by Jack Barsky
For one who was eager to get the ball rolling, my training unfolded at a painfully slow pace. There was never a written or structured plan with timelines, deliverables, and performance criteria. Nikolai gave me an outline of the subjects we would cover, but the implementation seemed to be a week-by-week, ad hoc exercise. The only constant in my training was my weekly time with Nikolai. Every Monday at nine o’clock sharp, I called him from a phone booth near my home, and he told me where and when we would meet. The only permanent feature of our meetings was the reports I had to turn in every month: an activity report and an expense report.
During our second meeting in Nikolai’s car, he handed me my first month’s pay—a stuffed envelope with 800 marks inside. This amounted to a 200-mark pay raise from my net income at the university.
“We pay in advance, and we do not take out taxes,” Nikolai said with the smallest hint of a grin.
At first, our meetings took place in Nikolai’s car, which he parked on Fürstenwalder Damm near the Friedrichshagen train station. He always brought me a stack of West German newspapers and magazines, and I looked forward to reading these interesting publications cover to cover, a true highlight of my otherwise mundane existence.
Our meetings generally lasted only twenty minutes, during which we engaged in small talk before Nikolai gave me my next set of instructions. It took me a couple of decades to realize that there is really no such thing as small talk between a spy and his handler. Nikolai was analyzing every word I said.
I quickly learned not to ask any questions about my training. I simply listened and learned. But it didn’t take long to see that the training was roughly divided into two categories: technical skills, or spycraft; and soft skills, which were about developing me as an individual.
All the technical skills were taught by highly proficient experts. I always worked one-on-one with my instructors, and Nikolai was the only other person allowed to attend. Because most of the technical specialists spoke neither German nor English, Nikolai often served as our translator. The seemingly vast resources required for my training led me to believe that the number of thoroughly prepared undercover agents had to be rather limited. I couldn’t imagine that there were thousands of us—and possibly not even hundreds—worldwide. Also, I never once met an active colleague—though, of course, such a meeting would have violated the fundamental rules of conspiracy.
The training covered the following subjects:
a) Shortwave Radio and Morse Code. The Morse code training was strictly focused on receiving. After I mastered the ten single digits and the alphabet at a slow speed, we concentrated on building up my receiving speed. I eventually topped out at a respectable 100 digits per minute. I was also instructed on the types of commercially available radios and how to use them to receive shortwave transmissions from my handlers in the KGB during my time in the West.
b) Cryptography. All transmissions I received via shortwave radio were encrypted, and I was taught to encrypt every specific piece of information (names, addresses, phone numbers, etc.) contained in my secret messages to KGB headquarters. The algorithm they taught me involved a double encryption. First, all letters were translated into digits, which were then randomized by adding or subtracting another set of digits derived by a separate algorithm. The fact that the only KGB document I ever signed with my full real name was a promise never to disclose any information about these algorithms speaks to the value the KGB attached to their code. According to my instructor, the code was unbreakable and good for about two hundred uses.
c) Secret Writing. The practice of secret writing, or the use of invisible ink, is as old as the written word. What changed over the years was the technology. The chemicals I used were almost impossible to detect. The process of creating a secret message started with writing a letter to a fictitious friend. This was called the open text. That sheet of paper was then placed on a plate of clean glass, or a mirror, and covered with a sheet of special contact paper and another sheet of regular paper. The secret message was written on the top sheet, using a #2 pencil and a light hand to avoid leaving any visible impressions on the bottom sheet. The letter containing the open text, which now also included the secret message, was sent via regular mail to a foreign address (the addresses I used were in West Berlin, Colombia, and Austria), where a trusted middleman would hand the letter over to a resident KGB agent, who in turn would forward it via diplomatic pouch to headquarters, where the writing would be developed in the lab. The entire process of getting a message to Moscow took two to three weeks.
d) Photography. As an avid amateur photographer, I didn’t need to be told how to use a camera or develop black-and-white film. I did, however, receive training in the use of a microscope to create a microdot—a negative no larger than a square millimeter that can easily be hidden under a postage stamp or glued into the inside of an envelope.
A great deal of attention was given to the area of field operations, which included surveillance detection, clandestine meetings, and dead-drop operations.
a) Face-to-Face Meetings. These meetings were used to give oral instructions, exchange passports, and hand over money. They were subject to a stringent protocol, including recognition signals and mutually known passcodes. My usual signal was that I would carry a copy of US News & World Report rolled up over a brown briefcase. To indicate danger, I would carry the magazine and the briefcase in separate hands. My meeting partner would always initiate the passcode sequence by saying, “Excuse me, are you looking for Susan Greene?” I would respond, “Yes, you must be David.”
