The history of modern military intelligence in Russia begins on November 5, 1918, when the Registration Directorate of the Field Headquarters of the Red Army (RUPShKA) was established by order of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic, the successor of which is now the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia (GRU GSH).
About the fate of the most famous military intelligence officers of our country. Richard Sorge

Certificate issued by the OGPU to Richard Sorge for the right to carry and store the Mauser pistol.

One of the outstanding intelligence officers of the 20th century was born in 1895 near Baku in a large family of German engineer Gustav Wilhelm Richard Sorge and Russian citizen Nina Kobeleva. A few years after Richard's birth, the family moved to Germany, where he grew up. Sorge took part in the First World War both on the western and eastern fronts, was repeatedly wounded. The horrors of the war affected not only his health, but also contributed to a radical break in his worldview. From an enthusiastic German patriot, Sorge turned into a convinced Marxist. In the mid-1920s, after the German Communist Party was banned, he moved to the USSR, where, after marrying and receiving Soviet citizenship, he began working in the apparatus of the Comintern.
In 1929, Richard moved to the Fourth Directorate of the Red Army Headquarters (military intelligence). In the 1930s, he was sent first to China (Shanghai), and then to Japan, where he arrived as a German correspondent.It was the Japanese period of Sorge that made him famous. It is generally accepted that in his numerous cipher messages, he warned Moscow about the imminent German attack on the USSR, and after that he brutalized Stalin that Japan would remain neutral towards our country. This allowed the Soviet Union, at a critical moment for it, to transfer new Siberian divisions to Moscow.
However, Sorge himself was exposed in October 1941 and captured by the Japanese police. The investigation into his case lasted almost three years. On November 7, 1944, the Soviet intelligence officer was hanged in Tokyo's Sugamo prison, and 20 years later, on November 5, 1964, Richard Sorge was posthumously awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

Nikolai Kuznetsov

Nikanor (original name) Kuznetsov was born in 1911 into a large peasant family in the Urals. Having studied as an agronomist in Tyumen, in the late 1920s he returned home. Kuznetsov showed outstanding linguistic abilities early on, he almost independently learned six dialects of the German language. Then he worked in logging, was twice expelled from the Komsomol, then took an active part in collectivization, after which, apparently, he came to the attention of the state security agencies. Since 1938, after spending several months in a Sverdlovsk prison, Kuznetsov became the detective of the central apparatus of the NKVD. Under the guise of a German engineer at one of the Moscow aircraft factories, he unsuccessfully tried to infiltrate the diplomatic environment of Moscow.

Nikolai Kuznetsov in the uniform of a German officer.

After the outbreak of World War II in January 1942, Kuznetsov was enrolled in the 4th Directorate of the NKVD, which, under the leadership of Pavel Sudoplatov, was engaged in reconnaissance and sabotage work behind the front line in the rear of the German troops. Since October 1942, Kuznetsov, under the name of a German officer Paul Siebert, with documents of an employee of the secret German police, conducted intelligence activities in Western Ukraine, in particular, in the city of Rivne, the administrative center of the Reichskommissariat.

The scout regularly communicated with officers of the Wehrmacht, special services, senior officials of the occupation authorities and sent the necessary information to the partisan detachment. For a year and a half, Kuznetsov personally destroyed 11 generals and high-ranking officials of the occupation administration of Nazi Germany, but, despite repeated attempts, he failed to eliminate Erich Koch, the Reichskommissar of Ukraine, known for his cruelty.
In March 1944, while trying to cross the front line near the village of Boratin, Lviv region, Kuznetsov's group ran into soldiers of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA). During the battle with Ukrainian nationalists, Kuznetsov was killed (according to one version, he blew himself up with a grenade). He was buried in Lviv at the memorial cemetery "Hill of Glory".

Jan Chernyak

Yankel (original name) Chernyak was born in Chernivtsi in 1909, then still on the territory of Austria-Hungary. His father was a poor Jewish merchant, and his mother was Hungarian. During the First World War, his entire family perished in Jewish pogroms, and Yankel was brought up in an orphanage. He studied very well, even at school he mastered German, Romanian, Hungarian, English, Spanish, Czech and French, which he spoke without any accent by the age of twenty. After studying in Prague and Berlin, Cherniak received an engineering degree. In 1930, at the height of the economic crisis, he joined the German Communist Party, where he was recruited by Soviet intelligence, which operated under the guise of the Comintern. When Chernyak was drafted into the army, he was appointed as a clerk in an artillery regiment stationed in Romania.At first, he passed on information about the weapons systems of European armies to Soviet military intelligence, and four years later he became the main Soviet resident in this country. After the failure, he was evacuated to Moscow, where he entered the intelligence school of the Fourth (intelligence) Directorate of the General Staff of the Red Army. Only then did he learn Russian. Since 1935, Chernyak traveled to Switzerland as a TASS correspondent (operational pseudonym "Jen"). Regularly visiting Nazi Germany, in the second half of the 1930s, he managed to deploy a powerful intelligence network there, which received the code name "Krona". Subsequently, the German counterintelligence failed to uncover any of its agents. And now, out of 35 of its members, only two names are known (and there are still disputes about this) - this is Hitler's favorite actress Olga Chekhova (wife of the writer Anton Chekhov's nephew) and Goebbels' mistress, star of the film "The Girl of My Dreams", Marika Rekk .

Jan Chernyak.

In 1941, Chernyak's agents managed to obtain a copy of the Barbarossa plan, and in 1943, an operational plan for the German offensive near Kursk. Chernyak transferred to the USSR valuable technical information about the latest weapons of the German army. Since 1942, he also sent information to Moscow on atomic research in England, and in the spring of 1945 he was transferred to America, where he was planned to be included in the work on the US atomic project, but because of the betrayal of the cryptographer, Chernyak had to urgently return to the USSR. After that, he was almost not involved in operational work, he received the position of assistant to the GRU General Staff, and then a translator at TASS. Then he was transferred to a teaching job, and in 1969 he was quietly retired and forgotten.
Only in 1994, by Decree of the President of the Russian Federation "for the courage and heroism shown in the performance of a special assignment," Chernyak was awarded the title of Hero of the Russian Federation. The decree was passed while the intelligence officer was in a coma in the hospital, and the award was presented to his wife. Two months later, on February 19, 1995, he died, never knowing that the Motherland remembered him.

Anatoly Gurevich

One of the future leaders of the "Red Chapel" was born in the family of a Kharkov pharmacist in 1913. Ten years later, the Gurevich family moved to Petrograd. After studying at school, Anatoly entered the Znamya Truda No. 2 plant as a metal marker apprentice, where he soon grew to be the head of the factory civil defense.

