He holds dual bachelor's degrees from Pace University and a master's degree from New York University. Andrei was allowed to visit him in prison only once, after he was sentenced to death. I was 18 years old. He sees that episode differently now. After Penkovsky urged Wynne to arrange a meeting with the entities in question, he officially became a Western spy with the codename Hero.. Continue. It said Bokhans son, Alex, 18, was having trouble in military school and suggested the deputy take his vacation now, three months early, and return to the Soviet Union to deal with him. Penkovsky was portrayed by Merab Ninidze in the 2020 British film The Courier, in which Benedict Cumberbatch played Greville Wynne. Oleg Gordievsky and Leila Alieva met in Copenhagen: she was a typist for the World Health Organization; he was an unhappily married KGB officer, and a spy for MI6. A skilled intelligence officer, he had been promoted a few months before to rezident, or chief, of the KGB station in the British capital. GRU agent Vladimir Rezun, however, claimed in his memoir that he saw footage of Penkovsky being strapped to a stretcher inside of a crematorium and burned alive. After his release, Wynne struggled with . This was seized upon by critics, including then Tory MP and espionage expert Rupert Allason, who rubbished much of Wynne's record. The same year, he said, they spotted the potential of Colonel Oleg Penkovsky, the assistant Soviet military attache in Ankara, Turkey. He was arrested for espionage in Budapest on Nov. 16, 1962. The stories of Oleg Gordievsky, Sergei Bokhan and Leonid Poleshchukreported here in extensive new detail and based on interviews with Gordievsky, Bokhan and Andrei Poleshchuk, as well as former FBI and CIA officialssuggest the damage a mole can do. For Oleg Penkovsky, however, his world-altering espionage work hastened his death. [13], Penkovsky was arrested on 22 October 1962. Trong khi , mt ip vin ca GRU tn . After 14 days of strained negotiations, on October 28 Khruschev agreed to withdraw Soviet weapons from Cuba and the world breathed a sigh of relief. Penkovsky provided plans and descriptions of the nuclear rocket launch sites in Cuba to the West. Wynne was arrested in Budapest and extradited to the Soviet Union. Penkovsky never knew his father, who was killed fighting as an officer in the White Army in the Russian Civil War when he was a baby. In October 1962, the U.S. and U.S.S.R. were on the brink of nuclear war after Soviet nuclear missiles were spotted in Cuba. At first I couldnt even recognize him, Andrei said. The KGB told Andrei his fathers remains were cremated and there would be no grave. [12], Penkovsky's activities were revealed by Jack Dunlap, a National Security Agency (NSA) employee and Soviet spy working for the KGB. In 1997, Andrei and Svetlana emigrated to the United States. While Oleg was tried and executed by the Soviets, they sentenced Wynne to eight years in prison. These things have to be run to ground.. According to an official Soviet announcement, he was executed on May 16, 1963, though other reports have him committing suicide while in a Soviet camp. Over the course of his espionage, he delivered rolls of film, classified documents, and over 5,000 photos. After they chatted for a while, the rezident said, By the way, Sergei, this cable came in and tossed it over. Penkovsky, who was tried with him, was sentenced to death for treason. The publication of post-Cold War memoirs by former agents and the release of declassified documents by the United States and Russia have provided a fairly complete account of the CIA's activities, including both its successes and its failures. Top KGB officers had known for more than a year that Penkovsky was a British agent, but they protected their source, a highly placed mole in MI6. If it should turn out that the mole is no longer alive, the intelligence agencies would still run a damage assessment to try to reconstruct what and whom he might have betrayed. "Maybe we're only two people but this is how things change." The Courier is an intriguing spy drama. We have no more Information about his Father; we will try to collect information and update soon. This information allowed the West to identify the missile sites from the low-resolution pictures provided by US U-2 spy planes. This jump from the army to the GRU set the course for the rest of Penkovskys life. Although Gordievsky has written that he climbed into the trunk of one of the cars, a former CIA officer says he actually crawled into a space in a specially modified Land Rover. PG-13 I remember Oleg Penkovsky (a scintillating Merab Nididze) very well. Alexander Zagvozdin, chief KGB interrogator for the investigation, stated that Penkovsky had been "questioned perhaps a hundred times" and that he had been shot and cremated. He was born to his first wife, Sheila. After some months, she was released. This for the spy masters is an exercise in . I was angry because I was dropped from military school and sent to the Army, far off, near Vladivostok, he said. The Courier is currently lived by his son, Andrew, as he died in 1990 at the age of 70. After a West German agent overheard a remark at Stasi headquarters, paraphrased as "I wonder how things are going in Cuba" he passed it on to the CIA. Espionage charges in a Soviet court were not to be taken lightly and Penkovsky was sentenced to death. Greville Wynne and Oleg Penkovsky redirected the virus war. He was the real deal. Penkovsky, sadly, was tried and executed for conspiracy by the Soviets in 1962. [7], Former KGB major-general Oleg Kalugin does not mention Penkovsky in his comprehensive memoir about his career in intelligence against the