What was the importance of the tunnel? Even those who reject the the theory of its use for deception are sometimes dubious. ‘Intelligence analysts on the receiving end were underwhelmed with the fruits of all [the] labour’, writes one recent historian of the CIA quoting a comment by Gordon Stewart, a former chief of the agency’s foreign intelligence staff. Allen Dulles kept asking ‘Is there anything interesting?’, recalled Stewart, ‘but there never was.’4
But if the principal reason for listening in was to warn of impending attack, ‘nothing interesting’ was precisely what Washington and London hoped to hear. In the years so dominated by nightmares of nuclear attack, no news was good news. Britain’s Room 40 in the First World War, its naval and diplomatic code-breaking centre, had likewise revealed negative and profoundly reassuring indications about the plans of the Kaiser’s high seas fleet as they recorded how infrequently it left port. A generation later its successor, Bletchley Park, had likewise provided gratifyingly negative indicators about Hitler’s invasion plans. Secure in this knowledge, allied leaders had been able to plan ahead.
But could similar conclusions have been reached without the massive expense of the tunnel? Above ground, after all, Brixmis and other allied missions were roving through East Germany looking for any signs of Red Army preparations for invasion, and what they could see with their own eyes often appeared to tell them that Moscow was clearly neither prepared nor able to mount an attack on the West. Yet intelligence analysts are professional pessimists, always prepared for the worst-case scenario – and in the 1950s still deeply scarred by recent history. Had anyone actually seen the Japanese carrier fleet taking its deadly cargo of aircraft towards Pearl Harbor, they might have asked. Would the Soviets really be so foolish as to scatter visible evidence around if they were planning an attack? Obviously not, thought Western intelligence analysts. If further proof were needed of their ingrained caution, it is provided by Britain’s Joint Intelligence Committee in March 1956, only a month before the Soviets ‘discovered’ the tunnel and while the West was still digesting the contents of Khrushchev’s remarkable secret speech. ‘So long as the Soviets have the initiative’, declared the British intelligence chiefs, ‘any attack will be carefully planned and prepared. We believe that they will rate the importance of achieving strategic surprise with their initial nuclear strikes so highly that they will not allow any detectable preparation or movement of their ground forces that would jeopardise such surprise.’ But, they noted ominously, ‘The Group of Soviet Forces in Germany is, however, offensive in pattern and could launch a limited offensive without previous build up.’ In short, the listeners in of Stopwatch/Gold were needed as much now as ever before.5
It also became quickly apparent that, quite apart from its strategic importance, the tunnel promised rich rewards in other fields. The Kremlin was still largely a closed book to the West. Stalin might be dead, but what were his successsors up to? What plans did they have for Germany and Europe? And who was really running the show anyway? Western intelligence services were largely in the dark about the answers but under strong and persistent pressure from their political masters to produce. And if they looked to their spymasters for results, they in turn needed weapons to protect themselves and their agencies from the opponent. All the better, therefore, if the Berlin tunnel could reveal important inside information about KGB or GRU operations directed against the CIA and SIS.
One other way of evaluating the tunnel has also been suggested. Given that the KGB knew about it, perhaps there was another reason (besides that of protecting Blake) for their failure to use it for deception. Perhaps, suggests Peter Grose in his biography of Allen Dulles, the KGB was secretly acting in the interests of détente. Knowing that no attack on the West was planned, they wanted London and Washington to know that. And so, he postulates, they were quite happy not to confuse the listeners-in but to let them hear what was really going on.6 On the surface it is an intriguing idea – except that none of those on the Soviet side who have spoken about the tunnel has ever bothered to make the claim, which they surely would have done after the end of the Cold War made it possible for them to don the mantle of saviours of peace.
Notes
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
1. D. E. Murphy, S. A. Kondrashev and G. Bailey, Battleground Berlin: CIA vs. KGB in the Cold War.
INTRODUCTION
1. P. Lewis, The Fifties, p. 98.
2. The Times (6 March 2001); see also issues for 5 and 12 March, and Daily Telegraph (5, 12 March 2001).
3. R. Aldrich, The Hidden Hand: Britain, America, and Cold War Secret Intelligence.
1. ‘THE STUFF OF WHICH THRILLER FILMS ARE MADE’
1. Quoted in A. Richie, Faust’s Metropolis, p. 689.
2. I. Fleming, Thrilling Cities, p. 144.
3. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 8, 256.
4. M. Wolf, Memoirs of a Spymaster, p. 90.
5. P. Grose, Gentleman Spy, p. 399.
2. OUR MAN IN VIENNA
1. C. Andrew and V. Mitrokhin, The Mitrokhin File, pp. 442–3; the KGB description of Lunn’s tradecraft dates from his days as SIS chief in Beirut in the early 1960s.
