Using the situation of Captain King’s dire need for money that he hoped would help to advance his son’s career in high society, Pieck made his move. As someone who had already earned a reputation as a solid businessman with connections in society, he suggested to MAG an easy way to earn the money. As bait, COOPER used the same financial angle that had been used with SHELLEY. Having a solid foundation in economics (with his educational background in that area, back in his Prague days, he had served as economics adviser at the Soviet Trade Mission in Czechoslovakia), Dmitri helped Pieck to prepare the pitch in meticulous detail. COOPER told MAG that a big Dutch bank to which he had close ties needed certain political information in order to make money on the international stock exchange. With that information, financial investments could pay off handsomely. For example, if it could be confirmed that a war between Italy and Abyssinia, which was rumored at the time, was indeed going to break out, buying stock in Italian plants working for the war machine would promise the bank big returns on its investments. Information confirming that Germany’s air force buildup was soon to be legalized would have the same effect. The bank’s profits on investments in the German airplane industry would skyrocket. Coaching Pieck, Dmitri also supplied him with a few truly successful cases of such financial operations. He went over the numbers with Pieck several times, until he was sure the man was thoroughly prepared.46
To make it look natural, Pieck revealed to MAG his own ulterior motive to make a connection with the bank: of the one hundred British pounds a month the bank was ready to pay for the confidential diplomatic information, he would take forty pounds in commission. With Dmitri behind COOPER’s back at every step, MAG took the bait and began working successfully. Among many exceptionally valuable confidential materials, including ciphered telegrams, Dmitri and Pieck received from MAG a copy of a report about a meeting between the minister of foreign affairs of Great Britain, John Simon, and Adolf Hitler, which took place at the Chancellor’s Palace in Berlin on March 25 and 26, 1935.47
The last mention in the KGB files of Bystrolyotov’s involvement in decision making regarding MAG is dated September 1935. At that time, COOPER was occupied on the continent and could not come to England to accept MAG’s deliveries. With no one else in London to replace him, Dmitri again volunteered to step in despite the obvious risk: someone who had seen him with ARNO, for example, Kemp, still employed by the Foreign Office, might recognize him.48
MAG remained undetected by the British authorities for the duration of his work with the OGPU, which lasted until the summer of 1937, when his controller at the time, Theodor Mally, was recalled to the USSR. In 1940, three years after a high-ranking Soviet spy, Walter Krivitsky, defected to the West, he gave away the OGPU agent at the Foreign Office, Captain John Herbert King. Subsequently, during his interrogation, King confessed to his crimes and was given a ten-year jail term. After the end of World War II, his sentence was commuted, and he was released early.49
Krivitsky also provided many details about the handling of another British cipher specialist, Ernest Oldham, whose case the authorities had already forgotten. Among the Foreign Office employees, Oldham remained part of a typical “urban legend.” Apparently, based on the fact that in his last days ARNO had received phone calls and envelopes with money from France, legend had it that he had been working for the French and that the British intelligence service had finished him off, camouflaging his demise as a suicide.50
Krivitsky also revealed Bystrolyotov’s other alias, “Hans Galleni,” under which he operated at that time in Britain, and that he was traveling on a Greek passport. From the debriefing, it was clear that Lucy was somehow involved in the affair and that, if still alive, she would “know a great deal about the Greek.”51
The Oldham file does not indicate whether Krivitsky’s disclosures prompted any actions on the part of the British authorities. According to it, it was fully ten years later, on May 26, 1950, when British counterintelligence made another attempt to get to the bottom of Oldham’s case. They asked Mr. Kemp, who was still employed by the Foreign Office, to recall whatever he knew about it. He remembered Oldham and his wife quite well, but he stated that he did not recall anything about “Joe Perelly.” He also did not recognize him from a drawing of Bystrolyotov, at that time obtained by the MI5. Kemp said that, in his opinion, Mrs. Oldham “would certainly remember ‘Perelly,’ ” and he suggested finding her through her son from her first marriage, Raymond, who was in the army, stationed in Belfast, and whom she had gone to join at the beginning of the war.52
Slightly more than a month after that conversation took place, London’s Daily Express informed the public about a seventy-year-old woman who had drowned herself in the Thames. At the same time, a man of thirty-five, believed to be her son, was missing. There was evidence that both were in financial difficulties. The son was writing bad checks. He was soon found and arrested. There was some evidence that he had also tried to drown himself. He formerly had a distinguished army career and was put on probation for two years. The woman and her son were none other than Lucy Oldham and her son from her first marriage, Raymond Wellsted.53
Clearly, whatever financial assistance the OGPU had given Lucy back in 1933 after ARNO’s death did not last for too long.
