The Compatriots
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Copyright
Copyright © 2019 by Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Soldatov, Andreĭ, author. | Borogan, I. (Irina), author.
Title: The compatriots : the brutal and chaotic history of Russia’s exiles, emigrés, and agents abroad / Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan.
Other titles: Brutal and chaotic history of Russia’s exiles, emigrés, and agents abroad
Description: First edition. | New York : PublicAffairs, 2019. | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019021344 (print) | LCCN 2019980308 (ebook) | ISBN 9781541730168 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781541730182 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Russians—Foreign countries—History. | Refugees—Soviet Union. | Political refugees—Foreign countries. | Secret service—Soviet Union. | Soviet Union—Politics and government.
Classification: LCC DK35.5 .S65 2019 (print) | LCC DK35.5 (ebook) | DDC 305.8917/1—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019021344
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019980308
ISBNs: 978-1-5417-3016-8 (hardcover), 978-1-5417-3018-2 (ebook)
E3-20190823-JV-NF-ORI
CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Soviet/Russian Foreign Intelligence Organizations and Departments in Charge of Keeping Tabs on Russian Émigrés
Cast of Characters
Epigraph
Introduction
PART I: SPIES AND DISSIDENTS
1 Talent Spotting
2 Identifying Targets
3 The Cost of Love
4 “The Horse”
5 “The Mother”
6 Operations Area: United States
7 The Tide Turns
8 Warring Narratives
9 Stalin’s Daughter
10 Now It’s Official
11 Bear in the West
12 The KGB Thinks Big
13 Moving People
14 The Other Russia
PART II: MARKET FORCES
15 Moving the Money
16 The Scheme Devised
17 Muddying the Waters
18 Some Habits Die Hard
19 Cooperation and Rebranding
PART III: PUTIN’S PROJECT
20 A Fresh Start
21 The Siege
22 Getting Out the Message
23 The Crisis
24 Courting the White Church
25 Reunion
PART IV: MEANS OF OUTREACH
26 Political Emigration: Restart
27 Illusions Crushed
28 “We Need Some Targeted Hits”
29 Desperate Times
30 When the Party’s Over
31 Eliminating the Problem
32 Chasing a Poison
33 Everything Old Is New Again
34 The Fears of the Super-Rich
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Discover More
About the Authors
Also by Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan
Notes
Explore book giveaways, sneak peeks, deals, and more.
Tap here to learn more.
SOVIET/RUSSIAN FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE ORGANIZATIONS AND DEPARTMENTS IN CHARGE OF KEEPING TABS ON RUSSIAN ÉMIGRÉS
• 1920—INO (Inostranny Otdel; Foreign Department) at Cheka (the All Russian Extraordinary Commission, known as the Soviet secret police, established in 1917)
• 1922—INO at GPU (Glavnoye Politicheskoye Upravlenie; Chief Political Department) and then at OGPU (Obyedinyonnoye Gosudarstvennoye Politicheskoye Upravleniye; Joint State Political Department)
• 1930—Administration for Special Tasks at INO of OGPU and the Fifth Section at INO (emigration)
• 1934—INO, renamed in 1939 into the Fifth Department at NKVD (Narodny Kommisariat Vnutrennikh Del; People’s Commissariat of Internal Affairs)
• 1941—First Directorate at NKGB (Narodny Kommisariat Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti; People’s Commissariat of State Security)
• 1945—Ninth Section (Emigration) at First Directorate at NKGB
• 1946—Section 10-A (Emigration) at the First Directorate of the MGB (Ministerstvo Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti; Ministry of State Security)
• 1947—Section EM at KI (Komitet Informatsii; Information Committee)
• 1949—Third Section at First Directorate (External Counterintelligence) of the MGB
• 1951—Third Section at First Chief Directorate (Foreign Intelligence) of the MGB
• 1953—Ninth and then Fifth Section (External Counterintelligence) at the Second Chief Directorate of the MVD (Ministerstvo Vnutrennikh Del; Interior Ministry)
• 1954—Ninth Section within the First Chief Directorate (Foreign Intelligence) of the KGB
• 1963—Second Service (External Counterintelligence) of the First Chief Directorate of the KGB
• 1974—Department K (External Counterintelligence) of the First Chief Directorate of the KGB. The Fourth Section of Department K was specifically tasked to deal with the émigré organizations.