2. D. Hart-Davis, Hitler’s Olympics, p. 103.
3. Who’s Who (1997), p. 1208; P. Lunn, Evil in High Places, p. 252; P. Lunn, High-Speed Skiing, pp. 125–6; P. Lunn, Going Skiing, p. 10.
4. S. Fesq, quoted in S. Dorril, MI6, p. 120; and W. Hood, Mole, p. 31.
5. W. B. Bader, Austria between East and West, 1945–1955, pp. 1–175.
6. G. Greene, The Third Man, pp. 13, 119; N. Sherry, The Life of Graham Greene, vol. 2, pp. 243–50.
7. G. Greene, Ways of Escape, p. 126; Sherry, p. 250.
8. P. S. Deriabin, with J. C. Evans, Inside Stalin’s Kremlin, p. 200; Hood, p. 74.
9. G. Blake, No Other Choice, p. 8.
10. R. Steers, FSS: Field Security Section, p. ii.
11. For an illuminating sample of Field Security operations at this time, see Steers, especially pp. 58–9, 74–5, and 157–62. See also A. Clayton, Forearmed: A History of the Intelligence Corps, pp. 201–2.
12. D. Colley, ‘Shadow Warriors’, VFW (Veterans of Foreign Wars) (September 1997).
13. For Korda, the Z network and King’s early SIS career, see A. Read and D. Fisher, Colonel Z, pp. 176–91, 230–31.
14. A. Cavendish, Inside Intelligence: The Revelations of an MI6 Officer, p. 75; and private information.
15. T. Bower, The Perfect English Spy: Sir Dick White and the Secret War, 1935–1990, p. 180.
16. Blake, p. 10.
17. Letter to the author from the SOE adviser at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, dated 14 May 2001; and private information.
18. P. Wright, Spycatcher, p. 156; Bower, p. 348.
19. Wright, pp. 18–20, 47.
3. SMOKY JOE’S
1. Bob Steers, correspondence with the author.
2. M. Smith, New Cloak, Old Dagger, p. 116.
3. Blake, p. 9.
4. Cavendish, pp. 73–4.
5. Hood, pp. 28, 30–31.
6. D. Martin, Wilderness of Mirrors, pp. 74–5; J. Ranelagh, The Agency: The Rise and Decline of the CIA, pp. 138–9.
7. Martin, p. 76.
8. Ibid.; Ranelagh, p. 140; N. West, Seven Spies Who Changed the World, p. 139.
9. Bower, pp. 135–6.
10. David E. Murphy, letter to the author, 10 February 2000.
4. BLACK FRIDAY
1. S. Ambrose, Ike’s Spies: Eisenhower and the Intelligence Establishment, p. 169.
2. M. Wolf, interview for Cold War television series, Jeremy Isaacs Productions.
3. Cavendish, p. 6.
4. Wright, p. 7.
5. Aldrich, pp. 10–11.
6. See, for example, J. E. Haynes and H. Kehr, Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America; A. Weinstein and A. Vassiliev, The Haunted Wood: Soviet Espionage in America: The Stalin Years; N. West, Venona: The Greatest Secret of the Cold War; and R. L. Benson and M. Warner, Veno
na: Soviet Espionage and the American Response.
7. Bower, p. 144.
8. Donald Steury, commentary on his paper on the Berlin tunnel presented at the Berlin Conference 1998.
9. D. A. Hatch and R. L. Benson, NSA Korean War 1950–1953 Commemoration: The Sigint Background, p. 5.
10. C. Andrew, For The President’s Eyes Only: Secret Intelligence and the American Presidency from Washington to Bush, p. 185.
11. Cited in Haynes and Kehr, Venona, p. 49.
12. KGB Archives, Moscow, File 43173, vol. 2v, 25–27; quoted in Weinstein and Vassiliev, pp. 291–2.
13. Hatch and Benson, p. 6. I am grateful to Matthew M. Aid for drawing this material to my attention.
14. Andrew, p. 197.
5. THE HUMAN FACTOR
1. R. Lewin, The American Magic, pp. 232–46.
2. Rowlett died in 1998. For appreciations see the Daily Telegraph (18 July 1998), The Times (15 July 1998) and F. B. Saxon, ‘Wizard in Making and Breaking Codes’, New York Times (2 July 1998). See also J. Bamford, The Puzzle Palace, pp. 152–6, 374. I am grateful to David Kahn for further information about Rowlett.
3. Martin, p. 68; R. Lamphere and T. Schachtman, The FBI-KGB War, p. 61; R. Powers, The Man Who Kept Secrets, p. 137; B. Hersh, The Old Boys, p. 187; E. Thomas, The Very Best Men, pp. 130–31.
