Pavel sudoplatov. Pavel Sudoplatov Pavel Anatolievich Sudoplatov

Pavel Sudoplatov - intelligence agent, saboteur, NKVD officer - was often called the "Stalinist executioner" or the "genius of terror." During the period from 1929 to 1953, all the operational affairs of the Soviet special agencies were somehow connected with the name of Sudoplatov.
For a long time, the fight against Ukrainian nationalism was within the scope of his activities. During the war and after it, he was at the head of all operations that led to the defeat of the nationalist underground in Western Ukraine. Sudoplatov also played an active role in suppressing the activities of Trotskyist organizations.
The intelligence officer himself notes that in 1942 his group planned to arrange an assassination attempt on Hitler with the participation of the Polish prince Radziwill. A detachment of saboteurs was even sent to Berlin, but Stalin considered then the elimination of Hitler inappropriate.
Some authors write that Sudoplatov was collecting information about interned or captured Soviet citizens. Others claim that he took an active part in organizing and carrying out a number of murders, including the bishop of the Mukachevo Greek Catholic diocese Theodor (Romzha), the Polish engineer Naum Samet, the Ukrainian revolutionary Alexander Shumsky and the director Solomon Mikhoels.
It is authentically known that on May 23, 1938, Sudoplatov personally destroyed the founder of the OUN, Colonel Yevhen Konovalets, "giving" him a box of sweets with explosives, on March 5, 1950, he carried out an operation to capture UPA cornet general Roman Shukhevych (Shukhevych was killed during a shootout), and also took a direct part in the development of the operation to eliminate Trotsky.
There may be an opinion that Sudoplatov was an obedient tool in the hands of the Soviet party elite. Not certainly in that way. For example, when in October 1939 the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Serov arrested an elderly veteran of the Ukrainian liberation movement Levitsky, Sudoplatov condemned this decision.
Moreover, he did not support Khrushchev's proposal for the mass deportation of the youth of Western Ukraine for "reforging" in the Donbass and the Far East. Stalin then listened to the opinion of an experienced intelligence officer: Levitsky was released, and the deportation was canceled.

In the small Ukrainian town of Melitopol, in a poor large family, Pavel Anatolyevich Sudoplatov was born in 1907. At a young age, the boy came across Bukharin's book "The ABC of the Revolution". Inspired by the idea of a just society, in 1919, twelve-year-old Pavel left home with the cavalry detachment of the Red Army passing through the city. The Red Army soldiers fought mainly with Ukrainian nationalists - the troops of Petlyura and Konovalets. In 1921, members of the Special Section of the division were ambushed and suffered heavy losses. They urgently needed a telephonist and cryptographer, and Pavel Sudoplatov was sent to this job. Thus began his service in the state security organs.

Since 1932, Sudoplatov was transferred to foreign intelligence. At first, he works as a courier and illegal agent, but thanks to his unique abilities, he quickly advances in the service. Soon he is assigned to develop sabotage, reconnaissance operations. Sudoplatov creates agent networks. For the entire experience - not a single failure. His name was classified, no one knew about him, except for his closest relatives and high authorities. Undercover reports were signed by the pseudonym Andrey.

One of the first brilliantly executed operations of Pavel Sudoplatov was the elimination of the leader of the Ukrainian nationalists (OUN), Yevgeny Konovalets. It was the spring of 1938, when war with Germany was considered inevitable. The OUN was preparing to take the side of Hitler. Having entered the inner circle of Konovalets under the guise of a young student, Sudoplatov arranged a meeting with Konovalets. The place of the meeting was unknown until the last moment. The Soviet agent had to work out possible escape routes in all the main cities of Europe. Finally, the meeting took place in a Rotterdam cafe. In parting, Sudoplatov handed the Ukrainian colonel a box of chocolates with views of Kyiv. A clever explosive device was built into the box. It worked half an hour after the young man left. Konovalets was finished.

Returning from abroad after a successful operation, Sudoplatov met Beria for the first time. For about four hours, he asked about the details of the operation against Konovalets. After that, Sudoplatov was appointed deputy head of the foreign department of the NKVD, he began to create intelligence networks abroad. In the summer of 1938, purges began in the NKVD. The agents recalled from abroad ended up immediately in prisons, and Lubyanka employees disappeared one by one. In November, the direct superiors of Sudoplatov and then Yezhov were arrested. Beria becomes People's Commissar of Internal Affairs.