It is remarkable—and speaks volumes of Bystrolyotov’s trade craft—that the British security service had an active file for him as “Joe Pirelli” until 1950 and was still trying to identify him as late as 1974 (they contacted one of Oldham’s stepsons for information on him).54
Parallel to his involvement in recruiting and handling British agents, Dmitri took part in several other covert operations on behalf of Soviet foreign intelligence, this time on the European continent.
TEN
In the Arms of the Fiercest Enemy
It’s best to appear not bright, and stay that way all the time. One smart look, and they would suspect that something isn’t right about you.
—BYSTROLYOTOV, IN CONVERSATION WITH THE AUTHOR
The year 1935 began with further ominous developments in Germany. After the death of President Paul von Hindenburg on August 2, 1934, Adolf Hitler had assumed the office of Reichspräsident and thus became commander in chief. All officers and soldiers of the German armed forces had to swear a personal oath of loyalty to the Führer, as Hitler was now called. The Third Reich was born.
This worrisome chain of events wasn’t totally unexpected. Anticipating this development, Soviet foreign intelligence had refocused its main efforts from England to Germany. In June 1933, legal rezident Boris Berman was recalled to Moscow, and the new rezident, Boris Gordon, took over his position at the end of the year. At the beginning of 1934, Soviet foreign intelligence designated the various apparatuses of Nazi Germany as targets for penetration, including the army, the police, and the Nazi Party, as well as the entourages of Adolf Hitler, Hermann Goering, and later, in 1935, War Minister Werner von Blomberg.1
Brought back to the continent after the end of the ARNO affair, while still supplying input on the handling of British agents who were to be recruited to replace Oldham, Bystrolyotov took part in an operation concerned with behind-the-scenes maneuvering between Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. In both his unpublished screenplay “Generous Hearts” and his novel Para Bellum, describing the operation as a scheme to intercept and copy special delivery correspondence between Hitler and Mussolini, Bystrolyotov adapted the complicated real-life political situation in Europe to Soviet sensibilities at the time he was writing his work (the mid-1960s). For propaganda reasons, for decades on end, the Soviet people had been kept in the dark about the complexity of the relationship between the Führer and the Duce, which the Soviet mass media invariably portrayed as harmonious and mutually supportive from the outset of their political careers.2
As is known now, nothing was further from the truth. Initially, Mussolini was strongly opposed to Hitler’s expansionist intentions and for some period sought Soviet help in this regard. The Soviet people h
ad equally been kept in the dark about ideological, economic, and political rapprochement between Stalin and Mussolini in the early 1930s, as well as about the Italo-Soviet Pact of Friendship, Neutrality, and Nonaggression signed in September 1933.
Therefore, at the time of the operation in question (summer 1934), a secret correspondence between the Führer and the Duce could hardly take place. Tensions between the two dictators ran high. They had met for the first time in June 1934 and disliked each other. After the meeting, Mussolini characterized Hitler as an unimaginative little fellow whose speech reminded him of a gramophone record stuck on the same quotes from Mein Kampf and playing them over and over again. Also, Mussolini disapproved of Hitler’s intention to annex Austria. In fact, to show that he meant business, when there was danger that Germany might invade Austria, Mussolini moved a considerable number of his troops to the Italian-Austrian border and warned Hitler that he would retaliate. Only later, with Hitler’s support of Mussolini’s 1935 Ethiopian campaign, relations improved, eventually leading to the formation of the Rome-Berlin Axis in late October 1936.
