Acknowledgments
Introduction. Postwar Czechoslovakia: The Master Key to Europe?
1. Resurrecting Czechoslovakia from its Munich Grave
2. General Eisenhower Declines to Liberate Prague
3. Spring 1945: The Americans Return to the Schönborn Palace
4. Ambassador Steinhardt's Delayed Arrival
5. A Chronicle of Wasted Opportunities
6. Steinhardt Encounters Reality: Nationalization, Expulsions, and
U.S. Military Withdrawal
7. America's First Warning Signs: From the Stechovice Raid Toward
the May 1946 Elections
8. Great Expectations and Lost Illusions: U.S. Intelligence in
Postwar Prague
9. Passing the Point of No-Return: Prague Withdraws from the
Marshall Plan
10. The Communists Exchange Popularity for Absolute Power
11. The Schönborn Palace Under Siege: Americans as "Spies and
Saboteurs"
Notes
Index
Igor Lukes is University Professor of History and International Relations at Boston University. He is the author of Czechoslovakia between Stalin and Hitler: The Diplomacy of Edvard Benes in the Thirties and Rudolf Slansky: His Trials and Trial.
"Vividly told."--Kieran Williams, Times Literary Supplement
"Lukes's work is more than a study of postwar events in one country
in Eastern Europe caught up in the rivalry between Washington and
Moscow. He makes a significant contribution to the field of cold
war studies. Although the Communist takeover in Czechoslovakia was
unique and delayed compared to other East European countries, Lukes
gives insight not just into the role of U.S. policy, but also into
Moscow's reactions and its perceptions of Washington as well as
what was happening in the Prague government . Will be the major
account of this period in U.S.-Czechoslovak relations for many
years to come."--Paul Kubricht, H-Net
"Lukes convincingly backs up his arguments with fascinating
depictions of the personalities involved, which are detailed and
penetrating but never unkind or unconscious of attractive traits.
Highly Recommended."--CHOICE
"As Igor Lukes shows in On the Edge of the Cold War, his engrossing
chronicle of the days when Czechoslovakia hung in the balance, the
country's place behind the Iron Curtain was anything but
foreordained...an invaluable account."--Wall Street Journal
"This is a surprisingly good book. It is surprising because it
could have been a narrowly focused dry scholarly diplomatic
history. Instead, On the Edge of the Cold War provides a brisk
narrative that includes lively portraits of American diplomats and
spies and raises the question of whether America could have saved
Czechoslovakia from Communist takeover in 1948."--H-Diplo
"Though full of thrilling detail, this excellent history of the
failure of American diplomats and spies to support Czechoslovak
democracy before the communist takeover is ultimately quite
sobering. Deep research in both American and Czech archives reveals
some of the lessons that Americans had to learn in order to become
a great power."--Timothy Snyder, author of Bloodlands
"Espionage and intelligence-gathering have often been described as
the 'missing dimension' in the historiography of the Cold War. Igor
Lukes's fascinating book fills in this dimension in great detail.
By showing how U.S. intelligence agencies went astray in early
postwar Czechoslovakia, Lukes's gripping narrative sheds invaluable
light on the initial years of the Cold War."--Mark Kramer, Cold War
Studies Program, Harvard University
"Superb and unique--I know of no account of the Cold War's
beginnings as vivid and entertaining as this or as full of lessons
and warnings for today. Igor Lukes presents these three postwar
years as a high-stake drama, full of suspense. Had that drama ended
differently--and he reminds us that it could have--it would have
changed the shape of the Cold War that was to beset the world for
two generations. With sinking hearts we watch Czechoslovak
democracy--this pivot point, this 'master key to Europe'--being
lost, step by step, by wrong-headed Western policies, naiveté, lack
of will, and inept intelligence work."--Tennent H. Bagley, author
of Spy Wars
"Unique among studies of the history of the Cold War, Lukes's book
is a penetrating account of the human cost of U.S. diplomacy and
intelligence for their practitioners as well as their unintended
victims during the formative period of the global conflict. A
result of prodigious multi-archival research, the absorbing
narrative puts the catalytic role of Czechoslovakia into a new
light."--Vojtech Mastny, author of The Cold War and Soviet
Insecurity
"With inventive research and skillful storytelling, Igor Lukes
reconstructs the crucial Cold War history of Czechoslovakia between
the collapse of the Third Reich and the momentous February 1948
Czech coup. A striking cast of characters--adventurous spies, naive
diplomats, secret police rogues, and seductive women--inhabits this
intriguing, if ultimately tragic, tale of the fecklessness of the
U.S. government when facing the destruction of Czechoslovak
democracy."--Norman M. Naimark, Stanford University
"In his meticulously researched book 'On the Edge of the Cold War:
American Diplomats and Spies in Postwar Prague,' historian Igor
Lukes describes how a small group of Soviet-backed communists were
able to seize power in Czechoslovakia in 1948."--Washington
Times
"A superbly documented, well-written story of US intelligence
operations in early postwar Czechoslovakia, not told before in such
detail."--The Intelligence Officer's Bookshelf
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