Then he entered the Intourist Institute and began to intensively study foreign languages. When the civil war began in Spain in 1936, Gurevich went there as a volunteer, where he served as an interpreter for the senior Soviet adviser, Grigory Stern.
In Spain, he was given documents in the name of Lieutenant of the Republican Navy Antonio Gonzalez. After returning to the USSR, Gurevich was sent to study at an intelligence school, after which, as a citizen of Uruguay, Vincent Sierra, he was sent to Brussels under the command of the GRU resident Leopold Trepper.

Anatoly Gurevich. Photo: from the family archive

Soon Trepper, because of his pronounced Jewish appearance, had to urgently leave Brussels, and the intelligence network - the "Red Chapel" - was headed by Anatoly Gurevich, who was given the pseudonym "Kent". In March 1940, he reported to Moscow about the impending attack by Nazi Germany on the Soviet Union. In November 1942, the Germans arrested "Kent", he was personally interrogated by Gestapo chief Müller. During interrogations, he was not tortured or beaten. Gurevich was offered to participate in the radio game, and he agreed, because he knew how to communicate that his ciphers were under control. But the Chekists were so unprofessional that they did not even notice the prearranged signals. Gurevich did not betray anyone, the Gestapo did not even know his real name. In 1945, immediately after his arrival from Europe, Gurevich was arrested by SMERSH. At the Lubyanka, he was tortured and interrogated for 16 months. The head of SMERSH, General Abakumov, also participated in torture and interrogations. A special meeting at the Ministry of State Security of the USSR "for treason" sentenced Gurevich to 20 years in prison. Relatives were told that he "disappeared under circumstances that did not entitle him to benefits." Only in 1948 did Gurevich's father find out that his son was alive. The next 10 years of his life "Kent" spent in the Vorkuta and Mordovian camps.After his release, despite Gurevich's many years of appeals, he was regularly denied a review of the case and the restoration of his honest name. He lived in poverty in a small Leningrad apartment, and spent his tiny pension mainly on medicines. In July 1991, justice prevailed - the slandered and forgotten Soviet intelligence officer was completely rehabilitated. Gurevich died in St. Petersburg in January 2009.

Gevork Andreevich Vartanyan was born on February 17, 1924 in Rostov-on-Don in the family of Andrey Vasilyevich Vartanyan, an Iranian citizen, director of an oil mill.

In 1930, when Gevork was six years old, the family left for Iran. His father was connected with the Soviet foreign intelligence and left the USSR on her instructions. Under the guise of commercial activities, Andrei Vasilievich conducted active intelligence work. It was under the influence of his father that Gevork became a scout.

Gevork Vartanyan connected his fate with Soviet intelligence at the age of 16, when in February 1940 he established direct contact with the NKVD station in Tehran. On behalf of the resident, Gevork led a special group to identify fascist agents and German intelligence agents in Tehran and other Iranian cities. In just two years, his group identified about 400 people, one way or another connected with German intelligence.

In 1942, "Amir" (the operational pseudonym of Gevork Vartanyan) had to carry out a special reconnaissance mission. Despite the fact that Great Britain was an ally of the USSR in the anti-Hitler coalition, this did not prevent the British from carrying out subversive work against the USSR. The British created an intelligence school in Tehran, in which young people with knowledge of the Russian language were recruited for their subsequent transfer with intelligence missions to the territory of the Soviet republics of Central Asia and Transcaucasia. On the instructions of the Center, "Amir" infiltrated the intelligence school and completed a full course of study there. The Tehran residency received detailed information about the school itself and its cadets. Abandoned on the territory of the USSR "graduates" of the school were neutralized or re-recruited and worked "under the hood" of the Soviet counterintelligence.

"Amir" took an active part in ensuring the security of the leaders of the "Big Three" during the work of the Tehran Conference in November-December 1943. In 1951 he was brought to the USSR and graduated from the Faculty of Foreign Languages ​​of Yerevan University.

This was followed by many years of work as an illegal intelligence agent in extreme conditions and difficult situations in various countries of the world. Always next to Gevork Andreevich was his wife Gohar, who had come a long way in intelligence with him, an illegal intelligence officer, holder of the Order of the Red Banner and many other awards.

The Vartanyans' business trip abroad lasted more than 30 years.

The scouts returned from their last trip in the autumn of 1986. A few months later, Goar Levonovna retired, and Gevork Andreevich continued to serve until 1992. Gevork Andreyevich Vartanyan's services in intelligence activities were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, many orders and medals, as well as the highest departmental awards.

Despite the fact that Colonel Vartanyan was retired, he continued to work actively in the Foreign Intelligence Service: he met with young employees of various foreign intelligence units, to whom he passed on his rich operational experience.

On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the legendary Soviet intelligence officer in the Moscow art gallery A. Shilov, People's Artist of the USSR Alexander Shilov presented a portrait of the Hero of the Soviet Union Gevork Vartanyan.

Check out the second series.
The main characters of the film "True Story. Tehran-43" are a married couple, illegal intelligence officers Gevork and Gohar Vartanyan. In the film, the intelligence officers themselves tell about the events in Tehran in 1943. The plot of the film is based on a unique intelligence operation carried out by the Soviet foreign intelligence and prevented the assassination of the leaders of the three powers, members of the anti-Hitler coalition - Joseph Stalin, Franklin Roosevelt and Winston Churchill at the Tehran conference in 1943. By genre, the film "True Story. Tehran-43" - docudrama. The film contains large episodes played by actors, and there is a chronicle and a documentary part, where the Vartanyans comment on the events of those distant days. Sixteen-year-old Gevork Vartanyan receives from I. I. Agayants, a resident of Soviet intelligence in Tehran, the task of creating a small detachment of 6-7 people from his friends and voluntary assistants to identify German agents in Tehran. Gevorg Vartanyan is gathering his team. Among them is a sixteen-year-old Armenian girl Gohar. Between Gevork and Gohar, friendship first arises, and then love. From 1940 to 1945, Vartanyan's group discovered more than 400 German agents in Iran. Service in Iran, which lasted from 1940 to 1951, became the most important stage of life for Vartanyan and his wife. This is the only "page" of their undercover activity, about which one can speak openly so far.

The exploits of fighters and commanders, soldiers and officers of the Red Army, committed by them during the Great Patriotic War, are known to many, but the combat pages of the NKVD, the people's commissariat, turned by Russophobic propaganda into a bunch of executioners and sadists, these days often remain in the shadows.