West. He would not say why. Robert Wallace and H. Keith Melton, with Henry R. Schlesinger, 'Fatal Encounter' BBC TV documentary 3 May 1991, KGB, MI6 and CIA officers involved with the Penkovsky reveal their stories, This page was last edited on 30 January 2023, at 08:39. It was apparent that Soviet counterintelligence agents did not yet have enough evidence to arrest him. Gordievsky was taken home, but Grushko confronted him at the KGB the next day. Penkovsky had in the meantime become increasingly disillusioned with the Soviet system, particularly with the leadership of Nikita Khrushchev. This paper is about Oleg Penkovsky and his profound contributions to the UK and US military intelligence. Some days passed before his boss, Viktor Grushko, drove him to a KGB dacha, saying some people wanted to talk to him. The KGB took her to a sanitarium, where she was drugged and interrogated further. Only a few days earlier he had called his brother-in-law in Kiev, where Alex was studying, and been assured his son was doing well. There were certain anomalies that took place that we just couldnt put our finger on., And Bearden says, I remain convinced there is a fourth man. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). The same can be said about arriving at your workplaceand finding out that it has been overrun by a variety of pests. Controversy surrounds Penkovsky's death, with many believing that MI6 put him in danger after Blake confessed all to the Soviet officials. Leonids original case officer blamed himself for years for letting my father down. The information he provided on the Soviets relatively weak capability in long-range missiles proved invaluable to the United States before and during the Cuban missile crisis of October 1962. [9] While the weight of opinion seems to be that Penkovsky was genuine, the debate underscores the difficulty faced by all intelligence agencies of determining information offered from the enemy. Penkovsky and Wynne's motivation to steal top-secret intel from the USSR is driven by their desire to protect their loved ones from a nuclear holocaust. He was later traded in an exchange after the British had a Russian spy, Konon Molody in their custody. After many years, I understood him. The film tells the story of Oleg Penkovsky, one. Penkovsky stashed the documents in packs of cigarettes and candy boxes which he hid in agreed-upon public places, in what are known as dead letter drops. This method allowed him to transfer items to his Western handlers without attracting attention. Penkovsky was portrayed by Eduard Bezrodniy in the 2014 Polish thriller Jack Strong, about Ryszard Kukliski, another Cold War spy. The recruitment of a well-placed spy, in this case a high-ranking Soviet military intelligence officer, lessened the tensions of the Cold War by providing information on the intentions, strength, and technological advancement of the Soviet Union. Occasionally the killer will opt to dispense with the coffin . Penkovsky was decorated four times during his 1939-1940 tour of duty. Advertising Notice If I was waiting for the elevator, they went down the stairs. He was a highly placed Soviet official in Moscow who fed secrets to the West before and during the Cuban Missile crisis. Officially, he was shot to death. Oleg Vladimirovich Penkovsky, (born April 23, 1919, Vladikavkaz, Russiadied May 1963?, U.S.S.R.), senior Soviet military intelligence officer who was convicted of spying for the United Kingdom and the United States. A KGB general told him he had confessed. But this Land Rovers driveshaft had been rerouted through one of the vehicles doors, the former CIA officer says, so that Gordievsky could fold himself into the hump, in effect hiding in plain sight. In November 1960, Greville Wynne, a 41-year-old British businessman, sat down for a lunch that would change his life. I just saw The Courier The true story about two men who helped prevent nuclear war between the US and Russia in 1962. Benedict Cumberbatch is quite brilliant. Gophers and other rodents can prove to be a real nuisance for open sporting fields, and if you want to have an undisturbed game or event, our specialists will make sure that everything is OK. He was convicted of spying on 11 May 1963 and sentenced to eight years in prison; Penkovsky was sentenced to death and executed (although Wynne himself in his book "The man from Odessa' claimed that Penkovsky committed suicide in prison). His work helped American intelligence confirm that Soviet nuclear capabilities were vastly inferior to Americas arsenal information that would prove vital in resolving the Cuban Missile Crisis. We had neighbors that were very close. That happened several times.. For two years I went to Lefortovo two, three times a week, Alla Bokhan told me. He reportedly committed suicide in a Soviet labor camp. Stansfield. Houses, offices, and agricultural areas will become pest-free with our services. Her eyes were empty. In simple terms, the GRU was Soviet army intelligence. His arrest was followed by a public trial in May 1963. The "cremated alive" hypothesis appears in several Clancy novels, though Clancy never identified Penkovsky as the executed spy. No, he was told, theyre here for you.. If so, Hunting Pest Services is definitely the one for you. It was surreal, like a bad nightmare, Andrei told me. Penkovsky-wynne spy trial, May 1963, a Sanyo portable transistor radio . Leonid never made it to the rock, his son said. Bokhan assumed that both the KGB and the GRU were watching him. As they walked on the beach that Saturday, he said his career was in trouble. We are a Claremont, CA situated business that delivers the leading pest control service in the area. However, the