Joyce james

1983 · 17587 — New York: Holt Rinehart and Winston 1983. First Edition Stated First Printing Stated. Hardcover. Very good. 24 cm xv 1 608 pages. Authors' Notes. Appendix. Bibliographical Note. Notes. Index. Small sticker residue on rear board. Signed by the author Radosh. Publisher's ephemera laid in. Ronald Radosh born 1937 is an American writer professor historian and former Marxist. As described in his memoirs Radosh was like his parents a member of the Communist Party of the United States of America until the Khrushchev thaw. Subsequently he was a New Left and Anti-Vietnam War activist. Later Radosh turned his attention to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. After studying declassified FBI documents and interviewing their friends and associates Radosh concluded that Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were indeed guilty of spying for the KGB. According to his close friend David Horowitz Radosh's decision to publish his findings led to his social ostracism. Radosh has also published books about the activities of Joseph Stalin's NKVD during the Spanish Civil War and the foundation of the State of Israel. His most recent book co-authored with his wife Allis Radosh is A Safe Haven: Harry S. Truman and the Founding of Israel published by HarperCollins in 2009. Based on a review published when the book was released; WERE Julius and Ethel Rosenberg guilty of transmitting American atomic secrets to the Soviet Union in the 1940's or were they scapegoats of the cold war whose execution was a grave miscarriage of justice That both are true is the intriguing argument of Ronald Radosh and Joyce Milton in their definitive account of the controversial case ''The Rosenberg File: A Search for the Truth.'' Following the arrest for espionage of the British atomic scientist Klaus Fuchs in England in February 1950 the Federal Bureau of Investigation found his courier Harry Gold in Philadelphia. Mr. Gold in turn led the F.B.I. to David Greenglass a soldier who had worked at the atomic bomb facility in Los Alamos N.M. Mr. Greenglass testified at the trial of the Rosenbergs that he had given notes and sketches of the atomic bomb to his brother-in-law Julius Rosenberg who had them typed by his wife Ethel and then turned them over to the Russians. The Rosenbergs were convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage and they were put to death in the electric chair at Sing Sing on June 19 1953. Thirty years later advocates and opponents of the Rosenbergs are still debating whether ''the crime of the century'' was the Rosenbergs' theft of American atomic secrets or the Government's execution of two young idealists. The authors of ''The Rosenberg File'' say they believed the Rosenbergs were innocent until their study of the documents in the case required them to reassess their views. The evidence that Julius Rosenberg played a central role in a Soviet spy ring emerges from so many independent indeed mutually antagonistic sources that it is impossible to discount. The value of the Radosh-Milton research is that it almost never relies on one type of source. It corroborates F.B.I. files by interviews with people who were active in the American Communist Party in the 40's and 50's such as John Gates who was editor in chief of The Daily Worker Junius Scales who was chairman of the Communist Party of North Carolina and James Weinstein a former member of the party who is now editor in chief of In These Times. Mr. Radosh and Miss Milton conclude that the Rosenbergs ''were indeed hapless scapegoats of a propaganda war - a war in which their deaths would be counted as a victory for both sides.'' ''The Rosenberg Files'' has succeeded in the ''search for the truth'' announced in its subtitle - perhaps not the whole truth but certainly the basic truth. All future discussions about the Rosenberg case will have to begin with the historical fact that Julius Rosenberg was guilty of espionage. Holt, Rinehart and Winston hardcover