Sudoplatov was demoted and offered to be expelled from the party. Chance helped him. Stalin decided to deal with his old enemy in the party, Lev Trotsky, and then it turned out that there was no one to entrust the planning of this operation, except Sudoplatov. He was promoted again - to the Deputy Chief of State Security.

Then Sudoplatov did not yet know Spanish and did not communicate with Spanish-speaking agents. To eliminate Leon Trotsky, Operation Duck was developed; Sudoplatov, along with his colleagues, called this case “Lion Hunt”. Trotsky was hiding in Mexico, from where he led a wide network of his supporters around the world. According to the operation plan, the main role was assigned to two women - Caridad Mercader and Trotsky's secretary. The son of Caridad Ramon Mercader was ready to destroy Trotsky himself, but in illegal work both mother and son were complete amateurs. Sudoplatov went to Paris and, together with Eitingon, conducted a short course of undercover training for them in just a month. After Eitingon went to Mexico to organize a "lion hunt". He was a very experienced agent, and Sudoplatov allowed him not to send reports to Moscow.

In Mexico, Ramon Mercader, courting Trotsky's secretary, gained access to his villa and soon became a frequent visitor there. According to the plan, one day he managed to get a private meeting with Trotsky in his office, hiding an ice ax in his hand under his raincoat. Mercader expected that a noise would rise and he would be able to leave unnoticed, but he miscalculated. As soon as he locked the office door behind him, the experienced revolutionary understood everything and began to call for help. Mercader managed to deliver only one blow with an ice ax before people fled. However, even this blow was enough, and Trotsky died in the hospital the next day, August 20, 1940. And Ramon Mercader fell into the hands of the Mexican police. He completely served the received term of 20 years, 6 of which he managed to hide his name. After his release, he came to the Soviet Union and was awarded the Star of the Hero.

When the Great Patriotic War began, Sudoplatov led all reconnaissance and sabotage work, creating intelligence networks in the occupied territory and spreading misinformation, sabotage behind German lines, and organizing a partisan war. To do this, the NKVD formed a separate motorized rifle brigade for special purposes (OMSBON), the forerunner of modern special forces. When the Germans came close to Moscow in October 1941, Sudoplatov received an order to defend the center of the capital and the Kremlin at all costs and Beria's verbal order to mine the city. For several days, Sudoplatov's people mined railway stations, metro stations, streets, some government buildings and summer cottages. Fortunately, the city did not have to be blown up, but not all buildings were cleared of mines. Subsequently, this became the reason for Sudoplatov's accusation that he and Beria planned the overthrow of the Soviet government. So, TNT under the hotel "Moscow", laid down during the war, was discovered by accident only in 2005.

In the midst of the Stalingrad operation, Sudoplatov received an order from Beria to consider the atomic problem a priority and to obtain information about the work of scientists abroad to create an atomic bomb. Kurchatov named the 7 most important centers and 26 scientists in the United States, information about whose activities was of great importance. And Sudoplatov began work. His agents in England and the USA obtained documents from classified publications about atomic energy, thanks to which the atomic bomb in the USSR was created in just 4 years.

The last order of Stalin in 1953 was the preparation and organization of a terrorist attack against Joseph Broz Tito using agent Grigulevich. This most difficult task meant the death of the performer, and Sudoplatov was playing for time to remove one of his best agents from under the blow. Two weeks later, Stalin died, and the order to eliminate Tito remained unsigned.

After the death of the leader, a wave of arrests surged - first of Beria, and then of his associates. In a group of 50 people arrested in Beria's conspiracy, Pavel Sudoplatov was listed as number 8. He was arrested in his own office on Friday, August 21, 1953. A special instruction on the order of detention read: “It is necessary to keep secret the very fact of keeping numbered prisoners. Keeping their names, surnames, past secret.

Sudoplatov was taken to Butyrka prison. At the first interrogation, he was told that, as a confidant of Beria, he was accused of actively participating in a conspiracy to seize power, planning a terrorist attack against the leaders of the state, creating a special group under the people's commissar of internal affairs to eliminate persons objectionable to him. The former services to the state did not help.

