Phillip Deery

Phillip Deery is an emeritus professor of history at Victoria University, Melbourne. He specialises in the fields of communism, espionage, and the Cold War. His books include Spies and Sparrows: ASIO and the Cold War (2022), The Age of McCarthyism: A Brief History With Documents, Third Edition (2017), Red Apple: Communism and McCarthyism in Cold War New York (2014) and Espionage and Betrayal: Behind the Scenes of the Cold War (2011).

Phillip Deery reviews ‘Vatican Spies: From the Second World War to Pope Francis’ by Yvonnick Denoël

July 2025, no. 477 • 25 June 2025

The global reaction to the recent death of Pope Francis and the ensuing election of Pope Leo XIV confirmed the centrality of the Vatican to its 1.3 billion followers and the international political landscape. The Vatican is the world’s smallest sovereign city-state with a tiny permanent population of 882, yet has immense influence. The intensely hierarchical Holy See is far from transparent. Sec ... (read more)

Phillip Deery reviews ‘Lost Souls: Soviet displaced persons and the birth of the Cold War’ by Sheila Fitzpatrick

April 2025, no. 474 • 24 March 2025

Many students of Australian history are aware of a particularly ugly cartoon published in the Bulletin in December 1946. ‘The Pied Harper’ depicted a hook-nosed Arthur Calwell playing a Jew’s harp welcoming a shipload of ‘imports’ (Jews) into Australia. This was the stereotypical image: bearded, unattractive, and similarly hook-nosed. The analogy with the legendary Pied Piper of Hamelin ... (read more)

Phillip Deery reviews 'The Spy Catchers: The official history of ASIO 1949–1963, Volume One' by David Horner

December 2014, no. 367 • 01 December 2014

In the interests of national security, my luggage was recently searched at Los Angeles airport. The culprit: Spy Catchers. The uncorrected proof copy was so bulky that it triggered an alert. I declined to tell the Customs and Border Protection officer (in no mood for irony) that one chapter in the offending item was entitled ‘Keeping out Undesirables’. David Horner’s first volume in the hist ... (read more)