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But the declassified files, snapshots of a world in flux, show how hard it was to predict the future and how tempting it was to hire people who seemingly could help. One 1946 report describes treeless, toxic wastelands of radioactive lakes and deformed villagers in China, where Japanese scientists had processed uranium in the race for nuclear technology. The files describe in real time how post-war Chinese forces were seizing Japanese physicists just as US and Soviet forces were capturing German rocket and missile technology, all laying the groundwork for an arms race that created the potential for global destruction.

Consider Manchuria, a resource-rich land strategically located between China and the Soviet Union and one of the earliest targets of Soviet expansion in Asia - the sort of threat that would lead to wars in Korea and Vietnam. In June 1946, a former spy both for the Soviets and Chinese Communists in the region offered his services to the Americans at a time when US intelligence officials were desperate for any news from one of the most sinister, tightly sealed places on the planet.

"Those districts where I intend to go are most dangerous," the agent, identified only by the codename "Bedrock," wrote in a report passed on to top US intelligence officials. "Normally speaking it would be almost impossible to penetrate into those places. I can go there and successfully complete a mission."

This remarkable offer to gather intelligence on Soviet troop movements and industrial development in Manchuria, Mongolia, and northeastern Russia was laced with a broad view of an era far more uncertain than the present one. After a US agent briefed him on some unspecified American intelligence objectives, Bedrock "emphatically stated that those were not the important issues," according to notations on Bedrock's report.

The true goals, he said, were to study the spread of Soviet influence, the capacity of its burgeoning military industries, and its preparations for "scientific warfare."

"The Second World War has been over for nearly one year. The world has evidently been divided into two distinct spheres," Bedrock wrote. "This is a new world condition; it is a transitional period in history. Its final outcome will be largely determined by events of a historical nature. It is beyond the ability of politicians to foretell future events."