How the KGB read letters from citizens - recalls former KGB colonel Oleg Gordievsky. Former intelligence colonel of the KGB of the USSR: Putin made a huge mistake regarding Ukraine

“Now Russia has no friends in the world at all... Putin has now made everyone his enemies.” Former intelligence colonel of the KGB of the USSR about the threat of the Putin regime to democracy and freedom in Ukraine. And also about how the invasion of Ukraine will turn out for Russia.

The regime of “managed democracy” from the Kremlin stood in the way of the bloody Ukrainian struggle for freedom. The naked unilateral military aggression against the people of Ukraine under the command of Russian President Vladimir Putin, a former colonel of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the KGB of the USSR, means that Ukrainian democracy has become a direct threat to the KGB regime of the Kremlin.

Indeed, in Russia, Vladimir Putin and his colleagues from the KGB (FSB) established a vertical system of state government of the special services (FSB, GRU, other special forces) in combination with the organized criminal world in the economy and locally.

In Ukraine in last years Even worse happened - criminal forces seized power and established their control over the intelligence services and law enforcement agencies of the state, as well as over the economy and finance, when on average more than 40 billion US dollars were transferred out of Ukraine per year.

Spanish special prosecutor Jose "Pepe" Grinda Gonzalez, who spent 10 years studying the activities of the Russian mafia in Spain, notes that Russia, Ukraine and Belarus are effectively ruled by dictatorial regimes that base their power on intelligence services in alliance with organized crime clans.

We talk about the threat to such regimes of democracy and freedom in Ukraine and other European countries in our program with Oleg Gordievsky, a former colonel in the foreign intelligence department of the KGB of the USSR and an agent of the British intelligence services (1974-1985). In the USSR, Oleg Gordievsky was sentenced to death penalty, which has not been canceled in Russia today. Putin’s colleagues from the FSB believe that Gordievsky was an agent of Western intelligence services, who inflicted perhaps the greatest damage on Moscow in the entire history of the totalitarian regime and intelligence services here.

Therefore, I asked Mr. Gordievsky, first of all, what he thinks about the role of intelligence agencies like the KGB and FSB in the confrontation with democracy and freedom in society.

- Russian intelligence services, because the Ukrainian ones were insignificant under the heel of the KGB, Russian intelligence and counterintelligence, both actively worked throughout Ukraine and Crimea and collected information about all, even the smallest, aspects of the life of Ukrainians, politics, diplomacy, etc.. And despite the fact that their numbers were very large (hundreds of KGB and GRU officers), they were unable to keep Ukraine and other republics under the rule of the totalitarian regime former USSR. And today we have, as a result of the long-term activities of these special services and their regime, a huge catastrophe in foreign policy Putin's Russia, which affects Ukraine and threatens Europe.

The fact that Putin seized Crimea will not go away so easily for him, since Western countries, the USA and Europe depend very little on Russia. And their threats of sanctions and pressure will completely discredit Moscow. This is a huge mistake by Putin and his company. They planned to seize Crimea, and possibly other Ukrainian territories, if not all of Ukraine. Now it turns out that this plan will not be able to be implemented due to the extremely harsh and unanimous international reaction. And the Kremlin has already realized that they are playing with fire. And Ukraine is now moving towards democracy, and Putin's attempts to restore something like a new USSR will never be realized.

— Mr. Gordievsky, Putin apparently spent a long time preparing for such a plan of action in Ukraine?

- Well, of course a long time ago. This has been in preparation for more than 5 years, if not all 10 years. Putin was especially active in developing this with his company after the first Maidan in 2004. The first Maidan scared them terribly and showed that this could happen anywhere. Although in Russia, after Stalin’s repressions, the people became so cowardly that, it seems to me, the majority of them are not yet ready to go to any Maidan. And it is unlikely that there will be any kind of Maidan in Russia in the near future. But they, Putin and company, still began to prepare a strike on Ukraine. And today this is happening.

— Mr. Gordievsky, are representatives of Moldova warning Europe that they, too, face the threat of Putin’s invasion?

“It’s even difficult to specifically foresee this.” Moldova is located between Romania and Ukraine. But this is possible.

— Although the occupation of such large territories requires huge funds, and this could hit the Russian economy?

- Certainly. I'm watching different ones now analytical materials, reviews indicating that this will all turn into a huge humiliation for Russia. Because its economy is weak. As one of the Western authors wrote about his stay in Russia, he went to buy a screwdriver, and there was not a single one that was made in Russia. Everything is imported. Russia relies on Western imports and imports from China. The economy is going downhill today. And after the Winter Olympics in Sochi cost more than $50 billion, it’s hard to say how Russia can recover from this.

— Do you think that this system of Putin’s rule in Russia, with the help of special services and local criminals, will be imposed on the territories he occupied?

- Yes, sure. It is even stronger in the occupied territories. There will also be military personnel there. You see how in Crimea they are trying to capture one base after another. It will be the same in Moldova if they extend their hand there too. But Putin's regime will lose all confidence of the whole world. Their only friends will be North Korea and Nicaragua. Now Russia has no friends in the world at all.

