“The story has spread that in testifying against Mr. Hiss I am working out some old grudge, or motives or revenge or hatred. I do not hate Mr. Hiss. We were close friends, but we are caught in a tragedy of history. Mr. Hiss represents the concealed enemy against which we are all fighting, and I am fighting. I have testified against him with remorse and pity, but in a moment of history in which this Nation now stands, so help me God, I could not do otherwise.”

—  Whittaker Chambers , Witness

televised testimony of August 25, 1948
Source: Witness (1952), pp. 694-695

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Whittaker Chambers 33
Defected Communist spy 1901–1961

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