Sudoplatov was waiting for the inevitable execution, but he came up with the next move. If you gradually stop answering questions and at the same time quietly throw away food, then after two or three weeks the person falls into prostration from exhaustion, and the forensic doctor will be forced to send him to the prison infirmary. Sudoplatov was taught this technique by his mentor Sergei Shpigelglas, the head of foreign intelligence, who organized the abduction of the head of the ROVS Miller in France in 1937. Sudoplatov used this method, even withstanding a painful lumbar puncture, so that the doctors would no doubt recognize his unsuitability for interrogations and placed him in the hospital.

One day in 1954, he drew attention to the newspaper in which the book of the nurse who was watching him was wrapped. The note spoke about the execution of Beria and his associates. Sudoplatov realized that he needed to continue simulating his condition, to play for time. The next time the nurse's book was wrapped in an old letter. A distant relative wrote that “the old man was exposed at a general meeting of collective farmers, the accountants are not feeling well, the conditions at the company are still the same, but there is enough money to continue everything further and further.” Sudoplatov understood the meaning of encryption. At the 20th Party Congress, Khrushchev exposed Stalin's personality cult, most of those convicted in the Beria case have already been sentenced. When an article appeared on the newspaper cover about the resignation of Molotov and Kaganovich, Sudoplatov realized that the situation had changed dramatically, and it was time to act. Much later, he learned that this method of transmitting information was invented by his wife, who bribed the nurse. Sudoplatov's wife - Emma Kaganova, aka Shulamith Krimkor - worked in the Secret Political and Foreign Departments of the NKVD. As an illegal agent, she also repeatedly participated in foreign operations.

After spending five whole years in a stupor, in 1958 Sudoplatov returned to normal. The interrogations began again. At the end of the investigation, he received a term of 15 years. Sudoplatov, like other supporters of Beria, was accused of trying to overthrow the government in the Soviet Union. The former scout served his sentence in the Vladimir prison, where he met both his friends and enemies. Vasily, Joseph Stalin's son, was sitting three cells away from him. Sudoplatov was released on August 21, 1968, exactly 15 years after his arrest, as a sick, exhausted old man. For many years he fought for the return of his name, but was rehabilitated only in 1992, and after 4 years he died.

Pavel Anatolievich Sudoplatov(July 7 - September 24) - Soviet intelligence officer, saboteur, employee of the OGPU (later NKVD - NKGB), before being arrested in 1953 - Lieutenant General of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs.

In 1928-1930. studied at the worker's faculty of the GPU. Since 1932, he moved to Moscow - was appointed an employee of the central apparatus of the OGPU, since 1933 he worked in the Foreign Department (illegal intelligence in several European countries). Since, in addition to Russian, he was fluent only in Ukrainian, he specialized in Ukrainian nationalists. In May 1938, on the personal orders of Joseph Stalin, he killed the leader of the Ukrainian nationalists, Konovalets, by handing him a bomb disguised as a box of chocolates in the restaurant of the Atlanta Hotel in Rotterdam.

Work in the NKVD before the war

After the arrest of the former intelligence leaders, the removal of Nikolai Yezhov and his replacement by Lavrenty Beria, from November 6 to December 2, 1938, he acted as head of the Foreign Department of the NKVD of the USSR. After Sudoplatov, he is demoted to the head of the Spanish department. In 1939 he was appointed deputy chief of intelligence. From February 1941 - Deputy Head of the 1st (Intelligence) Directorate of the NKGB of the USSR. He taught at the NKVD Special Purpose School.

The most famous operation of this period was Operation Duck - the assassination of Leon Trotsky in August 1940 (Sudoplatov and Naum Eitingon led the operation).

Work during the Great Patriotic War

In the first days of the war, by order of the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR, a Special Group was created under the NKVD, which was entrusted with the organization of reconnaissance and sabotage work and partisan warfare in the rear of the Nazi troops, it was formed on the basis of the First (intelligence) Directorate of the People's Commissariat of State Security, headed by its deputy chief First Directorate of Sudoplatov. In 1942, Pavel Sudoplatov headed the 4th Directorate of the NKVD of the USSR. There were not enough staff. Sudoplatov turned to Beria with a request to return to intelligence her former employees who were fired or were imprisoned. Beria immediately agreed. Many former intelligence officers wrote to Sudoplatov with a request to return them to service (as, for example, Leonid Linitsky) and Sudoplatov promptly responded to their requests.

