A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal

by Ben Macintyre

The head of the Abwehr was on nodding terms with his opposite numbers in MI6 and Soviet intelligence. ‘Everyone was well informed as to the identity of everyone else,’ wrote Elliott.

One of the richer ironies of Philby’s position is that while he could do no wrong in British eyes, in Moscow he continued to be viewed with mistrust.

Posing as a flax buyer, he had spent much of the war gathering intelligence on the Middle East, while seldom leaving his table at the Park Hotel.