Peter M. F. Sichel, a fourth-generation wine merchant, found the path he was destined to walk interrupted by the Nazis while growing up as a Jew in Germany. He moved to France in 1939 but was imprisoned as an enemy alien at the outbreak of World War II. When he was released, he hid in the Pyrenees before reaching the United States in 1941.

After joining the Army, he served with the U.S. Office of Strategic Services, sending spies into Germany, before becoming a senior official with the Central Intelligence Agency, where he served in key positions in Berlin, Hong Kong, and...