After being wounded in battle in 1944, Penkovsky left the army and joined the renowned Frunze Military Academy. After a show trial, Penkovsky, who had been hoping to defect to the West with his family, was sentenced to death and executed by firing squad; Wynne, meanwhile, ended up serving 18 months in the . Oleg Penkovsky was a Soviet military intelligence colonel during the late Fifties and early Sixties responsible for informing the UK about the Kremlin's emplacement of missiles in Cuba. May 11, 1963. Oleg Penkovsky was a Soviet military intelligence colonel during the late Fifties and early Sixties responsible for informing the UK about the Soviet emplacement of missiles in Cuba, to help build . Oleg lives a quiet and unassuming life with his wife Vera (played by Maria Mironova) and their daughter Nina (played by Emma Penzina), who's about 5 or 6 years old. All our insect andgopher control solutions we deliver are delivered with the help of top gradeequipment and products. Oleg Penkovsky was born in a small town on the 23rd of April in 1919. Positive Elements. Everyone avoided me. The Soviet authorities rejected appeals by Greville Wynne's lawyer but 17 months into his sentence, they agreed to exchange Wynne for Soviet spy . 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. Before Ames, there was Edward Lee Howard, a CIA officer who had been slated to go to Moscow but was fired instead for drug use and petty theft. That Friday, Gordievsky received a cable ordering him to report to Moscow urgently to confirm his promotion and meet with the KGBs two highest officials. May 11, 1963. As Penkovskys position necessitated travel to Britain, the Russians initially didnt suspect him of espionage. The Spy Who Saved the World: Explores how information provided by Soviet Colonel Oleg Penkovsky aided the Kennedy administration during the Cuban Missile Crisis. In his memoir Spycatcher: The Candid Autobiography of a Senior Intelligence Officer (1987), written with journalist Paul Greengrass, Wright says: When I first wrote my Penkovsky analysis Maurice Oldfield (later Chief of MI6 in the 1970s), who played a key role in the Penkovsky case as Chief of Station in Washington, told me: 'You've got a long row to hoe with this one, Peter, there's a lot of K's [knighthoods] and Gongs [medals] riding high on the back of Penkovsky' he said, referring to the honours heaped on those involved in the Penkovsky operation. 445 & 35. It also gave US President John F. Kennedy, during the Cuban Missile Crisis that followed, valuable information about Soviet weakness that allowed him to face down Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev and resolve the crisis without a nuclear war. " He also went to war serving as a unit commander of an artillery unit. The agency cautioned that it would be too risky for him to bring that much cash through the airport and told him the money would be in Moscow, stashed inside a fake rock. Be that as it may, the British intelligence official returned in 1964 after spending two years in Soviet prison. In the Jack Ryan universe, he is described as the agent who recruited Colonel Mikhail Filitov as a CIA agent (code-name CARDINAL) and had urged Filitov to betray him to solidify his position as the West's top spy in the Soviet hierarchy. Controversy surrounds Penkovsky's death, with many believing that MI6 put him in danger after Blake confessed all to the Soviet officials. Penkovsky (right) during his trial. Penkovsky at his public trial in Moscow. After Penkovsky urged Wynne to arrange a meeting with the entities in question, he officially became a Western spy with the codename Hero.. For a long time he resented the impact of his fathers CIA spying on his own life. After Gordievsky escaped, a Soviet military tribunal sentenced him to death in absentia. [7], Former KGB major-general Oleg Kalugin does not mention Penkovsky in his comprehensive memoir about his career in intelligence against the West. Reiser was waiting in a car at the other end. If I was waiting for the elevator, they went down the stairs. Examining this moment in Cold War Era history, the film does a good job of remaining historically accurate with a . 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. Because I knew it was a death sentence.. Years later, Penkovsky himself would try to halt the Soviet spread of communism. Dunlap was just another source they had to protect. Enter Oleg Penkovsky. In April 1985, he has said, he told a Soviet contact in Washington the names of two or three double agents who had approached the CIA but who were actually working for the KGBdangles, in intelligence parlance. He was a highly placed Soviet official in Moscow who fed secrets to the West before and during the Cuban Missile crisis. He was arrested by the Soviets in 1962 and executed the next. His spying career was the subject of episode 1 of the 2007 BBC Television docudrama Nuclear Secrets, titled "The Spy