by Douglas Boyd
This book is dedicated to all the political prisoners
and others who suffered in the Stasi prison
on the Lindenstrasse in Potsdam,
and to our predecessors there under the KGB 1945–1952
and under the Gestapo 1933–1945
‘Those who do not remember the past are compelled to repeat it.’
George Santayana
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Despite the two and a half decades since the collapse of the USSR, a surprising number of people who assisted my research asked not to be mentioned as sources, some giving no reason and others pleading that there might be repercussions against family members still living in their countries of birth. Others still were helpful initially and then said, ‘I’m sorry. I can’t help you any more.’ I never argued or tried to persuade them because it seemed this was not from personal guilt for anything, but rather that even thinking about those years will always be too painful for millions of people who lived through them. Who could blame them for that?
Among those I can thank for their help are Stella Dvoraková, William Sirben and Jiri Dubnicka for insights into the Cold War period in Czechoslovakia; Nikolai Karailiev for reading the Bulgarian pages and Gabriele Schnell, whom I first met in the former Lindenstrasse prison in Potsdam, for the work she has done to document the experiences of the Stasi’s victims in the so-called German Democratic Republic.
At The History Press, I can also thank commissioning editor Mark Beynon, project editor Rebecca Newton, designer Katie Beard and cover designer Martin Latham.
CONTENTS
Title
Dedications
Acknowledgements
List of Abbreviations
Part 1: Setting the Scene
1 Through a Glass Darkly
2 Life is a Game of Chess
Part 2: The Stasi in German Democratic Republic
3 Deutschland Unter Russland
4 Creating a New Class of Criminals
5 Fear as a Political Tool
6 The New Class Enemy
7 Lies, Spies and More Spies
8 War on the West
9 War in the Air
10 HVA Versus MI5
11 Death of the Stasi
Part 3: State Terror in Central Europe
12 The Polish UB – Crushing a Suffering Nation
13 Betrayal, Beatings, Elections and Executions
14 The Horizontal Spy
15 The StB Versus the Czechs and Slovaks
16 The ABC of Espionage – Agents, Blackmail, Codes
17 The AVO and Bloodshed in Budapest
18 Magyars on Mission Abroad
Part 4: State Terror in Eastern Europe
19 The KDS – Dimitrov’s Lethal Homecoming Present to Bulgaria
20 A Different Umbrella in Bucharest
21 Albania – From Serfdom to the Sigurimi Secret Police
Author Note
Plates
By the Same Author
Copyright
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
AAP
Australian Associated Press news agency
ABLT
Állambiztonsági Szolgálatok Történeti Levéltára (Hungarian state intelligence archives)
ABW
Agencja Bezpieczenstwa Wewnetrznego (Polish counter-espionage service)
AK
Armia Krajowa (Polosh Home Army)
AL
Armia Ludowa (People’s Army)
AVH
Allamvédelmi Hatósag (second name of Hungarian secret police)
AVO
Allamvédelmi Osztálya (first name of Hungarian secret police)
BA
Belügyminisztérium Állambiztonsági (Hungarian intelligence agency)
BfV
Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (Federal German security service)
BIRN
Balkan Investigative Reporting Network
BIS
Bezpecnostní Informacní Služba (Czech post-Communist security service)
BKP
Bulgarska Komunisticheska Partia (Bulgarian Communist Party)
BND
Bundesnachrichtendienst (Federal German intelligence service)
BStU
Bundesbeauftragte der Unterlagen des Staatssicherheitsministeriums der ehemaligen Deutschen Demokratischen Republik (Stasi archives)
CIA
Central Intelligence Agency
CIC
US Counter-Intelligence Corps
CIO
Anti-Communist Czech Intelligence Office
CNSAS
Conciliul National pentru Studearea Archivelor Securitâtii (Romanian post-Communist intelligence archives)
CPGB
Communist Party of Great Britain
CSSR
Ceskoslovenská Socialistická Republika (Czechoslovak Socialist Republic)
DM
Deutsche Mark (West German currency)
DST
Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire (French security service)
EAM/ELAS
Left-wing Greek resistance
FDJ
Freie Deutsche Jugend (Communist equivalent of the Hitler Youth organisation)
GCHQ
Government Communications Headquarters
GDR
German Democratic Republic
GRU
Glavnoye Razvedatelnoye Upravleniye (Soviet military intelligence)
GZI
Glowny Zarzad Informacji (Polish military intelligence)
HVA
Hauptverwaltung Aufklärung (East German foreign intelligence service)
IGM
Internationale Gesellschaft für Menschenrechte (International Association for Human Rights)
IM
inoffizielle Mitarbeiter (informer working for the Stasi)
IWF
