DEFECTOR DESCRIBES ACTIVITIES OF THE SOVIETS' GRU

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000302330061-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 2
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 10, 2012
• Sequence Number: 61
• Publication Date: July 20, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/10/10: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302330061-7 3TAT
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HUMAN EVENTS
20 July 1985
Book Review
Defector Describes Activities of
the Soviets' GRU
The story sounds more like a spy
novel than a true-life account: An FBI
counterintelligence agent meets a
Soviet spy over drinks at a quiet
restaurant in a southern California
shopping center. It's Sept. 26, 1984.
The two are planning a trip together
overseas to Vienna. They've done some
shopping and found a coat. October in
Austria is not like L.A.
The Soviet agent, a petite blonde pos-
ing as an emigre who calls herself
Svetlana Ogorodnikov, tells her part-
ner and sometime lover, Special Agent
Richard Miller, not to forget the impor-
"Inside Soviet Military Intelligence"
By Viktor Suvorov
Macmillan, Inc.
866 3rd Avenue
New York, N.Y. 10022
193 pages, $15.95
cant papers. Miller, a 20-year veteran ,
has in his possession secret FBI counter-
intelligence files on Soviet activities in
California. He has been promised
$65,000 in cash and gold for the deal.
The blonde Russian outlines the
itinerary for their little holiday in Vien-
na (she had preferred Warsaw, but
Miller said no for obvious security
reasons): October 9-leave for Vienna;
October 10 - arrive in Vienna; Octo-
ber 11 -meeting with Mikhail, a GRU
general. Mikhail, she tells him, is a very
important person in the Soviet govern-
ment; GRU stands for Soviet military
intelligence.
? The events above were described by
Miller during an interview with FBI
agents shortly before his arrest on es-
pionage charges last October 2. Mrs.
Ogorodnikov, along with her husband,
recently pleaded guilty to the charges,
and Miller is scheduled for trial shortly.
By BILL GERTZ
By coincidence, Viktor Suvorov's In-
side Soviet Military Intelligence was
published the day after Miller's arrest.
It contains an appendix listing the
GRU's High Command and top of-
ficers. Mikhail is among them.
According to Suvorov, the blonde
Russian was right -Mikhail is a very
important person in the Soviet govern-
ment. Mikhail is the codename listed
for Lt. Gen. Moshe Milstein, GRU
Deputy Chief for Disinformation and a
veteran "illegal" spy. The venerable
Mikhail is well known to GRU
operatives as the author of a spy
manual with the sardonic title Honor-
able Service.
FBI officials would not comment on
the timing of Miller's arrest, but
anyone with cursory knowledge of
Soviet intelligence capabilities knows
how easy it would have been for Soviet
agents to kidnap Miller in Vienna, load
him with chemicals and pull a trove of
FBI secrets out of him.
Suvorov, a pseudonym, was a major
in the GRU before defecting sometime
in the 1970s. His real name and the ex-
act date of his defection remain a
secret; he fears revealing those details
would endanger relatives still living in
the Soviet Union.
For defecting, he was sentenced to
death-in-absentia under article 64a of
the Soviet Constitution ("betrayal of
the homeland"). But the book's final
chapter, "For GRU Officers Only,"
contains a plea of not guilty: "The real
betrayers of the homeland are those in
the Kremlin." He urges would-be GRU
defectors to consider carefully "the
agonizing way," but says, "If you are
prepared to risk your life for one
minute of freedom, then go."
Inside Soviet Military Intelligence
provides the first post-Stalin account of
the massive Soviet military intelligence
complex that is virtually unknown in-
side the Soviet Union. It presents both a
history and the complete structure,
secret methods and operational tech-
niques of the Soviet military spy agen-
cy.
"GRU" is the acronym for a Russian
name virtually unpronounceable by the
untrained tongue: Glavnoe Raz-
vedyvatel 'noe Upravienie. It translates
more easily into the Chief Intelligence
Directorate, General Staff of the
Ministry of Defense, USSR.
