LETTER TO WILLIAM L. ARMSTRONG FROM WILLIAM J. CASEY

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP85M00364R001001570015-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: November 26, 2007
• Sequence Number: 15
• Publication Date: May 19, 1983
• Content Type: LETTER

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OEXA 83-1025/A
.-
fir, 7D
2 9 MAY 1983
The Honorable William L. Armstrong
United States Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510,
Dear Senator Armstrong:
As you suggested, we have put together a list of Soviet industries
which utilize forced labor and produce goods for export. A copy of that
list is enclosed. While we have done extensive research on this question
for many years, we cannot determine the exact magnitude of the contribution
forced labor makes to the total output in each industry, nor can we give
you a list of brand names or products.
I thought you might find the enclosed article from the Fall 1982
issue of Workers Under Communism, an.AFL-CI0 journal, interesting. It is
a generally accurate summary, consistent with our own sources of informa-
tion, and includes the names of some specific products produced with the
help of forced labor.
Sincerely,
. /s/. .William I vassi
William J..Casey.
Director of Central Intelligence
Distribution:
Original - Addressee.
1 - DCI w/enclosures
1 - DDCI
1 EXDIR
1 - E R
1 D/OEXA w/enclosures
1 - DD/OEXA w/enclosures
T - DDI
1 - ADDI
1 - D/OGI
2 OGI/GD w/enclosures
LLD:WB:aw Retyped (9 May 1983)
Retyped (16 Ma 1983
1 - OEXA Record w/enclosures
1 - OEXA Chrono
DRAFTED: DDI/OGI (511lay 1983
STAT
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lumber
furniture
casings for clocks
cabinets for radio and TV sets
wooden.chess pieces
wooden souvenirs
wooden crates for fruit and vegetables
cardboard containers
II. Electronic
- cathode ray tube components
- resistors
- camera lenses
- glassware
- chandeliers
IV. Automotive
- auto parts
- wheel rims
- parts for agricultural machinery
V. -Mining/Ore Processing
- gold
- iron
aluminum
-.coal and peat
uranium
asbestos
limestone
construction stone and gravel
Based on a variety of intelligence sources and open
publications CIA has
compiled the following list of industries and products in which STAT
forced labor is used extensively.
I. Wood Products
VI., clothing
-coat, gloves, boots
- buttons and zippers
VII. Petroleum Products and Chemicals
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VIII. Food
Tea
IX. Miscellaneous
brick and tile
watch parts
wire fences, mattresses, screens
steel drums and barrels
lids for glass jars
plumbing equipment
storage battery cases
concrete products
electric plugs/cords
electric heaters
electric motors
pumps
woven bags
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ENCLOSURE 2
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Enclosure. 2
Made in the Gulag
xports are vital to the Soviet economy, and provided by the prison at Vladimir. The casings for
-"' an enormous number of these products are the radios and televisions are made in camp OU 8518
made., in forced labor,-':camps.., Russian emi- in the Crimea and in a camp in Mordovia. Camp 36 in
grants, exiled dissidents, Jewishpressur'e groups, and Perm manufactures spare parts-as well as electronic
organizations such--as',- affirm elements for cathode ray tubes and heating elements
that every item exported by theU%S S.R from a heavy for, irons, which are then sent to the turbo generator-..,,
truck to an_:ornamental gla2ss;ffhas at least one factory in Lysva. ' ?,
Dr: Cronid Lubarsky, who spent five years = in
component which is produced byslavelabor
Dissidents - feel. rt? is time:that.. hidden secrets of prison, has given a. remarkable picture of how
Soviet industry-be revealed to the naive West, which ::Vladimir prison,. situated 120 miles from Moscow, is i
is at resent takin gadvantaga of. its lukewarm ` able'to sustain its pace in the production of Vega radio
P with th : e U.S S R.:Therefore an intensive resistors y
;
1=- relationship.
inquiry nay. ~CCiT--
complaints of twenty forrnerpnsoners;.` and.. the
extent to which;the?. British=imarket..has been con
taminated'.' by slave labor- products has been
'lie
investigated
At the. Soviet Trace Delegation in London, Vladimir
Cheklin,-refused to, discuss the allegations regarding
Soviet products marketed in Great Britain, asserting,
hose.- who. make:- these> accusations do not ' even
ow whether they are correct" That is why he sees
no reason to get. into, the subject. He has suggested
that: his questioners visit Siberia. themselves to
pursue their inquiry,,on sitmaintaining that ,what
.v t~'asn 1 + !f ~.
they would seretwould prove the dissidents wrong
W}ieri asked whether` it.would be .7possible to visit
The working conditions are unbelievable and every a
thing is' made in cells which, although only ten square
yards in size, contain three men, beds, and a toilet as well...-,,, as all the equipment and machinery necessary for the
kwork. In the cells the lights are switched on at 5 o'clock in
the morning and are not put out until 10 o'clock at night.