Institut für wirtschaftliche Forschung (Institute for Scientific Research, a cover name for HVA)
KDS
Komitet za Darzhavna Sigurnost (Bulgarian Committee of State Security)
KdSBP
Komitet do Spraw Bezpieczenstwa Publicznego (Polish Committee for Public Security)
KGB
Komityet Gosudrarstvennoi Bezopacnosti (Committee of State Security of USSR)
KgU
Kampfgruppe gegen Unmenschlichkeit (West German anti-Stasi group)
KKE
Kommunistikó Kómma Elládas (Greek Communist Party)
KPD
Kommunistiche Partei Deutschlands (German Communist Party)
KSC
Komunistická Strana Ceskoslovenska (Czechoslovakian Communist Party)
LSK
Luftstreitkräfte (East German air force)
MBP
Ministerstwo Bezpieczenstwa Publicznego (Polish Ministry of Public Security)
MDP
Magyar Dolgozók Párt (Hungarian Workers’ Party, i.e. Communist Party)
MfS
Ministerium für Staatssicherheit (Ministry of State Security)
MI5
British Security Service
MI6
British Intelligence Service
MIG
Mikoyan i Gurevitch (names of two Soviet aircraft designers)
MKP
Magyar Komunista Párt (Hungarian Communist Party)
MNVK2
Magyar Néphadsereg Vezérkara 2 Csoportfonöksege (Hungarian military intelligence)
MSW
Ministerstwo Spraw Wewnetrznych (Polish Ministry
of Internal Affairs)
MSzMP
Magyar Szocialista Munkáspárt (Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party)
MVD
Ministerstvo Vnutrennikh Dyel (Soviet successor to NKVD)
NICSMA
NATO Integrated Systems Management Agency
NKVD
Narodny Komissariat Vnukhtrennikh Dyel (Soviet forerunner of KGB)
NSA
US National Security Agency
NSDAP
Nazionalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (full name of Hitler’s Nazi party)
NVA
Nazionale Volksarmee (East German army)
OKW
Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (German General Staff in Second World War)
OSI
US Air Force Office of Special Investigations
OSS
US Office of Strategic Services (in Second World War)
PCF
Parti Communiste Français (French Communist Party)
PCI
Partito Comunista Italiano (Italian Communist Party)
PCR
Partidul Comunist Român (Romanian Communist Party)
PKSh
Partia Komuniste e Shqiperisë (Albanian Communist Party)
PKWN
Polski Komitet Wyzwolenia Narodowego (Polish Committee of National Liberation)
POW
Prisoner of war
PPSh
Partia e Punës e Shqipërisë (Albanian Workers’ Party)
PSL
Polski Stronnictwo Ludowe (Polish Christian Democrat agrarian party)
PZPR
Polska Zjednoczona Partia Robotnicza (Polish United Workers’ Party, i.e. Communist Party)
RAF
Royal Air Force
RBP
Resort Bezpieczenstwa Publicznego (Polish Department of Public Security)
RHSA
Reichssicherheitshauptamt (Chief Administration of Third Reich Security)
RIAS
Rundfunk im Amerikanischen Sektor (US-financed propaganda station in West Berlin)
RTRP
Rzad Tymczasowy Rzeczyoospolitej Polskiej (Provisional Government of Poland)
SB (MSW)
Słuzba Bezpieczenstwa Ministerstwa Spraw Wewnetrznych (Polish Security Service of Ministry of Internal Affairs)
SDECE
Service de Documentation Extérieure et de Contre-Espionage (French intelligence service)
SDP
Sozialistische Demokratische Partei (German Social Democratic Party)
SED
Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands (East German Communist Party)
SHAPE
Supreme Headquarters, Allied Powers in Europe
ShIK
Shërbimi Informativ Kombëtar (Albanian successor to Sigurimi)
ShISh
Shërbimi Informativ Shtetëror (successor to ShIK)
SIE
Serviciul de Informatii Externe (Romanian post-Communist intelligence service)
Sigint
Signals intelligence (electronic eavesdropping)
SIS
Secret Intelligence Service
SOE
Special Operations Executive
SRI
Serviciul Rôman de Informatii (Romanian post-Communist security service)
SSR
Soviet socialist republic
Stasi
Ministerium für Staatssicherheit (East German Ministry of State Security)
StB
Státní Bezpecnost / Státna Bezpecnost (Czechoslovakian State Security service)
SWT
Sektor für Wissenschaft und Technik (HVA Section for technological espionage)
TVO
Trudovo-Vazpritatelni Obshchezhitiya (Bulgarian gulag)
UB
Urzad Bezpieczenstwa (Polish state security)
UPA
Ukraïnska Povstanska Armiya (Ukrainian underground army)
ZAIG
Zentrale Auswertungs und Informationsgruppe (evaluation department of HVA)
PART 1
SETTING THE SCENE
1
THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY
Each year, 3 October is a German national holiday known as der Tag der deutschen Einheit – the day of German Unity. It celebrates the reunification of the country in 1989 after forty-four years of being split in two by the front line of the Cold War. The date is not an exact anniversary of any particular event, but was carefully chosen to avoid reminding people of embarrassing events in recent German history.
