First Published on 14th June 1952 - 158 pages

A chance sighting of Erich von Stalhein by Ginger leads to investigations as to what he is up to. He is observed meeting a soldier, Guardsman Ross, and encouraging him to desert from the army to join an International Brigade. Ross is recruited to assist Biggles and agrees to desert so that Biggles and Ginger can follow him and find out where other deserters have gone. They follow Ross to Paris and then on to Prague in Czechoslovakia. Things go wrong when Biggles unexpectedly (and literally) bumps in von Stalhein. Forced to flee, Biggles and Ginger lose Ross and hide out with an English secret agent in Prague. From here, they again have to flee, in a desperate roof top scramble (depicted on the dust cover of the book) and eventually they manage to get Algy to fly them out of the Country. An attempt to find Ross in the Russian sector of Berlin fails and Biggles then has to organise an expedition to find Ross in Manchuria. He and other deserters are being held prisoner there and being forced to broadcast propaganda on the radio to Korea. Calling on help from both Wung Ling (from the Biggles short story 'The Case of the Mandarin's Treasure Chest') and Gimlet King and his team (from W.E. Johns' "Gimlet" books), Biggles and the team go and rescue Ross and blow up the radio station.