During the war, Sudoplatov worked with the famous Soviet intelligence officer Nikolai Kuznetsov, and led sabotage activities in the Caucasus. He led the brilliant operations "Monastyr" and "Berezino" based on the radio game. During the German offensive on Moscow, he was responsible for mining the most important objects. Together with another high-ranking NKVD officer, V.N. Ilyin, he developed a plan to assassinate Hitler by a group of I.L. Miklashevsky. Since 1944 - the head of the group (later - the department) "C", which was engaged in undercover production and generalization of materials on nuclear issues.

Work after the war, imprisonment and rehabilitation

After the war, he headed the "F" department. According to some authors, he took an active part in organizing and carrying out a number of murders, including Bishop Teodor (Romzha), Naum Samet, Alexander Shumsky, Solomon Mikhoels in 1948 in Minsk (Belarus).

On September 12, 1958, he was sentenced by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR under the "counter-revolutionary" article 58-1 paragraph "b" to 15 years in prison "for actively aiding the traitor to the motherland Beria in preparing a coup d'etat, performing experiments on people, kidnapping and numerous murders" . He pleaded not guilty. He served his sentence in the Vladimir prison, where he suffered three heart attacks, became blind in one eye, and received a disability of the 2nd group.

Released after serving his sentence on August 21, 1968. Returning to Moscow, Sudoplatov took up literary activities. Under the pseudonym Anatoly Andreev published three books, actively participated in the veterans' movement. For over 20 years he fought for his rehabilitation. Fully rehabilitated by the decision of the Chief Military Prosecutor's Office of the Russian Federation of January 10, 1992. Some members of the Memorial Center express doubts about the legitimacy of his rehabilitation ( Nikita Petrov: "the organizer and participant of criminal offenses proven by the court were rehabilitated") .

Shortly before his death, in collaboration with his son - a historian of special services, Professor of Moscow State University Anatoly Sudoplatov (1943-2005) published a book of memoirs about his life and work - "Intelligence and the Kremlin" (- in English and German; - in Russian), became an international bestseller. Six months after his death, the book “Special Operations. Lubyanka and the Kremlin. 1930-1950s". According to Leonid Shebarshin, "Sudoplatov's book is good, but it contains a lot of things that could harm our security - it was written by American journalists."

Awards

Order of Lenin (04/30/1946)
three orders of the Red Banner (11/13/1937, 06/16/1941, 11/3/1944)
Order of Suvorov, 2nd class (November 5, 1944)
Order of the Patriotic War, 1st class (02/24/1945)
two Orders of the Red Star (04/26/1940, 09/20/1943)
medals
badge "Honored Worker of the NKVD" (02/04/1942).

He was deprived of all awards by a court verdict in 1958. In 1998, the President of the Russian Federation signed a Decree on the restoration of Lieutenant General P. A. Sudoplatov posthumously in the rights to all state awards in connection with his rehabilitation.

Special and military ranks

Senior lieutenant of state security (12/30/1936)
Captain of State Security (09/25/1938)
Major of State Security (03/14/1940)
Senior Major of State Security (8/8/1941)
Commissar of State Security 3rd rank (02/14/1943)
Lieutenant General (07/09/1945).

He was deprived of his military rank as convicted by the court by the Decree of the Council of Ministers of the USSR of October 17, 1958. In 1998, the President of the Russian Federation signed a Decree on the reinstatement of Lieutenant General P. A. Sudoplatov in the military rank posthumously in connection with his rehabilitation.

