OSS Against the Reich: The World War II Diaries of Colonel David K. E. Bruce (review)

Abstract

162 SAISREVIEW of such magnitude as to tax the efforts of even the most enlightened leadership, and in many cases political and economic reform may exacerbate the situation. Perhaps the most serious of such problems is China's fight to control its bloated population, which, despite what Tyrene White calls "the most intrusive and limiting family planning program in the world," continues to threaten to overwhelm even the most dramatic economic growth. (Authorities estimate a population of over 1.3 billion by the year 2000.) The implications of failure in this regard cannot be overestimated, for it will have far-reaching effects on the global environment and regional stability. Despite virtual success in the cities, the remaining 75-80 percent of the population has largely succeeded in circumventing the "one-child" policy. The deterioration of Sino-American relations is also more than a transitory function ofChinese retrenchment, according to David Zweig. The end ofthe Cold War, Zweig asserts, marks the end of the "long honeymoon" stage of SinoAmerican relations and threatens a steady decline into divorce. Trade friction, arms proliferation and human rights concerns are among the primary perpetrators . Zweig sees little cause for optimism for a satisfactory resolution of these bilateral tensions in the near future, due especially, he says, to American partisan politics and Chinese paranoia in the era of a single, and increasingly intrusive, superpower. Edwin Winckler concludes the volume on an optimistic note with a look at an increasingly modernizing, democratic and enlightened society on the "other China," Taiwan, whose plans for its ever-expanding economy include turning the island into the "trade, financial and communications center ofthe western Pacific" in the next century. Left undiscussed, however, were the intangibles, the potential roadblocks to Taiwan's smooth road into the future, not the least being unknowable political developments in the cross-Strait relationship: What role might Taiwan play in a post-Old Guard China? What would be the implications for Taiwan ofa succession crisis or instability on the mainland? These and other questions remain to be answered and threaten to disturb even the best laid plans. OSS Against the Reich: The World War II Diaries ofColonel David K. E. Bruce. Edited by Nelson D. Lankford. Kent, Ohio: Kent State University Press, 1991. 257 pp. $28.50/Hardcover. Reviewed by Scott E. Anderson, MA., SAIS, 1992. From early 1942 to late 1944, David K E. Bruce was the London representative of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), America's intelligence organization during World War II. For much of this period, Bruce kept a detailed account of his daily activities and recorded vivid impressions of the events raging around him. His position afforded him a unique perspective on the war—high enough to have encountered many ofthe allied military leaders, yet low enough to have had regular contact with field officers and intelligence agents. The diaries, previously unpublished, are a valuable addition to the growing literature concerned with the wartime experience of the OSS. BOOK REVIEWS 163 The purpose of the OSS was to augment and aid the regular military by undermining the strength and fighting ability of the enemy. It performed a number ofdistinct functions: secret intelligence collection, research and analysis, subversive propaganda, and special operations (sabotage, demolition and assistance to partisan guerrillas). Colonel Bruce, as the senior OSS officer in London, oversaw all field operations in the European theater, maintained close links with his chief in Washington, General William Donovan, and sought to maintain cooperative relationships with the British intelligence community and the various resistance groups scattered throughout the Continent. The diaries begin with voyages from Washington, where Bruce was first based, to London and Cairo. In 1943, once he had set up his headquarters in London, Bruce then traveled to North Africa and Sicily to observe firsthand the allied invasions and to report on OSS activities in the Mediterranean. The entries from this period convey the extent to which informal channels and personal ties were necessary for the functioning of the OSS, which often encountered opposition from more orthodox military organizations. Bruce remained in London through much of 1944, where he survived the first ofthe V-I "buzz bomb" and the V-2 rocket attacks...