Double Crossed
The Missionaries Who Spied for the United States During the Second World War
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Narrated by:
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Angelo Di Loreto
About this listen
The untold story of the Christian missionaries who played a crucial role in the allied victory in World War II
What makes a good missionary makes a good spy. Or so thought "Wild" Bill Donovan when he secretly recruited a team of religious activists for the Office of Strategic Services. They entered into a world of lies, deception, and murder, confident that their nefarious deeds would eventually help them expand the kingdom of God.
In Double Crossed, historian Matthew Avery Sutton tells the extraordinary story of the entwined roles of spy-craft and faith in a world at war. Missionaries, priests, and rabbis, acutely aware of how their actions seemingly conflicted with their spiritual calling, carried out covert operations, bombings, and assassinations within the centers of global religious power, including Mecca, the Vatican, and Palestine. Working for eternal rewards rather than temporal spoils, these loyal secret soldiers proved willing to sacrifice and even to die for Franklin Roosevelt's crusade for global freedom of religion. Chosen for their intelligence, powers of persuasion, and ability to seamlessly blend into different environments, Donovan's recruits included people like John Birch, who led guerilla attacks against the Japanese, William Eddy, who laid the groundwork for the Allied invasion of North Africa, and Stewart Herman, who dropped lone-wolf agents into Nazi Germany.
After securing victory, those who survived helped establish the CIA, ensuring that religion continued to influence American foreign policy.
Surprising and absorbing at every turn, Double Crossed is the untold story of World War II espionage and a profound account of the compromises and doubts that war forces on those who wage it.
©2019 Matthew Avery Sutton (P)2019 Basic BooksListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"In a thrilling and remarkably original narrative, Matthew Avery Sutton explains the critical part missionaries played in American espionage during what was, for them, a holy war to save Christian civilization. For anyone who cares about the history of religion or the Second World War, this fine book will be a revelation." (Michael Kazin, author of War Against War: The American Fight for Peace, 1914-1918)
"In this brilliant book, Matthew Avery Sutton has recovered the long-hidden history of Americans who blurred the line between religious missions and secret missions in the Second World War. Rooted in painstaking research and written with powerful prose, Double Crossed is a must-read." (Kevin M. Kruse, author of One Nation Under God: How Corporate America Invented Christian America)
"Double Crossed tells an astonishing and heretofore unknown story of the Christian missionaries and religious activists who doubled as American spies during World War II. Although their wartime scheming often conflicted with their religious principles, the work of the four men profiled here - whose covert operations ranged from Europe to China and across the Middle East - was absolutely critical to the success of U.S. military strategy and diplomacy, and it built the edifice for religious collaboration with espionage that, for better or worse, persists in the CIA to this day. Matthew Sutton has written a deeply researched, captivating, and indispensable contribution to our understanding of the role of religion in the history of American spycraft." (Marie Griffith, author of Moral Combat: How Sex Divided American Christians and Fractured American Politics)
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- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 10 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1943, as the war against Nazi Germany raged abroad, President Franklin Roosevelt had a critical goal: a face-to-face sit-down with his allies Joseph Stalin and Winston Churchill. This first-ever meeting of the Big Three in Tehran, Iran, would decide some of the most crucial strategic details of the war. Yet when the Nazis found out about the meeting, their own secret plan took shape—an assassination plot that would’ve changed history.
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Fabulous book!
- By Luke Einfeldt on 01-18-23
By: Brad Meltzer, and others
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An Impeccable Spy
- Richard Sorge, Stalin’s Master Agent
- By: Owen Matthews
- Narrated by: Mike Grady
- Length: 16 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Richard Sorge was a man with two homelands. Born of a German father and a Russian mother in Baku in 1895, he moved in a world of shifting alliances and infinite possibility. A member of the angry and deluded generation who found new, radical faiths after their experiences on the battlefields of the First World War, Sorge became a fanatical communist - and the Soviet Union’s most formidable spy.
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Lots of Politics
- By Cynthia on 04-24-20
By: Owen Matthews
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When France Fell
- The Vichy Crisis and the Fate of the Anglo-American Alliance
- By: Michael S. Neiberg
- Narrated by: David de Vries
- Length: 10 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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According to US Secretary of War Henry Stimson, the "most shocking single event" of World War II was not the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, but rather the fall of France in spring 1940. Michael Neiberg offers a dramatic history of the American response - a policy marked by panic and moral ineptitude, which placed the United States in league with fascism and nearly ruined the alliance with Britain.
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Proceeds from a faulty premise
- By Buretto on 12-11-21
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Citizens of London
- The Americans Who Stood with Britain in Its Darkest, Finest Hour
- By: Lynne Olson
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 17 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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Here is the behind-the-scenes story of how the United States forged its wartime alliance with Britain, told from the perspective of three key American players in London: Edward R. Murrow, Averell Harriman, and John Gilbert Winant. Drawing from a variety of primary sources, Olson skillfully depicts the dramatic personal journeys of these men who, determined to save Britain from Hitler, helped convince a cautious Franklin Roosevelt and a reluctant American public to support the British at a critical time.