Memory

Streets in the cities of Smolensk and Gagarin named after Sudoplatov

Compositions

Special operations. Lubyanka and the Kremlin 1930-1950. - M.: OLMA-PRESS, 1997. - ISBN 5-87322-726-8
Different days of secret war and diplomacy. 1941 - M.: OLMA-PRESS, 2005. - ISBN 5-224-04960-1
Victory in the secret war. 1941-1945 years. - M.: OLMA-PRESS, 2005. - ISBN 5-224-05345-5
Intelligence and the Kremlin. Notes of an unwanted witness. - M.: Gaia, 1996. - ISBN 5-85589-024-4

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Literature

Sudoplatov A.P. The secret life of General Sudoplatov. Book. 1 and 2. - M.: OLMA-PRESS, 1998. - ISBN 5-224-00136-6
Anatoli Sudoplatov, Pavel Sudoplatov, Leona P. Schecter, Jerrold L. Schecter. 576 pages Publisher: Back Bay Books; Updated edition (June 1, 1995) - ISBN 0-316-82115-2; ISBN 978-0-316-82115-5
Petrov V. N. Who was in charge of the security forces. 1941-1954. - M.: Links, 2010. - S. 825-826.

additional literature

Zoya Voskresenskaya, Eduard Sharapov. The secret of Zoya Resurrection. M., Olma-Press, 1998, ISBN 5-87322-877-9.

Notes

Links

in the library of Maxim Moshkov

Predecessor:
Zelman Isaevich Passov

And about. head of the Soviet foreign intelligence (INO NKVD)
from November 6 to December 2, 1938

