Better Than Fiction! The Ultimate Cold War Spy Story Oleg Gordievsky & The Spy and the Traitor Audib — Transcript

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1. 0:03Introduction.
2. 0:07May 18th, 1985.
3. 0:11For the KGB's counterintelligence
4. 0:13section, directorate K, this was a
5. 0:16routine bugging job.
6. 0:18It took less than a minute to spring the
7. 0:20locks on the front door of the flat on
8. 0:21the eighth floor of 103 Leninsky
9. 0:24Prospekt, a Moscow tower block occupied
10. 0:26by KGB officers and their families.
11. 0:30While two men in gloves and overalls set
12. 0:32about methodically searching the
13. 0:33apartment, two technicians wired the
14. 0:36place swiftly and invisibly, implanting
15. 0:39eavesdropping devices behind the
16. 0:40wallpaper and baseboards, inserting a
17. 0:43live microphone into the telephone
18. 0:45mouthpiece, and video cameras in the
19. 0:47light fixtures in the sitting room,
20. 0:49bedroom, and kitchen. [clears throat]
21. 0:51By the time they had finished, an hour
22. 0:53later, there was barely a corner in the
23. 0:55flat where the KGB did not have eyes and
24. 0:58ears.
25. 0:59Finally, they put on face masks and
26. 1:01sprinkled radioactive dust on the
27. 1:03clothes and shoes in the closet,
28. 1:05sufficiently low in concentration to
29. 1:07avoid poisoning, but enough to enable
30. 1:09the KGB's Geiger counters to track the
31. 1:12wearer's movements.
32. 1:14Then they left and carefully locked the
33. 1:16front door behind them.
34. 1:18A few hours later, a senior Russian
35. 1:21intelligence officer landed at Moscow's
36. 1:23Sheremetyevo Airport on the Aeroflot
37. 1:25flight from London.
38. 1:28Colonel Oleg Antonovich Gordievsky of
39. 1:31the KGB was at the pinnacle of his
40. 1:33career.
41. 1:34A prodigy of the Soviet intelligence
42. 1:36service, he had diligently risen through
43. 1:38the ranks, serving in Scandinavia,
44. 1:41Moscow, and Britain with hardly a
45. 1:42blemish on his record.
46. 1:44And now, at the age of 46, he had been
47. 1:47promoted to chief of the KGB station in
48. 1:50London, a plum posting, and invited to
49. 1:53return to Moscow to be formally anointed
50. 1:55by the head of the KGB.
51. 1:57A career spy, Gordievsky was tipped to
52. 2:00ascend to the uppermost ranks of that
53. 2:02vast and ruthless security and
54. 2:04intelligence network that controlled the
55. 2:06Soviet Union.
56. 2:08A stocky, athletic figure, Gordievsky
57. 2:10strode confidently through the airport
58. 2:12crowds.
59. 2:13Inside him, though, a low terror
60. 2:16bubbled. For Oleg Gordievsky, KGB
61. 2:19veteran, faithful secret servant of the
62. 2:22Soviet Union, was a British spy.
63. 2:25Recruited a dozen years earlier by MI6,
64. 2:28Britain's foreign intelligence service,
65. 2:30the agent code-named Nocturn had proven
66. 2:33to be one of the most valuable spies in
67. 2:35history.
68. 2:36The immense amount of information he fed
69. 2:39back to his British handlers had changed
70. 2:41the course of the Cold War, cracking
71. 2:43open Soviet spy networks, helping to
72. 2:45avert nuclear war, and furnishing the
73. 2:48West with a unique insight into the
74. 2:49Kremlin's thinking during a critically
75. 2:51dangerous period in world affairs.
76. 2:54Both Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher
77. 2:56had been briefed on the extraordinary
78. 2:58trove of secrets provided by the Russian
79. 3:00spy.
80. 3:01Though neither the American president
81. 3:03nor the British prime minister knew his
82. 3:06real identity.
83. 3:07Even Gordievsky's young wife was
84. 3:09entirely unaware of his double life.
85. 3:12Gordievsky's appointment as KGB
86. 3:14resident, the Russian term for a KGB
87. 3:17head of station, known as a residentura,
88. 3:20had prompted rejoicing among the tiny
89. 3:22circle of MI6 officers privy to the
90. 3:24case.
91. 3:26As the most senior Soviet intelligence
92. 3:28operative in Britain, Gordievsky would
93. 3:30henceforth have access to the innermost
94. 3:32secrets of Russian espionage.
95. 3:35He would be able to inform the West
96. 3:36about what the KGB was planning to do
97. 3:39before it did it.
98. 3:41The KGB in Britain would be neutered.
99. 3:44And yet the abrupt summons back to
100. 3:46Moscow had unsettled the Nocturn team.
101. 3:49Some sensed a trap.
102. 3:51At a hastily convened meeting in a
103. 3:53London safe house with his MI6 handlers,
104. 3:56Gordievsky had been offered the option
105. 3:58to defect and remain in Britain with his
106. 4:00family.
107. 4:02Everyone at the meeting understood the
108. 4:03stakes.
109. 4:05If he returned as official KGB resident,
110. 4:08then MI6, the CIA, and their Western
111. 4:10allies would hit the intelligence
112. 4:12jackpot. But if Gordievsky was walking
113. 4:15into a trap, he would lose everything,
114. 4:18including his life.
115. 4:20He had thought long and hard before
116. 4:21making up his mind.
117. 4:23"I will go back."
118. 4:25Once again, the MI6 officers went over
119. 4:27Gordievsky's emergency escape plan, code
120. 4:30named Pimlico, that had been drawn up 7
121. 4:33years earlier in the hope that it would
122. 4:35never have to be activated.
123. 4:38MI6 had never exfiltrated anyone from
124. 4:40the USSR before, let alone a KGB
125. 4:43officer.
126. 4:44Elaborate and hazardous, the escape plan
127. 4:47could be triggered only as a last
128. 4:48resort.
129. 4:50Gordievsky had been trained to spot
130. 4:52danger.
131. 4:53As he walked through the airport, his
132. 4:55nerves ragged with internal stress, he
133. 4:58saw signs of peril everywhere.