— But Russian television, propaganda is now showing someone from Great Britain, London, who is talking about some historical rights of Russia to Crimea, calling against sanctions against Moscow?

— These are often half or completely bought people. But the agents, or those who were invited to Russia every year to Putin’s dachas, where they were freely fed, watered, treated to caviar, and other delicacies. They gave gifts, jars of caviar. There is such a group of people here. But they are, compared to the social thought of Britain, insignificant. Because there are many articles in newspapers, in particular in the Times, against Russia. So this time, three huge articles condemn Putin and his actions. And this is a very influential newspaper here, even throughout Europe. And so every day. And those who are trying to say something to justify Russia, they do not have any significant weight in the UK.

— Can Putin use nuclear blackmail against Europe?

- This blackmail will not work. Because by doing this, Putin completely discredits himself. I think nothing nuclear weapon will never be used. Even countries like India, Pakistan, which have nuclear weapons, as well as North Korea, they are not going to seriously use nuclear weapons. Because it's actually suicide. Can you imagine if Russia drops at least one nuclear warhead to Europe! So then Moscow and everything industrial cities Russia will cease to exist. Because there will be American responses nuclear strikes. This is a toy that is actually impossible to use.

— Doesn’t Putin understand that even his closest neighbors, the Ukrainians, will now be his enemies?

- Certainly. He has now made everyone his enemies. It has already turned out that Russia has no friends anywhere in the world. And now, after this, Ukraine will be hostile, all Ukrainians, to the same Russia. I've met so many of them there in my life. And they all had very warm feelings for their Fatherland. I remember my childhood: Ukrainian culture was a second culture for us Russians.

Interviewed by Subdeacon Nathanael, Church of the IPC of Greece, USA.

Subdeacon Nathanael: Tell us something about yourself.

Konstantin Preobrazhensky: I was born in 1953 in Moscow. My father Georgy, a KGB general, was secretly Orthodox Christian and raised us in the Orthodox faith.

My grandfather was a famous doctor and also an Orthodox Christian. Together with selected doctors, he secretly advised Stalin shortly before his death. However, in 1953, during the last Stalinist purge, my grandfather was almost arrested. He escaped arrest only thanks to Stalin's death.

In 1976, I graduated from Moscow University with a degree in Oriental Studies and entered graduate school at Tokyo Tokai University in Tokyo (Japan), where I studied from 1975 to 1976.

- When did you join the KGB?

- I joined the KGB intelligence department in 1976. I have long known about the morals of this office. I knew that the KGB tortured people, blackmailed them and used church structures in the interests of the state.

As soon as I joined the KGB in 1976, I was sent to counterintelligence school in Minsk. From the very beginning we were taught the "art of recruitment." We learned that money, blackmail and human misery could be used for recruitment.
It was all so disgusting that I immediately began writing an expose of the KGB. I published my text on Japanese in 1994, three years after my dismissal, when the communist government fell in 1991.

- What was your work in the KGB?

I was resident in Tokyo from 1980 to 1985 as a senior officer, i.e. colonel. Officially, I was a TASS correspondent specializing in Japanese science. Of course, I studied journalism at Moscow University and wrote many articles about Japanese society and culture.

My main task was to recruit Japanese and Chinese scientists to work for Soviet technical intelligence. I reported personally on my work to Vladimir Kryuchkov, the then head of the KGB.

- To what extent did the KGB interfere in church affairs and, in particular, in the work of the Moscow Patriarchate?

- I knew what was made public in 1993. Then the archives of the Communist Party were opened, and it turned out that many bishops of the Church, including the current Patriarch Alexy II, then Metropolitan of Leningrad, were KGB agents. At the same time, the operational nicknames of the bishops of the MP became known. “Drozdov” was the nickname of Alexy II, and “Mikhailov” was the nickname of Archbishop Kirill of Smolensk.

The infiltration of the KGB into church politics was a completely natural thing. The fact is that the KGB also considered itself something of a “church”, because it was engaged in controlling human souls. He tested the communist faith in people for its sincerity. That is why KGB officers called themselves “healers of souls,” as if they were priests. As the civilized world now knows, some of them really were and remain so.

- Why was the KGB interested in infiltrating the Moscow Patriarchate?

The main goals were foreign espionage and recruitment, although, of course, the KGB also wanted to weaken the Church from within. In the early 1960s. The Moscow Patriarchate joined the World Council of Churches (WCC). Thus, the WCC provided cover for various intelligence operations as it brought the Russian Church into the political arena Western Europe and the rest of the world.

- What can you say about the impending unification of the Moscow Patriarchate and the ROCOR? Is the KGB involved in this?

- The KGB is very actively involved in the union between the Moscow Patriarchate and the ROCOR Metropolitan Laurus.

- How?

- In the second half of the 80s. I learned about operational plans to absorb the Russian Church Abroad in order to better control the Russian emigration and its churches. And all this fits well with Putin's vision of global dominance.

- Can you tell us something about the spy scandals that happened in Japan during your time?

