ROKOSSOVSKIY, THE FOURTH POLISH MARSHAL

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80-00809A000600400055-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: R
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: August 25, 2011
• Sequence Number: 55
• Publication Date: June 27, 1951
• Content Type: REPORT

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CLASSIFICATION g1VRLCTP Rte tJb W tkJ
CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY REPORT
INFORMATION FROM
FOREIGN DOCUMENTS OR RADIO BROADCASTS CD NO.
COUNTRY
SUBJECT
HOW
PUBLISHED
WHERE
PUBLISHED'
DATE
PUBLISHED
LANGUAGE
Poland, USSR DATE OF
INFORMATION 1949
Biographic - Military
Monthly periodical
Paris
Jan 1950
DATE DIST. Ofq Jun 1951
NO. OF PAGES 5
SUPPLEMENT TO
REPORT NO.
THIS IS UNEVALUATED INFORMATION
THIS DOCONEMT CONTAINS INFORMATION AEIECTIHN THE NATIONAL REPOSES
OS THE UNITED STATES WITHIN THE MEANING OF OSPIONANE ACT SO
A. S. C.. S 1 AND $1. AS AMENDED. ITS TRANSMISSION ON THE NEYRLATION
01 ITS CONTENTS IN ANT NANM[R TO AH YNAOTHONI110 PERSON IS PRO.
NISITED ST LAW. REPRODUCTION OF THIS FORM IS PROHISIISO.
Kultura /emigre anti-.Communist publication]
Ryszard Wraga
,he following re ort presents highlights from an
article by Ryszard WrAta, a Pole who was for many years
before World War II in charge of the study of Communism
and the USSR for Polish military.intelligence. The
article provides interesting data on the early career of
Marshal Rokossovskiy7
In late 1921, I was assigned to the Polish Consulate at Kiev. I
had previously visited it in 1920, as an officer candidate with Smigly's
army. In 1920, there had been much destruction in the city as well as
In the autumn of 1928, large joint maneuvers were organized
there. The military attaches of West Europe, as well as the Polish mili-
tary attaches were'not invited. However, German officers arrived in
Kiev with General Blomberg (later marshal) at their head. Colonel von
Hammerstein was chief of staff of this mission. Voroshilov, People's
Commissar of Defense USSR, also was present. The maneuvers, planned on
an extensive scale, were definitely for offense. Although they did
not extend west of Zhitomir, it was easy to uncover their anti-Polish
character. I worked feverishly to obtain as much information as possible
and for the first time felt the confining observation of the OGPU.
Shortly after the maneuvers had been completed, while I was sub-
stituting for the consul who was absent on vacation, I was visited by
a young cavalry officer. It was immediately evident that the visitor
had received Russian military training, was very intelligent, and well
disciplined. He said that his name was Rokossovskiy and that he wanted
to take care of certain formalities connected with his inheritance in
Polish Volhyn'_a, He spoke Russian, while I answered in Polish.
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Rokossovskiy said that although his parents were Polish, he only knew a
few words of Polish. He commented that he was a Communist and that a
Communist has no country. He added that-he had taken no part in the
Soviet-Polish war and preferred to fight Ukrainian and Russian counter-
revolutionary groups.
I inquired whether he had any brothers and whether Capt Jerzy Rokossovskiy
of the Polish Army was his brother. My question embarrassed him, but
he managed to answer that he had cousins of the same name in Poland but never
had anything to do with them.
I had asked this question because immediately after the Soviet-Polish
war while in the 21st Infantry Regiment, the Dzieci Warszawy, I had met
a young lieutenant, later captain, Jerzy Rokossowski, an excellent soldier,
who had the Virtuti Militari decoration. I knew that Jerzy Rokossowski
had a half brother by hi- father's first marriage to a Russian.t The
half brother had served in 1916 as a volunteer in the Russian Army, had
joined the Bolshevik Party in 1917, and had reached a high rank in the
Soviet cavalry. In 1925 or 1926, Jerzy Rokossowski transferred to the
air force. He was assigned to an air squadron at Lwow and committed suicide
there. There are various rumors about the suicide. Jerzy had always been
a hell-raiser and a ladies' man. It had also been said that he was mixed up
in some spying and there were rumors of connections with his half brother
in the Soviet Army.
I suggested that Rokossovskiy return the following day to take care of
his business, but he had to have the matter settled on the same day since his
garrison was stationed at Berdichev and he managed only with difficulty to
get one day to come to Kiev. I then asked him to return that evening.
When Rokossovskiy came back that evening, his papers were not yet ready.