Part 1. Lion hunter

The fate of Pavel Sudoplatov, a scout and saboteur, may well form the basis of an excellent movie. What? Judge for yourself.

Born in 1907 in a poor and large Melitopol family, inspired by Bukharin's book "The ABC of the Revolution", as a 12-year-old boy, Pavel dropped out of school and left his home, escaping along with an equestrian detachment passing through the city. The Red Army soldiers in those places fought with Ukrainian nationalists - the detachments of Petliura and Konovalets (with whom his life would later collide again).

The graduate of the regiment participated in the battles, was captured, fled, was homeless in Odessa, and after the capture of the city by the Reds, by 1921, he again found himself in the ranks of the Red Army. In the same 21st, as one of the few who can read and write, he falls into the detachment of the Special Department (previously ambushed and suffered heavy losses) as a cipher clerk. So the 14-year-old Pavel began his service in the state security organs, and at 15 he already went to the border troops. Further, Sudoplatov's career went up: from the 23rd year in the Komsomol work, from the 25th - in the Melitopol GPU, from the 28th - a member of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and an employee of the GPU of the Ukrainian SSR. In the same period of his life, Sudoplatov married a girl from Gomel, Emma Kaganova (in fact, her name was Shulamith Krimker).

In 1932, Pavel was transferred to Moscow, and the following year he was sent to work in the Foreign Department of the GPU, where Sudoplatov, who was fluent in Ukrainian, was assigned to work against Ukrainian nationalists. There, the courier and illegal agent also quickly advanced in the service, the assignments became more and more serious - the intelligence officer was entrusted with the preparation of sabotage, intelligence operations, and the creation of intelligence networks. Pavel was classified, his reports were signed with the pseudonym "Andrey", and only his immediate leaders and immediate family knew about him.

Regularly traveling abroad, in 1935 he was able to infiltrate the environment of the leaders of the OUN in Berlin. Konovalets, already known to us, headed the Ukrainian nationalists. His plans included the capture of a number of regions of the Ukrainian SSR and the creation of an "independent" Ukraine, moreover, under the leadership of the Third Reich. The nationalists prepared combat detachments and terrorist groups.

Konovalets

"Befriended" with Konovalets Sudoplatov in 1938 received an order to eliminate the main nationalist. To do this, they made a bomb, disguised as a box of chocolates beloved by Konovalets. When the nationalist was finished, a split occurred in the ranks of the OUN - Bandera and Melnik (Konovalets's successor) fought among themselves, and Sudoplatov, under the guise of a Polish volunteer, went to Spain. There, in the ranks of the international partisan detachment, he met Ramon Mercader del Rio.

Returning to Moscow, Pavel met with Beria, to whom he reported on the results of the liquidation of the OUN leader and continued to work in the NKVD. challenge to Stalin.

The leader instructed Sudoplatov to prepare an operation to eliminate Trotsky, who had settled in Mexico, Beria had to report personally, and Pavel himself was appointed deputy head of intelligence, giving the broadest authority to recruit a group of militants.

To help himself, Sudoplatov took an experienced saboteur Naum Eitingon. Nickname in the Cheka - Leonid. It was he who recruited people familiar from the war in Spain who could infiltrate Trotsky's entourage. By that time, Lev Davidovich, by the way, had developed a storm of activity: he tried with might and main to split and incite the world communist movement against Stalin, collaborated with the Abwehr and helped organize a rebellion against the republican government in Barcelona.

Taki Trotsky

The operation to eliminate Trotsky was called the "Duck", although Sudoplatov himself called it the "Lion Hunt". Eitingon created 2 groups - "Horse" and "Mother". The first was led by Mexican artist David Alfaro Siqueiros, one of the founders of the Spanish Communist Party, and the second by the former anarchist Caridad Mercader. Both groups were unaware of each other's existence.

The first assassination attempt, led by Siqueiros, turned out to be unsuccessful - the fighters who recruited a security guard named Hart (US citizen), in military and police uniforms, broke into the courtyard of Trotsky's house and opened fire on the bedroom. They shelled the room for 15 minutes, but neither Trotsky nor his wife were hurt. The only result of the assassination attempt was a scratch on the leg of Trotsky's grandson, who was sleeping in the next room, and the only victim was a recruited guard who was killed for conspiracy. Trotsky himself never found out about Hart's role in the assassination, so a memorial plaque appeared on the guard's house: "In memory of Robert Sheldon Hart, 1915-1940, killed by Stalin."

Siqueiros

Sudoplatov analyzed the operation: the reason for the failure was called poor preparation. The members of the Siqueiros group who fought in Spain had neither experience in special operations, nor experience in searching and cleaning buildings. In general, Beria was furious, Eitingon announced his readiness to be punished, and Stalin ordered the use of the second group. Trotsky, too, wasted no time in fortifying the house and strengthening the guards. Members of the Horse group were arrested, but Siqueiros, although he admitted his guilt, stated that the attack had one purpose: to exert psychological pressure and force Trotsky to leave Mexico.

In the second group, an important role was assigned to the son of her leader, Ramon Mercader, already familiar to Sudoplatov. Back in 1938, he met in Paris the sister of an employee of Trotsky's secretariat, a resident of New York, Sylvia Ageloff. Relations began between them, the matter was approaching marriage ... It is worth noting here that Mercader posed as the Belgian Jacques Montrard, a wealthy heir, the son of the Belgian consul in Tehran. In 1939, under the name of Frank Jackson, with a fake Canadian passport, he arrived in New York. He told Sylvia that in this way he “mows down” from the army. A little later, Ramon moved to Mexico, where he was waiting for his bride. She came to her lover, thanks to her sister got a job in Trotsky's secretariat, and Mercader, playing the role of a staunch Trotskyist, got access to the estate of the future victim ...

On August 20, 1940, Mercader remained in Trotsky's office, inviting him to read his article. Deep in reading, he did not notice how the saboteur took out an ice pick from under his cloak. The blow fell on the back of the head, but Trotsky not only did not die immediately, but also managed to utter a cry ... Mercader was arrested and declared personal hostility to be the motive for the murder. He managed to hide his name for 6 years, and Ramon was released only in 1960. Then, during a visit to the USSR, Mercader received the Star of the Hero of the Soviet Union.

Sudoplatov, in addition to leading the assassination of Trotsky, continued to engage in intelligence - he traveled under the guise of an "adviser to Molotov" to Latvia, participated in the operation to annex Western Ukraine ...