- The Japanese police caught me during a meeting with a Chinese agent whom I had previously recruited. I was released from arrest after just a couple of hours thanks to several phone calls.

However, my superiors forcibly returned me to Moscow and unfairly placed all the blame for the failure on me. But these issues are very multifaceted, and you cannot blame just one person. My superiors simply made me a “scapegoat” in order to continue their activities on Japanese territory without a twinge of conscience.

This story brought me great “famous” and laid the foundation for my well-known journalistic work exposing the KGB and its illegal and inhumane activities after I left in 1991.

My book The Spy Who Loved Japan was an unexpected success.

- What did you do after you left the KGB in 1991?

I took some time off to switch to another activity. Then in 1993, I started working as a freelance journalist and Japanese translator.

I have written several times on state security topics for the Moscow Times, an English-language Moscow newspaper. My articles exposing the inhumane and illegal activities The KGB brought me great fame.

- Did you put your life in danger by exposing the KGB for Russian and Western readers?

- Of course, I risked my life. I received many threats on my life, and was also illegally arrested in 1998 while being summoned for questioning.

Luckily, I had a lawyer on hand and was able to avoid jail.

- Did they try to arrest you illegally? HowThishappened?

One evening I was at home. Ten police officers broke into my apartment and took me away for interrogation. If I had not had a lawyer ready, I would have been imprisoned. But it's a long story.

Did your articles exposing the KGB affect the current president? Russian Federation Vladimir Putin?

- Putin is a former KGB lieutenant who, having gained supreme power, has even more influence and control over the KGB or, as the Russian intelligence agency is now called, the Foreign Intelligence Service.

Therefore, when Putin came to power, it became extremely dangerous for me to continue writing critical articles about the activities of Russian intelligence. Nowadays, dissidents and critics of the KGB quickly find themselves behind bars or in fatal “disasters.”

- So, then you quit your job as a freelance reporter in "MoscowTimes"?

- Not only did I quit my job, I had to flee Russia to save my life.

TO BE CONTINUED

Translation: (c) Portal-Credo.Ru, 2006

The fight against the Bandera underground, which took place in Western Ukraine, has been described many times in historical and fiction, films have been made about her - just remember one of the series “ State border" However, today there are practically no living witnesses to the bloody war that took place after the Great Patriotic War. Almost 70 years have passed, someone has died, and Novokuznetsk is located quite far from the western borders of the former USSR. Nevertheless, we managed to talk with Vasily Andreevich Simkin, a retired KGB colonel. He is 92 years old, of sound mind and in excellent health. physical fitness. In the apartment there is a horizontal bar on which he regularly does pull-ups, and an exercise bike. When we came to visit him, he put on a jacket with the Orders of the Red Star and the Great Patriotic War.

– Vasily Andreevich, you look great for being 92 years old, you play sports...

– I’m trying, I’ll turn 93 in January.

– Today there is a lot of talk about the events in Ukraine, about what happened after the war and what is happening now. You are one of the few people in Kuzbass who actually fought the Bandera underground. Tell us how you ended up in Ukraine.

– I’ll start with my biography. Before the war, I studied at a mining technical school in Prokopyevsk. On June 23, we were gathered and told that the war had begun. The training program has changed a lot. Firstly, they began to devote a lot of time military training, secondly, we, students, started working in the mine. Times were hard. There wasn’t enough food, some of my classmates were fed by relatives, so they shared potatoes with us. We studied, worked, studied again, there were practically no days off. In 1943, when the time came for conscription into the army, we were gathered at the military registration and enlistment office. Everyone wanted to go to the front, but the military commissar lined us up and said that coal industry workers would no longer be called to the front - “reservation.” Us: “What kind of reservation?” We want to go to the front." But they didn’t even call us to volunteer. I then wanted to enter the Siberian Metallurgical Institute, passed the entrance exams, but the condition was strict - either study or work. Combining was not allowed. I had to choose a job, and that’s how I became a professional miner.

He worked in the mines in Prokopyevsk and Osinniki. Then a person from State Security came to me and talked. I special attention didn't contribute to the conversation. And then our Komsomol organizer told me: “They want to invite you to work in the ‘organs’.” I agreed.

Today, before you become a professional security officer, you are taught the basics of the profession. And then they promoted me to junior lieutenant as a person who graduated from technical school, and soon sent me to Western Ukraine.

– Did you know what was happening there?

- Approximately. We, of course, were instructed that the Bandera underground was operating. In Moscow they even changed their clothes. They gave me a pilot's cap for conspiracy (according to the official version, I had nothing to do with state security, but with air force) and sent to Gorodok, this locality in the Lviv region.

-Did they at least teach you how to shoot?

– Shoot – yes, we’ve been to the shooting range. In general, people were sent there from all over the USSR, different ages, and there were elderly security officers. But the situation there was difficult. The boundaries as such between Soviet Union and Poland was not. Bandera's men wandered through the forests. They fought in Western Ukraine and went to the border areas of Poland to recover. It was difficult to understand who was the enemy and who was the friend. I had to meet with my assistants at night in some ravines. The attitude towards the Russians was simply terrible - we had to save two girl teachers, who were from middle zone Russia was sent to teach Russian. At first they were threatened, then they tried to knock down the door and set the house on fire...