Similar to its sister, the notorious
KGB, the GRU is a lessor-known but
equally powerful intelligence service.
But its priorities range far beyond the
boundaries of traditional martial intel-
ligence targets - assessing an enemy's
military strength.
Besides military intelligence collec-
tion, the GRU's peacetime role involves
the wholesale theft of military in-
dustrial secrets as well as conducting
political and strategic operations
against the West - all under the close
supervision of the Soviet Communist
party.
During military conflicts, crack
paramilitary units known as "Spetnaz"
can be mobilized from deep cover
within Western societies. These
"illegal" units, operating without
diplomatic back-up, are trained to
paralyze political and military infra-
structures through assassinations of
political leaders, sabotage of utilities
and attacks on command and
communications centers.
Suvorov's details of the GRU are
sometimes too intricate and seem writ-
ten for the benefit of intelligence
professionals. It seems as though he
committed to paper most of what he
provided Western intelligence analysts
-a wealth of information and addi-
tional pieces of the puzzle of the Soviet
secret service.
Suvorov paints some fascinating
vignettes which show the GRU in ac-
tion. For instance, the GRU sends
teams of operatives to hundreds of
Western trade fairs each year. Before
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/10/10: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302330061-7
 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/10/10: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302330061-7
an exhibition featuring military elec-
tronics, armaments and military tech-
nology or similar wares, a GRU delega-
tion shows up at the local Soviet Em-
bassy with a wish list of samples to
be begged, borrowed or stolen. (West
Germany's Interior Ministry recently
netted one of the "red books" the size
of a Manhattan telephone directory).
The GRU team goes from exhibit to
exhibit carrying suitcases full of cash in
an effort to buy samples whose sale to
the Soviet bloc is strictly prohibited.
Target samples can be small parts or jet
engines that are quickly shipped off to
Soviet research institutes where copies
are made and then put into production.
Exhibitions by struggling high-tech
firms also provide a wonderful environ-
ment for recruiting GRU agents who,
once ensnared, can be used in opera-
tions against larger defense contrac-
tors.
of the real thing with the inside coated
with radioactive waste.
The GRU was not happy about the
deal and asked permission to
assassinate the major. The request was
denied, but in any case the major had
timed the sale to coincide with the end
of his tour of duty in Germany.
Suvorov concludes his book with an
appeal to Western security services:
"Be human - do expel Soviet spies
occasionally. By expelling one, you
enable others to reduce their frantic ac-
tivities." The first to go? Suvorov urges
getting rid of the top GRU officer in
each country. Once he goes, the GRU
network will be an army without a com-
mander. ^
Mr. Gertz is a reporter for the Washington
Times..
The GRU effort has provided the
Soviets with a technology windfall.
Suvorov notes that GRU headquarters
in Moscow uses the most modern
American computers to keep its
analysts busy.
Another spy story in Suvorov's
book involves an unnamed Amer-
ican Army major stationed in West
Germany who snookered a hapless
GRU residency out of thousands
of dollars.
The major approached the GRU with
an offer to sell a U.S. nuclear-tipped ar-
tillery shell. To sweeten the deal, and to
his discredit, the officer turned over
details on NATO nuclear weapons
depots to the GRU.
A week later, the transfer of the shell
took place on a rainy night. The major
met three GRU men and turned over
the shell. Its serial numbers, markings
and radiation level all checked out. A
suitcase full of cash was turned over to
the major and the GRU agreed to
return in two months to give the shell
back.
The artillery warhead was whisked
off to Moscow, without considering if
it was booby-trapped to explode. When
GRU Command found out the shell
was in Moscow, "a long and largely un-
printable tirade ensued," Suvorov
writes. It seemed the GRU leaders were
concerned the shell could have turned
Moscow into another Hiroshima.
After it was dismantled at a GRU fa-
cility outside Moscow, the shell turned
out to be a beautifully replicated copy
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/10/10: CIA-RDP90-00965R000302330061-7