The following is a copy of an undated letter to the Prosecutor General of the USSR Rudenko from People's Artist of the Ukrainian SSR and UZ SSR Valentina Chistyakova with a request to provide information about her husband Oleksandr Kurbas, who was sentenced in 1934 to 5 years of imprisonment, information about his whereabouts, andContinue reading "Letter from Wife of People’s Artist of Ukraine Oleksandr Kurbas to Soviet Authorities in Hopes of Learning his Fate, ca. 1954"
Coded Telegram to Moscow on Meeting Between Maksim Litvinov and FDR the Day After the Attack on Pearl Harbor
On 8 December 1941, new Soviet Ambassador to the United States Maksim Maksimovich Litvinov met with US President Franklin Roosevelt to present same with his credentials and address the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The following is an English translation of the coded telegram penned by Litvinov that day (sent to Moscow on 10 December).Continue reading "Coded Telegram to Moscow on Meeting Between Maksim Litvinov and FDR the Day After the Attack on Pearl Harbor"
Former WWII German Sailor Passes Classified Minesweeping Document to Soviets under British Noses
In today's translation of an undated Russian document, Osip Borisovich Bron (1896-1988), head of the Department of Theoretical Foundations of Electrical Engineering at the Leningrad Institute of Aviation Instrumentation, related the story of the Soviet Navy's post-war quest for a rumored instruction on how to properly sweep for German mines, and British efforts to thwartContinue reading "Former WWII German Sailor Passes Classified Minesweeping Document to Soviets under British Noses"
Ukrainians React to Stalin’s Death in a Way that Attracts the Attention of State Security
Source: Istorychna Pravda, “How Ukrainians Reacted to Stalin's Death. Declassified Special Notifications of the MGB” On Friday, 5 March 1953, the newspaper Pravda published the following sensational piece of news: “On March 5, at 9:50 in the evening, after a serious illness, the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Union of the SSRContinue reading "Ukrainians React to Stalin’s Death in a Way that Attracts the Attention of State Security"
Russian FSB Publishes Declassified Archival Materials About Hitler’s Last Days
An announcement was made on 27 April 2023 that the Russian FSB’s Public Relations Center has published declassified documents from the investigation file stored in the FSB archives for the Novgorod Region regarding Adolf Hitler’s personal pilot, SS Gruppenführer and Police Lieutenant General Hans Bauer. Along with the documents of Baur himself, the investigation fileContinue reading "Russian FSB Publishes Declassified Archival Materials About Hitler’s Last Days"
Lithuanian KGB Hopes to Put a Stop to Wayward Airborne Weapons from Striking Local Farms, 1955
In 1955, the Chairman of the Committee of State Security under the Council of Ministers of the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic, Colonel K. Lyaudis, drafted a Top Secret memo to address a number of recent incidents involving practice bombs dropped by Soviet Air Force pilots at an Air Force range in the Eišiškės region. AsContinue reading "Lithuanian KGB Hopes to Put a Stop to Wayward Airborne Weapons from Striking Local Farms, 1955"
New Acquisition: Collection of Materials from the Higher School of the Dzerzhinsky KGB School of the USSR
A recent acquisition for this site is the 392-page "Materials from the Higher School of the Dzerzhinsky KGB School of the USSR," published in 1988 under the classification of Top Secret. We're scouring through the pages to determine which, if any, of the articles warrant translation and dissemination through these pages. There are some ratherContinue reading "New Acquisition: Collection of Materials from the Higher School of the Dzerzhinsky KGB School of the USSR"
1990: Soviet Union Responds to Czechoslovakia Request for 1968 Prague Spring Invasion Documents
In 1990, members of the CPSU's Central Committee found themselves in a touchy situation. With the communist regime no longer in power in Czechoslovakia, that country's Office of the Attorney General asked the Soviet Union leadership to hand over a specific document that, it was felt, could finger the individuals responsible for the 1968 invasionContinue reading "1990: Soviet Union Responds to Czechoslovakia Request for 1968 Prague Spring Invasion Documents"
Beria’s Son Petitions CPSU and KGB Leadership for Return of Confiscated Goods, Academic Title, and State Decorations
By 1965, Sergo Beria had lived with his KGB-assigned new last name 'Gegechkori' (his mother's maiden name) for a decade. He'd also found himself, in his words, unaware that he had been stripped of his academic credentials, and that his discharge from the Soviet Army had been accompanied with a demotion down to the lowestContinue reading "Beria’s Son Petitions CPSU and KGB Leadership for Return of Confiscated Goods, Academic Title, and State Decorations"
1971 Ukrainian KGB Report Documents Grisly Discovery of Ukrainian Mass Burial Site in Bykvinya
The following is a declassified Secret report filed by Vitaliy Fedorchuk, at the time the Chairman of the Ukrainian Committee for State Security, regarding the discovery of the now infamous mass grave site in Bykvinya, near Kyiv. Following up on the news that a number of juveniles had unearthed gold dental work and skeletal humanContinue reading "1971 Ukrainian KGB Report Documents Grisly Discovery of Ukrainian Mass Burial Site in Bykvinya"
Translating History 