'SPY THAT NEVER WAS' DENIES HE WASN'T

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201370003-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 19, 2012
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: August 1, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

ST Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-R
Y
CHICAGO TRIBUNE
GAGE " `- 1 August 1985
D P90-00965 R000201370003-9
`Spy that never was' denies h~W 4511
By George E. Curry
Chicago Tribune
WASHINGTON-Arkady
Shevchenko, the highest-ranking
Soviet official ever to defect to the
United States, dismissed Wednes-
day as "absolutely ridiculous"
charges that much of his best-
selling book, "Breaking With Mos-
cow," was fabricated.
He held a press conference to
reply to charges that he made up
key portions of his book, which has
sold more than 180,000 copies and
was serialized in Time magazine.
The strongest criticism was a
review by Edward Jay Epstein in
New Republic magazine:
Epstein, best known for his book
attacking the Warren Commission
finding that Lee Harvey Oswald
acted alone in killing President
John Kennedy, wrote: "As it turns
out, much of the material about
Shevchenko's espionage career has
either been spun out of formulaic
spy fiction or invented out of whole
cloth... . What is fabricated here
are not just car chases, meetings,
conversations, reports, dates,
motives and espionage activities,
but a spy that never was."
,~.hwchenko said Presidents
Jim v Cart r an Reaa n high-
IN . r__ an tate nartment
0 ormer national secu-
re advisers all ew of the role
-ire as a ou e agent. or-
neeer ad ormer De u Director
Ray me su rt thi- defector
to the
pub-
licly '
the United States with valuable
rote i ence.
All " o a sudden. someone is
coming and telling, 'No, there was
no story at all,' " Shevchenko said.
He called the criticism "absolutely
ridiculous."
Shevchenko did acknowledge er-
rors, which he called "a few minor
things." One involved a meeting
that he said took place in 1976
among Shevchenko; KGB head
Boris Aleksandrovich Solomatin
and his -wife, Vera; and Georgy
Arbatov, head of the Soviet U.S.-
Canada Institute.
As Epstein pointed out, the
meeting could not have taken
place at that time because
Solomatin returned to the Soviet
Union in mid-1975.
In another mistake, the former
Soviet official wrote that he con-
sidered approaching UN Ambassa-
dor John Scali about defecting
sometime after the summer of
1975. Scali was replaced by Daniel
Patrick Moynihan in June of 1975.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201370003-9