Successor:
Vladimir Georgievich Dekanozov



Heads of the GUGB

Deputy Heads of the GUGB

Heads of counterintelligence department

Heads of the secret political department

Heads of a special department

Heads of foreign department

Heads of the Investigative Department

Special ranks

An excerpt characterizing Sudoplatov, Pavel Anatolyevich

Despite the fact that someone's carriage was standing at the entrance, the porter, looking at the mother and son (who, without ordering to report about themselves, went straight into the glass passage between two rows of statues in niches), glancing significantly at the old coat, asked whom they whatever, princes or count, and, having learned that it was a count, he said that their excellency is now worse and their excellency does not receive anyone.
“We can leave,” the son said in French.
– Mon ami! [My friend!] - said the mother in an imploring voice, again touching her son's hand, as if this touch could calm or excite him.
Boris fell silent and, without taking off his overcoat, looked inquiringly at his mother.
“My dear,” Anna Mikhailovna said in a gentle voice, turning to the porter, “I know that Count Kirill Vladimirovich is very ill ... that’s why I came ... I’m a relative ... I won’t bother, my dear ... But I just need to see Prince Vasily Sergeyevich: because he is standing here. Report it, please.
The porter sullenly pulled the string up and turned away.
“Princess Drubetskaya to Prince Vasily Sergeevich,” he shouted to a waiter in stockings, shoes and a tailcoat who had run down and peered out from under the ledge of the stairs.
Mother smoothed out the folds of her dyed silk dress, looked into the one-piece Venetian mirror in the wall, and cheerfully in her worn-out shoes went up the carpet of the stairs.
- Mon cher, voue m "avez promis, [My friend, you promised me,]" she turned again to the Son, arousing him with the touch of her hand.
The son, lowering his eyes, calmly followed her.
They entered the hall, from which one door led to the chambers allotted to Prince Vasily.
While the mother and son, going out into the middle of the room, intended to ask for directions from the old waiter who jumped up at their entrance, a bronze handle turned at one of the doors and Prince Vasily in a velvet coat, with one star, at home, went out, seeing off the handsome black-haired man. This man was the famous St. Petersburg doctor Lorrain.
- C "est donc positif? [So, is that right?] - said the prince.
- Mon prince, "errare humanum est", mais ... [Prince, it is human nature to err.] - the doctor answered, grasping and pronouncing the Latin words in a French accent.
- C "est bien, c" est bien ... [Good, good ...]
Noticing Anna Mikhailovna with her son, Prince Vasily dismissed the doctor with a bow and silently, but with an inquiring air, approached them. The son noticed how suddenly deep sorrow was expressed in the eyes of his mother, and he smiled slightly.
- Yes, in what sad circumstances we had to see each other, prince ... Well, what about our dear patient? she said, as if not noticing the cold, insulting look fixed on her.
Prince Vasily looked inquiringly, to the point of bewilderment, at her, then at Boris. Boris bowed politely. Prince Vasily, not answering the bow, turned to Anna Mikhailovna and answered her question with a movement of his head and lips, which meant the worst hope for the patient.
– Really? exclaimed Anna Mikhailovna. - Oh, it's terrible! It’s terrible to think… This is my son,” she added, pointing to Boris. “He wanted to thank you himself.
Boris bowed again politely.
“Believe, prince, that a mother’s heart will never forget what you have done for us.
“I am glad that I could please you, my dear Anna Mikhailovna,” said Prince Vasily, straightening the frill and showing in gesture and voice here in Moscow, before the patronized Anna Mikhailovna, even much greater importance than in St. Petersburg, at the evening at Annette Scherer.
“Try to serve well and be worthy,” he added, addressing Boris sternly. - I'm glad ... Are you here on vacation? he dictated in his impassive tone.
“I’m waiting for an order, Your Excellency, to go to a new destination,” Boris answered, showing neither annoyance at the prince’s sharp tone, nor a desire to enter into a conversation, but so calmly and respectfully that the prince looked intently at him.
- Do you live with your mother?
“I live with Countess Rostova,” Boris said, adding again: “Your Excellency.”
“This is the Ilya Rostov who married Nathalie Shinshina,” said Anna Mikhailovna.
“I know, I know,” said Prince Vasily in his monotonous voice. - Je n "ai jamais pu concevoir, comment Nathalieie s" est decidee a epouser cet ours mal - leche l Un personnage completement stupide et ridicule. Et joueur a ce qu "on dit. [I could never understand how Natalie decided to go out marry that filthy bear. Completely stupid and funny person. Besides a gambler, they say.]
- Mais tres brave homme, mon prince, [But a good man, prince,] - Anna Mikhailovna remarked, smiling touchingly, as if she knew that Count Rostov deserved such an opinion, but asked to pity the poor old man. - What do the doctors say? asked the princess, after a pause, and again expressing great sadness on her tear-stained face.
“There is little hope,” said the prince.
- And I so wanted to thank my uncle again for all his good deeds to me and Borya. C "est son filleuil, [This is his godson,] - she added in such a tone, as if this news should have extremely pleased Prince Vasily.
Prince Vasily thought for a moment and grimaced. Anna Mikhailovna realized that he was afraid to find in her a rival according to the will of Count Bezukhoy. She hastened to reassure him.
“If it weren’t for my true love and devotion to my uncle,” she said, pronouncing this word with particular confidence and carelessness: “I know his character, noble, direct, but after all, only the princesses are with him ... They are still young ...” She tilted her head and she added in a whisper: “Did he fulfill his last duty, prince?” How precious are these last moments! After all, it couldn't be worse; it must be cooked if it is so bad. We women, prince,” she smiled tenderly, “always know how to say these things. You need to see him. No matter how hard it was for me, but I'm used to suffering.
The prince, apparently, understood, and understood, as he did at the evening at Annette Scherer's, that it was difficult to get rid of Anna Mikhailovna.
“This meeting wouldn’t be hard for him, chere Anna Mikhailovna,” he said. - Let's wait until the evening, the doctors promised a crisis.
“But you can’t wait, prince, at this moment. Pensez, il u va du salut de son ame… Ah! c "est terrible, les devoirs d" un chretien ... [Think, it's about saving his soul! Oh! this is terrible, the duty of a Christian…]
A door opened from the inner rooms, and one of the princesses, the count's nieces, entered, with a gloomy and cold face and a long waist strikingly disproportionate to her legs.
Prince Vasily turned to her.
- Well, what is he?
- All the same. And as you wish, this noise ... - said the princess, looking at Anna Mikhailovna, as if she were a stranger.
“Ah, chere, je ne vous reconnaissais pas, [Ah, my dear, I didn’t recognize you,” Anna Mikhailovna said with a happy smile, approaching the count’s niece with a light amble. - Je viens d "arriver et je suis a vous pour vous aider a soigner mon oncle. J`imagine, combien vous avez souffert, [I came to help you follow your uncle. I imagine how much you suffered,] - she added, with participation rolling his eyes.
The princess made no answer, did not even smile, and went out at once. Anna Mikhailovna took off her gloves and, in a conquered position, settled down on an armchair, inviting Prince Vasily to sit down beside her.
- Boris! - she said to her son and smiled, - I'll go to the count, to my uncle, and you go to Pierre, mon ami, for the time being, don't forget to give him an invitation from the Rostovs. They invite him to dinner. I don't think he will? she turned to the prince.
“On the contrary,” said the prince, apparently out of sorts. – Je serais tres content si vous me debarrassez de ce jeune homme… [I would be very happy if you would get rid of this young man…] Sitting here. The Count never once asked about him.
He shrugged. The waiter led the young man up and down another staircase to Pyotr Kirillovich.

