Security Empire: The Secret Police in Communist Eastern Europe (Yale-Hoover Series on Authoritarian Regimes)

The secret police were one of the most important institutions in the making of communist Eastern Europe. Security Empire compares the early history of secret police institutions, which were responsible for foreign espionage, domestic surveillance, and political violence in communist states, in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and East Germany after the Second World War. While previous histories have assumed that these forces were copies of the Soviet model, the book delves into the ways their origins diverged due to local social conditions, languages, and interpretations of communism. It illuminates the internal tensions inside the forces, between veteran agents who had fought in wars in Spain and Germany, and the younger, more radical agents, who pushed forward the violence, arrests, and show trials inside Eastern European communist parties in the late 1940s and early 1950s. In doing so, the book traces the role of political violence, ideological belief, and surveillance in building communist institutions in Europe by the mid-1950s. A compelling examination of the establishment of the secret police in Communist Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Eastern Germany

†‹This book examines the history of early secret police forces in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and East Germany in the aftermath of the Second World War. Molly Pucci delves into the ways their origins diverged from the original Soviet model based on differing interpretations of communism and local histories. She also illuminates the difference between veteran agents who fought in foreign wars and younger, more radical agents who combatted “enemies of communism” in the Stalinist terror in Eastern Europe. "Security Empire examines the history of early secret police forces in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and East Germany in the aftermath of the Second World War. Molly Pucci delves into the ways their origins diverged from the original Soviet model based on differing interpretations of communism and local histories and illuminates the difference between veteran agents who fought in foreign wars and younger, more radical agents who combatted 'enemies of communism' in the Stalinist terror in Eastern Europe"--Jacket This volume examines the history of early secret police forces in Poland, Czechoslovakia, and East Germany in the aftermath of the Second World War. Molly Pucci delves into the ways their origins diverged from the original Soviet model based on differing interpretations of communism and local histories. She also illuminates the difference between veteran agents who fought in foreign wars and younger, more radical agents who combatted 'enemies of communism' in the Stalinist terror in Eastern Europe