Spies: The Rise and Fall of the KGB in America (110 page)

40. "Vadim" to Moscow Center, s March 1945, KGB file 43173, v.1, pp. 88-89,
Vassiliev, Black, 5o-s1.

41. Washington Field Office to Director, Re: Harold Glasser, 13 May 1947, serial 2429, FBI Silvermaster file 65-56402. List of "Ruble's" acquaintances, 5 January 1945, KGB file 43072, v.1, p. 133, Vassiliev, White #3, 6o. Gorsky's 5 March cable
is used in Kai Bird and Svetlana Chervonnaya, "The Mystery of Ales," American
Scholar, Summer 2007, http://www.theamericanscholar.org/suo7/ales-birdlong.html
#31, to argue that "Ales" was not Hiss and offers Wilder Foote as a replacement can didate. The multiple flaws in Bird and Cheivonnaya's argument are brought out in
John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr, "`Ales' Is Still Hiss: The Wilder Foote Red
Herring," paper presented at Symposium on Ciyptologic History, Center for Ciyptologic History, National Security Agency, Ft. Meade, MD, 2007, http://wwv .john
earlhaynes.org/page7o.html, and John Ehrman, "Once Again, the Alger Hiss Case,"
Studies in Intelligence 51,140. 4 (December 2007), https://www.cia.gov/library/cen
ter-for-the-s tudy-of-intelligence/c si-publications/cs i-studies/studies/vol51no4/index
.html, as well as in a forthcoming essay on Hiss and "Ales" by Eduard Mark in the
Journal of Cold War Studies in 2oog.

42. "Vadim" to Moscow Center, 2 April 1945, KGB file 43072, v.1, p. 82, Vassiliev, White #3, 57. Emphasis in original. Weinstein, Perjury, 516.

43. KGB Moscow to "Vadim," 29 May 1945, KGB file 43173, v.2, p. 6i, Vassiliev, Black, 66.

44. KGB Washington to Moscow Center, 22 June 1945, KGB file 55302, v.1,
p. 78, Vassiliev, White #3, 98. Emphasis in original.

45. "Vladimir" to Center, 25 December 1948, KGB file 43173, v4, P. 479, Vassiliev, Black, 73. "Vladimir," KGB Washington station chief, was mistaken in his belief that Chambers as German by birth. Chambers seas American-born of old-stock
American parentage, not German. But he became a skilled German linguist, at times
supporting himself with translation work. In 1928 he translated from the original
German the first American edition of the childhood favorite Bantbi. During his years
in the Communist underground in the 1930s, he often affected a foreign accent, and
some underground Communists with whom he worked gained the impression he
was foreign born, possibly a Russian, a German, or a Volga German. In his autobiography, Witness, Chambers discussed the usefulness of appearing to be a foreigner
in his underground work when he noticed that American Communists were more impressed if they though they were dealing with a Russian or a German than with an
ordinary American. Chambers, Witness, 350-52.

46. P. Fedotov and K. Kukin report to KI chairman, December 1948, KGB file
43173, v.2c, p. 203, Vassiliev, Black, 73. When confronted by the FBI, Wadleigh
confessed to espionage and appeared as a prosecution witness in the Hiss trials. Pigman was a professional staff member of the U.S. Bureau of Standards, working on
high-technology projects. Under FBI questioning in the late 1940s Pigman denied
having delivered material to Chambers but admitted he had met on several occasions in 1936-38 with David Carpenter, Chambers's assistant. Reno was a mathematician at the U.S. Army Aberdeen Proving Grounds, working on advanced military
technology. Confronted by the FBI, in 1949 he confessed that he had supplied technical data to Chambers's espionage apparatus in the mid-1930s. In 1952 he pled
guilty to perjury and was imprisoned for submitting deceptive information on his
federal employment and security applications.

47. Report to KI chairman responding to "Vladimir's" telegram of 25 December
1948, KGB file 43173, v2c, pp. 33-38, Vassiliev, Black, 76.

