The Big Breach - Index of

The Big Breach; From Top Secret to Maximum SecurityCompliments of http://www.192.comchocolate flake, just before I emerged from the stairs into the streetbelow, on a cold December's day. The surveillance team noted my bizarreacquisition and reported it to the DS.Every evening after a day of lectures or foot-slogging aroundPortsmouth practising our anti-surveillance skills, we listened to alecture from a guest speaker, usually a member of the service, whowould describe a real-life operation in which they had taken part sothat we could see how our new skills could be applied. One evening,Ball announced that we had a special guest who should be treated withthe utmost respect. Oleg Gordievsky, the so-called `jewel in the crown'of MI6's Russian defectors, told us the story of his defection toBritain, as he does to every IONEC, providing a dramatic account oftradecraft in action.Gordievsky first made contact with MI6 in 1974 while working as a KGBofficer in Copenhagen under cover as the press attach‚ in the Russianembassy. He was cultivated over a series of badminton games and waseventually recruited by Colin Figures, who later became Chief. For thenext 11 years Gordievsky provided MI6 with a treasure trove ofinformation from the heart of the KGB. Gordievsky was run with suchsecrecy that only a handful of officers knew of his existence and,rather than risk widening the indoctrination circle, many nonindoctrinatedofficers were allowed to pursue futile operations whichwere known from Gordievsky to be compromised. But despite the caretaken to keep his existence secret, it was inevitable that Gordievskywould eventually fall under suspicion from his masters in Moscow.During a period of home leave, he was arrested and interrogated. He waseventually released, but was suspended from work and his passportconfiscated while the KGB conducted further enquiries. He managed toget word of his plight to the station in Moscow, where a mid-careerofficer, the Honourable Raymond Horner, was the number two. Everystation has on its standing orders at least one plan for exfiltrationof defectors in such emergencies. The exfiltration plan in Moscow wasto smuggle the agent over the Russian border into neutral Finland. Aroute from Moscow had already been reconnoitred, and Horner had a Saab90 as his official car, which in 1985 was the only car with a largeenough boot to comfortably hold a grown man. This upmarket foreign carhad caused some resentment amongst Horner's FCO colleagues, as theywere forced to drive inferior British models and assumed that theHonourable Horner had been exempted from this rule because he held atitle. Every evening Gordievsky took a stroll in Gorky Park, followedclosely by his round-the-clock surveillance team. Horner identified apatch of dead ground where Gordievsky would be momentarily out of sightof his followers, meaning the pickup had to be made with split secondprecision, and spent the day driving around Moscow ostensibly on`errands', in reality doing thorough anti-surveillance. With militaryprecision, he arrived at the designated spot at exactly the same timeas Gordievsky, who leaped into the Saab's capacious boot, under thesoon-to-be-disjointed noses of his surveillance. Horner drove out ofMoscow and started the long and nerve-jangling ride to the Finnishborder. Horner could not be sure that his car was not bugged, so darednot communicate with his hidden passenger. Even when over the border,it was too risky to speak out, though he must have been stifling ashout of jubilation. To let his passenger know he was safe, he playedGordievsky's favourite piece of music over the car stereo. To this day,page- 42 - To purchase the original limited edition hardback version of this bookplease call 08000 192 192 or go to http://www.192.com