Pierre did not manage to choose a career for himself in St. Petersburg and, indeed, was exiled to Moscow for riot. The story told at Count Rostov's was true. Pierre participated in tying the quarter with a bear. He arrived a few days ago and stayed, as always, at his father's house. Although he assumed that his story was already known in Moscow, and that the ladies surrounding his father, who were always unfriendly to him, would take advantage of this opportunity to annoy the count, he nevertheless went to half his father on the day of his arrival. Entering the drawing room, the usual residence of the princesses, he greeted the ladies who were sitting at the embroidery frame and at the book, which one of them was reading aloud. There were three. The eldest, clean, long-waisted, strict girl, the same one who went out to Anna Mikhailovna, was reading; the younger ones, both ruddy and pretty, differing from each other only in that one had a mole above her lip, which made her very pretty, sewed in a hoop. Pierre was greeted as dead or plagued. The eldest princess interrupted her reading and silently looked at him with frightened eyes; the youngest, without a mole, assumed exactly the same expression; the smallest, with a mole, of a merry and humorous disposition, stooped down to the embroidery frame to hide a smile, caused, probably, by the upcoming scene, the amusingness of which she foresaw. She pulled down the hair and bent down, as if sorting out the patterns and barely holding back her laughter.
“Bonjour, ma cousine,” said Pierre. - Vous ne me hesonnaissez pas? [Hello cousin. You don't recognize me?]
“I know you too well, too well.
How is the Count's health? May I see him? Pierre asked awkwardly, as always, but not embarrassed.
“The Count suffers both physically and morally, and it seems that you took care to inflict more moral suffering on him.
May I see the count? Pierre repeated.
“Hm!.. If you want to kill him, kill him completely, you can see. Olga, go and see if the broth is ready for the uncle, the time will soon be, ”she added, showing Pierre that they are busy and busy reassuring his father, while he is obviously busy only upsetting.
Olga left. Pierre stood for a moment, looked at the sisters, and, bowing, said:
- So I'll go to my place. When you can, tell me.
He went out, and the sonorous but quiet laughter of the sister with the mole was heard behind him.
The next day, Prince Vasily arrived and settled in the count's house. He called Pierre to him and said to him:
- Mon cher, si vous vous conduisez ici, comme a Petersbourg, vous finirez tres mal; c "est tout ce que je vous dis. [My dear, if you behave here as in Petersburg, you will end up very badly; I have nothing more to tell you.] The count is very, very sick: you don’t need to see him at all.
Since then, Pierre has not been disturbed, and he spent the whole day alone upstairs in his room.
While Boris entered him, Pierre walked around his room, occasionally stopping in the corners, making threatening gestures to the wall, as if piercing an invisible enemy with a sword, and sternly looking over his glasses and then starting his walk again, pronouncing obscure words, shaking shoulders and arms outstretched.
- L "Angleterre a vecu, [End of England]," he said, frowning and pointing his finger at someone. - M. Pitt comme traitre a la nation et au droit des gens est condamiene a ... [Pitt, as a traitor to the nation and the people right, sentenced to ...] - He did not have time to finish Pitt's sentence, imagining himself at that moment as Napoleon himself and, together with his hero, having already made a dangerous crossing through the Pas de Calais and having conquered London, - as he saw a young, slender and handsome officer entering him He stopped. Pierre left Boris a fourteen-year-old boy and decidedly did not remember him, but, in spite of this, with his usual quick and cordial manner, he took him by the hand and smiled amiably.
- Do you remember me? Boris said calmly, with a pleasant smile. - I came with my mother to the count, but it seems that he is not completely healthy.
Yes, it looks unhealthy. Everything disturbs him, - Pierre answered, trying to remember who this young man was.
Boris felt that Pierre did not recognize him, but did not consider it necessary to identify himself and, without experiencing the slightest embarrassment, looked into his eyes.
“Count Rostov asked you to come and dine with him today,” he said after a rather long and awkward silence for Pierre.
- A! Count Rostov! Pierre spoke happily. “So you are his son, Ilya. You can imagine, I didn't recognize you at first. Remember how we went to Sparrow Hills with m me Jacquot ... [Madame Jaco ...] a long time ago.
“You are mistaken,” Boris said slowly, with a bold and somewhat mocking smile. - I am Boris, the son of Princess Anna Mikhailovna Drubetskaya. Rostov's father's name is Ilya, and his son's name is Nikolai. And I m me Jacquot didn't know any.
Pierre waved his arms and head as if mosquitoes or bees had attacked him.
- Oh, what is it! I confused everything. There are so many relatives in Moscow! You are Boris...yes. Well, here we are with you and agreed. Well, what do you think of the Boulogne expedition? Surely the English will have a hard time if only Napoleon crosses the canal? I think the expedition is very possible. Villeneuve would not have blundered!
Boris did not know anything about the Boulogne expedition, he did not read the newspapers and heard about Villeneuve for the first time.
“We are more busy here in Moscow with dinners and gossip than with politics,” he said in his calm, mocking tone. I don't know anything about it and don't think so. Moscow is busy with gossip the most,” he continued. “Now they are talking about you and the count.

