Quiet Wars

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A01=Brian Ellison
American foreign intelligence
American intelligence rivalry
Author_Brian Ellison
Category=JWCK
Category=JWKF
Category=NHF
Category=NHW
Category=NHWL
Central Intelligence Agency
China
China intelligence operations
Chinese Civil War
CIA
Cold War
Cold War Asia policy
Cold War intelligence
covert naval activities
defense intelligence evolution
domino theory
East Asia security history
eq_bestseller
eq_history
eq_isMigrated=1
eq_isMigrated=2
eq_new_release
eq_nobargain
eq_non-fiction
Far East
Human Intelligence
HUMINT
Indochina
intelligence case studies
intelligence community origins
intelligence institutional reform
intelligence tradecraft history
interwar intelligence development
John F. Kennedy
MAAG-V
MAC-V
MAC-V SOG
Manchuria
Marine Corps Intelligence
maritime intelligence
military human intelligence
Naval Advisory Group
naval attache networks
naval attaches
naval clandestine operations
naval espionage operations
Naval Intelligence
naval intelligence history
Naval Special Operations
North Vietnam
North Vietnam operations
Operation Market Time
Operation Shufly
Pacific Campaign
Pacific crisis response
Pacific surveillance missions
Pacific war intelligence
prewar intelligence collection
SACO
Second Sino-Japanese War
signals versus human sources
Sino-American Cooperative Organization
Sino-American tensions
Taiwan
Taiwan Crises
Taiwan Strait confrontation
twentieth century espionage
U.S. Navy
U.S.-China strategic rivalry
World War II

Product details

  • ISBN 9781682479704
  • Dimensions: 152 x 228mm
  • Publication Date: 25 Dec 2025
  • Publisher: Naval Institute Press
  • Publication City/Country: US
  • Product Form: Hardback
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The U.S. Navy has a rich history in conflicts with China. Between 1931 and 1965, naval services collected, analyzed, and applied intelligence in crises in the Asia Pacific. The U.S. Navy, which had been one of the sole collectors of foreign intelligence prior to World War II, underwent a series of institutional transformations as the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and, later, the CIA, were established. Quiet Wars is the first book to document how and why the Navy developed its HUMINT (human intelligence) capabilities during this key period.  

Author Brian J. Ellison presents four case studies of naval HUMINT during crises with China. Part I examines intelligence gathering by the Navy and Marine Corps in China, beginning with the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931. The role of naval HUMINT changed after December 7, 1941, and again with the resumption of the Chinese Civil War; this is the focus of Part II. Part III is a study of the Taiwan crises in the 1950s, and Part IV explores intelligence activities against North Vietnam and China in the 1960s. 

Brian J. Ellison holds a PhD in war studies from Kings College, London and is an expert in Chinese strategic affairs, naval warfare, and intelligence. Before joining the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, where he leads research studies and teaches a course on intelligence, he was a senior research scientist at the Center for Naval Analyses. Ellison lives in Maryland with his family.

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