4. S. Hersh, The Dark Side of Camelot, pp. 186–7.
5. O’Brien, interview with the author, Washington DC, April 2001.
6. ‘The longest continuous sample …’, see CIA Clandestine Services History: ‘The Berlin Tunnel Operation, 1952–1956’, CS Historical Paper 150, prepared 25 August 1967, published 24 June 1968. Declassified in 1977 and obtained by the author under FOIA request, 30 December 1999, ref. F-2000–00117. See also CIA: ‘Field Project Outline, 16 September 1953’, in Documents on the Intelligence War in Berlin, 1946 to 1961, ed. D. Steury, pp. 442–6; and Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 209–12.
7. ‘Fleetfoot’, rather than ‘Fleetwood’, is, pace Murphy, the correct nickname of Harvey’s linkman on the tunnel in Frankfurt. For Truscott, see Hersh, p. 409, and Thomas, p. 65.
6. 2 CARLTON GARDENS
1. M. Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, vol. 8, p. 690; N. Rose, Churchill: An Unruly Life, p. 336.
2. Churchill to Minister of Defence, 30 July 1952, ‘Personal and Secret’, PRO, DEFE 13/352.
3. ‘Likelihood of Total War with the Soviet Union to the end of 1954’, memorandum from the Chiefs of Staff to the Minister of Defence, 28 May 1952, COS (52), 28 May 1952; and Minister of Defence to the Prime Minister, 3 August 1952, PRO, DEFE 13/352.
4. A. W. Buzzard, Director of Naval Intelligence, ‘Summary of N.I.D.G.C. report no. 42 (Not to Nato)’, March 1953, PRO, DEFE 13/352.
5. N. W. Brownjohn to the Minister of Defence, 26 June 1953, commenting on JIC (53), 11, 14, 36, 37, 38 and 39, PRO, DEFE 13/352.
6. D. Stafford, Churchill and Secret Service, p. 379.
7. P. Lashmar, Spy Flights of the Cold War, pp. 61–75.
8. Aldrich, p. 405.
9. Bower, p. 180.
10. Blake, pp. 11–14.
7. AGENT ‘DIOMID’
1. Bower, p. 261.
2. Blake, p. 164; for Blake in general, see H. M. Hyde, George Blake: Superspy.
3. Blake, p. 160; for Rodin, see C. Andrew and O. Gordievsky, KGB: The Inside Story, pp. 322, 362–3; see also Andrew and Mitrokhin, p. 520.
4. Sunday Times (14 November 1999).
5. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, p. 215; see also Kondrashev, as quoted in the Sunday Times (14 November 1999).
6. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 36, 482–3; Blake, pp. 16–17.
8. OPERATION STOPWATCH/GOLD
1. Author’s interview with Hugh Montgomery, Washington DC, April 2001.
2. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, p. 213.
3. Thomas, p. 79.
4. See Ambrose, Ike’s Spies, p. 714, and N. Miller, Spying for America: The Hidden History of U.S. Intelligence, p. 381. For Auchinloss, see Thomas, p. 73.
5. Quoted in Andrew, p. 202.
6. CIA History, The Berlin Tunnel Operation, 1952–6, pp. 6–10.
7. See A. Geraghty, Beyond the Frontline: The Untold Exploits of Britain’s Most Daring Cold War Spy Mission, pp. 3, 35, 63. See also N. N. Wylde, ed., The Story of Brixmis, 1946–90, passim.
8. Prime Minister’s personal minute M 304/53, 2 October 1953, in PRO, DEFE 13/352.
9. ‘KILTS UP, BILL!’
1. A. Horne, Back Into Power, pp. 257–72.
2. Churchill to Field Marshal Alexander of Tunis, Minister of Defence, personal minute, 8 February 1954; G. L. McDermott, Foreign Office, to W. H. Hanna, Ministry of Defence, 9 February 1954; and Alexander to Churchill, 10 February 1954, PRO, DEFE 13/352.
3. ‘Direction of Intelligence Effort’ (Joint Services Intelligence Group [Germany] aide-memoire), JSIG(G)P(54)30, 19 July 1954, PRO, DEFE 14/90.
4. Aldrich, p. 327.
5. Ibid, p. 328.
6. Blake, p. 168.
7. Record of SIS/CIA meetings on Stopwatch/Gold held in London 15–18 December 1953, reproduced as Appendix 9 in Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 449–53. From files of the SVRA (the Foreign Intelligence Service of the Russian Federation).
8. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, p. 217.
