PHILBY BID: SPY SWAP TO KILL BOOK

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP73-00475R000401070002-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 27, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 6, 2014
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: December 19, 1967
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 50-Yr 2014/01/06: CIA-RDP73-00475R000401070002-4
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Dec 9 196?
I
0 EXCLUSIVE SUPERSPY INTERVNi
THE BACKGROUND
Soviet double agent Harold (Kim) Philby, whose in-
filtratinn of British and American intelligence operations
marked him as the Kremlin's most successful spy
in the postwar era, is reportedly attempting to publish
his memoirs in the West.
In lengthy interviews with London Sunday Times re-
porter Murray Sayle, Philby, who fled tO the Soviet
Union in 1963. suggested that he might withdraw his
memoirs (presumably damaging to Western intelligence)
If Soviet spies Peter and Helen Kroger were exchanged
for Gerald Brooke.
The Krogers were sentenced in Britain in March, 1961,
to 20 years for. espionage. Brooke was sentenced in
July. 1965, to a year's imprisonment and four years in;
a labor camp. Suggestions of an exchange have been !, ?
steadfastly refused by the British government.
colleagues," and very early in our Conversation he ex-
plained, "I am a serving officer of the KGB (the Soviet
secret police), as you Probably know."
.? ?
i He said he would assume that ? it was possible that 1
? worked for some Western intelligence service.
:- 'I naturally took precautions against any rough stuff?
:
,1 you would not have got 10 yards down the street." he said.
II We met subsequently at a number of, restaurants. During
these long Russian meals vodka, wine and brandy flowed
, freely, and Philby talked lengthily, even compulsively.
.1 .? He is clearly .a sociable type of drinker and he seems
to have an iron head; I could detect no change In his
it alertness or joviality as the waiters arrived with relays
:c or 300 grams of vodka or 600 grams of Armenian brandy.
The conversations which follow took place in no particular
41 order, and I present them without further ointment.
.1 GERALD BROKE AND THE KROGERS: Philby raised
1 this subject himself, spontaneously.
:1 ? "There was an interesting suggestion in the Economist."
By Murray Sayie -
London Sunday Times Special
1
MOSCOW? My first direct contact wall Harold Philby
was a telephone call to my room at the Leningradskaya
Hole, ;n Moscow. We arranged to meet In Room 436 at .
the Minsk Hotel on Gorky Boulevard (the "Broadway of I
Moscow"), at 8 the same night.
1 knocked, the door opened, and there was Philby, smiling
-1 with hand outstretched. The room was bare except for two
chairs and a table on which stood a briefcase, a bottle of
1
vodka and two glasses. The tables stood by a window with a
breathtaking view over Moscow, red stars shining on the
ghostly white walls and spires of the Kremlin in the distance.
"This is a tough, dynamic city," said Philby. "This .?.
society is going somewhere. Care for a drink?"
I accepted his offer. Philby is a courteous man, smiles
, a great deal, and his well-cut gray hair and ruddy corn-
, plexion suggest vitality and enjoyment of life..
He speaks exactly as a senior British civil servant?would
'about his present employers?"My superior!" be says. "my.
.4
4
?
he said. "The idea was that I would be prepared to withdraw
my manuscript if ? the Krogers were exchanged for Brooke.
If that were in fact a condition of- the ? Krogers being re-
leased, of course I would withdraw My book."
? I asked, "Is that a message for -Someone? Do you want ;
that passed on?" '
Philby replied; "Nb, it was just an idea I had." 11 asked;
"Why are you so anxious to make this exchange with the
Krogers?"
"Our position is that the Krogers are innocent of the
charges on which they were convicted." Philby said. "They
were personal, not political friends of Gordon Lonsdale. We
don't dispute that people like Gordon and Col. Abel. were our ?
agents, highly skilled professionals, but we -cannot agree !
that the Krogers were the top-level agents they are being ;
represented as, or indeed our agents at all except .in the ?
sense of being friends of Lonsdale. . ?.
"Now, look at the other side. It's a .pity about Brooke. *.
e really was a silly fellow. He, got involved with the
NTs (the "People's Labor Front,", a venerable Russian ref-
ugee organization) and they gave him a list of people to.
contact who were supposed to be working inside the Soviet
Union. We have penetrated what is lett of the NTs so thor-
oughly that the very first person he contacted was a KBG
man. All this came out at Smoke's. trial and is well known
in the West,". .
I said: "There seemi to be. a feeling in the West that '
Brooke was more or less. innocently Witting out anti-Com-
munist literature and was grabbed by- your people. in. order
.to.exatmote_him _off foriht.K.rngers.'1,
?...
I
STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release @ 50-Yr 2014/01/06: CIA-RDP73-00475R000401070002-4