48. A. Gorsky, "Failures in the USA (1938-48)," December 1948, KGB file
43173, v.2c, pp. 49-50, Vassiliev, Black, 77. Note that Chambers was a senior editor
at Time, not editor-in-chief. Wadleigh's name was Henry Julian Wadleigh-that is, Henry J. Wadleigh. But there is no "J" in Cyrillic. Why the Cyrillic "A" was substituted is unclear. Chambers identified Alger Hiss, Donald Hiss, Wadleigh, Reno,
Collins, Pigman, Peters, Pressman, Carpenter, Inslerman, Field, White, Silverman,
and Glasser as involved with his GRU apparatus. While Chambers did not know the
name, he identified a source that the FBI determined to be Vladimir V. Sveshnikov.
Lester Hutm and Harry Azizov may be spelling garbles for sources that Chambers
described, again without remembering the names, that the FBI identified as Lester
Huettig and Morris Asimow. No one resembling Peter MacLean is known to be involved with Chambers. Barna Bukov is the GRU officer Chambers identified as
"Boris Bykov," pronouncing the name as "boo-koff." Tanenhaus, Whittaker Chambers, 548. Chambers's statements about these persons and their background are discussed in Chambers, Witness; Weinstein, Perjury; and Tanenhaus, Whittaker Chain-
bers. On Bukov, also see M. Lurie and V. Kochik, GRU: Dela i liudi [GRU: Cases and
People] (Moscow: Neva Olma-Press, 2002), 356.

49. "Plan of measures for the 1st Department, is Directorate of the KI to improve intelligence work in the USA," approved by S. Savchenko, 16 March ig5o,
KGB file 43173, v.zc, p. 74, Vassiliev, Black, 82. The KGB document referred to
"Leonard"/Hiss's State Department status in the present sense, but he had left the
State Department in 1946 to take the position as head of the Carnegie Endowment.

i. Pavel Sudoplatov et al., Special Tasks: The Memoirs of an Unwanted Witness, a Soviet Spynaster (Boston: Little, Brown, 1994), 172-200; Hans Bethe,
"Atomic Slurs," Washington Post, 27 May 1994; William J. Broad, "Physicists Try to
Discredit Book Asserting Atom Architects Spied," New York Times, 1 May 1994;
David Streitfeld, "FBI Says Evidence Lacking against A-Bomb Scientists," Washington Post, 2 May 1995; Thomas Powers, "Were the Atomic Scientists Spies?" New
York Review of Books, 9 June 1994.

2. Moscow Center announced the cover name "Enormous" in a message to the
KGB New York station, 26 November 1942, KGB file 40159, v.3, p. 222, Alexander
Vassiliev, Black Notebook [2007 English Translation], trans. Philip Redko (199396), io8.