– As I understand it, you received the Order of the Red Star for work in Western Ukraine?

– Yes, we received information that the Bandera militants (a militant unit of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army - author’s note) spent the night on the farm. They gave me a group of army men, and we went to check this farm. I’m with the PPSh, I still put two magazines in the tops of my boots. There don't seem to be any. There is only one house left. The windows are dark. I tell the soldiers: “Surround the house.” And, unfortunately, I did not control the execution of the command. They walked around the house and stood at the entrance. The owner opens the door. “Is there anyone?” - I ask. “No way,” the owner replies. And then there was a burst of machine gun fire from behind him. One bullet hit me in the chest, one slid across my forehead, the third pierced my face and knocked out my eye. The most important thing is that I did not immediately realize that I was wounded. I immediately open fire in response, into the door crack. He wounded the owner with the first shots, moved the barrel a little, fired another burst, and by the screams he realized that he had hit someone else. If I had managed to open the door, I probably would have killed everyone. But I feel like one eye can’t see, blood is pouring out. Rolled back behind some heap. The army sergeant says to me: “Comrade junior lieutenant, you are seriously wounded.” And I told him: “Why are you standing there, block the windows, block the windows!” And Bandera’s men rushed through these windows: they pulled out the wounded militant I had hit, and began to leave for the forest. It turns out that their windows were tightly curtained, and they were billeted by this owner, who regularly received them. If the army had carried out my order and blocked the windows, we would have taken them here on the spot. And so I had to pursue.

– Were you pursued with injuries?

- Of course not. Help came from the city and they took me to the hospital in a truck. I soon learned that the militant I had wounded was captured in a nearby village, and later the entire fighting was liquidated. For this operation I was given the Order of the Red Star, and then, as a participant in the liquidation of underground gangs, I was given the Order of the Great Patriotic War. They were equated to front-line soldiers. I received disability at the age of 22; a Bandera member knocked out my eye with a bullet. As a result, they left me in the authorities.

– Returned to Stalinsk?

– Not right away, I stayed in Ukraine for some time, participated in operations against Bandera, but without shooting. And then - yes, I came to hometown and until his retirement he served in the department of the USSR KGB Directorate for Novokuznetsk.

– Do you regret that you went to the “authorities”?

- Of course not. If I had stayed at the mine, I would hardly have become a coal general, but in the “authorities” I became a colonel (laughs)

– What do you wish to young employees?

– Be honest, the most important thing.

On the night of April 28, 1938, Landau was arrested. He could not cross the threshold, and two security officers carried him out by their arms. Based on newly discovered documents, it can be assumed that a grandiose trial of physicists, similar to the “Doctors’ Case,” was being prepared. The arrest warrant for Landau was signed by Deputy People's Commissar of Internal Affairs Mikhail Frinovsky, the super-executioner of the Stalinist regime. This meant that the matter was given special importance.

L. D. Landau: “The fact that Lenin was the first fascist is clear,” “Our system, as I have known it since 1937, is most definitely a fascist system and it has remained that way and cannot change so easily. Therefore, the question is about two things. Firstly, about the extent to which there can be improvements within this fascist system... Secondly, I believe that this system will be undermined all the time. I believe that as long as this system exists, it was never possible to have hopes that it would lead to something decent; in general, it’s even ridiculous. I don't count on it"

Anatoly Razumov

Anatoly Yakovlevich Razumov – senior Researcher, the head of the “Returned Names” center told readers “ Novaya Gazeta» about the horrors of repressions and executions, falsification of cases and impunity of executioners during the “Great” and “Red” terror, as well as the peculiarities of compiling books of memory about the victims of these events.

Homizuri G. P.

Adhering to the principle of the presumption of innocence, I cite only those texts where there is a clear indication of the authorship of V. I. Lenin. As chairman of the Council of People's Commissars and leader of the party, he, of course, is responsible for all documents adopted by the Council of People's Commissars and the Central Committee of the party.

Homizuri G. P.

Terror is an integral attribute of the communist regime; only thanks to terror can it exist.

Kozlov V. A.

The history of mass unrest under socialism has always been a closed topic. The talented historian Vladimir Kozlov describes the conflict between the people and the authorities during the false “silence” of post-Stalin society. Little-known documentary evidence is provided about the events in the Gulag camps, about social and ethnic conflicts. The author has revealed ambiguous reasons, motives, programs and behavior patterns of protest participants. The secret nature of events in Soviet time and the incompleteness of the work on declassifying documents dedicated to these events, as well as the historical analysis of the riots given by the author, make this publication especially relevant for our time, when a wave of popular unrest swept not only across our country, but also through the territories of the former republics of the USSR.

79 years ago, Olga Borovskaya accidentally wandered into the place of execution in Kurapaty. In the years Stalin's repressions More than 30 thousand people were killed there.

