This book delves into a spy scandal involving fabricated allegations that an adviser to Finland's president in the 1990s had secretly worked for the East German State Security Ministry, the notorious Stasi, during the Cold War. Intrigues, backstabbing, and illegal leaks to the media made the whole thing painfully public. One might assume we were talking about a fictional television drama set in the tensest period of the Cold War. But, in fact, the book is a non-fiction account of an incident that occurred in the 21st century, long after the Soviet Union had ceased to exist.
In 2002 the Finnish security police, SuPo, officially opened an investigation into Alpo Rusi, a Finnish diplomat who had been enlisted as a foreign policy adviser to Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari (in office 1994–2000), based on allegations that he had earlier worked as a spy for the Stasi. The allegations, which never led...