Part 2. In defense of the Fatherland

Among the awards of Pavel Sudoplatov is the Order of Suvorov II degree. It was awarded to the commanders of corps, divisions and brigades, their deputies and chiefs of staff:

For organizing a battle to defeat an enemy corps or division, achieved with lesser forces, as a result of a sudden and decisive attack based on the full interaction of fire weapons, equipment and manpower;

For breaking through a modern defensive line of the enemy, developing a breakthrough and organizing relentless pursuit, encirclement and destruction of the enemy;

For organizing a battle while surrounded by numerically superior enemy forces, exiting this encirclement and maintaining the combat capability of their units, their weapons and equipment;

For a deep raid behind enemy lines carried out by an armored formation, as a result of which a sensitive blow was inflicted on the enemy, ensuring the successful completion of an army operation.

Commander's award, so to speak. Sudoplatov, it seems, was not a commander. Or?..

On June 16, 41, Pavel Anatolyevich received a call: “Beria, having called me to his place, gave the order to organize a special group from among the intelligence officers under his direct subordination. She was supposed to carry out reconnaissance and sabotage actions in case of war. At the moment, our first task was to create a strike group from among experienced saboteurs capable of resisting any attempt to use provocative incidents on the border as a pretext for starting a war, ”Sudoplatov wrote in his book Intelligence and the Kremlin.

Nahum Eitingon

Naum Eitingon became Sudoplatov's deputy, his task was to provide communication between the fighters of the group and the military command. Both security officers developed plans for the destruction of fuel depots that supplied the German motorized tank units, which had already begun to concentrate at our borders, but a conversation with General Pavlov, commander of the Western Special Military District, which took place on June 20, showed a terrible thing: the general had little interest in the situation on the border and he confidently declared that even if the Germans suddenly attacked, there would be no problems. On June 22, when equipment not even prepared for battle fell into the hands of the treacherously attacking Germans and their European allies, it turned out that Pavlov's assessments were very far from reality. By the way, on June 18, a directive was sent to the troops to bring them to full combat readiness, which this very general, as well as his subordinates, was tritely ignored. You already know the price of such arbitrariness ...

But the border guards subordinate to the NKVD, as you know, held out to the last. Like many commanders and soldiers of the Red Army, cut off from command.

On the very first day of the War, the relevance of sabotage work in the German rear, into which the Soviet territory was rapidly turning, increased a thousandfold. Sudoplatov began to manage this work, but the documentation appeared later - only on July 5, when the Special Group was officially created, on the basis of the First (Intelligence) Directorate of the NKVD. In addition to sabotage, the group had to deal with the opening of enemy intelligence networks, the extraction of intelligence, radio games and misinformation of the enemy.

“We needed a huge number of people, thousands and thousands. No states of the NKGB could stand it. So the idea arose to create a special military unit, which would have to deal exclusively with reconnaissance and sabotage work, ”the scout recalled. Where to get footage? Experienced Chekists recalled from retirement, from prisons, a recruitment of volunteers began. More than 800 athletes got into the group - without exaggeration, the whole color of Soviet sports: football players, runners, weightlifters, boxers, shooters ... Among them, for example, the Znamensky brothers runners or the famous boxer Nikolai Korolev. As a result, the group included ... 25 thousand people! This is how a separate motorized rifle brigade for special purposes (OMSBON) appeared - a real special forces of the NKVD.

From Sudoplatov's book "Special Operations": "Under our command we had more than twenty-five thousand soldiers and commanders, of which two thousand were foreigners - Germans, Austrians, Spaniards, Americans, Chinese, Vietnamese, Poles, Czechs, Bulgarians and Romanians."

Some statistics of the combat work of the Brigade:

derailed 1415 enemy echelons;

more than 120 garrisons, commandant's offices and headquarters were defeated;

more than 90 km of rail tracks were blown up;

about 700 km of telephone and telegraph cable were destroyed;

335 railway and highway bridges were blown up and burned down;

344 industrial enterprises and warehouses were destroyed;

liquidated 87 high-ranking German officials;

exposed and neutralized 2045 enemy intelligence groups;

in more than a thousand open battles with punishers, parts of the Wehrmacht and the SS, more than 150 thousand fascists were destroyed;

27 people were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union.

The fighters of the brigade accounted for the legendary operations "Concert", "Rail War", "Citadel" ... Not a single Soviet military formation was so effective.

Partisan commander Dmitry Medvedev

It is worth noting that Sudoplatov himself did not "sit out" in Moscow. So, in the summer of the 42nd, a scout gathered a group of climbers in a day and went with them to the Caucasus: to defend the passes and carry out sabotage. The Germans never got the Caucasian oil, and when the group retreated, Pavel Anatolyevich was in the cover detachment ...

But we will return to the Order of Suvorov.

Naturally, German intelligence did not sit still and, of course, actively tried to obtain the most accurate and truthful information about the plans of the Soviet command. Naturally, there was a need to prevent this. Operation "Monastery" was developed, in which the main role belonged to the intelligence officer Alexander Demyanov, and the leadership was Sudoplatov. Coming from the nobility, Demyanov already had contacts with the Germans, and he was taught radio and encryption by none other than Abel himself ...

Alexander Demyanov on the right

In general, at the end of the 41st, Demyanov crossed the front line and spoke about the underground church-monarchist anti-Soviet organization Throne, of which he was a representative, and even was sent just to communicate with the German command. The intelligence officer withstood constant interrogations, checks, the Germans even decided to "shoot" him. German intelligence decided to use the "anti-Soviet" and sent him to study at the Abwehr school, assigned the pseudonym "Max", and already in March 42 sent him to the territory of the USSR. After 2 weeks, the first "disinformation" went to Germany ... In addition to the constant misinformation of the Germans, the operation had other, "side" effects - German agents, saboteurs and liaisons were arrested - about 60 people. At the "Monastery" they also "earned" several million Soviet rubles received from the Germans!

How important was Operation Monastery? Sudoplatov wrote: “On November 4, 1942, “Heine” (“Max”) informed the Abwehr that the Red Army would strike on November 15 not near Stalingrad, but in the North Caucasus and near Rzhev. The Germans expected a blow near Rzhev and repelled it. The encirclement and capture of a group of German troops under the command of Field Marshal Paulus near Stalingrad turned out to be a complete surprise for them, which, ultimately, opened the way for the Red Army to victory over Nazi Germany in May 1945.

It was after Stalingrad that Suvorov, together with Eitingon, received the Order of Suvorov. Well, why not a commander?