October 30 in Russia is the Day of Remembrance of the Victims political repression. Memorial events will be held in dozens of cities the day before and on this day. This year memorable date there are more questions and doubts surrounding us than ever before. More and more often we hear arguments that there were no repressions, and that this was an invention of the perestroika era, invented to denigrate the Soviet Union. We asked historian Sergei Bondarenko to tell us how to argue with such statements. This time our cards are built around the most common theses of skeptics and revisionists who question the history of Soviet political terror.

The French communist Guieneff came to the USSR in 1923, where he became a prominent aviation figure (for some time he even lived in the GPU house on Lubyanka). In 1933 he left the USSR. In France, Guieneff wrote books about the Stalinist regime, which he characterizes as “the most ruthless machine of the exploitation of man by man, undreamed of by Karl Marx himself.” He characterizes the Soviet regime as fascist-technocratic.

The list of repressed members of the USSR Academy of Sciences began to be compiled by F.F. Perchenko and was published after his death in the collection. " Tragic fates: repressed scientists of the USSR Academy of Sciences" (M.: Nauka, 1995), a more detailed list, including the repression of scientists who were subsequently elected to the USSR Academy of Sciences, was published in the book: In memoriam: Historical collection in memory of F.F. Perchenko, M .; St. Petersburg: Phoenix, Atheneum, 1995, pp. 141-210. The current list is based on this publication, but minor clarifications of various biographical data have been added to it. A number of dates of death of some scientists, unfortunately, are still not precisely established .

Sergei ZHIRNOV, former senior officer of the illegal intelligence of the PGU KGB of the USSR and the SVR of the Russian Federation

WHERE WAS FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE AND WHERE WAS PUTIN?
(Putin never served in the foreign intelligence service of the KGB of the USSR)

After Putin and a group of security officers came to power with him, the most idiotic and persistent myths began to circulate among the people about his imaginary membership in foreign intelligence (although it is documented, including from Putin’s own memoirs, that he was never in foreign intelligence served) and about allegedly brilliant career there, launched in the media by Kremlin PR specialists on the eve of the “election” to the post of President of the Russian Federation in the spring of 2000.

I often get asked a question about Putin’s real place in the KGB hierarchy and in intelligence before the collapse of the USSR. Therefore, I decided to finally draw up a kind of table of prestige ranks within the KGB, so that anyone, even someone not very privy to the secrets of the KGB, could clearly figure out for themselves who and where on this ladder was in Soviet times.

The KGB of the USSR in the late Andropov era (after 1978) had the status of an autonomous union State Committee with the rights of a union-republican ministry and officially numbered about 400 thousand employees (including about 100 thousand - border troops, then also KGB troops, special forces and a whole army of civilians and servants, personnel officers there were something like 100-200 thousand, it is impossible to determine more precisely, because the KGB always hid its numbers). At the same time, this arithmetic did not take into account the huge secret apparatus of “voluntary assistants” or “informers” (agents, trusted connections and proxies) - about 5 million Soviet and foreign citizens.

Of course, even these 400 thousand KGB employees from the 260 million population of the USSR are a drop in the ocean. There was one KGB officer for every 600 Soviet citizens. And if we take only career operative officers, there was one operative for every 1200-1400 citizens of the USSR. Therefore, the security officers, of course, arithmetically fell under the concept of rarity, the elite, the “cream” of society.

This is the KGB elite Soviet people(along with other elites - party, state, Komsomol, trade union, military, diplomatic, foreign trade, journalist, scientific, artistic, creative, writer, thieves, intellectual, religious and the like). Getting into it was considered very difficult and already a very honorable thing. Therefore, in itself, belonging to the closed and prestigious KGB corporation was considered enviable for the overwhelming majority of Soviet people.

Did Putin serve in the elite KGB corporation? Definitely yes. Did Putin serve in intelligence? For some time and conditionally, but internally. Did Putin serve in foreign intelligence? Never in my life! Putin’s career in the table of ranks of prestige of the KGB operational staff is expressed by the following numbers: 43-42-39-34-31-34-26-39. And it requires some explanation (you will find it below). Was Putin's career in the KGB bright and successful? Compared to two thirds of the security officers - yes. But compared to real employees of real foreign intelligence - no.

Inside the “elite” KGB corporation itself, there was a multi-stage ladder of success for the operational personnel - various individual elites, which looks something like this (the prestige in it decreases as you go down from the first to the forty-third position):

TABLE ON THE RANKS OF PRESTIGE OF THE USSR KGB OPERATIONAL STAFF
__________________________
FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE
__________________________
ILLEGAL FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE

1. illegal intelligence officer “in the field” (operator of the “Special Reserve” of the KGB of the USSR), on a long trip abroad (DZK) in a developed capital country of the “first grade”, the Western world (USA, England, France, Germany, Canada, Japan, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, Spain, Norway, Denmark, the Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, South Africa, Israel, etc.)
2. illegal intelligence officer of the Center (operator of the active reserve of the KGB of the USSR “under the roof” or 1st department central office illegal intelligence (directorate "C")), constantly and regularly traveling "into the field" on short-term business trips and on individual, one-time illegal missions around the world
3. illegal intelligence officer “in the field” (operator of the “Special Reserve” of the KGB of the USSR), in the DZK in a “second-class” country, in the most developed of the so-called developing countries with a capitalist orientation (Argentina, Mexico, Peru, Chile, Hong Kong, South Korea, Brazil, India, Kenya, Turkey, Morocco, Latin American, Arabic, African countries, states South-East Asia) or an operative of the “Special Reserve” on settlement or legalization in an intermediate country
4. an officer of department “C”, who is undergoing special training to become illegal immigrants through the 3rd department or a candidate for enrollment as an illegal immigrant
5. security officer special purpose(special forces) special forces unit "Vympel" of the 8th department of control "S" (sabotage, sabotage, terrorism, guerrilla and raid warfare deep behind enemy lines in any country in the world)
__________________________
"LEGAL" FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE

6. an operative of a “legal” residency in a DZK in a developed country of the Western world, working “in the field” through illegal intelligence (“N”) or an operative of the active KGB reserve “under the roof” in civilian ministries, departments, institutions and organizations in the USSR in preparation for the DZK (Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Foreign Trade, State Committee for Science and Technology, State Committee for Economic Relations, TASS, State Television and Radio Broadcasting, APN, mass media, etc.)
7. an operative officer of a “legal” residency in a DZK in a developed country of the Western world, working “in the field” along the line of political intelligence (PR) or an operative officer of the active KGB reserve “under the roof” in an institution in the USSR in preparation for a DZK along this line
8. an operative of a “legal” residency in a DZK in a developed country of the Western world, working “in the field” through scientific and technical intelligence (“X”) or external counterintelligence (“KR”) or an operative of the active KGB reserve “under the roof” in an institution in the USSR in preparation for DZK along this line
9. an operational “legal” employee of the central apparatus of illegal intelligence (directorate “C”), who regularly goes “to the field” on one-time “legal” special missions around the world
10. operational “legal” employee of the prestigious geographical departments of the PSU or the “T” and “K” departments of the central office (PGU), who regularly goes “to the field” on one-time “legal” special assignments around the world
11. an operative officer of a “legal” residency in a DZK in a developing capitalist-oriented country, working “in the field” through illegal intelligence (“N”) or an operative officer of the active KGB reserve “under the roof” in an institution in the USSR in preparation for a DZK
12. an operative officer of a “legal” residency in a DZK in a developing country with a capitalist orientation, working “in the field” through political intelligence (“PR”) or an operative officer of the active KGB reserve “under the roof” in an institution in the USSR in preparation for a DZK
13. an operative of a “legal” residency in a DZK in a developing capitalist-oriented country, working “in the field” through scientific and technical intelligence (“X”) and external counterintelligence (“KR”) or an operative of the active KGB reserve “under the roof” in an institution in the USSR in preparation for the DZK
14. an operational officer of the central apparatus of illegal intelligence (directorate “C”, Yasenevo), working at the Center in a prestigious geographical department within illegal intelligence (4th or 5th)
15. an officer of the central apparatus of foreign intelligence (PGU, Yasenevo) of the KGB, working in the Center in the prestigious geographical department of the entire PGU (1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th or 7th)
16. an operational officer of the central apparatus of management "T" or management "K" (Yasenevo), working at the Center in the prestigious geographical department of his department
17. an operational officer of the central apparatus of illegal intelligence, working in the Center in a low-prestige geographical, functional or auxiliary department (2, 3, 6, 7 and 8 departments of management “C”)
18. an operational officer of the central apparatus of foreign intelligence (PGU in Yasenevo), working at the Center in a low-prestige geographical department of the PGU (for example, English-speaking or French-speaking countries of Africa, near-socialist countries of Southeast Asia)
19. an officer of the central apparatus of the departments “T” and “K” of foreign intelligence (PGU), working in the Center in a low-prestige geographical, functional or auxiliary department of his department, or an employee of a low-prestige department or service of the PGU (NTO, legal service, archives, NIIRP ), or CI teacher
20. student of the Main (three-year) faculty of the Institute of Culture of the KGB of the USSR (official diploma of the USSR of a unified state standard on the second higher education).
21. student of the two-year faculty of the KGB USSR CI (internal KGB certificate of advanced training).
_________________________
OTHER EXTERNAL ACTIVITIES OF THE KGB IN CAPITAL COUNTRIES, DEVELOPING CAPITALIST-ORIENTED COUNTRIES AND IN "HOT SPOTS"

22. an operative of other lines of the KGB, working in a subsidiary control department in a developed country of the Western world (security officer, cryptographer, operational driver, scientific and technical support technician, etc.)
23. an operative of other lines of the KGB, working in a DZK in a developing country with a capitalist orientation (security officer, cryptographer, NTO technician, etc.) or a “legal” and official adviser to the KGB in “hot spots” (Angola, Mozambique, Nicaragua, Afghanistan , Syria, Libya, Iraq, Cuba, Algeria, Vietnam, etc.)
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INTERNAL INTELLIGENCE (INTELLIGENCE FROM THE TERRITORY OF THE USSR, COUNTRIES OF THE SOCIETAL BLACK COUNTRIES AND DEVELOPING COUNTRIES OF SOCIALIST ORIENTATION) AND OTHER INTERNAL ACTIVITIES OF THE KGB