On 3 October 2008 several thousand people were celebrating the reunification at what had been the border crossing-point between Marienborn in the so-called German Democratic Republic (GDR) and Helmstedt in the Federal Republic when the country was divided roughly north to south by the Iron Curtain after the Second World War. Living conditions to the east of the ‘inner German frontier’ were so grim under the neo-Stalinist government implanted by, and controlled from, Moscow that a total of 3.5 million GDR citizens fled to the West between the end of the war in 1945 and the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961.1
By 1952 the population haemorrhage threatened the economic survival of Stalin’s German puppet state and the green border was made increasingly escape-proof by barbed wire, watch-towers, minefields, searchlights, trip-wires connected to locked-off machine guns and SM-70 Claymore-type mines with a lethal range of 25m. There were also stretches where attack dogs roamed free and the foot patrols of border guards had orders to shoot to kill – the infamous Schiessbefehl that cost so many lives.
★★★
To the many thousand troops of the Western Allies who drove along the autobahn to Berlin during the Cold War, the Marienborn–Helmstedt crossing was known as Checkpoint Able; Baker was at the other end of the autobahn, where it entered West Berlin; the more famous Checkpoint Charlie was on the line where the American sector of ‘the divided city’ confronted Communist East Berlin.
On that sunny, rather windy, autumn afternoon in 2008 at Marienborn/Helmstedt family groups were picnicking on the grass and people of all ages queued to visit the small museum at this former flash-point where World War III might have begun. The motorway having been diverted once the checkpoint was redundant after the reunification of Germany, people wandered across the vehicle lanes that had often been clogged with Allied military convoys and commercial traffic deliberately delayed by Soviet troops or GDR border police. Others photographed a solitary watch-tower that had been left standing to remind visitors that Checkpoint Able had been one of the few tightly controlled gaps in the long internal German border stretching 866 miles from the shores of the Baltic all the way to the Czech frontier. Whereas two-thirds of escape attempts had previously taken place across this ‘green border’, the number of documented attempts there after the border was closed in 1952 plummeted to fewer than 100 per year, of which only about six were successful. 2 Many of the other would-be refugees paid with their lives.
For most of the Germans present on that day in 2008, the occasion was a pleasant family day out. Doubtless, some of the older visitors had unhappy memories, having lived im Osten – to the east of the border – under the most repressive Communist regime in Europe. I shared their mixed feelings, walking with my wife away from the crowds towards a small, rather temporary-looking building to the left of the traffic lanes. For other visitors curious enough to peer through the grimy windows, there was no evidence of the crushing bureaucracy of which this had been the westernmost outpost, but looking through that glass darkly took me back nearly half a century.
On 12 May 1959, aged 20, I was sitting in that office on a wooden chair facing an officer of the Ministerium für Staatssicherheit – the Ministry of State Security, usually abbreviated to ‘Stasi’ – who had been interrogating me for six long weeks. Also present were his escort of two Stasi heavies in ill-fitting suits and a distinguished-looking English lady in the smart blue uniform of the International Red Cross, who had c
ome to escort me back to the free world. For twenty minutes, she fielded all attempts to get her to make any political remark by her ready stream of small talk about the weather, the pleasure of drinking tea as opposed to coffee and so on. As the clock on the wall showed the agreed handover time of midday, she rose to return to the Helmstedt side of the crossing, in what was then the British zone of occupied Germany.
With nothing against him personally, I shook hands with my interrogator. It was the Cold War that had made us enemies. If he had sometimes had me hauled out of my cell for questioning in the middle of the night or very early in the morning, it was not often enough to constitute harassment, but it did make me wonder whatever sort of life he led, if those were his normal working hours.
Walking with the Red Cross lady, whose name I never learned, out of the door and towards the western side of the checkpoint, time slowed down. It seemed a long walk, and I was frightened that this was a dream, a delusion or some kind of psychological trick that would end with a sudden shout of ‘Halt! Stehenbleiben!’ at which I would turn round to see a frontier guard with his machine pistol levelled at me – and raise my hands, waiting to be taken back to my cell.