As Bystrolyotov mentioned briefly during our private meeting, the operation in question was concerned with intercepting secret correspondence not between Hitler and Mussolini, but between the Führer and Costanzo Ciano, the father of Galeazzo Ciano, Mussolini’s son-in-law and future foreign minister. And there was good reason for Hitler to keep in touch with the man. Costanzo Ciano was one of a handful of Italian Fascist leaders who never wavered in his support of close ties with Germany. In fact, he was one of the most influential Italian Nazi admirers, and he carried considerable political clout. A decorated World War I hero, he was not only president of the chamber of deputies of the Italian parliament at that time, but most important, he was also secretly appointed to replace the Duce in case of his sudden demise. It was only natural that the Soviet authorities wanted to know what these men were up to.3
At their meeting in Berlin, Bazarov informed Dmitri that Soviet agents in Italy had established the identity of the courier of this secret correspondence. His name was “Gaetano Monaldi,” and he was colonel of the First Legion of Fascist secret police. It was also reported that, while traveling from Rome to Berlin, “Monaldi” stopped to rest in Basel, Switzerland, where he owned a villa. A decision was made to strike at him there.
Dmitri sent his assistants, Leppin and Erica, to Basel. They had to do some groundwork: find the villa and study its guard system and the household rituals, including the names of people who made regular deliveries of food and other supplies to the villa. They also had to familiarize themselves with the city and the incoming roads. He gave them three weeks to complete the reconnaissance work.
Since it was also known that “Monaldi” was a middle-aged man and a widower, Dmitri brought into the operation an agent he had recruited earlier, soon after he moved to Berlin—a young and beautiful German lady called “Greta.”
Although he describes in minute detail the circumstances of her recruitment, and in his confidential cover letter to the KGB censors accompanying the submission of his screenplay manuscript, he discloses her true name—Countess Magritte Brockdorff-Rantzau—there are unresolved problems concerning her identity. My check of her background yielded no results. According to Sergei Milashov, Bystrolyotov assured him that “Greta” was the daughter of the famous German diplomat and first foreign minister of the Weimar Republic, Ulrich Graf von Brockdorff-Rantzau. He played a significant role in Russian political history. He was instrumental in the notorious subversive operation of early 1917: securing the safe passage across Germany back to Russia of a group of Russian émigré revolutionaries headed by Vladimir Lenin. The aim of this operation was to cause political destabilization in the Russian rears, Germany’s World War I adversary, thus weakening its military effort. It’s no wonder that later on, after the Bolsheviks came to power in the country, they welcomed the man who had served as German ambassador to Soviet Russia for most of the 1920s; he died in 1928.
The problem with the claim that “Greta” was this man’s daughter is that he was a lifelong bachelor, and furthermore, although theoretically speaking he could have fathered an illegitimate child, it was impossible for such a child to inherit his aristocratic title without being officially adopted by him. Thus, it is highly questionable that she belonged to the nobility, and her nobility was the main reason she was chosen for recruitment in the first place. Together with her youth and beauty, the title of countess was an important element of using her as sex bait in entrapment of prospective agents. Was she the daughter of Ulrich Brockdorff-Rantzau’s twin brother, Count Ernst Ludwig Emil Schlesswig? The authoritative reference book on European nobility, Almanach de Gotha, does not list her as his daughter either. It records that he divorced his wife, Kamelita Osin von Roer, in February 1916, at approximately the time when, according to Bystrolyotov’s account, “Greta” was born. Could that account for her claim that she didn’t remember her father and that her mother had died giving birth to her? Or had the lady fooled Bystrolyotov himself by claiming the surname and title as her own? Though Dmitri identifies a young lady in a set of three photos (marked 1930) in his personal archive as his beloved German agent “Greta” (the photos miraculously survived the search during his 1938 arrest by the NKVD), the mystery remains.4
Regardless of who exactly “Greta” (code-named ORLENOK, “a little eagle” in Russian) was, her participation in the operation was essential. According to Bystrolyotov, this is how he was able to pull it off. A month before the next expected visit of “Monaldi” to Basel, “Greta” arrived there and checked into one of the most fashionable hotels in the city, Kaiserhof, equipped with several fashionable dresses, hats, shoes, and the other accessories of a stylish young lady. Her beauty, aristocratic manners, and good disposition charmed the hotel owner, who befriended her and showed all signs of respect and admiration. She told him that she planned to stay in the hotel until the end of summer for she had to recover from a long illness. Since it was known that “Monaldi” was an old friend of the hotel owner, it would only be a matter of time before he introduced him to the charming hotel guest.5
The plan worked. “Monaldi” couldn’t resist the allure of the young German aristocrat and immediately began courting her. Under Dmitri’s guidance, “Greta” played her cards carefully. Since his messenger duties prevented “Monaldi” from staying in Basel for long stretches, “Greta” had the opportunity to learn more about the man during the intervals between his visits. Among other things, the hotel owner told her she should be aware that her suitor was in dire need of money. In fact, he not only owed a lot to the hotel owner, but no local bank was willing to give him the substantial loan he needed to repair his villa. Once Dmitri received that bit of information, he knew what to do.