b) Dead-Drop Operations. A dead-drop operation is a scheduled, indirect (no face-to-face contact), one-way transfer of material, such as money, a passport, microfilm, or a valuable document. The item to be transferred would be placed in an inconspicuous container, such as an old oil can or a stone made of plaster of Paris, and left in a prearranged drop location (a remote spot with little traffic). The person making the drop would set a signal for the recipient, such as a chalk mark on a utility pole, in a known location that the recipient would be certain to see. Once the pickup had been made, the recipient would set a responding signal for the person who made the drop, indicating the successful completion of the operation.
c) Surveillance Detection. Meetings, dead-drop operations, and other operational activities, such as mailing a letter with secret writing, would be preceded by a thorough surveillance-detection procedure. This involved traveling on a two- or three-hour route across the city to determine whether anyone was following. The most effective method of surveillance detection involved a series of small trips via public transportation. If the route was properly selected, it was virtually impossible for even the most sophisticated surveillance team to remain undetected.
Soft subject training involved five elements: ideological foundations, study of West Germany, human contact, learning a language, and cultural enrichment.
To build my understanding of Communist ideology, I was given a three-volume History of the Communist Party and a biography of Lenin to study.
I dissected the West German constitution, read West German publications, and watched their television programs. TV was especially rewarding because not only did it provide entertainment, but it was an activity I might otherwise be punished for, a clear indication of my above-the-law status.
Our mantra became “contacts, contacts, contacts,” which I heard often during my tenure with the KGB. This was indicative of the high value they placed on human intelligence. I had an ongoing task to meet, get to know, and report on as many new people as possible.
I was told that every KGB operative had to become proficient in a second language. Given the opportunity to choose, I picked English. The KGB paid for private tutors, and I dove into my language studies with the same zeal with which I had studied chemistry at the university.
I happily took advantage of the requirement for cultural enrichment. The KGB wanted their star agents to be broadly educated in order to fit in with the
upper strata of any society. I attended the theater, ballet, opera, and museums, and the KGB reimbursed all tickets and entrance fees as part of my expenses.
In particular, I spent a lot of time on Berlin’s Museum Island, home to five world-renowned museums. My favorite was the Pergamon, particularly its collection of classical antiquities, which reminded me how, as a twelve-year-old, I had devoured a German transcription of both The Odyssey and The Iliad.
Occasionally I was given additional tasks, some strictly for practice and others meant to yield real results. Among those were several investigations of individuals with relatives in the West, including a couple who lived in Bernau, some twenty kilometers northeast of Berlin.
In order to accomplish that task, I took up temporary residence in the town, under the guise of a doctoral student of history doing research concerning certain events in Bernau’s past. The full beard I sported in those days made the cover quite believable. I interviewed a number of residents until one of them recommended that I also interview the target couple.
I now had a point of reference, which made my approach very natural and allowed me to strike up a conversation with the couple that turned into a brief friendship, during which I was able to extract the desired information concerning their relatives in the West.
Two other investigations took me into West Berlin, and the successful outcomes gave me confidence that I was not distinguishable as someone from the East. I was also asked to infiltrate the National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD), an East German political party, by profiling some of their leaders and writing a general report about the party. I gained access to several midlevel functionaries in the NPD by befriending an active member, the curator of the Gerhart Hauptmann Museum, which was located in my new hometown of Erkner. Given that the NPD was closely allied with, and probably even supervised by, the Communist Party, this was very likely a practice task.
During the early months of training, Nikolai acted like a hard boss, someone to be feared rather than liked. The underlying tension in our relationship came to a head in the summer of 1973.
Somehow, my last girlfriend from Jena had gotten ahold of my mailing address. At first, she sent me a very sweet love letter, which she concluded by saying, “And now everything is in your soft, warm hands.”
When I did not respond, she decided to surprise me in person. I could not have been more shocked when I answered a knock at the door of my humble abode and found Gabriele standing there. Though I was rather ashamed of my living quarters, I felt I had no choice but to invite her in. We sat next to each other on the bed, and she initiated the conversation.
“Albrecht, I cannot forget you. I should never have left Jena when I did. You know I never wanted to leave you. I just had to get away from that hateful chemistry lab. Please, let us give it another try—we can make this work.” By now, tears were running down her cheeks.
Despite my laser-like focus on the future, it was hard to watch a beautiful woman cry—and cry over me. But this was an impossible situation. I could not have a girlfriend from the past while I was preparing to leave my entire past behind. Such a relationship would jeopardize everything.
With a coldness that belied my true feelings, I said what had to be said, even though I knew it would hurt her. “Gabriele, I liked you a lot, but I never loved you. There is no foundation for a lasting relationship.”
“But—” she answered meekly, and then her tears began to flow freely as she realized that it really was over.
For the remainder of her visit, I managed to keep the conversation casual, and at the end of the day, I put her on a train back to her hometown of Leipzig.
When I confided to Nikolai what had happened, he straightened up immediately, and his face turned red with anger.
“Well, you can get back together with that girl if you want, but if that’s the case, you may want to consider a career in farming.”