And the Germans greatly appreciated Demyanov and even awarded him the Iron Cross ... The Soviet command did not leave the intelligence officer without awards either: he was awarded the Order of the Red Star for Stalingrad ...

Information from "Max" came to the Abwehr until the summer of 1944, when Demyanov was "transferred" from the General Staff to the railway troops, and instead of the "Monastery" operation "Borodino" began. Both radio games were never discovered by German intelligence. The degree of secrecy was such that even Zhukov did not know about the radio game, and in 1943 Churchill warned Stalin about a "mole" working for the Germans in the Soviet General Staff.

Not only against the Germans...

The amount of work placed on the shoulders of Sudoplatov was simply enormous. In the 44th, he was instructed to obtain information on the "Manhattan Project" - the development of the American atomic bomb. The work was organized so successfully that Stalin received the test results almost before Roosevelt ...

RDS-1

The information obtained by Sudoplatov's agents made it possible to greatly speed up the interrupted by the war work on the creation of our nuclear "club".

The contribution of Pavel Anatolyevich to our Victory, as well as to the further security of the USSR, cannot be overestimated, but Khrushchev managed to answer the intelligence officer with terrible ingratitude.

Part 3. "Gratitude"

Again against the nationalists

It so happened that the fate of Sudoplatov made a kind of loop and Pavel Anatolyevich was again instructed to fight the Ukrainian nationalists, who, after the Great Patriotic War, were enough in Western Ukraine. Having gone through the war on the side of the enemy, they did not at all strive to become normal Soviet citizens. And in general...

Only peaceful Ukrainians at the hands of nationalists killed about half a million. And more than 400 thousand Soviet prisoners of war, 220 thousand Poles and 850 thousand Jews. Well, about 5 thousand of their own, not enough Svidomo, were killed. All this was done with the blessing of the Uniate Church, which absolved all the sins of Bandera and prayed in honor of the "invincible German army and its chief leader, Adolf Hitler." It makes no sense to paint the “charitable” deeds of these child-killers, rapists who enthusiastically “fought” with civilians. Suffice it to mention that Khatyn is their handiwork. And it's far from the only thing. By the way, some of the UPA units were led by Uniate priests.

Here is such a "struggle" for "independence".

And after the War, Bandera did not calm down: they robbed, raped, killed ... For example, in the village of Svatovo, near Lvov, 4 young teachers were tortured and killed. Only because they were from the Donbass. I don't know what exactly they did to these girls, but the fate of another teacher, Raisa Borzilo, is well known. She was accused of promoting Soviet power, at first threatened, and then they moved from words to deeds: on December 1, 1945, a young Komsomol member (and she was born in 1924) was seized. The last hours of her life were spent in complete darkness: the girl's eyes were burned out, her tongue was cut off, a five-pointed star was carved on her body, mockingly, then they put a wire loop around her neck and, still alive, tied her to a horse, went for a ride across the field.

Is there no fascism in Ukraine?

And now let's remember May 2, 2014 in Odessa, terror against Russians in Donbass, weddings and other celebrations in German uniforms.

After the Great Patriotic War, about 80 thousand more civilians were killed by Bandera.

Naturally, it was necessary to fight these well-organized and armed non-humans. They were led by Roman Shukhevych, now glorified in Ukraine, aka "General Taras Chuprinka." Here are his words: “The OUN must act in such a way that all those who recognized Soviet power are destroyed. Do not intimidate, but physically destroy! There is no need to be afraid that people will curse us for cruelty. Let half of the 40 million Ukrainian population remain - there is nothing wrong with that ... ". This character, recruited very, very distinguished himself during the war with his atrocities, cruelty, love of torture. He was also one of the authors and executors of the "method" of massacres: the population of the villages was herded into one place, after which mass extermination began. Then the dead fell into pits, covered with earth, and bonfires were lit on mass graves. In just two days, on August 29 and 30 on August 43, Shukhevych's Bandera killed 15 thousand women, old people and children ... By the way, "Chuprinka" was recruited by the Germans back in the 26th year ...

child killer and rapist, hero of Ukraine, Shukhevych

The Chekists took up the fight against the nationalists who remained in the rear of the Red Army in 1944. The activity was aimed at searching for the leaders and destroying the militants, but there were clearly not enough forces, and the number of caches and some kind of support from the locals helped Bandera to continue to do black. Uniate priests also helped them.

In 1949, Stalin instructed Sudoplatov to put an end to nationalist lawlessness: “Comrade Stalin, according to him, is extremely dissatisfied with the work of the security agencies in combating banditry in Western Ukraine. In this regard, I was ordered to focus on the search for the leaders of the Bandera underground and their liquidation. It was said in an unquestioning tone." Sudoplatov went to Lvov.

good bandera - dead bandera

The undercover work began again, the collection of information again. Developed Uniate priests. They were looking for ways to contact Shukhevych's confidants, his mistresses. As a result, they managed to detain Chuprynka's contact Darina Gusyak, who gave false information during interrogation and constantly complained about feeling unwell. She was sent to the infirmary, where there was a “beaten” woman smeared with brilliant green. This woman turned out to be the agent "Rose" - a former nationalist, caught and recruited by the Chekists. She was able to ingratiate herself with Gusyak and she told where to look for Shukhevych.

By the way, Gusyak has survived to this day, still talks about the terrible torture that “damn Muscovites” did on her in order to get information. The new Ukrainian authorities do not forget about the old woman and even reward her.

Prisoner #8

On March 5, 1953 Joseph Stalin died. On June 26, Beria is arrested on charges of treason. Maybe that's when they get killed. On August 21, 1953, on charges of conspiracy, Lieutenant-General Pavel Sudoplatov was arrested in his own office. He was accused of wanting to overthrow the Soviet government and "restore capitalism", accused of creating a special group to destroy the objectionable.

In fact, Khrushchev simply eliminated competitors and witnesses. According to the memoirs of Pavel Anatolyevich, a very curious episode took place: after the annexation of Western Ukraine, Nikita Sergeevich insisted on the resettlement of young people in Siberia and the Far East. Sudoplatov opposed and Stalin listened to his opinion. There were also documents signed by Khrushchev and the head of state security of the Ukrainian SSR Savchenko, speaking of the need for mass repressions in Ukraine.

To avoid interrogations and interfere with the investigation, Sudoplatov decided to resort to a trick that his mentor Sergei Shpigelglas had once taught him: he stopped answering questions and began to starve, eventually falling into prostration. Doctors were forced to declare him unfit for interrogation and place him in a hospital.