• 1975—Nineteenth Section within the First Chief Directorate of the KGB
• 1991—SVR (Sluzhba Vneshney Razvedki; Foreign Intelligence Service or External Intelligence)
• 1992—GRU (Glavnoye Razvedivatelnoe Upravlenie–GRU VS Rossii; military intelligence agency known as the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Russia)
• 1995—FSB (Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti; Federal Security Service)
CAST OF CHARACTERS
LEADERS OF NATIONS
Joseph Stalin
Leonid Brezhnev
Richard Nixon
Mikhail Gorbachev
Boris Yeltsin
Vladimir Putin
STALIN’S SECRET SERVICES
Vasily Zarubin, chief of station in the United States
Mikhail Trilisser, head of the Foreign Intelligence Department (INO)
Nahum Eitingon, chief operative in charge of high-profile assassinations
Liza Gorskaya, operative; Zarubin’s third wife
Yakov Blyumkin, operative, head of illegal station in Istan
bul
Jacob Golos, head of Soviet spy ring in New York
Earl Browder, chairman of Communist Party in the United States
George Koval, “illegal” in New York
Caridad Mercader and Ramon Mercader, Eitingon’s assets
COMMITTEE OF STATE SECURITY (KGB)
Yuri Andropov, chairman
Vladimir Kryuchkov, head of the foreign intelligence branch—the First Chief Directorate—and later chairman
Leonid Shebarshin, head of the First Chief Directorate
Alexander Vassiliev, KGB operative, journalist, and later historian
Yuri Sagaidak, KGB operative, journalist, and later financier
YELTSIN’S SECRET SERVICES
Evgeny Primakov, head of SVR Foreign Intelligence agency
Yuri Kobaladze, SVR’s head of public relations
Alexander Litvinenko, FSB officer, refugee in London, and author
PUTIN’S SECRET SERVICES
Sergei Naryshkin, head of SVR Foreign Intelligence agency
Sergei Tretyakov, SVR deputy head of station in New York
Anna Chapman, SVR agent in the United States (New York)
Mikhail Semenko, SVR agent in the United States (Washington, DC)
Evgeny Buryakov, SVR operative, New York station
EITINGON/ZARUBIN FAMILY
Zoya Zarubina, spy and translator; daughter of Vasily Zarubin and stepdaughter of Nahum Eitingon
Alexei Kozlov, financier, inmate, activist, and Russian-German businessman; grandson of Zoya Zarubina
Olga Romanova, journalist and head of Russia Behind Bars; wife of Alexei Kozlov
KARA-MURZA FAMILY
Vladimir Kara-Murza (senior), journalist and NTV news anchor
Vladimir Kara-Murza Jr., journalist and politician; son of Vladimir Kara-Murza
Zhenya Kara-Murza, wife of Vladimir Kara-Murza Jr.
AMERICANS
George Kennan, diplomat, historian, and author of the “containment” policy
Henry Kissinger, secretary of state
Louis Fischer, journalist
George Fischer, author and researcher; son of Louis Fischer
Bert Jolis, Office of Strategic Service veteran, diamond trader, and fund-raiser for Resistance International
Bill Browder, investor, anti-Kremlin campaigner; grandson of Earl Browder
RUSSIAN OPPOSITION
Boris Nemtsov, Yeltsin’s vice prime minister and politician
Vadim Prokhorov, lawyer to Boris Nemtsov and Vladimir Kara-Murza Jr.; no relation to Mikhail Prokhorov
COMPATRIOTS
Leon Trotsky, founder of the Red army and Stalin’s archenemy in exile
Svetlana Alliluyeva, Stalin’s daughter and writer
Mikhail Baryshnikov, dancer
Alexander Solzhenitsyn, soldier, prisoner, and writer
Natasha Gurfinkel, senior vice president of Bank of New York
Vladimir Galitzine, aristocrat and vice president of Bank of New York
Lucy Edwards, vice president of Bank of New York
Vladimir Bukovsky, dissident and founder of Resistance International
Mikhail Tolstoy, member of parliament and organizer of the First Congress of Compatriots
Alexei Jordan, aristocrat, financier, and leader of the United Russian Cadet Corps in the United States
Boris Jordan, financier and media manager; son of Alexei Jordan
Peter Holodny, priest, financier, and treasurer of the White Church
Masha Gessen, journalist, author, and LGBTQ activist
Masha Slonim, journalist and granddaughter of Stalin’s foreign minister
Ilya Zaslavskiy, oil company manager and activist at Free Russia Foundation
Garry Kasparov, chess champion and opposition activist
OLIGARCHS
Boris Berezovsky, go-between and go-getter, and former ally of Putin exiled to London
Vladimir Gusinsky, media magnate and founder of NTV and Russian Television International; in exile
Mikhail Khodorkovsky, oil tycoon, prisoner, and leader of Open Russia movement; in exile
Alexander Lebedev, KGB officer in London, banker, and media magnate in Russia and the United Kingdom
Mikhail Prokhorov, nickel tycoon, owner of the Brooklyn Nets, media magnate, and owner of Snob (Global Russians club)
“There is no business like it. We are politicians. We are soldiers. And, above all, we are actors on a wonderful stage.”
LEONID NIKITENKO,
a chief of the Nineteenth Section of the KGB, in charge of recruiting agents in the Russian émigré communities in the West
“A strong diaspora can only exist if there is a strong state.”