3. In the early i9gos, before the release of the decoded cables of the Venona
project, retired KGB officers deliberately spread misleading information about an alleged source in the Manhattan Project with the cover name "Perseus." Vladimir
Chikov wrote a lengthy article and a book about Soviet espionage, extolling the contributions of veteran KGB American agents Morris and Lona Cohen. He credited
Morris with recruiting "Perseus," described as a physicist whom Morris had known
in connection with the International Brigades in the Spanish Civil War. According
to Chikov, "Perseus" was a key Soviet atomic spy who had worked at the Metallurgical Laboratory at Chicago and later at Los Alamos. Another retired KGB officer,
Anatoly Yatskov, confirmed the story. After the deciphered Venona messages appeared, a number of researchers assumed that Chikov's "Perseus" had been just a
minor disguise for the Soviet atomic source "Persian" in Venona (in Russian the cover name is "Pers"). But several parts of the "Perseus" story didn't fit with Venona's "Persian," including Chikov's claim that "Perseus's" cover name was changed to "Mlad."
"Persian" was not changed to "Mlad" in Venona. In any case, "Mlad" was clearly the
cover name of Theodore Hall, who did not fit Chikov's description of "Perseus."
Eventually, most historians concluded that Chikov and Yatskov had deliberately conflated several different Soviet sources, added outright deception, and created a nonexistent "Perseus." Vladimir Chikov, "How the Soviet Secret Service Split the American Atom," New Times [Russia] 16 and 17 (23-3o April 1991); Vladimir Chikov,
Comment Staline a vole la bombe atomique aux Americains: Dossier KGB no. 13676,
assisted by Gary Kern (Paris: R. Laffont, 1996); Michael Dobbs, "How Soviets Stole
U.S. Atom Secrets," Washington Post, 4 October 1992. On the unraveling of the
"Perseus" story, see "The Perseus Myth" in Joseph Albright and Marcia Kunstel,
Bombshell: The Secret Story of America's Unknown Atomic Spy Conspiracy (New
York: Times Books, 1997), 267-77, and Gary Kern, "The PERSEUS Disinformation
Operation," H-HOAC, 17 February 2006, http://h-net.msu.edu/cgi-bin/logbrowse
.pl?trx=lm&list=h-hoac.

4. KGB New York to Moscow Center, 7 February 1944, KGB file 40594, v.6,
p. 240; "Agent network as of 1.02.45," 1 February 1945, KGB file 40594, v7, PP. 2425, Vassiliev, Black, 117-18, 120.

5. Communist Labor Party News [Cleveland], no. 3 (November 1919): 2; Testimony of Edward Cassell, 24 August 1940, U.S. House Special Committee on UnAmerican Activities, Investigation of Un-American Propaganda Activities in the
United States (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Govt. Print. Off., 1940-44), v.4, 1698-99;
Robert Cohen, When the Old Left Was Young: Student Radicals and America's First
Mass Student Movement, 1929-1941 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993),
234.

6. Cohen, When the Old Left Was Young, 234; "Communist Matters-Russell
Alton McNutt Gives Results of Interview with M," 14 September 1951, CIA FOIA
F-1975-00144. Michael and Anne Sidorovich summary, 29 September ig5i, serial
159 (NY 65-15380), FBI Michael and Anne Sidorovich file 65-59294.

7. "Communist Matters-Russell Alton McNutt Gives Results of Interview
with M," 14 September 1951, CIA FOIA F-1975-00144, serials 92 and 159, FBI
Michael and Anne Sidorovich file 65-59294. Waldo McNutt's interviews in serials 92
and 159 differ on some details about how he first met Julius. Sam Roberts, The
Brother: The Untold Story of Atomic Spy David Greenglass and How He Sent His
Sister, Ethel Rosenberg, to the Electric Chair (New York: Random House, 2001),
174.

8. Moscow Center to "May," 26 April 1944; "`Antenna' made contact," KGB file
40159, v3, PP. 354, 361, Vassiliev, Black, 112; Venona 212 KGB New York to
Moscow, ii February 1944; Venona 854 KGB New York to Moscow, i6 June 1944.

9. Moscow Center to "Anton," "analysis of work in 44," 14 January 1945, KGB
file 40159, v3, P. 457, Vassiliev, Black, 113; Venona 212 KGB New York to Moscow,
ii February 1944; Venona 854 KGB New York to Moscow, 16 June 1944.

io. "Grouping of probationers as of March 1945," KGB file 40594, v7, P. 97,
Vassiliev, Black, 135; "Aleksey's first meeting with Persian," ii March 1945, KGB file 40129, v.3a, p. 380, Alexander Vassiliev, White Notebook #1 [2007 English Translation], trans. Steven Shabad (1993-96), 116.

ii. KGB New York to Moscow Center, 5 February 1945, KGB file 82702, V.1,
p. 284, Alexander Vassiliev, Yellow Notebook #1 [2007 English Translation], trans.
Philip Redko (1993-96), 17. The business may have been Indian Lake Lodge in the
Adirondacks, which McNutt purchased in the spring of 1943 with Lee Weiner for
$17,000. He later told the FBI that his wife Rose and Sally Weiner ran the lodge
during the summer season and he would travel there on weekends to assist.