from Moscow" in which he was portrayed by Mark Bonnar. I dont want to live in a tent, she said. He was later traded in an exchange after the British had a Russian spy, Konon Molody in their custody. Though much of Americas knowledge of the Soviet nuclear missile installations in Cuba came from spy plane photographs, one man defied his country to bring America vital intelligence that helped prevent nuclear war. The CIA delayed in contacting him. Over the course of his espionage, he delivered rolls of film, classified documents, and over 5,000 photos. Long after the massive losses in 1985, the lingering questions still gnaw at their counterintelligence experts. The timeline just didnt work to explain Gordievskys recall to Moscow, FBI Special Agent Leslie Wiser, who ran the Ames case, told me. After many years, I understood him. On the appointed day he startedproverka, or dry-cleaningwalking an elaborate route to throw off anyone who might be watching him. Murder by Cremation. This was seized upon by critics, including then Tory MP and espionage expert Rupert Allason, who rubbished much of Wynne's record. The documents provided by Penkovsky showed that the Soviet Union was not prepared for war in the area, which emboldened Kennedy to risk the operation in Cuba. They are in relation from previous few years of a strong relationship. It was in my fathers handwriting. Leonid Poleshchuk knew his first CIA case officer, who had recruited him in Nepal, as Joe. 3 3.Oleg Penkovsky - Your Resource for Espionage on the Web; 4 4.What Happened To Greville Wynne And Oleg - Showbizcorner; 5 5.The True Story Behind 'The Courier' | History| Smithsonian Magazine; 6 6.Spy Penkovsky biography. On April 23, 1919, Oleg Vladimirovich Penkovsky was born in Vladikavkaz, Russia. Whether your office needs a reliable exterminator or your home is under attack by a variety of rodents and insects, you dont need to fear anymore, because we are here to help you out. Without the senior Soviet military intelligence officer or his active role as a double agent during that time the Cold War could have gotten very hot. Penkovsky joined the Soviet Red Army in 1937 and served as an artillery officer in World War II, being severely wounded in 1944. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Oleg-Vladimirovich-Penkovsky, Public Broadcasting Service - Biography of Oleg Vladimirovich Penkovsky, Spartacus Educational - Biography of Oleg Penkovsky. The coded exchange triggered a meeting that night with his CIA case officer, Dick Reiser, who cabled headquarters in Langley that BLIZZARD was in trouble. More than a year before the crisis, they had recruited a civilian, British businessman Greville Wynne, to do so. Sergei Bokhan was also separated from his family for six years. After Ames, there was FBI agent Robert P. Hanssen, who was arrested in 2001. The MI6 specialist experienced post-arrest sadness and torment. In a letter to me from the federal prison in Allenwood, Pennsylvania, where he is serving a life sentence, Ames wrote: Im quite sure of my recollection that I gave the KGB no names of any other than the two or three double agents/dangles I provided in April 85, until June 13th.. The future double agents father died that same year fighting against the communists in the Russian Revolution. Oleg Penkovsky. Penkovsky, sadly, was tried and executed for conspiracy by the Soviets in 1962. Before his father left Lagos, Andrei said, he gave a gold watch to his CIA case officer at the time. This is a picture of Oleg Penkovsky in his uniform and all of his medals, which he earned during World War Two. Stuzhin & Cheredintzev/Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images. How the traitor Oleg Penkovsky was 7 7.The Courier vs. the True Story of British Spy Greville Wynne He played a role in both the Berlin Crisis in 1961 and the Cuban Missile Crisis the following year. Guaranteed Reliability and Proven Results! We know very well that youve been deceiving us for years, he said. 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. This for the spy masters is an exercise in . In August 1960, a Soviet colonel called Oleg Penkovsky contacted the West to offer to work as a 'soldier warrior for the free world. In Athens, Bokhan called an emergency telephone number that rang in the CIA station inside the American Embassy. In extended CIA and FBI debriefings, he talked about his nine years of spying for Moscowincluding the day when he turned over, in his words, the identities of virtually all Soviet agents of the CIA and other American and foreign services known to me.. You have the wrong number, he was told. Maybe a fifth. Outwardly, Janet was an ordinary mother of four children. The same can be said about arriving at your workplaceand finding out that it has been overrun by a variety of pests. The mere belief that theres another mole, whether correct or not, can cause chaos inside an intelligence agency. Penkovsky provided plans and descriptions of the nuclear rocket launch sites in Cuba to the West. Brought up in the North Caucasus, Penkovsky graduated from the Kiev Artillery Academy with the rank of lieutenant in 1939. Hanssen, who was convicted of espionage, is serving a life sentence in the supermax federal prison in Florence, Colorado. Soon there was a plan for an exfiltration, the CIAs term for spiriting an agent in danger out of a foreign country. When Oleg Penkovsky offered Soviet military secrets to MI6, she became the go-between. This story is a selection from the November issue of Smithsonian magazine. Some believe Penkovsky was burned alive as Soviet punishment for his treasonous espionage. 