two were captured by the KGB after the Russians discovered that they were being neutralized. And yet to an intelligence agency, ignoring the possibility of a mole isnt really an option, either. The daughter of a Russian mother . Oleg Penkovsky had his sights set on moving to the West and building a better life with his family and, therefore, he was keen to expose some of the Soviet's most valuable military secrets. His character's execution was the opening scene for the movie. The Soviets had arranged for the apparent good news to reach his wife through a friend and former co-worker in Moscow, who wrote to her in Lagos. Mr. Wint: Very moving. It doesnt matter, he said, and quoted a Russian proverb: S milym rai i v shalashe. If you love somebody, you will have heaven even in a tent. I had no job. Years later, Penkovsky himself would try to halt the Soviet spread of communism. GRU . pic.twitter.com/EbShcFsWv2, Kenneth MacRae (@kmacraeplockton) February 19, 2022. After Ames was arrested and charged with espionage, his attorney, Plato Cacheris, negotiated a plea bargain with prosecutors: Ames wife, Rosario, an accomplice in his spying, would be spared a long prison sentence if he cooperated fully with the authorities. 445 & 35. April 22, 1964. But before the two years were up, a KGB agent caught him passing secrets. The Spy Who Saved the World: Explores how information provided by Soviet Colonel Oleg Penkovsky aided the Kennedy administration during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Wars don't last forever, though, and after the shots quit ringing out, Penkovsky would go on to enter the Soviet version of the CIA the GRU. Oleg Penkovsky. In his autobiography, Wynne says that he was carefully developed by British intelligence over many years with the specific task of making contact with Penkovsky.[5]. A somewhat baroque means of murder, the killer shuts their victim in a coffin (knocking them out first is optional) and feeds the coffin into a crematorium oven. Maria, then 16, was carrying the patatuff. When I found a job, the KGB called and they fired me. Northolt Airport, England. Greville Wynne And Oleg Penkovsky were two people who had a significant role in containing the cold war. There were embraces, and everyone cried. He was most popular as the messenger who could give highly confidential information about the Soviets. In 1944, he was assigned to the headquarters of Colonel-General Sergei Varentsov, commander of artillery on the 1st Ukrainian front, who became his patron. The results you delivered are amazing! " He also went to war serving as a unit commander of an artillery unit. Because I knew it was a death sentence.. He dropped it, sensing that he was getting into dangerous territory. He was to stand on a certain Moscow street corner on a designated day and time until he saw a British-looking man who was eating something. The courier was Greville Wynne [] More than a year before the crisis, they had recruited a civilian, British businessman Greville Wynne, to do so. On September 21, 1985, Howard eluded FBI surveillance and escaped into the New Mexico desert with the help of his wife, Mary, and a pop-up dummy in his cars passenger seat (a technique he had learned in CIA training). Penkovsky had been trying to offer his services to the west for some years, blatantly buttonholing diplomats and businessmen at receptions and approaching tourists in the street. Did an Ancient Magnetic Field Reversal Cause Chaos for Life on Earth 42,000 Years Ago? Maybe a fifth. Penkovsky's father might have fled to the West rather than have died of typhus as Penkovsky had previously reported, the KGB prohibited Penkovsky from assuming his post in New Delhi but permitted him to remain in the GRU after his mother submitted a statement detailing her family's ignorance of her husband's fate.28 276 to 280, "A Spy Story: Sergei Skripal Was a LIttle Fish. In Wright's view, the failure of British intelligence leaders to listen to him caused them to become paralysed when such agents defected to the Soviet Union; in his book, Spycatcher, he suggests that his hypothesis had to be true, and that the Soviets were aware of this paralysis and planted Penkovsky. Was there a fourth mole in the U.S. intelligence system that blew these secret agents covers? He stayed in safe houses in Virginia at first, then lived half a year in California to learn English, moved back East and consulted for the CIA and some U.S. companies. His father, Leonid Poleshchuk, was a senior KGB counterintelligence officer, most recently the deputy rezident for counterintelligence in Lagos, Nigeria. You have the wrong number, he was told. A member of the Communist Party, he took part in the invasion of Finland and by the end of the Second World War had reached the rank of lieutenant-colonel. If there is a fourth mole, and he is still alive, the FBI would surely want to catch him and prosecute him. He was later traded in an exchange after the British had a Russian spy, Konon Molody in their custody. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. Janet Chisholms husband, Rauri Chisholm, worked with a man named George Blake who happened to be a KGB agent. The mole isnt just some guy who stole a few secrets. Penkovsky was the highest-ranking Soviet official to provide intelligence for the West up until that time, and is one of several individuals credited with altering the course of the Cold War. His real job was as a senior officer in the GRU, Soviet . In July 1994, Leslie Wiser, the FBI agent who unmasked Ames, flew to London to interview Gordievsky. One theory links his arrest to the spouse of a contact. 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