Only an hour's break is provided for exercise. In order to .
attain the target of three thousand resistors a day, it is-
necessary. to work more than eight hours a day. The
lighting and ventilation are dreadful and consequently
f;the prisoners' sight and health deteriorate rapidly.'The
'fl signs of-headaches appear: after three months and
there is total` physical, deterioration after six months:'
The daily: ration of food is measured according to the;;
Stuart`Robinson, Sales Director forthe Technics
ovia, a region of concentration camps: more':
important. than~?Sibena-; he;replied ;'Do you allow
Russians to visit pnson,,camps inNorthern Ireland?
~; Thousands..' f heag Stele' isions,=radios,' refrigera
tors and tape recorders have inundated the British
market in recent years,:and have been snapped up by
bargain. hunters~Practically all theseproducts are
marketed .funded the name 3"Vega' `The reliable
choice ,"`and all.`ar'eF sold by=KTechnica and :.Optical
quipment, a London company n y
'IV ega:radios are manufactured in four factories in
ie3U:S':S:R_:C)neof _themai'tuated in-Ries, receives
components rrom tour prison camps iocatea in inc
region Components for"~.th' Moscow factory .: are
MTh: report fzrst ap'cared rn L'Eventail Special, a Belgian
pulrli~atto>yerfrted a~ Char es rrpoor c~ n'~lE has; been 4
distril ufed err G'rrat Brr;sin by"the W ilberforce Council for
nra>s RicJits
tt.ORKZP.S;a.NDE, COMMUNISM
and Optical Equipment Company, refuses to discuss
the { origin of certain of .:his products ' We.' are a:?
commercial'company, and we have nothing to do with
.human rights Go, to Russia if. you want to write an-
'article on.that subject- Why don't you go to the Soviet `=
ambassador in order to meet, the person responsible?" .
At : the: Russian:`, shop in,.Ho_lborn,... London; the
elves are laden with wooden ornaments, painted ~'_
toys,jewelryr:boxes, ;glassware; wall clocks; ':stone
sculptures and especially the well-known little dolls of"'
e old woman-who lived in a shoe,_''Matrioshka'iese are some examples drawn from the consider='
le ; volume; of consumer products imported Into
Britain from the U.S.S.R Moscow car cover itself
when accusations arise concerning the useof forced
labor ''as most of these articles are sentao workers or:
skilled craftsmen to be finished: -.$ ~_ { . .
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spoken out-Joseph Lederman, Michael Vais and iceberg of goods originating in the gulags. Cameras,
Abraham Sin. They declared that these dolls are made binoculars and precision instruments are marketed
in camps in the Surgut region, in the Tuymenskaya.
district, and in the Alma Atinstaya region. Three
other dissidents who have been . interviewed
I (Lubars'ky, Yuri Belov and Nikolai Scharegin) re
ported that, they had made cuckoo, clocks 'and'..
wooden chess pieces during their internment in the
objects to be labelled with the name of a'. free" factory
Z ki and L bi t l fo
under the brand names Zenith, or, anuer
cameras; Helios for binoculars and lenses; Sekonda
for watches and microscopes, measuring instruments
and scientific engineering apparatuses (all distributed
by the firm Technical and Optical Equipment).
The internal parts of watches and clocks are made
in the camps in the Chistopol region, which supplies
the free company Kazan. Camps 35 and 37 (political
in a village or town.. The cuckoos made in camp 19 in; internees) make precision equipment which is.sent to
a, hand-: on the, outdated, machinery;; are ? sent ; to
Serdobsk: in the Penza region. for.:; final assembly' and
painting.- before',, being =: exported Each year Britain:
imports two.,to three thousand .of these clocks. The
under the:,brand name Vega,: in addition to the. other
wooden articles, such-.'as 'chess games or-sculptured
figures _Camps..5, 71and 19 `are- assigned political
prisoners-sentenced to% hard labor who work under
appall ing,conditions:.. As for the--'souvenir Olympic
at the Russian shop in London, they come from camp an agreement that it, would sell copiers` and dupli
ON-55 in the- Kalinin region cators to- the Soviet. Committee: for:: Science and
-The Potma camp produces glassware and chande Technology and would obtain in exchange Russian
the prisoners work : the glass' in an-atmosphere full of:' shire. These motors were to be made by both ordinary
dust and do not. wear a protective mask- There are and political prisoners in the. Vladimir prison. This
also glassworks in; the women's camp on Lake Baikal fact'. was .discovered ..by Nikolai,' Scharegin,, who
1 destined, to'contain Moskovskaya vodka are made. in a modifications of the Rank Xerox motors, wnicn was
camp near rozny horn souvenirs are made, but are addressed to the Russian officials supervising the . 15, finished in 'free- factories Painted wooden cigaretteF' { work"in-,t eprison-
. " ~~ 4 ~~ r t
boxes
Am, _k ;` Divisio 'has confirmed these? state-`
,_ nof Rank Xerox,
he firm Cowan, deGroat distributes Russian merits, "'adding that his company had not known abouV
ade articles to abo t 1,80o shops in the United ;the work of prisoners '.'If we had known, we should.