12. "Anton was informed," g February 1945; KGB New York to Moscow Center, ii May 1945, KGB file 82702, v.1, pp. 284, 310, Vassiliev, Yellow #1, 18, 24.
Moscow Center to Uglov, 8 June 1948, KGB file 40159, v.5, p. 147, Vassiliev, Black,
128.

13. "Russell Alton McNutt," 25 August 1953, CIA FOIA case F-1975-00144;
Roberts, Brother, 174.

14. McDowell News, 7 January 2002; Washington Post, 17 November 1974. McNutt obituary, Fairfax Times, i February 2008. In 2007 Harvey Klehr and John
Haynes contacted Mr. McNutt to ask if he wished to comment on the documents we
had found about his relationship with Soviet intelligence and sent him background
material. He declined an interview.

15. The evidence regarding Robert Oppenheimer's relationship to the CPUSA
is thoroughly examined in Gregg Herken, Brotherhood of the Bomb: The Tangled
Lives and Loyalties of Robert Oppenheimer, Ernest Lawrence, and Edward Teller
(New York: Henry Holt, 2002), supplemented by the Web site "The Brotherhood of
the Bomb," http://ss7~sw.brotherhoodofthebomb.com/, which contains a more detailed set of footnotes than the printed book. It also contains a "new evidence" section about documentation available subsequent to publication of the book about Oppenheimer's membership in the CPUSA, particularly the unpublished journal of
Barbara Chevalier and the unpublished memoir of Gordon Griffiths. Gordon Griffiths, "Venturing outside the Ivory Tower: The Political Autobiography of a College
Professor," Gordon Griffiths Papers (Washington, D.C.: Library of Congress Manuscript Division), 26-28.

16. Oral transcription of interview between Lt. Col. John Landsdale, Jr., and Dr.
J. Robert Oppenheimer, 12 September 1943, inserted in U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Govt.
Print. Off., 1954), hearing of 3 May 1954, 871-86; Herken, Brotherhood of the Bomb,
pp. 107-15, 160-63.

17. San Francisco FBI report of i July 1945-15 March 1947, serial 5421, FBI
Comintern Apparatus file. Eltenton moved to England in 1947 and refused to discuss the matter for the rest of his life.

18. Venona 1773 KGB New York to Moscow, 16 December 1944; Venona 58o-
581 KGB San Francisco to Moscow, 13 November 1945.

1g. Venona 259 Moscow to New York, 21 March 1945, deals with the proposal
that "Huron" approach "Veksel" and Goldsmith. Vassiliev's notes on Yatskov's report
make clear "Veksel" was Fermi. Venona's identification of "Veksel" as Oppenheimer
was based on Venona 799 KGB New York to Moscow, 26 May 1945, which had indi cated that "Veksel" headed work at Los Alamos. At that time Fermi had moved to
Los Alamos for the final phases of the project, and the KGB officer sending Venona
799 apparently made the mistake of assuming Fermi was in charge of the New Mexico facility. Since Oppenheimer directed Los Alamos, that misled NSA/FBI analysts
into identifying "Veksel" as Oppenheimer. Arnold Kramish, a physicist who had
worked in the Manhattan Project, suggested in 1997 that "Veksel" was not Oppenheimer but Enrico Fermi. Arnold Kramish, "The Manhattan Project and Venona,"
paper presented at Symposium on Ciyptologic History, Ft. Meade, MD, 29-31 October 1997. In addition, Vassiliev's notebooks show that Fermi had the cover name
"Vector," and Venona's "Veksel" was likely a decoding garble for "Vector.-