24. operative officer of the central official representative office of the KGB in the capital of the socialist country in the DZK, working through illegal intelligence
25. officer of the central official representative office of the KGB in the capital of the socialist country in the DZK, working through internal intelligence from the territory of the socialist countries and other lines of KGB activity
26. operative officer of the official representative office of the KGB in the socialist country in the DZK, working through internal intelligence in the provincial branch (intelligence point in the socialist countries)
27. operative of various lines of the KGB in the DZK in the socialist country, working in the province or in a group Soviet troops(FGP)
28. an operative officer of the 11th department of the PGU (internal intelligence from the territory of socialist countries) or an operative officer of the active reserve of the KGB of the USSR “under the roof” of Soviet external organizations (SSOD, KMO USSR, Peace Committee, Soviet Women's Committee, Olympic Committee, etc. )
29. operational officer of the central apparatus of the RT in Moscow (internal intelligence from the territory, the first line of activity of the territorial bodies of the KGB)
30. operational officer of the first department (internal intelligence from the territory in the structure of the territorial bodies of the KGB) of the KGB for Moscow and the Moscow region
31. student of one-year courses at the Andropov Red Banner Institute of the KGB of the USSR (KGB certificate of advanced training for internal intelligence from the territory of the USSR and socialist countries)
32. operational officer of the central apparatus of the KGB of the USSR (second main board and other departments) in Moscow
33. first-line operative (internal intelligence from the territory of the USSR) of the regional departments of the KGB in Moscow and the Moscow region
34. an officer of the first departments (internal intelligence from the territory, the first line of KGB activity) of the republican, regional or regional apparatus of the KGB in the capital of one of the 14 union republics or in a large provincial city and/or large seaport(Leningrad, Klaipeda, Riga, Vladivostok, Odessa, Novorossiysk, Sevastopol, Batumi, Murmansk, etc.) or an employee of the active reserve “under the roof” in civil organizations
35. operational officer of the central apparatus of the republican, regional and regional KGB of the USSR (counterintelligence, etc.)
36. first-line operational officer (internal intelligence from the territory) of the regional departments of the KGB in the capital of one of the 14 union republics or in a large provincial city and/or a major seaport (Leningrad, Klaipeda, Riga, Vladivostok, Odessa, Novorossiysk, Sevastopol, Batumi, Murmansk and etc.)
37. operative officer of the first departments (internal intelligence from the territory, the first line of KGB activity) of the regional apparatus of the KGB for the non-prestigious regions of the RSFSR and union republics
38. first-line operative (internal intelligence from the territory) of regional departments of the KGB in non-prestigious regions of the RSFSR and union republics
39. an officer of other lines (general, military, economic, transport, ideological counterintelligence, etc.) of the KGB in the capital of one of the 14 union republics or in a large provincial city or a major seaport (Leningrad, Vladivostok, Odessa, Novorossiysk, Murmansk, etc.)
40. an operational officer of other lines (general, military, economic, transport, ideological counterintelligence, etc.) in territorial bodies (district departments) in the province or a career border guard officer
41. Cadet of the Higher Red Banner and Dzerzhinsky School of the KGB of the USSR (counterintelligence, diploma of first higher education) or student of the Higher Courses of the KGB
42. student of operational courses of the KGB of the USSR (certificate of advanced training) or cadet of a border school
43. non-certified (civilian) employee of the KGB of the USSR or a long-term conscript, or a contract soldier

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EXPLANATIONS AND NOTES

(strong request: do not engage in meaningful discussions with me without carefully reading and understanding all of this):

1. In the KGB of the USSR, according to the geographical principle, there were two completely different and incomparable intelligence services: external (real - in developed countries West and in the most developed of the so-called developing countries) and internal (surrogate - intelligence from the territory of the USSR, socialist countries and poor satellite countries)

2. Accordingly, there were significant differences in the prestige of the position within the KGB and outside it - in the rest of Soviet society. Thus, in the USSR it was generally considered prestigious to go to any “abroad” (even to such backward and poor socialist countries as Mongolia, Romania, Bulgaria, Cuba, Syria or North Korea), and within the KGB not many developing countries, nor, especially, socialist ones, were not considered prestigious at all. Even capitalist countries like Finland. Because of this difference in perception between intelligence professionals and ordinary laymen, the latter think that Putin’s business trip to the GDR is a career success, although in reality it was considered at PGU as ending up in a landfill or in a garbage pit.

3. My table of prestige ranks applies exclusively to the operational, but not to the commanding staff of the KGB.

4. The structure of this table is only quantitatively pyramidal. That is, the lower categories are much more numerous (tens of thousands) than the higher ones (only a few hundred and tens of people). But they have no official dependence on each other.

