RUSSIA

Defector Literature

L - P

Levchenko, Stanislav. On the Wrong Side: My Life in the KGB. Washington, DC: Permagon-Brassey's, 1988.

Levchenko, a KGB major working under cover as a New Times correspondent, defected in Tokyo in October 1979.

Lunev, Stanislav, and Ira Winkler. Through the Eyes of the Enemy: Russia's Highest Ranking Military Defector Reveals Why Russia Is More Dangerous Than Ever. New York: Regnery, 1998.

Clark comment: Lunev was a GRU colonel prior to his defection in 1988 and, according to the dust jacket is "currently in the Witness Protection Program."

In a review carried by http://www.amazon.com, J. Michael Waller comments that "Lunev provides a riveting and disturbing -- and very credible -- look at the GRU and how it has resisted the reforms that have swept its country.... Lunev describes the situation [in today's Russia] lucidly. One cannot understand the situation in Russia today without reading this book."

Jonkers, AFIO WIN 12-99 (24 Mar. 1999), finds that the author tells his story in "simple, straightforward words, starting with his childhood and ending with his new life in America. It is a nice book for the general public, providing the human touch -- spies are people, after all." Less enthralled, Paseman, Intelligencer 10.2, finds so many problems -- beginning with a "blatant attempt to create interest via sensationalism" -- with this work that he suggests it would be better to "[s]ave your money" than spend it here.

Maffei, Riccardo. Tr., Robert L. Miller. "Fedor Butenko: One Man Against Bolshevism." International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence 23, no. 3 (Fall 2010): 534-566.

Butenko was a Soviet diplomat who defected to Mussolini's Italy in 1938. It is this choice that differentiates Butenko from other Soviet defectors of the period.

Maffei, Riccardo. "Il 'caso Helfand': La defezione nel 1940 del diplomatico sovietico a Roma nei documenti americani." Nuova Storia Contemporanea 18, no. 5 (Sep.-Oct. 2014): 49-74.

Lev Helfand, Soviet Charge d'affaires in Italy, defected with his family to the United States in 1940.

Myagkov, Aleksei. Inside the KGB: An Expose by an Officer of the Third Directorate. New Rochelle, NY: Arlington House, 1977. Richmond, UK: Foreign Affairs Publishing, 1976. New York: Ballantine, 1981. [pb]

According to Pforzheimer, Myagkov was "a significant KGB defector ... in 1974. He is the only defector to come out of the KGB Third Directorate which is responsible for security and counterintelligence in the Soviet Armed Forces.... This book is ... based on solid documentation." Constantinides notes that, with regard to operations, the author's knowledge of the KGB is "largely bound by his association with this one department."

Orlov, Alexander. Handbook of Intelligence and Guerrilla Warfare. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1963.

Pforzheimer identifies Orlov as a NKVD Lieutenant General who defected in 1938. This is an "authoritative work" which represents a "recreation of an intelligence manual which Orlov had written in 1936. It is particularly important on the operational techniques of Soviet 'illegals.'" For Constantinides, the book "is a valuable, needed, and rare insight into an intelligence practice [the use of illegals] of which the Soviets have been masters and on which they have traditionally relied."

A Studies 8.1 (Winter 1964) reviewer finds that this work is really "a survey of Soviet intelligence practice, especially as it relates to the role of the 'illegal' or deep-cover agent, using [the author's] wide past experience to analyze current Soviet techniques.... The weakest section ... is the final chapter on guerrilla warfare; here the dated quality of Orlov's information is most clearly shown." Writing elsewhere in the same volume, Frank G. Wisner, Studies 8.1 (Winter 1964), calls Orlov's work "provocative and edifying."

Orlov, Alexander. The March of Time: Reminiscences. London: St. Ermin's, 2004.

According to Hanyok, I&NS 20.2 (Jun. 2005), this manuscript was given to Edward P. Gazur, Orlov's last FBI "handler," shortly before the former NKVD general died in 1973. It was then locked away in the National Archives. The reviewer calls Orlov's memoirs "a corking read.... Sprinkled throughout the memoirs are some interesting, if unverifiable, anecdotes.... The book contains no historical commentary or review of the facts of these stories." And therein lies the problem. There are "large and obvious gaps in Orlov's memoirs.... The book simply does not advance our knowledge of Orlov's career or understanding of the man and his motives."

Orlov, Alexander. "The Theory and Practice of Soviet Intelligence." Studies in Intelligence 7, no. 2 (Spring 1963): 45-65.

This is an excerpt from Orlov's Handbook of Intelligence and Guerrilla Warfare (1963).

Petrov, Vladimir, and Evdokia Petrov. Empire of Fear. New York: Praeger, 1956. London: André Deutsch, 1956.

Clark comment: Vladimir Petrov was a senior Soviet MVD officer and his wife a code clerk. They defected in Australia in the early 1950s. Pforzheimer recommends this book for its "insight into the Soviet state, its intelligence apparatus and operations." Constantinides comments that the "important facts of Soviet intelligence activities in Australia that Vladimir Petrov revealed" can be found in the Report of Royal Commission on Espionage, but are not included in the Petrovs' book.

Pohl-Wannemacher, Helga. Tr., Rena Wilson. Red Spy at Night: A True Story of Espionage and Seduction Behind the Iron Curtain. London: New English Library, 1977.

Rocca and Dziak refer to this book as "[p]robably an apocryphal account by a self-declared Soviet agent who claimed to have defected to the West." Constantinides also has doubts about this book, noting that there "are 'Perils of Pauline'-like episodes ... that give it an improbable tone and quality."

Poretsky, Elizabeth [alias Elsa Bernaut and Elsa Reiss]. Our Own People: A Memoir of 'Ignace Reiss' and His Friends. London: Oxford University Press, 1969. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1970.

According to Rocca and Dziak, Ignace Reiss was the alias of Ignatz Poretsky, a GRU illegal in the 1920s who was reactivated by the NKVD along with Walter Krivitsky in Western Europe in 1933-1934. The two friends defected separately in 1937 and 1938. Reiss was murdered by the NKVD in September 1937. This work is Poretsky's "restrained memorial ... to her husband and to a small group of his Ukrainian-Polish colleagues." Constantinides sees in Poretsky's work "a parade of figures who later achieved fame as intelligence operatives or agents.... Her descriptions of Moscow in 1936 during the purges ... are chilling to read."

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