White Notebook #1 1 Translation of original notes from KGB archival files by Alexander Vassiliev (1993-1996) Translated by Steve Shabad, reviewed and edited by Alexander Vassiliev and John Earl Haynes (2007) [Pagination and formatting track the handwritten original notebook. Phrases in English in the original are italicized. Phrases that were transliterated from English to Russian in the original are in Arial font. Marginal comments in the left margin are chiefly page numbers from the archival file while those in the right margin are Vassiliev’s topic designations, his own comments, or notes to himself. Endnotes were added in translation.] ************************************************************************************************* File 35112, Vol. 1 p.381 To Cde. V. N. Merkulov, USSR People’s Commissar of State Security, State Security Commissar, First Grade Memorandum (on the station’s work in the country) [Arrived 4 Jan. 42 and departed 24 Aug. 44. Approximately a year and a half in Tyre and the rest of the time in Carthage.] “I was given the following principal tasks: 1. To select people to obtain information from regarding the situation in Germany and the occupied countries 2. To select people for infiltration into Germany and the occupied countries and to Europe in general with our assignments. 3. To select contacts in the occupied countries for us to use during the war. 4. To acquire agents for obtaining polit., ec. and tech. information in the “country.” To determine the state of affairs in p.382 “Sound’s” group and take measures to split it into smaller units. In addition to these principal tasks a number of others were given along with individual assignments, of which the most important were: 5. To establish a reputable commercial organization that could provide a cover for our people who are in various countries illegally. 6. Later a task was given to set up an organization to illegally transfer our people from the ‘country’ to the ‘countryside.’ [Infiltration of people into Europe: The country has joined the war and all communication with Europe has been cut off. There was almost no opportunity to pull people out. p.383 The only course of action is to turn the people whom the American spec. services were preparing for infiltration into Europe. They started this work shortly before the landing on the “shore.”] “The competitors of the ‘country’ made almost no use of the services of European émigrés for infiltration, but mainly used their own citizens of Europ. descent who knew languages.” [They began to select, through the Communist Party, people who according to their information were reliable and who had already been through training. Before their departure they tried to turn them. Our agent “Tyazh” departed for the “shore” with communications instructions, a call sign and a cipher. He arrived on the “shore,” but contact was not established with him. A group of people left for Yugoslavia, but contact with them was not established, either. “Amigo” was recruited, but his special assignment was canceled at the last minute. Later he left with Amer. troops and had a password and communications instructions.] “We tried to use citizens of the ‘country’ who were leaving with instructions from their govt. to Europe or the ‘shore.’ For example, a prominent official of the Treasury Dept. of the ‘country,’ Harold ‘Ruble’ (H. ____) , left for the ‘shore’ with assignments to set up a competitor’s bureau for the Glasser Treasury Dept. Through a responsible fellowcountryman from the ‘country’ who kept in p.384 touch with ‘Ruble,’ a full agreement was reached with the latter for him to work specifically for us on the ‘shore.’ A password was set up with ‘Ruble’ and promptly transmitted back home, and he was warned that a Russian or Soviet could contact him. In terms of his position ‘Ruble’ is a financial adviser to the ‘country’s’ representative on the ‘shore.’ We did not establish contact with ‘R’ there. He is currently in the country.” White Notebook #1 2 p. 384 [Based on a tip, “Carmen” recruited “Lok,” who left for a “Radio Station” department in “Fir” “Sidon.” She was contacted there. Our agent “Fir” left for the “shore” to work at De Gaulle’s radio station broadcasting to France. Two people have been infiltrated into Spain. p. 385 “With regard to your assignment to infiltrate people into the “mountains” (Switzerland?1), I took literally every measure to find suitable people and send them there. Communications from the “country” with the “mountains,” however, was only maintained by military competitors and the “cabin,” which sent responsible people there from time to time. They were a handful, who would fly there from the “country” on special planes out of the “Island,” each time by arrangement with the government of the “mountains.” p. 386 “In summing up this segment of work, I must say that in large part it was for nothing. Selecting people, working with them and training them took up a lot of time, energy and resources from me and other office employees, yet we got no practical results out of it.” p. 387 [Obtaining information about the situation in Germany. Émigré communications with Europe were cut off. Correspondence ran through two censors — those of Britain and the U.S. There are about 200,000 émigrés from G. The vast majority are Jews.] “Most of them have become citizens of the ‘country’ or were aiming for this and had and have no thought whatsoever of returning to Germany.” [Active polit. émigrés number several tens of people, mainly former leaders of the German Social-Dem. Party. p. 388 Thanks to our agents we were kept informed about their activities.] “They dealt mainly with three problems: by what means Germany could evade responsibility for the war and how they could help in this regard; how to return to the Weimar Republic and recover their posts and, finally and most importantly, by what means to impede the USSR from influencing the determination of Germany’s fate. Absolutely without exception, the active political German émigrés have been and remain fierce enemies of the USSR.” p. 390 [Attempts were made to get into the competitors’ offices that were working on Germany. It was determined that three Germans who had become US citizens were working in the German section of the “cabin.” Contact was made with “Ruff” (Franz ...). We didn’t make adequate use of him or “Ruff” educate him enough as an agent.] “Before the last attempt on Hitler’s life ‘Ruff’ reported to us on the negotiations between opposition groups in Germany and representatives of the ‘cabin’ in the ‘mountains’.” [We were working among French émigrés.] p. 395 “Work through the first line. When we arrived in the ‘country,’ we didn’t have any tips or leads in this direction. At the outset we didn’t know about the legal opportunities through the line of official institutions, and it later turned out that they were very insignificant and of no interest. Because of the nature of their covers, our regular operatives had no connections of their own and almost no prospects for acquiring them, due to the nature of the positions we held. Since it seemed to me that the development of legal connections through the White Notebook #1 3 line of our official institutions, through our regular operatives and agents would have taken too long and would have been problematic, I focused most of my attention on the use of fellowcountryman connections and opportunities in this direction. As a result of the war a number of new government institutions were established that were definitely of interest to us. Certain fellowcountrymen and progressive people they know went to work at these institutions. It seemed to me that by acquiring connections among them we would be able to obtain the information that interests us more quickly. ‘Helmsman’ wasn’t around during that period, and I G. Dennis got in touch with G. Dennis.2 p. 396 I asked him to assist us in this matter and to begin selecting people for us who were already working in government institutions and to take into consideration everyone who was just starting to work there. I received a reply to the effect that the fellowcountrymen leaders didn’t have ready information on this issue, but he would try to set up this work and help me in any way he could. Later, when ‘Helmsman’ returned from the ‘resort,’ I posed the same question to him and received roughly the same response. We took measures to utilize our other connections in fellowcountryman circles, ‘Helmsman’s’ brother, his wife, ‘Peasant,’ whom ‘Helmsman’ Helmsman designated to maintain communications with me. With tips from fellowcountrymen we recruited ‘Vick’ Henry ..., assistant chief of the Russian desk at the Commerce Department; ‘Yasha,’ Dmitry Vladimirovich ...; ‘Slang,’ Jane ... of the Far Eastern Department of the ‘cabin’; ‘Beaver-Cloth,’ William ... of the American Red Cross; ‘Rona,’ Rose ..., a volunteer worker, ← ‘Ruble,’ ‘Cantor’ and others, and while they were definitely of interest, they did not fulfill the hopes we pinned on them. Mainly it’s because these were either people who immediately began to leave, such as “Yasha,” “Vick,” “Ruble,” “Slang” and “Cantor,” and therefore could not be put to wider use by us, or they turned out to be people whose capabilities were somewhat overestimated by us, such as “Rona” and “Bever-Cloth,” who were subsequently deactivated. Some of these people continue to interest us and can be utilized by us, in terms of direct assistance with information during the crucial period they were of almost no help.” p. 397 “Sound’s” group. Concurrently we began to study “Sound’s” group.