Earlier this week, the official website for the Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation published an article on newly revealed activities of the nuclear industry’s counterintelligence organs. We’re translated the article and are happy to provide it to our readers. Nuclear Secrets of Department “K”: Counterintelligence Activities in the Development of Russia’s Nuclear Industry 1 DecemberContinueContinue reading “Rosatom: Nuclear Secrets of Department K: Counterintelligence Activities in Russia’s Nuclear Industry”
Category Archives: Post-War
FSB Spill: Russian Anti-Soviet Saboteur Describes Training by American Agents, Quick Capture by Soviet Authorities
An earlier article from TranslatingHistory offered some details from a brief interrogation of Aleksandr Lakhno, who was trained in West Germany in the early 1950s along with several other émigrés from the Soviet Union to carry out, at best, an anti-Soviet propaganda campaign. Lakhno spent months learning tradecraft from US and British intelligence specialists inContinueContinue reading “FSB Spill: Russian Anti-Soviet Saboteur Describes Training by American Agents, Quick Capture by Soviet Authorities”
FSB Materials on Post-War Operations of Soviet Nazi Collaborators With American Intelligence Agencies
The Central Archives of the Russian Federation Federal Security Service (FSB) recently declassified documents from criminal cases against members of a group of American intelligence agents — Aleksandr Lakhno, Aleksandr Makov, and Sergei Gorbunov — who served in Nazi penal establishments during the Great Patriotic War and were arrested in April 1953 by Soviet stateContinueContinue reading “FSB Materials on Post-War Operations of Soviet Nazi Collaborators With American Intelligence Agencies”
Russian FSB Declassifies and Publishes Materials from Potsdam Conference Preparations
To mark the 80th anniversary of the 16 July 1945 kick-off of the Potsdam Conference between the leaders of the Soviet Union, United States, and Great Britain, the Russian Federation Federal Security Service (FSB) has published a handful of materials, freshly declassified for the occasion. The following was translated from information cobbled together from aContinueContinue reading “Russian FSB Declassifies and Publishes Materials from Potsdam Conference Preparations”
30 May 1945: Soviet Intel Report on Life in the American and British Zones of Occupation
Until we can get our hands on more material, this ends our collection of post-war Berlin reporting from a well-placed Soviet intelligence officer. In this, his final report (which was written almost concurrently with our previous post), he and his unnamed (redacted) colleagues wandered across the German countryside to see how life for the GermansContinueContinue reading “30 May 1945: Soviet Intel Report on Life in the American and British Zones of Occupation”
30 May 1945: Hitler’s Will, Himmler’s Pill, and Dönitz (Still)
Another Top Secret coded telegram from Berlin to Moscow, this time with the Soviet agent providing information about sweeping into Nazi command and control headquarters to search for, examine, and abscond with the “most “most interesting” documents for Stalin’s eyes. We learn some information about Hitler’s last will, including the appointment of Dönitz as hisContinueContinue reading “30 May 1945: Hitler’s Will, Himmler’s Pill, and Dönitz (Still)”
28 May 1945: Dönitz Government Apprehended, Himmler Commits Suicide
Another Top Secret cable from Berlin to Moscow to keep Stalin apprised of the rather dynamic environment post-war Germany is undergoing. In this short (and partially-redacted) declassified account from a Soviet agent in Berlin, some details are provided of the large-scale British operation to apprehend the Dönitz government, carried out on 23 May. The authorContinueContinue reading “28 May 1945: Dönitz Government Apprehended, Himmler Commits Suicide”
16 May 1945: Positive ID of of Hitler and Goebbels Corpses Amidst Early Days of Berlin Post-War Recovery
Yet another in the series of Top Secret reports submitted from Berlin by an unidentified deep-cover “illegal,” one of many keeping Moscow informed of how things are working out in Germany in the early days after the war. In this excerpt, the author indicates that Berlin appears to be somewhat on the rebound, following theContinueContinue reading “16 May 1945: Positive ID of of Hitler and Goebbels Corpses Amidst Early Days of Berlin Post-War Recovery”
Declassified Soviet Eyewitness Testimony to the Lübeck Bay Tragedy
Earlier this month, the Russian FSB declassified and published a set of documents that offer eyewitness survivor testimony to the Lübeck Bay tragedy, and event that claimed the lives of thousands of prisoners of war. On 3 May 1945, with only a few days left before Germany’s final capitulation, the Royal Air Force conducted bombingContinueContinue reading “Declassified Soviet Eyewitness Testimony to the Lübeck Bay Tragedy”
Did ‘Cambridge Five’ Espionage Contribute to Poland Succumbing to Soviet Influence after World War II?
Recently declassified documents published to the Russian FSB website are claimed to contain information provided by the so-called ‘Cambridge Five’ – the notorious spy ring that provided information to the Soviet Union from the 1930s to the early 1950s. The documents deal with Poland’s efforts to prepare for a post-war world in which that countryContinueContinue reading “Did ‘Cambridge Five’ Espionage Contribute to Poland Succumbing to Soviet Influence after World War II?”
Translating History 