BOOKS

A NATION BETRAYED

THE PANTHER'S FEAST by Robert Asprey.Pumam, New York, 1959. 317 pages, $5.00. Reviewed by John Sheldon, Ph.D.

The story of Colonel Alfred Redl of the Royal and Imperial AustroHungarian Army would be too improbable to bother with if it were not true. It is a story of intrigue and diplomacy on the highest level, in pre-World War I Europe, a tale of personal corruption and of the social, corruption which produced it. Robert Asprey became interested in the story when he was serving with American intelligence in Europe after World War II, and after leaving government service he returned there to piece it together.

The basic facts are clear enoughColonel Redl, one of the most promising officers in the army and chief of counter-intelligence, over a long period of years sold out his country to its enemies, especially Russia. Why? Blackmail and greed. Redl was a homosexual, and the remarkably effective Russian intelligence network in central Europe learned of this and threatened to expose him unless he co-operated. As further inducement it offered to pay well for his services. For years Redl furnished Russian agents with valuable information about his country's defenses, and during these same years he was rising higher in

the army and being decorated for his services. Just before the war that was to destroy the Austro-Hungarian empire Redl's luck ran out, his treason was discovered, and he was forced to commit suicide.

That much was well known, but what caused all this, who was Redl, why did he do as he did, how did he operate and how was he caught? Time, two wars, and frantic official attempts to conceal the truth had hidden many of the details necessary for a full understanding of the case. As prey attacked the problem with the skill of a trained intelligence officer. Searching through previously classified files, interviewing the people concerned or people who knew them, he has filled out the bare skeleton with enough meat to draw Redl out of the shadows and make him seem real and plausible. Unfortunately for the scholar, he has written his account in seminovelized form, inventing conver sations, incidents, and interpre tations which cannot be based on knowledge. This makes for better reading and perhaps even for better understanding, but it reduces the value of the book for the serious student because it often is impos-

mattachine REVIEW

sible to distinguish fact from intuition. Let us hope that the author has deposited his notes in some library where they will be accessible to others interested in Redl and his times. Other criticisms are minor-some of the conversations do not ring true and Russian names are transliterated in the German rather

than the English manner (e.g. Pawlow instead of Pavlov). On the whole, though, the book is well written and a valuable contribution. I envy the author-it must have been interesting work.

This is the story of how a powerful man was brought to ruin by his own corruption. Superficially this took the form of homosexuality and the results were inevitable-blackmail, treason and suicide. Actually, Redl's homosexuality was only a complicating factor. Without it the tragedy might never have happened, but by itself it explains nothing. The author pays lip service to homosexuality as a terrible sin, but makes it clear that Redl was fundamentally corrupt, even in his professional life and in his occasional affairs with women. He was from a very large, very poor Galician family and grew up with a burning ambition to escape from this miserable life. This ambition coupled with his great natural ability led him to high places, but ambition is a poor subsitute for character and this he lacked.

Red1 wanted two things--young men and money. He wanted young men to satisfy the burning needs that are in all of us and that can never really be

killed or turned aside. He wanted money because he had never had any, because he was deeply in debt, and because an Austrian officer was expected to live far beyond his army pay. Later he needed money to buy the favors of the young officers he desired and to buy their silence afterward. He had no patriotism; his native Galicia, now part of Poland, seethed with separatist movements, and German was not even his native language. He was a setup for the Czar's agents. In a healthy society these things might not have mattered much. A man of Redl's ability would have advanced far and would have been payed accordingly, making an outside income unnecessary. Blackmail would not have been possible because no one would have cared about the nature of his sexual interests. Unfortunately for Red1 he was living in a very sick society, a society of false values, rigid barriers, and great hypocrisy, a society so sick that it was to die within a few years. The society in which Redl lived helped destroy him, just as he helped destroy it. Looking back, it does not seem to have been much of a loss.

However much society was to blame, the primary blame was necessarily Redl's. If we as individuals are not responsible for our own behavior then life has no meaning and man has no dignity.

Other men have faced the same problems that confronted Redl and have not sold out. Redl's cor ruption lay not in the problems that faced him but in his response to them. It is not corrupt to be a homo-