The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB

Chapter Four The Magnificent Five

1. Andrew and Gordievsky, KGB, p. 214. Primakov et al., Ocherki Istorii Rossiyskoi Vneshnei Razvedki, vol. 3, p. 19.

2. “Nationale für ordentliche Hörer der philosophischen Fakultät”: entries for Arnold Deutsch, 1923-7; “Rigorosenakt des Arnold Deutsch,” 1928, no. 9929, with cv by Deutsch; records of Deutsch’s 1928 PhD examination. Archives of University of Vienna.

3. vol. 7, chs. 9, 10.

4. Andrew and Gordievsky, KGB, pp. 214-15.

5. Sharaf, Fury on Earth.

6. Wilhelm Reich, Sexualerregung und Sexualbefriedigung, the first publication in the series Schriften der Sozialistischen Gesellschaft für Sexualberatung und Sexualforschung in Wien, carries the note “Copyright 1929 by Münster-Verlag (Dr. Arnold Deutsch), Wien II.” When he later wrote a classified memoir for NKVD files, Deutsch seems to have considered it imprudent to mention his previous close association with the sex-pol movement and Reich, who by then was engaged in a somewhat bizarre program of research on human sexual behavior. There is no mention of Reich either in Mitrokhin’s notes on the Deutsch file or in the two works by authors given some access to it by the SVR: Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, and West and Tsarev, The Crown Jewels. The 1997 SVR official history also makes no mention of Deutsch’s involvement with Reich or the sex-pol movement in its hagiographic chapter on him; Primakov et al., Ocherki Istorii Rossiyskoi Vneshnei Razvedki, vol. 3, ch. 1.

7. Viennese police reports on Deutsch of March 25 and April 27, 1934, ref. Z1.38.Z.g.p./34, Dokumentationsarchiv des Österreichischen Widerstandes, Vienna.

8. vol. 7, ch. 9, para. 10; ch. 10, para. 1. The illegal resident under whom Deutsch served in France was Fyodor Yakovlevich Karin, codenamed JACK.

9. Deutsch’s address and profession as “university lecturer” are given on the birth certificate of his daughter, Ninette Elizabeth, born on May 21, 1936. Further information from residents of Lawn Road Flats.

10. vol. 7, ch. 9, para. 10. London University Archives contain no record of Deutsch as either research student or lecturer, probably because he was involved only on a part-time basis.

11. Andrew and Gordievsky, KGB, pp. 214-15. vol. 7, ch. 9.

12. vol. 7, ch. 10, para. 24.

13. vol. 7, ch. 10, para. 1. The files noted by Mitrokhin make clear that Deutsch was the first to devise this recruitment strategy.

14. A similar stroke of chance explains why Cambridge produced more British codebreakers than Oxford in both world wars. The Director of Naval Education in 1914, Sir Alfred Ewing, was a former professor of engineering at Cambridge. He recruited three Fellows of his former college, King’s, who themselves became recruiters a quarter of a century later. In the Second World War, one third of the King’s fellowship served in the wartime SIGINT agency at Bletchley Park—a far higher proportion than those recruited from any other Oxbridge college.

15. vol. 7, ch. 10, para. 2. Andrew and Gordievsky, KGB, pp. 209-13. Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, pp. 125-30.

16. Page, Leitch and Knightley, Philby, ch. 5; Knightley, Philby, ch. 3.

17. vol. 7, ch. 9, para. 11; ch. 10, para. 2. Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, fail to identify EDITH as an agent recruited by Deutsch.

18. vol. 7, ch. 9, para. 11. Cf. Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, pp. 133-7.

19. Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, p. 136.

20. vol. 7, ch. 10.

21. The text of the report on Deutsch’s first meeting with Philby, sent to the Center by the London illegal resident, Ignati Reif, is published in Borovik, The Philby Files, pp. 38-40. Cf. Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, p. 137.

22. Borovik, The Philby Files, p. 29.

23. The exception was Philby, whose lack of attention to his studies earned him a third in part I of the Historical Tripos, followed by an upper second in part II Economics. Burgess gained a first in part I History but was ill during part II and awarded an aegrotat (the unclassed honors awarded to those unable to sit their examinations for medical reasons).

24. Cairncross, When Polygamy was Made a Sin.

25. Cairncross quotes Greene’s letter to him in a postscript to his book La Fontaine Fables and Other Poems.

26. vol. 7, ch. 9 confirms the names of the illegal residents identified (with photographs) in Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions.

27. Costello and Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, p. 132 and passim.