"After the collapse of Nazi power in 1945, the United States and the Soviet Union started secretly mobilizing forces against each other, building intricate networks of spies and digging in for the postwar era.".

"America's secret action plan was known as Rollback, an audacious strategy of espionage, subversion, and sabotage to foment insurrection in the Soviet satellite countries. The architect of the plan, an enigmatic American diplomat first known to the world under the pseudonym "X," publicly advocated an effort to "contain" communism. But following his legendary Long Telegram, Mr. X - George Kennan - devised a program of active confrontation with the Soviets through covert action.

Within the secret councils of the Truman administration, hidden from the public as well as from most of the government, Kennan and his colleagues set in motion a series of daring and dramatic, though ultimately failed, secret missions behind the Iron Curtain."--BOOK JACKET.