"How did Soviet spies steal the secrets of the atomic bomb? Since the convictions of Allan Nunn May, Klaus Fuchs and the Rosenbergs it has been assumed that only a handful of ideologically motivated, relatively low-echelon spies were responsible for passing the information to Moscow. But following the recent declassification of documents in Russia, Britain, and the United States a more complex picture emerges of wholesale espionage and deep penetration into almost every level of the Manhattan Project." "Who were the spies, what did they betray, and how were they handled by their Russian controllers? Mortal Crimes documents the molehunts, explains how the cryptographers traced obscure clues in intercepted cable traffic to identify the suspects, and placed hundreds of Communist sympathizers under sophisticated surveillance, yet still failed to prevent Stalin from pulling off the greatest theft in history."--Jacket.