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. Penkovsky was referred to in four of Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan espionage novels: The Hunt for Red October (1984), The Cardinal of the Kremlin (1988), The Bear and the Dragon (2000) and Red Rabbit (2002). He had been drugged. Central Press/Hulton Archive/Getty ImagesBritish spy Greville Wynne was Penkovskys contact and intermediate to MI6. Terms of Use When Bokhan escaped from Athens, the KGB hustled his wife back to Moscow, searched her apartment and began a series of interrogations. He always hoped Leila would join him in England. Henceforth, the ranks of your armed forces are increased by one man.. Its OK. To be dead or to be alive was the question for my dad. Within two weeks after his flight to the United States, he had a new name, a fake background, a Social Security number and a 9-millimeter Beretta. A 2020 film, The Courier, featuring Benedict Cumberbatch, follows his story. He decided to leave Athensbut not for Moscow. This both kills the victim and disposes of the body in one fell swoop. Penkovsky was wounded in action in 1944, at about the same time as Varentsov, who appointed him his Liaison Officer. The same year, he said, they spotted the potential of Colonel Oleg Penkovsky, the assistant Soviet military attache in Ankara, Turkey. Her husband was a spy who headed the MI6 station in Moscow but worked under the guise of a visa officer. As MacIntyre reminds us, the rumor has always been that MI6-CIA agent Oleg Penkovsky, betrayed by British-spy-turned-Soviet-agent George Blake, had been cremated alive in 1963 by the KGB after . CIA and FBI agents who knew the Russian agonized over . He was probably the Wests most valuable double agent during the Cold War. Chief KGB interrogator Alexander Zagvozdin said Penkosvky was questioned perhaps a hundred times and then shot. Penkovsky joined the GRU as an officer, in 1953. harvp error: no target: CITEREFSchecterDeriabinPenkovskij1992 (. By 1939 he had graduated from a Soviet military school and had been part of a group called Komosomol, meaning "young communists. Penkovsky was decorated four times during his 1939-1940 tour of duty. 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. In the morning, they took usmy mother, my grandmother and meand put us in separate black Volgas, Andrei said. This paper is about Oleg Penkovsky and his profound contributions to the UK and US military intelligence. JB: The first meeting with Oleg Penkovsky was about seven p.m. April twenty first 1961 and he was told what room to go to at the Mount Royal Hotel in London and thanks to my MI6 friends, they permitted me, since he first wanted to meet the Americans, to be the one to answer the door and meet him. secret papers written by Oleg Penkovsky, the Soviet official sentenced to death after the Greville Wynne trial. Penkovsky was portrayed by Eduard Bezrodniy in the 2014 Polish thriller Jack Strong, about Ryszard Kukliski, another Cold War spy. Northolt Airport, England. But unlike other famous characters, his personality, the role he played and what . He also held the view that leaking this information would bring him a great deal of recognition and a sense of honour. The results you delivered are amazing! Oleg Vladimirovich Penkovsky (Russian: ; 23 April 1919 16 May 1963), codenamed HERO,[1] was a Soviet military intelligence (GRU) colonel during the late 1950s and early 1960s. He is known as one of the greatest spies in the world. It shortened her life, he said. Inside the CIA, Howard was blamed for Tolkachevs unmasking and subsequent execution, although Ames, too, had betrayed the researchers identity. He did so, he said, to prove his bona fides as a potential KGB mole. Penkovskys stolen files showed that the Soviet arsenal was smaller and weaker than the Americans had previously thought. Oleg Penkovsky was executed by firing squad one week after the trial. 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. Athens, May 21, 1985: After the Tuesday-morning staff meeting at the Soviet Embassy, Col. Sergei Ivanovich Bokhan stayed behind to talk to his boss, the local rezident of the GRU, the Soviet military intelligence agency. 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