyn claims that the Soviet liberalisation was nothing than a tactic to deceive the West and to lessen the meassures the west takes against communism. Also eurocommunism, the Yugo-Soviet split and the Sino-Soviet split were all faked to deceive the west. Some claims are more believable as others.
October 28, 2008
If you like War and Peace then hold onto your skin. This book will take you at least three reads to get what Golytsin is trying to address. The author holds three Doctorates and writes on a philosophical level that is hard to grasp. However, incredibly brilliant when you grasp the concepts of Deception and Disinformation.
March 28, 2026
There are few books which can truly be called world changing, that changed the course of history.
This book should have been one of those books, it should have changed the way the history of the Cold War was viewed and it should changed the course of Western Policy as it existed in 1984, but because the brain of our elites are polluted by liberal ideology, it was casted aside and dismissed, not because it was proved wrong, but because it destroyed their idealist fool's errand.
Born in 1926, Anatoliy Golitsyn defected from the KGB to the West in 1961 and providing information that exposed multiple KGB agents throughout the west, the most famous being the Cambridge Five spy ring (Which he exposed the Jewish background of https://archive.ph/0KRNj)
but his important revelation was his first hand knowledge about the newly created Soviet strategy to destroy the West, which he exposed in this book, finished in 1980 and published in 1984.
The book is split into three parts, in the first part, Golitsyn relates the history of how the Communist uses Disinformation as a weapon historically, and how the Soviet Long Term Deception Strategy came to be.
He exclaims, that after the death of Stalin, the Soviet system was at its weakest point, the power vacuum left behind led to bloody power struggles between different factors, Stalin's repressive method of ruling caused tensions both inside the Soviet Union and the wider Soviet Bloc and his dogmatic view of Leninism led to stagnation in the potential of foreign espionage operations.
Faced with this crisis, the Khrushchev government decided that to look back at Lenin's New Economic Policy (NEP), and found that through painting a false picture of a weak Soviet goverment losing its ideological commitment (What Golitsyn calls the Weakness and Evolution Pattern of Disinfomation), Lenin tricked the West into building up the Soviet regime and saving it from total collapse.
And so, after the crushing of the Hungarian Revolution, in a series of Conferences between 1957 and 1960, the Soviet bloc came together and agreed to the pursuit of a Long Term Disinformation Strategy based on Leninist tactics which saw each member of the Bloc use their own Intelligence Services to act toward the policy of faking disunity in the Soviet Bloc for the ultimate goal of undermining and taking over the West.
In the second part, Golitsyn review Soviet Bloc history, showing that the disunity, splits and Dissent Movements in the Soviet Bloc was part of a series of disinformation operations to prepare for a fake liberalization. Golitsyn shows not only through his insider information, but through official Communist publications (the most cited being the Russian language Great Soviet Encyclopaedia yearly supplemental volumes), showing inconsistencies that could only be explained by the fact that disunity in the Soviet Bloc was a Disinformation Hoax.
Now years later, we have even more evidence than Golitsyn had, showing that Golitsyn's assessments on, for example, the Sino-Soviet split (see this heavily footnoted essay for information on that https://archive.ph/hA4Qm), was correct.
In the third and final part, Golitsyn gives a set of predictions on the direction of the Communist Bloc. Looking at Golitsyn's predictions, intelligence expert Mark Riebling says that Golitsyn's predictions had a accuracy rate of 94% https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
which is higher than any other Sovietologist can claim, yet even now, with Russia ruled by a "former" KGB agent, who has kept his Communist Party membership card https://archive.ph/J3hLm
who gives the leader of the Communist Party of Russia birthday gifts https://archive.ph/PWDFw
And whose party gives money to the Communist Party of Russia https://archive.ph/QB2P9
the Liberal establishment pretends that Golitsyn's evidence doesn't exist and dismisses Golitsyn as paranoid just like they did with McCarthy and other anti-communists who saw communism as the Satanic evil it was and still is.
This book should have been one of those books, it should have changed the way the history of the Cold War was viewed and it should changed the course of Western Policy as it existed in 1984, but because the brain of our elites are polluted by liberal ideology, it was casted aside and dismissed, not because it was proved wrong, but because it destroyed their idealist fool's errand.
Born in 1926, Anatoliy Golitsyn defected from the KGB to the West in 1961 and providing information that exposed multiple KGB agents throughout the west, the most famous being the Cambridge Five spy ring (Which he exposed the Jewish background of https://archive.ph/0KRNj)
but his important revelation was his first hand knowledge about the newly created Soviet strategy to destroy the West, which he exposed in this book, finished in 1980 and published in 1984.
The book is split into three parts, in the first part, Golitsyn relates the history of how the Communist uses Disinformation as a weapon historically, and how the Soviet Long Term Deception Strategy came to be.
He exclaims, that after the death of Stalin, the Soviet system was at its weakest point, the power vacuum left behind led to bloody power struggles between different factors, Stalin's repressive method of ruling caused tensions both inside the Soviet Union and the wider Soviet Bloc and his dogmatic view of Leninism led to stagnation in the potential of foreign espionage operations.