J\Jn Ir, %A%J R;s hese ua-asa^
a:-ectly thro ..,h o ffic mot Sovietcommercial channels;".-,,.z- of these we motors was stopped four years
, r p in Among automo i
'- , es, TaT a . ;_. cars.L.t now ,-m. ono .._golize all
cuckoo-the t ype.which Lubarskymadeincam 19 bles, Lda
Hails, says= he has never questioned Russian officials factory, established in Letchworth; handles "the
about the products hebuys and sells in the U K."It is 'import 'of Belarustractors,;:Belaz: lorr es, and two
. . _ . - _ ___v __ T e Ladas ern importe }aa,
made products is the Razno company, whose market ` now ;waiting to be delivered,`; as well as ? the 084
"Lhavevisited most `models which have already been sold this-
ing director, David Parker, states,year
_. a .: .. ',. , ?: - C-_..-...-.T -1: -1a...~ iLe L .:L~ ..L ~i.e
tent thousand free y
the sto=y about the prisoners The Russians, export = Volga,k and are manufactured:'by..
u,6rk is ,lone by Fiat,1which is also
g~g
ree. conditions. r , I,_ ; 7;,~ atiou the ,Chukhobezvodnoye region, "near., Gocky;..
uf. the wooden souvenirs are: only,;the tip of;the whe efcamps supplying; the factory swath wheel rims
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b d`
a factory in Sverdlovsk, which stamps its own ran
name on.the goods., This fact is confirmed by Cronid
-Lubarskv..The camps around Rybinsk on the Volga
manufacture precision glass and polished lenses for
cameras, telescopes, microscopes and binoculars. At
`Krasnogorsk components are made for. Zenith and
In = the.,- field of office equipment, -Rank Xerox
provides a classic example of the-way- in. which 'an:_
international, company can make a. purchase without'
knowing that the goods are produced by forced labor:
At the beginning of the Seventies, Rank Xerox signed
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i and fly-wheels are situated. According to Yuri Belov, hard labor. In the Perm region, one of the hard labor
some of these prisoners are "political," but the camps is allotted to women who have to work with
majority are Baptists. Also in the vicinity of Togliatti saws. At Murmansk there are at least seven hard
is complex :R-65, which also manufactures parts for labor camps equipped by a special firm making sou-
cars. venirs. Other camps of this type are situated around
Four of the main informants have confirmed that Archangel and in the lost forests of the Kara Sea.
Lada cars (which are known in Russia under the name The British Woodworking Federation maintains
of Zhigulis) and other Soviet cars- Moskvich, Chaika, that the timber used in England does not come from
Volga-are made of parts manufactured by the Siberia but is produced under normal working
victims of the gulags in Mordovia, in Vladimir prison, conditions. "It is supplied to us from the west of
in the Perm and Tula regions, and in the surround- Russia, from the regions of Murmansk, Archangel,
t,
err articles exported by th' Soviet Union are made by products of the gulag in. enormous. Quantities each
;We'sf represents-the United Kingdom's third largest right up to the shops in the High Street, and even in
As for agricultural equipment, that is made in a .. then sent to a free company in Astrakhan to be packed
very large. factory . in Dnepropetrovsk which is sua- into glass Tars for exhort. The iarr ara rnndp;:, 2nR+t;o,.
n
r
pro ucts estmed for export to prisoners. from the fish, is cleaned and salted by the women,
should bring this' up again. I admit that part of the prisoners. Seven thousand are to be found in camps in
final assembly at Togliatti is made outside the firm, Sakhalin and on the island of Chikotan in the Kuriles
bit 1. think it's too great a risk for the Russians to....__ islands in the Pacific. Red caviar, after extraction
e
t
u t d d ??
The public relations director of Lada Cars, Roger the Chelyabinsk region and near the RiverLena. This
Mercer, states, "I do not believe that any parts of our' has been confirmed by Scharegin. Other work
cars are manufactured in camps or prisons..I have on diamonds is done in camps near Salekard and
source. Two hard labor camps are situated at Korkyno in
who did manage to survive slept forty men to one tiny with 229 tons of gold in 1979, by arrangement with
dormitory room., His output. was eight hundred Switzerland. These fields are situated in Armenia, in i.
cylinders per day and his food, by'any standard, was the Carpathians and the Urals, around Chelyabinsk,
insufficient. Sverdlovsk,. and the vast polar regions of Kolyma.,
Nikolai Scharegin and another exile, former en- reputedly the coldest places in the northern hemis- _
gineer Lev Kvachevsky, have confirmed that wheel phere. There some thousands of miserable prisoners
rims for the Lada factory at Togliatti were made mine gold for export. And in this particular area of
in camp 3 at Barashevo. Parts for lorries, agricultural commerce, specialists admit " that the mining is.
10, a hard labor camp in Mordovia, where the of all the Soviet exports to Great Britain. The Russian
temperature fell below minus 20?, and where those gold fields (the largest in the world) supplied the West
Yuri Belov himself made wheel cylinders in camp Gold and diamonds are certainly the most lucrative
ings or Krasnoyarsk and Novorossiysk. and the Kara Sea." .
workris considered the most destructive in the gulag,
year. Hardly encouraging for the poor devils who
make them for their masters in the KGB, in the lost
archipelago of the prison camps..: