Transcriber’s Note: Two pages of advertising material were moved to the end of the book. J. EDGAR HOOVER Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation MASTERS OF DECEIT The Story of Communism in America and How to Fight It [Illustration: CARDINAL EDITION] POCKET BOOKS, INC. · NEW YORK _Masters of Deceit_ [Illustration] Henry Holt edition published March, 1958 Book-of-the-Month Club edition published June, 1958 GIANT CARDINAL edition published October, 1959 11th printing October, 1961 [Illustration] This GIANT CARDINAL edition includes every word contained in the original, higher-priced edition. It is printed from brand-new plates made from completely reset, clear, easy-to-read type. · GIANT CARDINAL editions are distributed in the U.S. by Affiliated Publishers, a division of Pocket Books, Inc., 630 Fifth Avenue, New York 20, N.Y. · _Notice_: GIANT CARDINAL editions are published by Pocket Books, Inc. Trademark registered in the United States and other countries. Copyright, ©, 1958, by J. Edgar Hoover. All rights reserved. This GIANT CARDINAL edition is published by arrangement with Henry Holt and Company, Inc. PRINTED IN THE U.S.A. _Foreword_ Every citizen has a duty to learn more about the menace that threatens his future, his home, his children, the peace of the world—and that is why I have written this book. If you will take the time to inform yourself, you will find that communism holds no mysteries. Its leaders have blue-printed their objectives. The time is far too late not to recognize this “ism” for what it is: a threat to humanity and to each of us. Moreover, there is the sobering fact that since the end of World War II we have spent billions of dollars to defend ourselves from communist aggression. This burden will continue to mount until the world is free from the communist menace. This book is an attempt to explain communism—what it is, how it works, what its aims are, and, most important of all, what we need to know to combat it. In writing this book I have been guided by many years of study and observation of the communist conspiracy in action in the United States. As a Special Assistant to the Attorney General of the United States in 1919, I was assigned to prepare a legal brief on the newly formed Communist Party and Communist Labor Party. This necessitated an extensive and penetrating study.