Faced with this crisis, the Khrushchev government decided that to look back at Lenin's New Economic Policy (NEP), and found that through painting a false picture of a weak Soviet goverment losing its ideological commitment (What Golitsyn calls the Weakness and Evolution Pattern of Disinfomation), Lenin tricked the West into building up the Soviet regime and saving it from total collapse.
And so, after the crushing of the Hungarian Revolution, in a series of Conferences between 1957 and 1960, the Soviet bloc came together and agreed to the pursuit of a Long Term Disinformation Strategy based on Leninist tactics which saw each member of the Bloc use their own Intelligence Services to act toward the policy of faking disunity in the Soviet Bloc for the ultimate goal of undermining and taking over the West.
In the second part, Golitsyn review Soviet Bloc history, showing that the disunity, splits and Dissent Movements in the Soviet Bloc was part of a series of disinformation operations to prepare for a fake liberalization. Golitsyn shows not only through his insider information, but through official Communist publications (the most cited being the Russian language Great Soviet Encyclopaedia yearly supplemental volumes), showing inconsistencies that could only be explained by the fact that disunity in the Soviet Bloc was a Disinformation Hoax.
Now years later, we have even more evidence than Golitsyn had, showing that Golitsyn's assessments on, for example, the Sino-Soviet split (see this heavily footnoted essay for information on that https://archive.ph/hA4Qm), was correct.
In the third and final part, Golitsyn gives a set of predictions on the direction of the Communist Bloc. Looking at Golitsyn's predictions, intelligence expert Mark Riebling says that Golitsyn's predictions had a accuracy rate of 94% https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
which is higher than any other Sovietologist can claim, yet even now, with Russia ruled by a "former" KGB agent, who has kept his Communist Party membership card https://archive.ph/J3hLm
who gives the leader of the Communist Party of Russia birthday gifts https://archive.ph/PWDFw
And whose party gives money to the Communist Party of Russia https://archive.ph/QB2P9
the Liberal establishment pretends that Golitsyn's evidence doesn't exist and dismisses Golitsyn as paranoid just like they did with McCarthy and other anti-communists who saw communism as the Satanic evil it was and still is.
February 10, 2019
O autor, ex-agente da KGB, intenta neste livro mostrar a estratégia comunista de desinformação para o mundo ocidental.
Divide-se em duas partes as dificuldades relativas à precisão das informações obtidas nos países comunistas, a primeira, mais conhecida, relativa ao próprio fechamento desses países e investimentos em contra-espionagem, a segunda, foco do livro, se refere à desinformação propagada pelos países comunistas, e para mim pareceu mais interessante o padrão declínio-evolução descrito, como se o bloco comunista aos poucos estivesse cedendo.
Mostra o movimento de desestalinização ocorrido ainda quando Stalin era vivo, onde não necessariamente se queria um anticomunismo. Aponta como Stalin foi tomado como "boi de piranha" por seus erros, tentando limpar a imagem do comunismo, como se Stalin tivesse errado, mas as teorias dele supostamente não seriam comunismo, falácia que continua viva hoje.
É mencionado a influência de Sun Tzu no pensamento de Lenin e de Mao, e suas consequências para a desinformação. Fala sobre o ultrapassado metodo de análise de ocidentais, baseado no tal método Borkenau, que deixou de ser válido a partir de 1960 para avaliar o bloco comunista.
Prossegue com análise da política de Kruschev, mais leninista, apontando contradições de seus discursos e atos públicos com as políticas de longo alcance do bloco comunista.
De forma mais concreta aponta fatos e indícios de cismas que seriam falsos, ente URSS, Iugoslavia e Albânia, com a chamada técnica da tesouras, onde os dois paises simulam desunião, mas na prática estão juntos. Há longas explanações sobre os supostos falsos cismas, com detalhes históricos que eu não tenho o mínimo conhecimento para avaliar a legitimidade das proposições do autor. Contudo, diversas situações parecem ocorrer hoje, como o uso da intelligentsia para apoio às ideias do regime comunista, que seria moderado e benéfico para todos.
O autor descreve como houve apoio da URSS a movimentos terroristas na Europa e possivelmente no resto do globo.
Minuciosamente, o autor mostra como o retorno da linha leninista em detrimento da stalinista, no sentido da "coexistência pacífica" e desinformação, desorientou a antiga metodologia ocidental, tirando proveito das confusões intencionais em prol do regime comunista.
Muitas previsões são feitas, surpreende que várias tenham se cumprido, ainda que muita coisa me pareça puramente conspiracionista. Livro importante para entender as estratégias comunistas.
Divide-se em duas partes as dificuldades relativas à precisão das informações obtidas nos países comunistas, a primeira, mais conhecida, relativa ao próprio fechamento desses países e investimentos em contra-espionagem, a segunda, foco do livro, se refere à desinformação propagada pelos países comunistas, e para mim pareceu mais interessante o padrão declínio-evolução descrito, como se o bloco comunista aos poucos estivesse cedendo.
