BOOK REVIEW: SWAP: A SECRET HISTORY OF THE NEW COLD WAR
By Drew Hinshaw and Joe Parkinson / Harper
Reviewed by: Joseph Augustyn
The Reviewer — Joseph Augustyn is a 28- year veteran of the CIA’s Directorate of Operations and a Cipher Brief Expert. He is also a Special Advisor to Global Reach, a nonprofit organization dedicated to bringing home Americans wrongly held abroad
REVIEW — August 1, 2024 saw the United States and Russia engage in the biggest and perhaps most complicated prisoner exchange since the Cold War. It was a swap that involved 24 prisoners and two children, and the participation of eight countries. The trade was so complex that the diplomats involved termed the spy swap Rubik’s Cube. Near the end of his term, President Joe Biden would even refer to this prisoner exchange as his “legacy.”
In their new book Swap: A Secret History of the New Cold War, Wall Street Journal reporters Drew Hinshaw and Joe Parkinson not only dissect and weave together the details, backchannel machinations and diplomatic jockeying that resulted in the August 2024 spy exchange, but also make the compelling argument that “hostage diplomacy” is here to stay, and that it is now a “central tool” of modern state tradecraft, a way by which super powers can inflict pain without risking nuclear confrontation.
While the 2024 spy swap extravaganza serves as the climax to the Hinshaw and Parkinson book, much of the work is devoted to a discussion of some of the most high profile and celebrated cases of “wrongfully detained” Americans. Among those are the cases of Brittney Griner, the WNBA superstar and two-time Olympic gold medalist who was arrested in Moscow in February, 2022, charged with carrying vaporized cartridges containing less than a gram of hash oil; US Marine Paul Whelan who was arrested on trumped-up espionage charges in Moscow in 2018; Trevor Reed, another Marine held in Russia on charges of assaulting a Russian police officer in 2019; and Evan Gershkovich, the first American reporter jailed in Russia for espionage since the Cold War in 2023.
Hinshaw and Parkinson are masterful storytellers. They are also keenly attuned to the current international and domestic political environments which, they argue, allow their “hostage diplomacy” theme to take shape. In addition to the highly publicized cases noted, the authors also chronicle dozens of hostage and imprisonment cases from around the world, each of which, they contend, eventually became arrows in the quiver of either the United States or Russia to be used as leverage and useful tools in the “New Cold War.” In many ways, Swap serves as a history of this practice in the 21st century. So many cases are covered in the book that the authors included a “Cast of Characters” on the opening pages.
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What Hinshaw and Parkinson make abundantly clear is that all hostage trades are not created equal, and that notoriety, publicity and official and unofficial pressure on the White House and other US Government entities often carries the day for some prisoners at the expense of those less publicly known. Paul Whelan, they note, for example, was often passed over for higher priority prisoners and spent more than five years in a Russian jail. This was despite the exhaustive efforts of his sister who clamored tirelessly for the White House to pay attention to her brother. But she could not compete with someone like WNBA star Brittney Griner whose supporters rallied the sports world and the nation on her behalf. Similarly, the authors note, Evan Gershkovich had the entire weight and support of the WSJ, garnering tremendous public support while applying continuous pressure on the White House to take action on their reporter’s behalf. Implicit in the authors’ message is that there was not, and probably is still not, a clear, regulated and consistent U.S. government policy on how to deal with and prioritize those individuals “wrongfully detained” overseas.
Swap is also a contrasting story of how the United States and Russia deal with political prisoners, be they ‘wrongfully detained” or “criminal.” The authors spend considerable time discussing Russian President Putin’s undying devotion and longstanding belief in the value of “illegals,” those deep-cover Russian intelligence officers who spend a lifetime living in a foreign country under false identity in hopes of someday reaping useful intelligence for the Motherland. Specifically mentioned, for example, is the story of Anna and Artem Dultsev, who posed as an Argentine couple while living their cover-life in Slovenia, and who Putin would demand be returned to Russia as part of the August 2024 spy swap. And then there is Vadim Krasikov, Putin’s hitman who was given a life sentence and imprisoned in Germany for the killing in 2019 in Berlin of Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, a Chechen insurgent. Despite the fact that Krasikov was a “criminal” and not a “wrongfully detained” prisoner, Putin made Krasikov the center of attention and a nonnegotiable pawn in the ultimate swap in 2024. Throughout the book, Putin’s hard-nosed supportive posture toward his Russian detainees is juxtaposed against the American way which, the authors strongly imply, was often confused, bureaucratic, inconsistent and slow to action.
Throughout the book, Hinshaw and Parkinson take the reader inside the halls of the White House, often detailing candid and personal discussions between Joe Biden’s National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and the administration’s Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs (SPEHA) Roger Carstens. Sullivan was Biden’s point-person for all hostage matters and any and all negotiations related to potential exchanges or releases. Sullivan, therefore, was the gatekeeper through whom Carstens was required to work. Here the authors are at their best as they document the different policy approaches and stylistic natures of the two officials. They portray Carstens, who they say had virtually no access to Biden, as an indefatigable champion of the “wrongfully detained” and their families. He was someone who would travel anywhere in the world to engage and negotiate with foreign officials if there was even only a modicum chance of success. Sullivan, on the other hand, they say, attempted to systematize a response to state-sponsored hostage taking, but ultimately failed, noting he was the “slowest” of all U.S. officials to make decisions that often needed immediate responses. According to the authors, Carstens believes Sullivan’s excessive patience and overly deliberative style could have even derailed a last-minute hostage exchange deal that would have included Russian opposition leader and dissident Alexei Navalny as part of the August 2024 spy swap.
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The last few chapters of the book read like a spy novel, a fast-paced and enthralling look at what it took to consummate successfully the August 2024 exchange. The White House at that time was under growing pressure from inside the government and from the families of those “wrongfully detained” Americans to find a way to bring them home. Front and center were Evan Gershkovich and Paul Whelan.
Hinshaw and Parkinson masterly describe how both Russia and the United States maneuvered to stack their decks with the “right people” to trade. Specifically, the authors disclose in detail how the United States called on its allies in Slovenia, Norway and Poland to agree to release their hostages in order to strengthen the United States’ hand with Russia, and the painstaking efforts it took to get Germany to agree to the release of the one person Putin would not forsake, the “criminally” charged and convicted Vadim Krasikov. When the swap finally occurred, Sullivan would call it “unprecedented” because of its complexity and historical significance. (Interestingly, the authors note that SPEHA Carstens was barred by Sullivan from attending the actual swap exchange where it took place in Turkey).
Swap is an excellent book, written by two experienced WSJ reporters who know how to captivate their readers. Their sources appear well-placed and credible, and their premise that prisoner trading is now the cost of business that both of America’s political parties have accepted, is convincing. It is this reviewer’s view, however, that despite Hinshaw and Parkinson’s comprehensive review of the subject, the authors fail to illuminate or give sufficient credit to the many NGO’s that have worked tirelessly side-by-side with their US Government partners, providing valuable guidance on negotiation strategies, financial and legal assistance to those detained and, equally important, invaluable assistance, counsel and emotional support to the family members of those Americans “wrongfully detained.”
All statements of fact, opinion, or analysis expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official positions or views of the US Government. Nothing in the contents should be construed as asserting or implying US Government authentication of information or endorsement of the author's views.
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