VLADIMIR PUTIN,
president of Russia, former colonel of the KGB
INTRODUCTION
Toward the end of December 2017, a skinny, young Russian with expressive eyes, a stubbly beard, and a slight limp walked into a coffee shop in downtown Washington, DC. His name was Vladimir Kara-Murza (junior), and he was a Russian political émigré and anti-Kremlin lobbyist. He had lived in DC for years but often traveled back and forth to Moscow, irritating the Kremlin. On a trip to Moscow in spring 2015, he had been poisoned and nearly died. During his treatment in a Washington hospital, he received a visit from an FBI agent who said he had been assigned to Kara-Murza’s case. When Kara-Murza recovered, he flew back to Moscow, and in February 2017 he was poisoned a second time, experiencing identical symptoms. That was why, ten months later, he was still limping.
The young Russian took a seat next to the window and a minute later was joined by a tall man in his midforties: the FBI agent. The agent had called for a meeting, promising to bring Kara-Murza some information about his poisoning. At this point, they had known each other for two years.
“We think we found the active substance you were poisoned with,” the FBI agent said.
He told Kara-Murza that the agency was preparing a detailed report and explained that the heads of the Russian secret services would be soon visiting Washington: “We are going to hand the report over to them—that there was an attempted murder of a Russian citizen on Russian territory for political reasons.”
The FBI’s intent, the agent implied, was to send a message that they were not very happy about politically motivated poisonings in Moscow. But some in the agency were more troubled by the strange events happening on their own turf—in Washington.
A year and a half earlier, a Russian former press minister and presidential aide had been brutally beaten near his Dupont Circle hotel. He managed to make it to his room and then died there, not far from the coffee shop where Kara-Murza and the FBI agent were sitting. Those who had beaten the ex-minister to death were never found, and the rumor in Moscow was that he had fallen out of line with the Kremlin just before the incident.
The FBI wanted to make its concerns clear to the Russian intelligence community, and the upcoming visit provided a unique opportunity. The heads of all three major Russian spy agencies—SVR, the foreign intelligence agency; FSB, the domestic security service; and the GRU, military intelligence—had never before traveled together to a Western capital, but they planned to do exactly that at the end of January 2018.
Three weeks after their coffee shop meeting, the FBI agent called Kara-Murza again. He didn’t offer to meet this time. He just told Kara-Murza that laboratory results on the poison were inconclusive and that the plan to deliver a report had been called off. Then he hung up.
The heads of the three Russian intelligence agencies flew to Washington, as planned, at the end of January. It was very unlikely, given the circumstances, that the report on Kara-Murza was mentioned at the highly secret meeting.1 The following month, another Russian, former spy Sergei Skripal, would be poisoned in Britain by two agents of Russian military intelligence.
Almost thirty years after the collapse of the Soviet Union and twenty since Vladimir Putin came to power in the Kremlin, Russians abroad were suddenly in the cross
hairs.
In January 2018, as the heads of all three Russian spy agencies went to Washington, we went to Paris.
In the heavy rain, across the enormous Champ de Mars, the Eiffel Tower seemed unreachable. We were standing at the epicenter of France’s military glory: behind us stood the stately classic complex of the École-Militaire—the famous center for French military education—and all around us the avenues were named after French marshals.
We decided to keep walking. It was a nice walk, even in the rain; after the winter in Moscow, it felt good to see something other than snow. From the Champ de Mars we headed down the Avenue Rapp—named after a Napoleonic general who led an attack at Austerlitz that completely decimated the Russian emperor’s elite Chevalier Guard. Our destination was the Pont de l’Alma, a bridge named after a Crimean War battle in which an expeditionary French and British force defeated the Russian army.
But our intentions for sightseeing were not historical in nature. Right at that junction stands a brand-new complex: four buildings with facades covered in beige limestone. The building in the middle, topped by five onion-shaped domes, is the Holy Trinity Cathedral—part of the Russian Orthodox Spiritual and Cultural Center.
We wanted to see it because although the center had been in operation for only two years, it had already sparked large-scale “spy mania.” Among the rumors circulating was that the French counterintelligence services had surrounded the complex with jamming devices to prevent the Russians from using the center’s facilities for electronic eavesdropping. And we knew that the officials at the French Foreign Ministry, located on the nearby Quai d’Orsay, were pissed off by the Russian government’s request that the center’s employees be granted diplomatic immunity.
We entered through the main doors. Two bulky security guards told us—very politely and in Russian—to open our bags. They checked the insides thoroughly.
We crossed the main hall and entered an internal courtyard, where the rain was still coming down. But when we tried to sneak into the next building, we were stopped; a man appeared from nowhere and gestured at us to stop and go back. It was clear that we had entered an area that was under careful watch. In an instant, we were struck by that familiar feeling of being on Russian territory—specifically, the territory of a Russian government institution abroad.