Sudoplatov's wife, Emma Kaganova, was able to figure out how to pass information to her husband. The nurse she recruited brought books wrapped in newspapers or old letters. From the newspapers, the scout learned that Beria and six more of his associates were shot, from a letter with the text “the old man was exposed at a general meeting of collective farmers, accountants feel bad, the conditions at the company are still the same, but there is enough money to continue everything and further” he learned about the exposure of Stalin's personality cult.

When the news came about the resignation of Molotov and Kaganovich (1957), Sudoplatov decided that it was time to act and decided to stop the simulation of madness. In 1958, a trial took place and the general was sentenced to 15 years, sent to the Vladimir Central. The scout was released on August 21, 1968, blind in one eye, crippled and survived several heart attacks.

Even in prison, he wrote letters, where he developed methods of countering enemy sabotage groups, after imprisonment he worked as an interpreter, under his old operational pseudonym "Andrey", remaining faithful to the Motherland and not blaming the state for his troubles.

By the way, after the overthrow of Khrushchev, Brezhnev was asked to reconsider the case, but he refused.

Why exactly he managed to survive, Sudoplatov himself did not know. Being the eighth number on the list of those arrested for the "Beria conspiracy", he did not share the fate - execution - with the first seven.

A child of his tough and cruel time, he turned out to be much nobler and more honest than those who rushed to power, who arrested and tortured him, did not change his oath, and even behind bars tried to benefit the Motherland.

The scout was rehabilitated only in 1992, and he died in 1996. The awards and title were returned to Pavel Anatolyevich only a year later.

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Legendary Soviet spy

He lived only 38 years and gave the best of them to intelligence. During this short time, Stefan Lang managed to do so much that he was rightfully enrolled in the classics of the world intelligence art. That part of his intelligence heritage that became known to the general public - the "Cambridge Five" - ​​is rightly recognized by professionals and historians of the world's intelligence services as "the best group of agents of the Second World War."

World War I radically changed the worldview of Europeans. Colossal human sacrifices, hitherto unimaginable in the most terrible apocalyptic predictions, rudely and visibly invaded reality. The line of development of civilization, which until then suits by and large the population of Europe, has ceased to be perceived as natural and the only true one. It was a time of confusion and social quest. Part of the war and post-war generation fell into depression.

But for the socially active and educated population of Europe, the ideas of socialism and communism turned out to be very attractive. Arnold Deutsch is one of those people. He devoted his whole life to the struggle for social equality and the ideals of justice. And he selected comrades-in-arms for his struggle from this category and according to the criteria of ideological proximity. It should be noted that none of his comrades-in-arms (and there were dozens of them) did not change their views over time and, moreover, did not embark on the path of betrayal.

I would not like to give an assessment of the worldview position of the hero in a biographical sketch. Not the right place, not the right reason. But the presence in Europe and overseas of a huge number of people who sympathized with the young Soviet Republic is an established historical fact. For some of these people, the Soviet Union became the Motherland, to which they gave all their strength, and often their lives. So was Arnold Deutsch, the legendary intelligence officer, whose life was amazing, and whose professional fate was unique.

He was born on May 21, 1904 in the suburbs of the Austrian capital in the family of a small businessman, a former teacher from Slovakia. In 1928 he graduated from the University of Vienna and received a Ph.D. Having a knack for languages, he was fluent in, in addition to his native German, English, French, Italian, Dutch and Russian. In the future, this greatly helped Deutsch in revolutionary and intelligence work.
Arnold's revolutionary activity began in the ranks of the youth movement - at the age of sixteen he became a member of the Union of Socialist Students, and at twenty he joined the Austrian Communist Party. After graduating from the university, he was sent to one of the underground groups of the Comintern. Active and dynamic in nature, Deutsch is appointed as a liaison officer, works in southern Europe and the Middle East.

This work, entrusted only to especially reliable members of the Comintern, developed in Deutsch the qualities so necessary for the future profession of an intelligence officer. These are the basics of conspiracy, and the organization of secure communication schemes, and the skills of finding and attracting promising associates to work, orienting them to obtain the necessary information. In a word, he learned the whole "technology" of intelligence activities in practice.

On the recommendation of the Comintern, Deutsch is sent to Moscow, where he is transferred from the Communist Party of Austria to the CPSU (b) and goes to work in the Foreign Department of the NKVD - the foreign political intelligence of the USSR. This completes the stage of his life associated with work in the Comintern. He becomes a career intelligence officer.

EARLY 1933, Deutsch goes to work illegally in France as an assistant and deputy resident. His task is to carry out special tasks of the Center in Belgium and Holland, and after Hitler came to power in Germany.

From that moment on, fellow workers know Deitch under the name of Stefan Lang. In his cipher telegrams and letters addressed to the Center, he signs the pseudonym "Stefan".

A year later, at the direction of the Center, Deutsch leaves France with the task of settling in the British Isles. It is here that he will perform his legendary professional feat.

In London, Deutsch becomes a student and then a teacher at the University of London, studying psychology. And one of the first Soviet intelligence officers widely and on a scientific basis uses knowledge of psychology in intelligence work.

This greatly facilitates the process of targeted access to a promising contingent of people, their study and involvement in cooperation with intelligence on an ideological basis. Deitch's in-depth analysis of the personality traits of a person of interest to intelligence was so thorough that the devotion of his "godchildren" to communist and anti-fascist views remained with them until the end of their lives.

Studying and working at the university give Deutsch the opportunity to make wide connections among student youth. Deitch himself, being a gifted and meaningful person with a wide range of interests, a wonderful storyteller, an interesting interlocutor, an attentive listener, attracts extraordinary people, and they imperceptibly fall under his charm. Taking into account a deep knowledge of human psychology, a subtle sense of the inner world of the interlocutor, Deutsch has the most effective abilities of a scout-recruiter.

And he makes the best use of the opportunities presented to him. From the position of a lecturer at the University of London, intelligence recruiter Deutsch conducted the study, development and recruitment of more ... - let's be careful - a whole group of anti-fascist students.

His second discovery was conscious and purposeful work for the future. It was an innovative idea for INO, a new contingent of people and a new working environment. And life has fully confirmed his correctness.

Deutsch concentrated his efforts on Oxford and Cambridge universities. He was primarily attracted to students, who in the future could become reliable intelligence assistants for a long time.

The time has come for his stellar moment in his intelligence career. He managed to create, educate and prepare the famous "Big Five", later called the "Cambridge". This is precisely his invaluable service to the Fatherland.

The FIVE was active in the 1930s and 1960s, with free access to the highest public spheres in Britain and the United States. It provided the Soviet leadership with highly up-to-date, reliable and classified documentary information on all aspects of international politics, as well as reporting on military plans and scientific research in Europe and overseas.

