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.I still have one of the published letters,supposedly from a man in Tel Aviv. Modern Israel is a country of peddlers, money changers, crooks,and demagogues, the fake letter said. Culturally, it s like the remoteprovinces of Russia, if not worse.Now I have everything, but Imiss our parties, our noisy apartments.Who will I eat and drinkwith? My next door neighbor from Morocco?.Local Socialist Partyactivists are illiterate bureaucrats whose education ended in thefourth grade.They masturbate to the ideas of Marx and Herzl and tryto build socialism. We made out far better when it came to getting our agents insideone of the most damaging, anti-Soviet propaganda organizationsRadio Liberty.The radio station, funded and controlled by the CIAwell into the 1970s, beamed a steady stream of pro-American andanti-Communist news back to the USSR in several different lan-guages, driving Soviet leaders crazy.Our government jammedRadio Liberty broadcasts, though not with total success.My job 0465014453-Kalugin.qxd 11/24/08 10:25 AM Page 223THE SPY GAME 223was to attack Radio Liberty at its European headquarters in Munichby placing agents on its staff.If we couldn t control what Radio Lib-erty was broadcasting, at least we could know what it was up to,learn something about the CIA, and perhaps soften the station sblows against us.In my ten years in foreign counterintelligence, we had several goodagents at Radio Liberty, whose staff included many émigrés from theUSSR.But by far our best agent there was a man named Oleg Tu-manov, who had a twisted history of involvement with the KGB thatcontinued into the 1990s.Tumanov s saga began as a young sailor with the Soviet merchantmarine, when he jumped overboard in the Baltic Sea and swam toSweden.He settled there for a while, later traveling to Austria.But Tu-manov apparently was just as unhappy in the West as he had been inthe USSR, and he began writing letters to relatives back home ex-pressing his dissatisfaction.We knew this because the KGB had anenormous department, employing thousands of people, whose jobwas to open most of the mail going in and out of the Soviet Union.The department read millions of letters annually, and among themone year was a disgruntled missive from Tumanov in which he told arelative, Maybe I have made the greatest mistake of my life. Clearly the letter was from an émigré or a defector, and the officersresponsible for intercepting correspondence passed along the letter tous.We knew of Tumanov s case, and sent an officer to visit the relativeto whom Tumanov had been writing.The KGB officer acted as if heknew nothing of the letters but pretended to be making inquiriesabout the fate of this Soviet traitor.Our officer asked to see any lettersthe defector had written and, as it was the early 1970s and Sovietswere not in the habit of saying no to the KGB, the relative turned overseveral letters.Our man began reading the correspondence, com-menting to the relative that everyone makes mistakes. In a return visit, we persuaded the relative to write Tumanov and tellhim that the security services had paid a call and said it wasn t too lateto make amends for what he had done.One of Tumanov s relatives, 0465014453-Kalugin.qxd 11/24/08 10:25 AM Page 224224 SPYMASTERwho was working for us, took the letter to Austria, located Tumanov,and asked him to read the correspondence. Listen, if you want to come back and start a new life, why don tyou do something for your country, our agent told Tumanov. Helpour people and they will help you.It s not difficult. Tumanov said he was interested in working for us and returning tothe Soviet Union, and our agent introduced him to a KGB officer sta-tioned in Vienna.Our officer told Tumanov that before he returned tothe USSR, we wanted him to take a job at Radio Liberty.His creden-tials were good (he was, after all, a defector), and before long Tu-manov was hired as a low-level analyst for Radio Liberty.He provedto be extremely capable and rapidly rose to the head of Radio Lib-erty s Russian-language service, a promotion that gave us much satis-faction in Moscow, knowing that a KGB agent was now in charge ofthe most fiercely anti-Soviet, Russian-language radio program.Tumanov remained head of the Russian service for several years.Inmeetings with his KGB case officers in Germany, he kept us well in-formed about activities at Radio Liberty and the CIA s involvementwith the station.He subtly helped us spread rumors and disinforma-tion, and did what he could to create conflict among the staff members.Among other things, we wrote anonymous anti-Semitic letters whichcaused a rift among some station employees.He also told us which ofhis colleagues might be ripe for recruitment or which because ofhomosexuality, philandering, or thievery might be susceptible toblackmail.Through Tumanov, we recruited two other Radio Libertyemployees, including one man from the Baltic States.Polish intelligencealso had two Polish émigré agents on the staff of Radio Liberty.Thoughhe had to be careful not to seem pro-Soviet, Tumanov did manage toavoid airing blatantly anti-Soviet material.Perhaps Tumanov s most notorious act was the help he gave us inplanting a bomb at Radio Liberty s Munich headquarters.The explo-sion was my idea, and my aim was not to hurt anyone but rather tostir up sentiment to move the rabble-rousing station out of Munichand Germany.We began planning the explosion in 1979, but didn t 0465014453-Kalugin.qxd 11/24/08 10:25 AM Page 225THE SPY GAME 225actually carry it out until two years later, when I was already inLeningrad.With Tumanov s help, an East German agent planted asmall bomb that caused minor damage but made an awful racket andshattered windows in the neighborhood.Unfortunately, even thoughthe KGB set off the explosion in the early hours, one person sustainedan eye injury.There is a postscript to the bombing story.In 1991, just three daysbefore the August coup, I visited Radio Liberty in Munich to talkabout the need to reform the KGB.While there, I told the Radio Lib-erty staff that I had masterminded the bomb explosion.I thoughtthey would pounce on me, but most took the news calmly and saidthey were happy I was now on their side.Tumanov eventually had to flee Munich and Radio Liberty when ahigh-ranking KGB official with knowledge of Tumanov s KGB ties de-fected to the West.Tumanov received a big welcome in Moscow,where the KGB portrayed him as a hero who had infiltrated and ex-posed that foul purveyor of anti-Communist propaganda, Radio Lib-erty.Our masters of deception claimed he was a KGB officer who hadrisked life and limb to work in the West.No mention was made of thefact that twenty years earlier he had defected from the USSR.I was to run into Tumanov again, in almost comical circumstances.In 1990, after I publicly denounced the KGB, Tumanov, still a stoogefor the security apparatus, attacked me.When I ran for the Soviet par-liament, he published scathing articles about my career and even trav-eled to my legislative district in southern Russia to lambaste me. I denounce this man! Tumanov said at one meeting. I knowhim.He betrayed everyone at Radio Liberty! In response, I let everyone know who in fact Tumanov was, for Ifound it unpalatable that the very man I had helped bring home tothe USSR a traitor and double defector was now accusing me oftreachery.Even today, Tumanov is a hard-liner, spouting nationalist,pro-Communist cant
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