We discussed Kiev and the Ukraine, and Rokossovskiy showed interest in
Polish matters. He commented on the poor Polish spoken at the Polish Theater
at Kiev, saying that there were too many Jews in the company.
I used this anti-Semitic theme to start a political discussion men-
tioning Trotskiy. At this time Trotskiy was on Principe Island, Tuu?key.
Rokossovskiy stated that, for a world revolution, Trotskiy was not needed
by the Bolshevik Communists who had other ideas. I brought up the Bolshevik
agreement with the Junker Prussians, and the comradeship of Voroshilov
and Blomberg, and finally asked whether Trotskiy was not closer to the idea
of world revolution than the Bolsheviks who were then on such friendly terms
with the real enemy of the working cias;es.
Rokossovskiy began to expound a long and complicated thesis which I
had previously heard from Communist military personnel and from Popov and
Pugavhev, that this was only a tactical maneuver to obtain information from
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aggressor but never for offensive purposes.
Rokossovskiy claimed that the USSR was preparing armies to repel invasion
and not to attack, that the Soviets had no intention of imposing revolution
by force, that revolution must mature within a country, and that the Soviets
were convinced that it would mature everywhere. In fact, the USSR had
decided to fortify the entire western border, and was then building defense
fortifications on the Polish border, particularly below Kiev on the Irpen'
River.
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For me thie was news. The Irpen' valley, marshy and wooded, was not
an attractive invasion point, and what Rokossovskiy said constituted impor-
tant information. I then asked what the purpose was of so much cavalry and
their haste to motorize the cavalry, which certainly did not seem to be
a defensive measure. Rokossovskiy reiterated that the Soviet Army was too
weak to repel the West and that strategic and tactical military doctrines
would require years to work out. Therefore, the Russians ,ere using the
Germans to gain information which would later be used against the Germans.
I asked whether Rokossovskiy was aware that the Germans could also
take advantage of their knowledge of Russian terrain. Rokossovskiy became
excited and said that Communists in Germany would never permit the rebirth
of German militarism. He accidentally betrayed the fact that he himself
had takan special military courses in Germany.
Rokossovskiy appeared to be a narrow-minded professional soldier, not
particularly agile mentally but somewhat versed in the party literature.
He believed in the supremacy of military over political and social matters,
and showed no deep devotion to ideals. He appeared to be a cynical and
amoral person who considered his career above any-thing else. His whole
bearing showed physical courage and brutality. After receiving the documents
he was waiting for, Rokossovskiy left.
A few months later, while traveling from Kiev to Odessa, I met Rokossovskiy
again near Kozhatin. Over a few drinks we discussed Trotskiy. At that time,
in 1929, mass arrests were taking place throughout the USSR and particularly
in the Ukraine to uncover Trotskiyites.
Rokossovskiy considered Trotskiy an opportunist whcy to gain personal
victory, was doing the greatest harm to world Communism. I recalled that
those were the exact basic tactics followed by Lenin: During a long and
violent tirade, no mention was made of Stalin. Rokossovskiy sneeringly
mentioned Voroshilov, with whom, he connected a clique of old Bolsheviks
without much influence, who, sooner or later, would have to make way for
the younger set. A continuous repetition of "we" made me wonder if a new
conspiracy was forming, since it had no resemblance to that of Bukharin or
any of the national Communist groups -- all the more since Rokossovskiy
spoke of the Ukrainians with contempt and hatred.
Suddenly Tukhachevskiy was mentioned. At that time, Tukhachevskiy
was the commander of one of the military districts, possibly the Volga.
Although he was not in favor with the Kremlin at that time, as far as
popularity among the military leaders was concerned, he was second only to
Bluecher. Rokossovskiy was enthusiastic about Tukhachevskiy, stating he
had created a new revolutionary strategy.
Rokossovskiy no longer believed in popular revolution and despised the
rl.i ... T did not ..li., at that +a...?'+l.o# Stalin also share
the same scorn of the masses. They felt that the cattle would not break their
shackles- of their own accord and reach for freedom.
In 1931, I was made head of Polish intelligence on the USSR, and
naturally had an interest in higher Soviet leaders. The discussions with
Rokossovskiy, as well as other observations on the USSR, suggested to me
that spontaneous conspiracies were forming among certain Red Army leaders.
They were unrelated conspiracies, or intimate groups centered around indi-
vidual Red Army commanders. In the Ukraine, there were a few suc' circles.
