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Documents

November 10, 1999

Memorandum, FBI National Security Branch to All Field Offices, 'Information on Surveys Conducted by the Russians for Sabotage and Infiltration in the U.S. during the 1950s and 1960s'

An FBI memo written in the wake of a "60 Minutes" segment regarding The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB.

June 2007

Once More about Radio Liberty. Folder 66. The Chekist Anthology.

Contains information on KGB active measures to undermine the activities and credibility of Radio Liberty, Radio Free Europe, and Voice of America during the mid 1970’s and early 1980’s. In one operation, personally authorized by KGB Chairman Yuri Andropov, the Spanish journal “Arriba” and 42 other Spanish journals published articles stating that Radio Liberty broadcasts into the USSR violated the Helsinki Accords because they impinged upon Soviet sovereignty, and were contrary to Spanish national interests. Following this activity, the Spanish leadership decided not to extend its agreement with the US which allowed Radio Liberty to broadcast from Spain. During a 1976 operation, an East German agent who worked as an international lawyer spread disinformation about Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty’s ‘illegal’ activities in 35 foreign embassies in Vienna. In October 1977, the KGB sent letters to a variety of Western news outlets, including the Washington Post, claiming to be from a group of Radio Free Europe employees. These letters were directed specifically at US Senators Edward Kennedy, Charles Percy, and Frank Church, and Representatives Edward Derwinsky, Clement Zablocky, Herman Badillo, and Berkley Bedell. In 1981, with the help of the journal “Pravda,” the KGB exposed the role of Radio Liberty in the ‘events’ in Poland.

June 2007

The Yuri Case. Folder 91. The Chekist Anthology.

In this entry, Mitrokhin draws upon KGB sources to describe Yuri Velichkov Bagomil Stanimerov (b.1941), a Bulgarian citizen who graduated from the Moscow State Institute of International Relations in 1968. Stanimerov was recruited by the Bulgarian branch of the KGB in 1970, and became a resident of Sweden in 1972. Mitrokhin’s summary of KGB documents indicates that in April 1974, CIA officer Huey Walter “Hearst” made Stanimerov an offer in the name of the National Security Council. While Stanimerov refused the offer, he told Hearst that he would continue collaborating with him. Stanimerov subsequently traveled to many foreign countries, but the Americans no longer expressed interest in him.

In 1975, Stanimerov was sent to work in the Bulgarian embassy in the United States. The Americans began to train Stanimerov as a spy and tried to ideologically convert him. The Mitrokhin account posits that the KGB gave Stanimerov instructions in case the latter succeeded in infiltrating the CIA. In 1978, the KGB received information regarding the fact that Stanimerov was being investigated by the FBI for his ties with the Bulgarian intelligence services

June 2007

National Alliance of Russian Solidarists. Folder 53. The Chekist Anthology

In this entry Vasili Mitrokhin expresses the KGB concerns regarding the National Alliance of Russian Solidarists’ (NTS) anti-socialist activities held in the Soviet Union and in the West. Mitrokhin states that the KGB had the task of taking control of NTS’ activities as well as destroing their reputation and connections with other anti-Soviet organizations. In order to paralyze the NTS, the KGB’s fundamental goal was to establish strong connections with the organization by sending undercover agents. Toward the end of 1963, the NTS became familiar with the presence of KGB agents among their members. KGB’s main goal was to create an illusion that the NTS was ruled by the KGB, which would help to make America and the West to distrust the organization. According to Mitrokhin, taking over the NTS’s publication “The Posev” was important as well. Mitrokhin provides a KGB plan to overturn the publication and he also attaches the list of all KGB agents who were involved in this undertaking, including their short biographies and codenames.

June 2007

Coordination of Soviet and Czechoslovak Intelligence Operations. Folder 80. The Chekist Anthology.

This folder consists of a detailed operational plan for cooperation between the Czechoslovakian Ministry of Internal Affairs and the KGB for the years 1975-1978. Specific objectives include penetrating the military, political, and economic establishments of the United States, Britain, West Germany, France, and NATO, impeding the activities of the Czech Congress of National Development (KNR), collecting information on “Zionist intrigues,” gathering scientific/technical information on Western achievements in the fields of biological, chemical, and thermonuclear weapons, and using active measures to curtail the activities of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty in West Germany.

June 2007

Association of the United Postwar Immigrants. Folder 52. The Chekist Anthology.

In this entry Mitrokhin provides an example of methods the KGB used to make foreign intelligence services distrust Soviet anti-socialist organizations. Mitrokhin cites the case of the Association of the United Soviet Postwar Immigrants. According to Mitrokhin, the head of the organization was a former citizen of the Soviet Union, but after WWII he stayed in Western Germany and had been actively promoting anti-socialist ideology among immigrants. Mitrokhin does not provide his real name, but uses his KGB codename “Konstantinov.”

According to Mitrokhin, in February of 1963 the KGB sent counterfeit documents to West German counter-intelligence stating that “Konstantinov” had been an active KGB spy since WWII. The KGB also sent letters in the name of Association of United Soviet Postwar Immigrants to National Alliance of Russian Solidarists stating that the officials of the latter organization are “politically bankrupt” and that they were no longer able to promote anti-socialist ideology. The KGB residency in Belgium prepared a flyer with false information stating that the Association of United Soviet Postwar Immigrants was a corrupt institution whose president used its funds for personal use. According to Mitrokhin, the reputation of the Association of United Soviet Postwar Immigrants was destroyed and no longer remained influential.