Zala focuses his account on the edition of the "Documents on German Foreign Policy" - documents that the US army, at the end of the Second World War, uncovered hidden in Thuringia. They were confidential documents from the archives of the German Foreign Office that had been evacuated. After the war, the United States commenced to publish these documents. Especially the documents on German relations with the Soviet Union and the discovery of the top secret additional protocol to the Soviet-German non-aggression pact of 1939 - dividing Poland up between both states - made them an excellent tool in the Cold War. Zala shows how these documents were used politically, but also what kind of controversies went on because of them in diplomatic channels.

Zusammenfassung
"Eindrucksvoll führt das Buch vor, daß der Staub der Archive stets auch der Pulverdampf früherer Schlachten ist, der manchmal sogar noch den Zündstoff für neue Auseinandersetzungen in sich trägt." Daniel Kosthorst, in: FAZ 9-10.2001