For three years of work in Great Britain, Deutsch, who has years of underground work in the Comintern behind him, managed not only to attract ideologically devoted sources to our side, but also to seriously prepare and train them on the widest range of issues of intelligence activities.
His achievement as a practical intelligence officer lies in the fact that the members of the "Cambridge Five" themselves were actively looking for and recruiting more and more assistants - ideological fighters for social justice and against the fascist threat on the eve and years of World War II. These assistants saw in the Soviet Union the real and only force that could resist and destroy Hitler's Nazism. This is Deutsch's third find.

If we talk only about the "Five", then, working as tipsters, developers and recruiters, its members have significantly expanded the network of new sources of information. They managed to infiltrate British intelligence and counterintelligence, the Foreign Office, the decryption service. The information coming to Moscow was of a proactive nature and allowed the Soviet side to make informed decisions in difficult war years.

This was extensive information about the military-strategic plans of the Third Reich, including on the Soviet-German front. Documentary secret information concerned the position of our British and American allies in the anti-Hitler coalition in relation to Germany, as well as the plans of the West for the post-war development of Europe and the world as a whole.

The result of Arnold Deutsch's work in England is impressive. In the second half of the 1930s, a group of pro-communist-minded British, created by Deutsch, began to operate in England, and during the war years, active anti-fascists. They were progressive-minded students, coming from noble wealthy families with a clear prospect of entering the highest echelons of power.

In one of his letters to the Center, Deutsch wrote of his assistants: “They all came to us after graduating from universities at Oxford and Cambridge. They shared communist beliefs. 80 per cent of the highest government posts in England are held by people from these universities, because education in these schools involves expenses that are available only to very rich people. A diploma from such a university opens the door to the highest spheres of the state and political life of the country ... "

Three years of hard work and sources acquired by Deutsch in England until the 1960s became the golden fund of Soviet foreign intelligence. The names of the members of the Five are now widely known and revered in our country. These are Kim Philby - a senior British intelligence officer, Donald Maclean - a senior British Foreign Office official, Guy Burgess - a journalist, British intelligence officer, British Foreign Office official, Anthony Blunt - a British counterintelligence officer, John Cairncross - an employee of the Foreign Office, the Treasury and the decryption service of Britain.

The intelligence capabilities of the members of the "Cambridge Five" and their activity are still surprising. Then there were no electronic documents, compact storage media. They worked with documents and got them with suitcases. Because of such volumes, the risk exceeded all limits, but Deutsch's master class and the impeccable work of the London residency staff made it possible to avoid even the slightest shadow of suspicion from the local intelligence services.

May 1 marks the 110th anniversary of the birth of the outstanding Soviet intelligence officer Arnold DEYCH

DURING the war, the Cambridge Five, which worked in the holy of holies of the British state, received authentic documentary information regarding the results of the decryption by the British of the correspondence of the German high command, daily reports from the British military cabinet on the planning of military operations on all fronts, information from British agents for operations and German plans around the world, documents from British diplomats and the War Cabinet.

The information received by Moscow covered the military situation on the Soviet-German front, in the North Atlantic, Western and Southern Europe; preparation by the Germans of attacks on Moscow, Leningrad, on the Volga and the Kursk salient; data on the latest German weapons - aviation, armored vehicles, artillery.

The members of the "Cambridge Five" should be spoken of as a special category of sources of information - as intelligence officers who, with their whole essence, were imbued with the concerns of the Soviet country at war with the aggressors. They showed initiative in seeking and obtaining preemptive information.
Even at the beginning of the Second World War, the "five" was aimed at finding information about work in the West on nuclear issues. And in September 1941, Donald MacLean and then John Cairncross handed over to the London residency extensive documentary information about the fact and state of work on the creation of atomic weapons in England and the USA.

As a result, the intelligence officers brought up by Deitch drew the attention of the Soviet government to the problem of the military atom with their information. Therefore, the name Deutsch deservedly stands among the names of Soviet scientists and intelligence officers involved in the creation of the Soviet atomic bomb. Its appearance in the USSR 65 years ago and the test carried out on August 29, 1949, put an end to the American monopoly on atomic weapons and no longer allowed the United States to brandish a “nuclear baton”.

Deutsch's "Chicks of the Nest" opened the era of atomic energy in the Land of the Soviets. It was the "light of a distant star" - "Stefan", which reached the Motherland years after the death of the scout.

IN SEPTEMBER 1937 Deutsch was recalled from London. In Moscow, the work of a scout was highly appreciated. From the leadership of intelligence, he was awarded the following recognition:

“During the period of illegal work abroad, “Stefan” showed himself in various sections of the underground as an exceptionally enterprising and dedicated worker ...

In 1938, Arnold Deutsch, his wife (also an illegal intelligence agent) and daughter applied for Soviet citizenship. In anticipation of a decision in the summer, they lived at the dacha of V.M. Zarubin, a talented intelligence officer who worked in Europe and Southeast Asia since the 1920s. His eighteen-year-old daughter Zoya was friends with the Deitch family. Many years later, Zoya Vasilievna recalled communicating with Arnold as an unusually interesting person, possessing an attractive force and calling for frankness.

She especially noted Arnold's attitude to physical training. Deitch considered keeping fit as a scout's duty. Zoya Vasilievna, herself an excellent athlete, recalled: “According to him, a scout must be physically hardy, which became clear to him while working underground along the lines of the Comintern.”

Deutsch actively used his stay at the dacha in a Russian family to restore his skills and improve his Russian language. Zoya, in the future also a scout, a major linguist and creator of the world school of simultaneous translation, tried her pedagogical skills on the Deutsch family.
Deutsch and his family received Soviet citizenship. He became officially Stefan Genrikhovich Lang. These pre-war years, according to Deutsch, became the most difficult and dreary period of his life. Deutsch's active nature protested against the measured and monotonous life, but he was not involved in operational work.

Yes, and there was no one to do it. In the country, devastating the ranks of not only intelligence, there was a total and unrighteous purge. Fortunately, the repression bypassed Deutsch and his family.

For nearly a year, Deutsch remained, as he lamented, in "enforced inactivity." Finally, he becomes a researcher at the Institute of World Economy and World Economy of the USSR Academy of Sciences. His extensive knowledge, experience in analytical work and enormous capacity for work proved to be in demand and appreciated.

AFTER the German attack on the Soviet Union, the intelligence leadership decides to immediately send an experienced intelligence officer to work illegally in Latin America. The place of intelligence activity is Argentina, which supported the Third Reich politically and economically during the Second World War.