5. The transition of an operational employee to the management team could significantly change his prestige, but this is outside the table presented, because it becomes too difficult (impossible) for objective assessment. What is better and more prestigious: to be a simple lieutenant in an “illegal” foreign intelligence station in Paris or Washington, or a general in some provincial “Uryupinsk” headed regional administration KGB?

6. In the KGB of the USSR, the operational staff could grow from a junior lieutenant to a lieutenant colonel (in rank) and from a junior intelligence officer to a senior assistant to the head of a department (in rank). Up to and including lieutenant colonel, ranks were assigned by internal orders of the chairman of the KGB of the USSR. Already in the GDR, Putin reached the limit of automatic growth of the operational staff within the KGB (lieutenant colonel, senior assistant to the head of the department) and would never have been able to rise higher (he was old and did not have the necessary education and qualifications for further growth), even if he really wanted to.

7. Starting with the colonel, the procedure changed, becoming radically more complicated, making it accessible to units. Assignments military ranks, starting with the colonel, fell into the nomenclature of the CPSU Central Committee. In this case, the following were required: successful completion of management courses (in Moscow at the CI or in Alma-Ata), representation by the Collegium and the Chairman of the KGB and approval in the Department of Administrative Bodies of the Central Committee apparatus, and the assignment itself was made by Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR.

8. It is very important not to confuse the prestige of a position in this table of ranks with profitability or material benefits. For example, a simple cryptographer working in a DZK in the most crooked country and receiving foreign currency was financially much better off than any of the most prestigious officers in Yasenevo. So the senior intelligence officer, Major Putin, being in the DZK at a provincial point of internal intelligence from the territory of the socialist countries in Dresden (GDR), received more (in 4 years he saved up for a new Volga) than the colonel of the most prestigious department of real foreign intelligence (PGU), but on This material side of the matter was where his advantages ended.

9. It must be said that full training at the KGB Intelligence Institute (CI) was not mandatory for working in “internal” intelligence - in surrogate intelligence from the territory, in the first line of the territorial bodies of the KGB in the USSR and socialist countries. For this, six-month advanced training courses in Kyiv, Gorky, a year in Minsk or at the CI in Moscow were enough. Therefore, when Putin went to a one-year course in Moscow, it was already clear from the very beginning that his personnel officers did not plan to join any foreign intelligence service. That’s why he later returned to St. Petersburg and went only to the GDR, to the official representation of the KGB under the Stasi, where real intelligence officers were practically not sent at the beginning of their careers.

10. Putin began his career in the KGB (from 1975 to 1991) from the lowest 43rd position (a civilian employee of the secretariat, an uncertified legal adviser of the Leningrad KGB), then rose to 42nd. For most of his career in the KGB, he was in the territorial bodies of the KGB in provincial Leningrad in the 39th position out of 43 in my table of prestige ranks in the KGB, gradually moving to 34th position (internal intelligence from the territory of the USSR in Leningrad). For 9 months before leaving for the GDR, he moved to Moscow to the 31st position, and then very briefly (for four months) back to Leningrad to the 34th position. During the DZK in the GDR (1986-1990), Putin temporarily rose to 26th position, and this was his highest achievement in the structure of the KGB of the USSR. Immediately after returning from the GDR (1990-1991), he moved back to Leningrad to 39th position.

11. The fact that Putin ended up as President of the Russian Federation is completely unrelated to his non-existent “successes” in the KGB and, moreover, in “foreign intelligence”, in which he never served (it starts from the 21st position and higher in table of prestige ranks). He just happened to be in the right place and in right time: in 1991-95 (under Sobchak in the St. Petersburg mayor's office) and then in 1997-99 (in the administration of President Yeltsin). Yeltsin's "family" and a group of oligarchs led by Berezovsky, mistakenly assessing Putin's dullness and diligence as his main advantage, made their main bet in an attempt to preserve the elusive power on him, as a puppet at the highest post in the state. And over time he abandoned them all. That's all the explanation. It has nothing to do with Putin’s “merits” in the KGB.

12. Personally, I immediately started in the KGB from the 4th position (1981-82), but then I proactively refused to complete special training and enlist as an illegal immigrant in the KGB (2nd position). After a forced return to the question of personnel service in the KGB, I had to fall far down - all the way to 20th position (1984-87)! Thus, personally, my lowest point in the table of prestige ranks in the KGB (20th) was six positions higher than Putin’s highest (26th)! Moreover, we never served in the same intelligence service: I was always in the real external intelligence service, and he was in the surrogate, internal intelligence service, and even then not always. Then I managed to immediately rise sharply to the 14th position (1987-1988), and from there I returned to the top again - to my original one, where I started, 4th (1988-89), with a loss of 6 years. And then to the 2nd (1989-91). Well, I ended my operational career in 1992 in the highest 1st position. After the destruction of the USSR and the liquidation of the KGB, I proactively retired, first to the reserves, and then finally retired from the spy agency, which I never regretted before and do not regret now (Read the autobiographical novel “How the KGB Hunted Me”).

Paris, March 2016.