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“TinmsTally Successful Tmstally Successful ———s “The Philby Conspiracy” is & full-length account of the activities of the three men, written by a team from The Sunday Times of London, For a combined effort, it is un- usually successful. It harnesses a large amount of material into a coherent narre- tive. The authors are sparing in their own judgment, but supply ertough facts to let the reader make up his own. It has more drive and more genuine suspense than & dozen concocted thrillers and will undoubt- edly-be the ot & do: edly be the source of dozen mors, “My Silent War” is Philby's own selective story of his involvement in British esplo« nage: how he joined it, how he rose in sery- ice, his near escapes and his fall. He is often fierce i in evaluating ners, pitiless in te in wl wants reader to infer, It is a0 * interesting ace tivity to compare the man who emerges from his own book with the one who is the subject of the other. One thing he doesn’t do is fully to de- clare his motives. The other book does better. It points out that after turning Communist, like countless others in the thirties, Philby went to Austria in time to see the Social Democrats destroyed by the Heimwehr. He was in Spain, reporting from Franco's side, when the Spanish Republic was abandoned by the Western democracies. Unlike others of his age, Philby saw what could happen to the Left in practice, not only in theory. It is almost as if he reasoned ne ould do more by clandestinely nist power ihan by identi- . fyi ‘o enly with @ group that would fall Pa next maneuver of the Fascist legions