There was a group attached to Bluecher, who was in the Ukraine. He was
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PiES T ICTED
later transferrer) to the Far East, and finally appointed marshal. There was the
talented group of his successor, General Yakir, the commander of Ukrainian Mil-
itary District, well known to the Poles from the war of 1920 as the brilliant
commandant of the 45th Divieion. There was the group of cavalrymen centered
around Buden, Krivorachko, and Primakov. There were such groups in other mil-
itary districts, especially in Belorussia, in the Caucasus and in Turkestan,
and in 1932 - 1935 in the Far East. All these groups entered ultimately around
two people. young Marshal Tukhachevskiy, then Vice-Commissar of Defense, and
Gamarnik, chief of the Political Administration of the Army.
Through Soviet propaganda, the Tukhachevskiy conspiracy is presented as an
attempt of the leading Soviet military clique, which was anti-Stalin and pro-
German, to provoke German intervention, thus providing the opportunity for a
coup d'etat to remove Stalin and his Politburo. I believe that such a view-
potnt is false. Soviet military leaders -- such as Bluecher, Yegorov, U .rein
vich, Kork, Eideman, and others -- like Tukhachevskiy, were for a favor of a secret military German-Soviet alliance. But, Hitler's rise to power
in 1932 - 1933 brought these people to their senses. Their original concept was
based on the fact that they did not think the German military forces as rebuilt
by the Junkers were supported by the masses, and that the army could very easi'.y
be overthrown-in time of war. When German militarism was bolstered by the nation-
alist movement, the Russians understood that this military force could very easily
be turned agains",. the USSR, and that i* would be impossible to eliminate without
fighting the whole German nation,
The situation then appeared paradoxical. The leader of world Communism,
Stalin, became the proponent of a movement toward a closer alliance with Germany
at any price to exploit Hitler's hatred for the rest of the capitalist world,
while the Soviet military leaders, with Tukhachevskiy, Garmarnik, and Bluecher,
opposed this alliance, The conspiracy began to support the West, France, and
Britain, and even the Cordon Sanitaire (Poland, the Baltic States, and Rumania).
Soviet military attaches were delicately sounding out European capitals. Putna
and Semenov in Warsaw bean
understanding to make
coordinated
agreement France,
tacts,ld seeking Vienantsov in
against the Germans.
I discuss this subject in my new book, All My Life I Spyed sic Russia
ft-itle appeared in English in original (A chapter from the book appears under
the title "Trust" in Kultura, issue of 21 April - 22 May 1949.) Because of im-
prudent inquiries and discussion in the West, the conspiracy was discovered not
only by Soviet intelligence, but also by German intelligence.
In 1932, Rokossovskiy was sent to the Far East. It appears that during this
time he made contact with a group founded there by Gamarnik. Lushkov, one of the
most important Soviet refugees and a former NKVD general, who fled to Manchuria
in 1938, told me many very interesting details concerninE, Rokossovskiy's role in
this conspiracy. In Lushkov's opinion, Rokossovskiy played the part of an agent
provocateur;
In 1936, Rokossovskiy was assigned to the Leningrad Military District. The
.cavalry officer Prymakov, patron of Rokossovskiy while eNlatlatter
erghadabeenTinhthe
Ukraine, became commander of this district. In 1937, the
cb-vskiy and his closest adherents, Uborevich, Yakir, Kork, Eidemann, Alksnis,
Putna, Bluecher, Yegorov, Orlov, Muklewich, and others. Thousands of generals
and commanders -- Duboviy, Popov, Vasilenko, Vostretsov, and others -- many of
friends them good and
was o Rok ssovskiy.
tion camps. Gamarnik committed suicide. Amongnthosedarrested prisons
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Soviet military officers. In 1941, when Stalin asked for a list of Soviet
commanders who were in prison and not yet liquidated, Rokossovskiy's name was
After his release7 Rokossovskiy was made a major general. According to
the opinion of the people who came in contact with him during this period, he
was cynical, completely devoted to Stalin, and devoid of any revolutionary ideals.
ject to the political rulers, specifically Stalin. From then on, Rokossovskiy
The official biographical sketches of Konstantin Rokossovskiy which came out
with his appointment as gauleiter in Poland do not have much truth in them.
was born in Belorussia of bourgeois parents. Today, the official view is that
he is of pure Polish stock, from Warsaw, even a descendant of the proletariat,
Poland has reached that point in Sovietization, where even extreme oppor-
tunism and compliance within the country will not satisfy the USSR. The next
stage, changing a people's democracy into a socialist totalitarian state, can
be executed only by uncompromising Bolsheviks, bred by the Kremlin. Soviet
experience teaches that such Bolsheviks can never be produced within the country
being Sovietized. It is necessary to import gauleiters.
has had a good education in the Ukraine, the Far East, concentration camps,
and .ar. He must think that for service rendered he has purchased permanent
they will be tomorrow what they are today. The supergauleiter, Rokossovskiy,
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