“The relationship is over, completely over,” I said emphatically until finally he seemed to believe me. I had no intention of endangering the path I had chosen, but the message from Nikolai was clear: We own your private life.
Although the matter was never mentioned again, I was certain that in his next report, Nikolai would note that I was honest to the bone and that I had a weakness for the fairer sex. Such a notation may have later played a role in the KGB’s allowing me to get married, possibly to prevent me from falling victim to the wiles of a female counterintelligence agent. As hardened and focused as I would become, there was a chink in my armor—not the temptation of a woman, but the innocence of a child—that one day would lead to my downfall . . . and also to my salvation.
ONE OCTOBER MORNING IN 1973, I hurried through the driving rain with an umbrella that offered little protection. It was a ten-minute walk from the commuter train station to Fürstenwalder Damm, where Nikolai regularly picked me up in his car. Finally, sopping wet, I pulled open the passenger side door and jumped inside. I expected Nikolai to complain about my messing up the interior of his car, as he had done on previous occasions, but this time he pulled out an envelope from his briefcase and handed it to me with a big grin.
“Open it,” he said.
I tried to dry off my hands before taking the envelope. Inside, I saw a big aluminum key.
“What is this for?” I asked.
“That, young man, is the key to your new apartment. You have worked hard these past nine months, and you deserve it. I will drive you there right now.”
The drive to Eitelstraße 31, in the Lichtenberg district, took half an hour. Nikolai parked on the street outside the building, which was a typical four-story prewar tenement with a brownish-gray facade that had multiple entrances. As if to welcome me to my new home, the rain stopped right on cue.
Entering a courtyard through the front entrance, we found a staircase off to the left that took us past the bombed-out first floor and up to the second landing. Nikolai used the key to open a wooden door and then stood aside as I stepped into my first real apartment.
“What do you think?” he asked with a proud look on his face.
“Very nice,” I said. I walked straight ahead into the kitchen, which had a gas stove, a sink with running cold water, and two ancient and well-worn pieces of furniture: a table and a cupboard. To the left was the living room, with a tiled coal-burning stove, a huge oak chest of drawers, and an armoire. Though not quite in live-in condition, this place was a big improvement over the dump in Erkner.
“The WC is outside, down one flight of stairs, but not bad,” Nikolai said. “And . . . ,” he paused and handed me another envelope with yet another wide grin, “here is something to help you with the furniture.”
The envelope contained a thousand marks, two hundred more than my monthly salary. Nikolai was full of surprises today.
We left the apartment separately, so as not to be seen together again, but that day marked a significant change in our relationship. Though I didn’t know the reasons, from that point on Nikolai acted more like a friendly mentor than a demanding boss. Apparently, I had survived the probationary period.
I put the money to good use, buying a blue sleeper sofa, a coffee table, two chairs, a small refrigerator, and a used color television set, which was useful to further my understanding of West German culture. Compared to what was available on East German television, the programs in the West were much more lively and entertaining. One of my favorite shows was the German version of Sesame Street, which never failed to make me laugh.
My new apartment now served as a primary meeting place for my times with Nikolai—a major improvement over meeting in his car. Every other month, he brought visitors from Moscow who had taken an interest in my development. One such visitor immediately asked me, “How’s your English training coming along?”
“I’ve always been good in English,” I replied with a touch of arrogance, “but I’m learning a hundred new words every day, and I can already read English novels without using a dictionary.”
“Really? That sounds promising.”
At our next meeting, Nikolai gave me a tape recorder and asked me to create a recording.
“Read some English text from one of your novels, and talk freely about a topic of your choice.”
A month later, I was invited to KGB headquarters in Moscow—which we always referred to as the Center—specifically to assess my progress in English. This was the first inkling I received that I might not be deployed in West Germany after all.
Because of the nature of my “job,” and because my future was so uncertain, I pretty much kept to myself between training sessions. Even at the peak of my training, I had plenty of free time. As the weeks stretched into months, I began to realize that I was lonely in the big city. Soon after moving into my new apartment, I decided to seek some companionship—at least someone to spend some time with—but I realized I needed to have a plan.
One Saturday afternoon, I got to thinking, What better place to meet someone than at Die Melodie? The famous dance hall was at the center of the city, about a ten-minute walk from the Brandenburg Gate. And what better time than now? Putting on my best suit, I gathered up my courage and took the downtown train to Friedrichstraße.
It was still early, so very few people were at Die Melodie when I arrived. As I pushed through the huge double doors, a large hall opened up before me with a parquet dance floor in the middle, a dais for the band straight ahead, and enough tables around the perimeter to hold about two hundred people.
I planted myself at a table for eight off to the side and away from the music. The other chairs were empty, but it wasn’t long before two attractive and well-dressed ladies sat down at the other end of the table. They certainly caught my eye. Based on the elegance of their attire and the fact that they were sharing the most expensive bottle of wine on the menu, I concluded that they were visitors from the West and should therefore be kept at arm’s length.