In November 1941, "Stefan's group" was ready to leave. The route lay through Iran, India and further through the countries of Southeast Asia. But when the group had already left, Japan began hostilities against the United States by attacking the naval base at Pearl Harbor.

For many months the group was looking for an opportunity to move to Latin America. But in June 1942, Deutsch was forced to inform the head of intelligence, P.M.Fitin:

“For 8 months now, I have been on the road with my comrades, but we are as far from the goal as we were at the very beginning. We're out of luck. However, 8 valuable months have already passed, during which every Soviet citizen gave all his strength on the military or labor front.
The group was returned to Moscow. A new route was proposed for penetration into Argentina from Murmansk by sea escort through Iceland to Canada and beyond. Deutsch stepped on board the Donbass tanker...

Valentin Pikul in his novel “Requiem for the PQ-17 Caravan” tells about the death of this allied caravan. It also talks about the fate of the Donbass tanker. However, our remarkable historian and popularizer of Russian, Russian and Soviet history made a mistake.

The TANKER indeed was repeatedly part of the allied caravans, but it was not part of the PQ-17. After the death of the PQ-17 caravan, solo voyages were ordered to Soviet ships. At the same time, it was recommended to stick to the northern part of the Barents Sea, closer to the edge of the polar ice.

The tanker "Donbass" with Deutsch on board went to sea in early November 1942. On November 5, the watch officer reported to the captain about the German squadron he had noticed, consisting of a cruiser and several destroyers, heading for Novaya Zemlya. The captain of the tanker, Zilke, decided to break the radio silence and warn other single ships, although the chance of getting away unnoticed was very high. The broadcast reached the addressees, but the Germans also found the tanker.

I happened to meet with the captain-mentor G.D. Burkov, president of the Association of Polar Captains, and he helped to document the circumstances of the heroic unequal battle of the Donbass tanker with the German squadron. A destroyer was sent to destroy the tanker, with which the Donbass entered the battle, having only two 76-mm guns on board. The last message from the tanker was "... we are engaged in an artillery battle ...". This signal was received on November 7 - the day of the 25th anniversary of the October Revolution.

Following the laws of the naval fraternity, the crew of the Donbass tanker saved dozens of other vessels at the cost of their lives. The German squadron was then unable to detect a single target, although it passed another 600 miles after the battle with the tanker to the east.

In his memoirs, the commander of the Nazi destroyer wrote that he decided to sink the tanker from a distance of 2,000 meters with a fan attack of three torpedoes. The crew of the tanker evaded her with a competent maneuver. Then the destroyer fired at the tanker from the main battery guns and, having broken the engine room, caused a fire on the ship. The tanker continued to conduct aimed artillery fire. Then, having reduced the distance to 1,000 meters, the destroyer fired several more torpedoes, one of which hit the tanker and split it in half.

More than forty crew members died, about twenty were captured and interned in concentration camps in Norway. Deutsch was not among the survivors ...

After the war, Captain Zilke, who returned from captivity, reported the details of the death of our scout. Deutsch participated in the battle with the destroyer as part of the artillery servants on the bow of the tanker. At the time of the torpedo explosion, he was there with broken legs. The depths of the Barents Sea swallowed up an outstanding intelligence officer. It happened three hundred miles west of the northern tip of Novaya Zemlya.

Soviet citizen Stefan Lang died uncharacteristically for a scout, in an open battle with the enemy. And although he was a passenger, he could not stay away from the fight with the Nazis, taking an active part in it.

The feat of the crew of the Donbass tanker did not go unnoticed. Vessels with this name sail the seas. In Donetsk, a Young Sailors Club was opened, called "Donbass".

In Vienna, a memorial plaque was installed on the house where Arnold Genrikhovich Deutsch, aka Soviet citizen Stefan Genrikhovich Lang, lived. The inscription “May the sacrifice made to them be understood by people” is engraved on it! It simultaneously serves as an epigraph to his bright life and an epitaph on his nameless grave.

The unique intelligence agent Deutsch-Lang had neither professional nor government awards. It would be fair even after many years since his last feat - a deadly battle with the Nazis in a naval battle, to apply to the Government of Russia with a proposal to award Arnold Deutsch - Stefan Lang with the Order of the Patriotic War, posthumously.

Englishman Kim Philby - legendary scout who managed to simultaneously work for the governments of two competing countries - England and the USSR. The work of the brilliant spy was so highly appreciated that he became the only owner in the world of two awards - the Order of the British Empire and the Order of the Red Banner. Needless to say, maneuvering between two fires has always been very difficult ...

Kim Philby is considered one of the most successful British intelligence officers, he held a senior position in the SIS intelligence service and his main task was to track down foreign spies. "Hunting" for specialists sent from the USSR, Kim at the same time was recruited by the Soviet special services. Work for the Land of the Soviets was due to the fact that Kim ardently supported the ideas of communism and was ready to cooperate with our intelligence, refusing to be rewarded for his work.

Philby did a lot to help the Soviet Union during the war years, his efforts intercepted sabotage groups on the Georgian-Turkish border, the information received from him helped prevent the American landing in Albania. Kim also provided assistance to Soviet intelligence officers, members of the Cambridge Five, who were on the verge of exposure in foggy Albion.

Despite the numerous suspicions put forward by Kim Philby, the British secret services did not succeed in obtaining a confession of cooperation with the USSR from their intelligence officer. Kim spent several years of his life in Beirut, officially he worked as a journalist, but his main task, of course, was to collect information for British intelligence.

In 1963, a special commission from Britain arrived in Beirut, which nevertheless managed to establish Kim's proximity to the Soviet Union. It is very interesting that the only irrefutable evidence turned out to be a bas-relief presented to the intelligence officer ... by Stalin. It was made of noble woods and inlaid with precious metals and stones. Mount Ararat was depicted on the bas-relief, which made it possible for Philby to come up with a legend that this curiosity was allegedly acquired in Istanbul. The British managed to guess that the point from which the majestic mountain was captured could only be located on the territory of the USSR.

After the exposure, Philby disappeared. It was not possible to find him for a long time, but then it became known that Khrushchev had granted him political asylum. Until his death in 1988, Kim Philby lived in Moscow. The fascination with the Soviet Union passed when the intelligence officer settled in the capital, much remained incomprehensible to him. For example, Philby genuinely wondered how the heroes who won the war could lead such a modest existence.

Another legendary Soviet intelligence officer who made a lot of efforts to defeat fascism is.