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If we are together nothing is impossible
- By Susan on 03-06-10
By: Lynne Olson
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The China Mirage
- The Hidden History of American Disaster in Asia
- By: James Bradley
- Narrated by: Pete Larkin
- Length: 12 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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In each of his books, James Bradley has exposed the hidden truths behind America's engagement in Asia. Now comes his most engrossing work yet. Beginning in the 1850s, Bradley introduces us to the prominent Americans who made their fortunes in the China opium trade. As they - good Christians all - profitably addicted millions, American missionaries arrived, promising salvation for those who adopted Western ways.
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Gross Negligence!
- By Donald Hill on 05-31-18
By: James Bradley
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From Warsaw with Love
- Polish Spies, the CIA, and the Forging of an Unlikely Alliance
- By: John Pomfret
- Narrated by: Donald Corren
- Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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From the award-winning and acclaimed author of The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom, From Warsaw with Love tells the epic story of how Polish intelligence officers forged an alliance with the CIA in the twilight of the Cold War. In 1990, soon after the Polish people voted in their first democratic election since the 1930s, the young Polish government sent a veteran spy, who’d battled the West for decades, to rescue six American officers trapped in Baghdad.
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Fascinating and well researched
- By wacek szymkowiak on 07-23-24
By: John Pomfret
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A Pope and a President
- John Paul II, Ronald Reagan, and the Extraordinary Untold Story of the 20th Century
- By: Paul Kengor
- Narrated by: James Anderson Foster
- Length: 23 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Even as historians credit Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II with hastening the end of the Cold War, they have failed to recognize the depth or significance of the bond that developed between the two leaders. cclaimed scholar and best-selling author Paul Kengor changes that. In this fascinating book, he reveals a singular bond - which included a spiritual connection between the Catholic pope and the Protestant president - that drove the two men to confront what they knew to be the great evil of the 20th century: Soviet communism.
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A wonderful account of two amazing lives and their impact on us all!
- By Lesia Petrizio on 01-25-18
By: Paul Kengor
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After Fidel
- The Inside Story of Castro's Regime and Cuba's Next Leader
- By: Brian Latell
- Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki
- Length: 10 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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In this compelling, behind-the-scenes account, former top CIA officer and Cuba expert Brian Latell examines the extraordinary Castro brothers and the impending dynastic succession of Fidel's younger brother, Raul. Exploring the brothers' remarkable relationship, he reveals how Fidel and Raul have collaborated, divided responsibilities, and resolved disagreements for more than 46 years, a challenge to the notion that the little-known Raul has been an insignificant player.
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Very Informative Read
- By BH FL on 04-09-08
By: Brian Latell
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The Secret War
- Spies, Ciphers, and Guerrillas, 1939-1945
- By: Max Hastings
- Narrated by: Steven Crossley
- Length: 30 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Spies, codes, and guerrillas played unprecedentedly critical roles in the Second World War, exploited by every nation in the struggle to gain secret knowledge of its foes, and to sow havoc behind the fronts. In The Secret War, Max Hastings presents a worldwide cast of characters and some extraordinary sagas of intelligence and resistance, to create a new perspective on the greatest conflict in history.
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Better read than listened to
- By B. In -t Veld on 03-25-17
By: Max Hastings
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Directorate S
- The C.I.A. and America's Secret Wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan
- By: Steve Coll
- Narrated by: Malcolm Hillgartner
- Length: 28 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Resuming the narrative of his Pulitzer Prize-winning Ghost Wars, best-selling author Steve Coll tells for the first time the epic and enthralling story of America's intelligence, military, and diplomatic efforts to defeat Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan since 9/11.
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Slow At Times But Always Horrifying And Engaging
- By Gillian on 02-20-18
By: Steve Coll
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The Abyss
- Nuclear Crisis Cuba 1962
- By: Max Hastings
- Narrated by: Max Hastings, John Hopkins
- Length: 19 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Bestselling author Max Hastings offers a welcome re-evaluation of one of the most gripping and tense international events in modern history—the Cuban Missile Crisis—providing a people-focused narrative that explores the attitudes and conduct of Russians, Cubans, Americans, and a terrified world that followed each moment as it unfolded.
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Good book, but has some issues
- By Mike From Mesa on 11-10-22
By: Max Hastings
What listeners say about Double Crossed
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall
- Jason Shepherd
- 10-03-19
Cynical
As a Christian minister who loves spy novels and true spy stories, I was very excited to get this book. It did not take long for me to realize that the author holds very cynical views of Christians and spies. He sees Christians as American imperialists who use their faith as a way to spread American values. He displays a special loathing for conservative fundamentalist believers. He sees all spies as lying murderers who would sink to any low to achieve their goals. If you're looking for a true spy story, get a book by Ben Macintyre. You'll feel intrigued and fascinated instead of depressed and needing a shower as I did after listening to this book.
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