First, he had to find a means to penetrate the villa himself in some inconspicuous way. For that purpose, the former delivery man from the local meat shop that usually supplied the colonel’s kitchen at the villa was offered a position as a waiter at one of the Basel restaurants, and Dmitri took over his place. Always wary of revealing an accent or a lack of knowledge about the details of local customs, he usually posed as a foreigner—this time, a Yugoslav man from Fiume, a Croatian town (now Rijeka) at that time occupied by Italy. Since the operation was expected to take some time, and Dmitri was simultaneously working on other assignments undercover as a Hungarian count, he had to find a place where, without raising any suspicions, he could safely transform himself from a meat delivery man into a count and vice versa. He couldn’t possibly do it in a room rented on the outskirts of the city, entering as a Yugoslav meat man and exiting as a dressed-to-kill Hungarian count. A solution to the problem was found: Leppin and Erica opened a therapeutic massage parlor in a quiet area near the center of the city. (Erica’s training as a nurse gave her the requisite skills to run such a business.) Because customers from all walks of life visited the office, Dmitri could safely use it to transform himself from one cover person
ality to another.
Meanwhile, since Dmitri had charged her with finding the location of the safe guarding the papers carried by “Monaldi,” during the man’s next short stay in Basel, “Greta” graciously accepted his invitation to visit his villa and dine there with him. This gave her an opportunity to look for a place where “Monaldi” might safeguard his papers. After dinner, trying to impress the young lady, among other fancy things, the Italian showed her an antique desk in his bedroom. When she expressed admiration for his exquisite taste in furniture, enamored and tipsy, with the gesture of a magician, “Monaldi” slid open the desktop, under which a small safe was concealed. “Greta” applauded in delight.
Before leaving, “Greta” expressed her deep appreciation for her reception at the villa. She found it absolutely charming. Moreover, she asked whether, the next time Signor “Monaldi” was in town, it would be possible to repeat it, only with one thing extra: instead of having dinner catered by the hotel restaurant, she asked that a genuine homemade Italian meal be prepared. And, if her gracious host didn’t mind, she wanted to be present to see for herself how these magical meals were created. “Monaldi” was delighted. He immediately agreed, called in his cook, and ordered him to indulge any of the young lady’s wishes.
When the Yugoslav man delivered the meat, “Greta” helped to distract the cook, and Dmitri slipped into the inner rooms of the villa.
“Greta” guarded the door to the bedroom while Dmitri worked on opening the safe and taking pictures not only of the coded letters in a small briefcase but also of the passport and travel documents belonging to “Monaldi.” Though some risk was involved, the rest of the operation went smoothly.
Several weeks passed before his financial problems made “Monaldi” desperate. Already owing substantial sums of money to the local bank and to the Kaiserhof owner—both refused to give more until the existing debts were paid off—one day, deeply depressed, he opened up to the young lady. “Greta” expressed sympathy for his situation. She told him that she knew some man, her boarding school classmate’s brother, a businessman who seemed to be awash in money. Perhaps “Monaldi” might try talking to this man.
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