Mostra o movimento de desestalinização ocorrido ainda quando Stalin era vivo, onde não necessariamente se queria um anticomunismo. Aponta como Stalin foi tomado como "boi de piranha" por seus erros, tentando limpar a imagem do comunismo, como se Stalin tivesse errado, mas as teorias dele supostamente não seriam comunismo, falácia que continua viva hoje.
É mencionado a influência de Sun Tzu no pensamento de Lenin e de Mao, e suas consequências para a desinformação. Fala sobre o ultrapassado metodo de análise de ocidentais, baseado no tal método Borkenau, que deixou de ser válido a partir de 1960 para avaliar o bloco comunista.
Prossegue com análise da política de Kruschev, mais leninista, apontando contradições de seus discursos e atos públicos com as políticas de longo alcance do bloco comunista.
De forma mais concreta aponta fatos e indícios de cismas que seriam falsos, ente URSS, Iugoslavia e Albânia, com a chamada técnica da tesouras, onde os dois paises simulam desunião, mas na prática estão juntos. Há longas explanações sobre os supostos falsos cismas, com detalhes históricos que eu não tenho o mínimo conhecimento para avaliar a legitimidade das proposições do autor. Contudo, diversas situações parecem ocorrer hoje, como o uso da intelligentsia para apoio às ideias do regime comunista, que seria moderado e benéfico para todos.
O autor descreve como houve apoio da URSS a movimentos terroristas na Europa e possivelmente no resto do globo.
Minuciosamente, o autor mostra como o retorno da linha leninista em detrimento da stalinista, no sentido da "coexistência pacífica" e desinformação, desorientou a antiga metodologia ocidental, tirando proveito das confusões intencionais em prol do regime comunista.
Muitas previsões são feitas, surpreende que várias tenham se cumprido, ainda que muita coisa me pareça puramente conspiracionista. Livro importante para entender as estratégias comunistas.
April 29, 2026
This book was not an easy read. There was a lot of repetition which seemed intended to emphasize the author’s position, but also made the experience of reading it a bit exhausting. It’s also hard for me to tell if the time invested reading this book was actually well spent. I think the fundamentals discussion regarding disinformation is solid, but everything built upon that foundation becomes a bit unstable.
Perhaps the most important event that the author highlights is the Eighty-one-party congress of November 1960, at which the long range policy for the communist movement was set in motion. This point is returned to regularly, and pretty much all the examples of ‘strain’ in the international communist movement are explained as planned events that have their genesis in this 1960 congress. From that point forward, all communist parties globally worked in cooperation, without setback, towards the long-range policy and strategy for the bloc and the international communist movement. Chinese, Albanian, Romanian and Czechoslovak parties participated, and apparently coordinated the plans for their “splits” to take place over the coming years.
It is worth bearing in mind throughout reading this book that the author defected from the Soviet Union in December 1961. Much of the commentary and analysis is regarding events that took place following his defection, and were informed my information available from open sources. The author spends only a limited amount of time on specific claims and revelations regarding secret information that he was privy to in his role prior to defection, and these details tend to be nestled deep in chapters of relatively unrelated discussion.
In the end, I feel as though I’ve read an extensive conspiracy theory that has world events have since the book was written had made it largely irrelevant. I find some of the framing of the author (that no previous defector had revealed these details of communist disinformation, and that future defector will be controlled by the KGB) to be a bit fantastical, and a bit too convenient. The feeing is reminiscent of the ending of The Usual Suspects, of having been led down the garden path with tales of a grand conspiracy that crumbled less tha
Perhaps the most important event that the author highlights is the Eighty-one-party congress of November 1960, at which the long range policy for the communist movement was set in motion. This point is returned to regularly, and pretty much all the examples of ‘strain’ in the international communist movement are explained as planned events that have their genesis in this 1960 congress. From that point forward, all communist parties globally worked in cooperation, without setback, towards the long-range policy and strategy for the bloc and the international communist movement. Chinese, Albanian, Romanian and Czechoslovak parties participated, and apparently coordinated the plans for their “splits” to take place over the coming years.
It is worth bearing in mind throughout reading this book that the author defected from the Soviet Union in December 1961. Much of the commentary and analysis is regarding events that took place following his defection, and were informed my information available from open sources. The author spends only a limited amount of time on specific claims and revelations regarding secret information that he was privy to in his role prior to defection, and these details tend to be nestled deep in chapters of relatively unrelated discussion.
In the end, I feel as though I’ve read an extensive conspiracy theory that has world events have since the book was written had made it largely irrelevant. I find some of the framing of the author (that no previous defector had revealed these details of communist disinformation, and that future defector will be controlled by the KGB) to be a bit fantastical, and a bit too convenient. The feeing is reminiscent of the ending of The Usual Suspects, of having been led down the garden path with tales of a grand conspiracy that crumbled less tha
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August 3, 2013pdf [Anatoliy_Golitsyn]_The_Perestroika_Deception__Me(BookFi.org)
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