P. A. Sudoplatov (1907 -1996)

One of the most striking figures of Soviet intelligence, and intelligence in general, was Pavel Anatolyevich Sudoplatov, a man of unusual dramatic fate, who, as he himself wrote, "managed to survive due to a bizarre combination of circumstances and undoubted luck."

In the small Ukrainian town of Melitopol, in a poor large family, Pavel Anatolyevich Sudoplatov was born in 1907. At a young age, the boy came across Bukharin's book "The ABC of the Revolution". Inspired by the idea of a just society, in 1919, twelve-year-old Pavel left home with the cavalry detachment of the Red Army passing through the city. The Red Army soldiers fought mainly against the Ukrainian nationalists - the troops of Petlyura and Konovalets. In 1921, members of the Special Section of the division were ambushed and suffered heavy losses. They urgently needed a telephonist and cryptographer, and Pavel Sudoplatov was sent to this job. Thus began his service in the state security organs.

Then Sudoplatov did not yet know Spanish and did not communicate with Spanish-speaking agents. To eliminate Leon Trotsky, Operation Duck was developed; Sudoplatov, along with his colleagues, called this case “Lion Hunt”. Trotsky was hiding in Mexico, from where he led a wide network of his supporters around the world. According to the plan of the operation, the main role was assigned to two women - Caridad Mercader and Trotsky's secretary. The son of Caridad Ramon Mercader was ready to destroy Trotsky himself, but in illegal work both mother and son were complete amateurs. Sudoplatov went to Paris and, together with Eitingon, conducted a short course of undercover training for them in just a month. After Eitingon went to Mexico to organize a "lion hunt". He was a very experienced agent, and Sudoplatov allowed him not to send reports to Moscow.

One day in 1954, he drew attention to the newspaper in which the book of the nurse who was watching him was wrapped. The note spoke about the execution of Beria and his associates. Sudoplatov realized that he needed to continue simulating his condition, to play for time. The next time the nurse's book was wrapped in an old letter. A distant relative wrote that “the old man was exposed at a general meeting of collective farmers, the accountants are not feeling well, the conditions at the company are still the same, but there is enough money to continue everything further and further.” Sudoplatov understood the meaning of encryption. At the 20th Party Congress, Khrushchev exposed Stalin's personality cult, most of those convicted in the Beria case have already been sentenced. When an article appeared on the newspaper cover about the resignation of Molotov and Kaganovich, Sudoplatov realized that the situation had changed dramatically, and it was time to act. Much later, he learned that this method of transmitting information was invented by his wife, who bribed the nurse. Sudoplatov's wife, Emma Kaganova, aka Shulamith Krimkor, worked in the Secret Political and Foreign Departments of the NKVD. As an illegal agent, she also repeatedly participated in foreign operations.