The Making of a Spy: Memoir of a German Boy Soldier Turned American Army Intelligence Agent

by Gerhardt B. Thamm

Overview

Leaving the chaos of postwar Germany for an uncertain future, 17-year-old Gerhardt Thamm arrived in America in 1948 with little more than his American birth certificate. With minimal command of English and little formal education, he enlisted in the Army and quickly found himself assigned to operations where his German language abilities were put to use. With the Soviet Union's emergence as a potential adversary, Thamm was recruited into the Army's clandestine services, where he operated as a secret agent in Germany, under multiple identities. This richly detailed personal narrative tells Thamm's incredible story (with more than two dozen photographs and sketches).

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780786455645
Publisher:	McFarland & Company, Incorporated Publishers
Publication date:	03/24/2010
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	231
File size:	1 MB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Gerhardt B. Thamm retired in 1987 after serving more than 38 years in intelligence and security-related operations. He has written for the Armed Forces Journal International, Periscope, Golden Sphinx, The Voice of Intelligence and Naval Proceedings. In 1994 the CIA specially honored Gerhardt for a report which was recently declassified and published in Naval Intelligence Professional Quarterly. He now lives in Fernandina Beach, Florida.
Gerhardt B. Thamm retired in 1987 after serving more than 38 years in intelligence and security-related operations. He has written for the Armed Forces Journal International, Periscope, Golden Sphinx, The Voice of Intelligence and Naval Proceedings. In 1994 the CIA specially honored Gerhardt for a report which was recently declassified and published in Naval Intelligence Professional Quarterly. He now lives in Fernandina Beach, Florida.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments     
A Man for All Seasons     
Words of Wisdom     
A Note About Names     
Prologue—A Man Called Trenker     

Scared as Hell     
Riding the Rollercoaster     
Boy Soldier     
Strangers in Our Own Land     
Life in Post–World War II Germany     
Black Market Days     
America at Last     
You’re in the Army Now...     
War—Once again     
Assignment: The U.S. Army General School     
Germany, Here I Come     
Something Special     
The Visit     
Every Man Has a Price     
Tattered Cloak and Rusty Dagger     
Doktor Hermann and Georg Trenker     
The Transformation     
Special Operations Team Number Three (SpecOps 3)     
Special Tasks—German Automobile License Plates     
Special Tasks—The Proprietary     
Special Tasks—The Proprietary 2     
Nosy Old Lady     
Close Call     
Special Tasks—The Proprietary 3     
On the Streets of Berlin     
Not Quite According to the Rules     
Ceramics?     
Problem in the Floor Wax Business     
Contact Lost     
Code Name “The Shepherd”     
Another Busy Day in Berlin     
Reorganization: The New Boss     
Wasted Effort     
The Last Christmas in Silesia     
New Task—Build a Bolthole     
Life Is a Gamble     
End of Tour of Duty     
Trust, and the Bad Apple     
Order, Counterorder     
The Later Years     

Postscript     
Notes     
Index     

Editorial Reviews

a compelling personal story...the strength of the book lies in his descriptions of the training, tradecraft, and agent-control techniques he developed in the field

The Intelligencer: Journal of U.S. Intelligence Studies

a compelling personal story...the strength of the book lies in his descriptions of the training, tradecraft, and agent-control techniques he developed in the field”—The Intelligencer: Journal of U.S. Intelligence Studies.

From the Publisher