9. Note on ‘Diomid’ file, 12 February 1954, SVRA, Moscow; quoted in Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, p. 216.
10. DIGGING GOLD
1. Murphy p. 424; Grose, p. 407.
2. Martin, p. 81.
3. S. Ambrose, Eisenhower, vol. 2, pp. 226–8; Ranelagh, pp. 276–9; Andrew, p. 221; Grose, p. 346.
4. Ambrose, Ike’s Spies, p. 188; R. Jeffreys-Jones, The CIA and American Democracy, pp. 74–5.
5. JIC (54) 82, 21 October 1954, PRO, CAB 158/18.
6. Martin, p. 83.
7. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, p. 220; and interview with Hugh Montgomery, Washington DC, April 2001.
8. Details of the tunnel’s construction are provided in the CIA internal history, in W. K. Harvey’s progress report to General Truscott in Frankfurt of 18 October 1954, in D. Steury, pp. 338–44, and in Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 219–25. For the Royal Engineers’ work on the vertical shaft and tap chamber, see R. E. Merrell, ‘The Berlin Spy Tunnel – A Memoir’, in the Royal Engineers Journal, vol. 116, no. 2 (August 2002), pp. 2–4.
9. JIC (55) 22nd, 10 March 1955, PRO, CAB 159/18.
10. ‘Memorandum for the Record’, dated 29 November 1954, a résumé of decisions reached on 18 November 1954. Steury, pp. 346–9.
11. TURNING ON THE TAP
1. Blake, p. 166.
2. Ibid., p. 174; Hyde, p. 46.
3. M. Beschloss, Mayday: Eisenhower, Khrushchev and the U-2 Affair, p. 103.
4. Ranelagh, p. 294.
5. See CIA History of the Berlin tunnel, section V, pp. 25–6, released in 1995; see also Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, p. 222.
6. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, appendix 5, p. 423.
12. CHESTER TERRACE
1. Bower, p. 182.
2. J. C. Evans, ‘Berlin Tunnel Intelligence: A Bumbling KGB’, International Journal of Intelligence and Counter-intelligence, vol. 9, no. 1 (1996), p. 43. For additional information on the Main Processing Unit in London I am deeply indebted to an interview with Joe Evans in April 2001.
3. Interview with the author, Florida, March 2001. For the Berlin base’s ‘Target Room’, see Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 256–7.
4. For Popov and the Berlin base, see Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 267–70.
13. ‘A BONANZA’
1. Evans, p. 47; and interview with the author, April-June 2001.
2. D. Holloway, Stalin and the Bomb, pp. 112, 177; W. Stiller with J. Adams, Beyond the Wall: Memoirs of an East and West German Spy, p. 171.
3. P. Maddrell, ‘British-American Scientific Intelligence Collaboration during the Occupation of Germany’, American—British—Canadian Intelligence Relations, 1939�
��2000, ed. D. Stafford and R. Jeffreys-Jones, pp. 74–94.
4. Ibid., pp. 85–6; see also Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 13–15, 425, appendix 5.
5. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, p. 425, appendix 5.
6. Evans, p. 46.
7. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, p. 427.
8. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, p. 427, appendix 5. Appendix B of the declassified CIA history of the tunnel entitled ‘Recapitulation of the Intelligence Derived’ has had all this material blanked out.
14. FINGERS CROSSED
1. Hood, pp. 72–3.
2. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 44–6, 178.
3. It can be found in Steury, pp. 267–72.
4. Murphy, Kondrashev and Bailey, pp. 226.
5. ‘Memorandum of Discussion at the 256th Meeting of the National Security Council’, Washington DC, 10 November 1955, in Foreign Relations of the United States 1955–1957, vol. 26, Central and Eastern Europe (Washington DC, 1992), p. 399; see also National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) ‘Probable Short-term Communist Capabilities and Intentions Regarding Berlin’, number 11–3–56, 28 February 1956, in Foreign Relations of the United States, vol. 26, pp. 414–23. In the same volume (pp. 423–30), the National Security Council Report 5404/1, ‘Progress Report on United States Policy Towards Berlin’, dated 17 May 1956, covering events in Berlin from September 1955 to May 1956, contains no reference to the spy tunnel. It should be noted, however, that paragraph 14 in the list of major developments has not been declassified. For discussions on the dissolution of the Cominform, see Foreign Relations of the United States 1955–57, vol. 24, Soviet Union and Eastern Mediterranean (Washington DC, 1989), pp. 95–6. Khrushchev Remembers, introduced with a commentary by Edward Crankshaw (London, Book Club Associates, 1971) contains no reference at all to the tunnel.
6. A. Dulles, The Craft of Intelligence, p. 202.
7. Joseph C. Evans, communication with the author.
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