Reds Under the Bed

Who were the Reds under the bed? Why did ASIO snoop on several members of this migrant family struggling to set up a new life in Australia?

 

ASIO maintained a vast library of files on half a million citizens, most of whom were never a threat to Australia's security. Through meticulous research, Michael Komesaroff has been able to sift through a multitude of records which were kept on his family, and discover why. This is not only an account of one family's activities, but more broadly, a history of the widespread fear of the presence and influence of communist sympathisers in Australia in the twentieth century.

 

'A well researched and absorbing record of a respected family, highlighting its pursuit by ASIO. A great read.' - Bernard Rechter, former director of the Monash University Centre for Jewish Civilisation

 

'Michael Komesaroff's painstakingly researched but entertainingly written book dives deeply into two intriguing worlds - that of his Lithuanian/Ukranian Jewish migrant family, and that of the intelligence bureaucracy that conducted substantial surveillance on a generation of family members. Its focus illuminates - more clearly than many encyclopaedic accounts of the secret world - the dangers of mistaking dissent for disloyalty.' - Rowan Callick, author of 'Party Time: Who Runs China, and How'