Resisting the KGB Mythmakers: Willy Fisher, spy fiction, and the myth of Rudolf Abel

ABSTRACT

The Soviet Committee for State Security (KGB) suffered a shocking setback when the head of its deep cover (illegal) agent networks in the United States Rudolf Abel, whose real name was William (Willy) Fisher, was arrested in Brooklyn in 1957. After Fisher was swapped for the downed CIA U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers and an American PhD student Frederic Pryor in 1962, the KGB attempted to turn the setback into a public relations victory by constructing the myth of an ideal Soviet intelligence officer. However, the myth required that Fisher continue his public life under the assumed identity of Rudolf Abel until his death and beyond. Drawing on KGB archival documents, memoirs of former KGB officers, Fisher’s published personal letters, and Russian language journalistic accounts, this article chronicles and analyses both the KGB activities to make Fisher into the mythic Abel and the former officer’s seemingly hopeless but remarkably persistent struggle to preserve his personal identity and integrity. A struggle that culminated in a little-known spy fiction novella which, using allusions and metaphors, articulated his critique of the KGB.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Fedor, Russia and the Cult of State Security, 2.

2. Ibid., 1.

3. Ibid., 11–29.

4. Ibid., 34–35.

5. A lot has been written on Willy Fisher’s life. For biographical details, I rely on the following sources: the expanded third edition of Vin Arthey’s biography Abel: The True Story of the Spy Traded for Gary Powers. Arthey based his research on declassified Soviet intelligence files, the English-language history of Soviet intelligence written by Andrew and Mitrokhin, The Mitrokhin Archive: The KGB in Europe and the West, the Russian language biographies of Fisher-Abel, such as that by Fisher’s friend and later Soviet emigrant Khenkin’s, Охотник вверх ногами [The Hunter, Hunted], and the former KGB officer Tarasov’s, Жаркое лето полковника Абеля [Colonel Abel’s Hot Summer]. In addition, my account is informed by the most extensive existing Russian language biography of Fisher-Abel written by veteran Soviet and Russian journalist Nikolai Dolgopolov and by other more recent Russian language journalistic accounts. See Dolgopolov, Фишер-Абель [Fisher-Abel]. On Dolgopolov’s work in general, see Kovacevic, “Nikolay Dolgopolov”. Also, in 1986 Richard Friedman published an article on Fisher in the CIA’s in-house journal Studies in Intelligence which was declassified in 2000. As later research has shown, this article contains several biographical inaccuracies. See Friedman, “A Stone for Willy Fisher.”

6. The source of this story is Fisher’s daughter Evelyna. Arthey, Abel, 208; and Dolgopolov, Фишер-Абель, 184.

7. Arthey, 17.

8. Ibid., 23–24, 35–48.

9. Ibid., 67–68.

10. In the early 1920s, Heinrich Fisher published a memoir about his radical past that was extremely well-received in the Soviet Union and brought him a great deal of literary fame. See Fisher, В России и в Англии [In Russia and in England]. The second edition of the memoir was published in 1935. See also David Saunders, “A Russian Bebel Revisited.”

11. Arthey, Abel, 74, 78.

12. Ibid., 80. The OGPU is the acronym for Объединённое государственное политическое управление [The Joint State Political Directorate], the Soviet state security service from 1923 to 1934.

13. Arthey, Abel, 74; and Dolgopolov, Фишер-Абель, 67 (in the e-book).

14. Dolgopolov, Фишер-Абель, 67, 69 (in the e-book).

15. Kolpakidi and Mzareulov, Советская внешняя разведка [Soviet Foreign Intelligence, 1920–1945], 18. According to Kolpakidi and Mzareulov, the number of people employed in the INO by the end of 1930 was 121. In addition, there were 68 people who served in the reserves in 1932.

16. The OGPU was incorporated into Народный комиссариат внутренних дел [NKVD, the People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs] in 1934.

17. Mukhachev, “Еще раз о Абеле [One More Time About Abel],” 124.

18. Ibid., 126.

19. Arthey, 84.

20. Ibid., 90.

21. Arthey, 107–108. Arthey mistakenly states that this is where Fisher and Abel first met. However, as Mukhachev’s photograph reveals, they likely met almost a decade earlier when they worked together in China.

22. Mukhachev, 125.

23. Arthey, 121.

24. Ibid., 126.

25. Stephan, Stalin’s Secret War, 153–190. For the post-Soviet Russian intelligence (SVR) version of these two operations, see Primakov, ed., Очерки истории российской внешней разведки [Essays on the History of Russian Foreign Intelligence], 178–211.

26. Dolgopolov, 167 (in the e-book).

27. Ibid., 107–8 (in the e-book).

28. The NKGB was renamed the MGB in March 1946. However, Soviet foreign intelligence was taken out of the MGB and became a part of the new organisation, the Committee of Information (KI), in May 1947. It was re-integrated into the MGB in 1951.

29. Arthey, 145–7.

30. Ibid., 146.

31. Ibid., 173–5; and Dolgopolov, 173–7 (in the e-book).

32. On these topics, see Donovan, Strangers on a Bridge; and Bernikow, Abel.

33. Arthey, 177–9.

34. Ibid., 189–94.

35. On Fisher’s emotional state after his return, see, for instance, the testimony of his daughter Evelyna. Dolgopolov, 130–1 (in the e-book).

36. Recall that the Komsomol was Fisher’s first place of employment in the Soviet Union.

37. Pavlov, Операция Снег [Operation Snow], 242 (in the e-book).

38. ”Because that was his [best] friend,” Evelyna replied. Dolgopolov, 143 (in the e-book).

39. Pavlov, 259 (in the e-book).

40. Ibid., 260 (in the e-book).

41. The first public mention of Fisher’s whereabouts in the Soviet Union after his return from the United States can be found in a newspaper article by Drozdov, a high-ranking Soviet intelligence officer, who played a major role in the Fisher-Powers swap operation as Fisher’s purported German relative Jurgen Drews. The article was published on the eve of the celebration of the 20^th anniversary of the Victory Day (May 1965). Drozdov’s portrayal of Fisher, whom he referred to as Abel, contained all the elements of the subsequently constructed KGB myth of Abel as an ideal Soviet intelligence officer, including his fake birthplace in the Soviet Union. See Drozdov, “Comrade Abel.”

42. “Перспективный план основных [A Long-Term Plan].”

43. Ibid., 45.

44. Pavlov, 260 (in the e-book).

45. Ibid.

46. Kozhevnikov’s novel was translated into English as Shield and Sword. The book’s dust jacket bombastically proclaimed that ‘this is the extraordinary story of Central European terror and the spy who smashed through the systems to fight a war of his own.’ So like James Bond and so unlike Fisher.

47. Braterskiy, “Разведка донесла: 50 лет любимому фильму Путина [Intel Service Reported: Putin’s Favorite Film Turns 50].”

48. ”Умер прототип разведчика из фильма ‘Щит и меч’ [The Prototype of the Intelligence Officer from the film ‘The Shield and the Sword’ Has Died].” There is a recently produced Russian documentary film about Sviatogorov that makes the same claim. See История советского разведчика Александра Святогорова [The History of Soviet Intelligence Officer Aleksandr Sviatogorov]. One of the last surviving members of the Shield and Sword film crew, interviewed in this documentary, calls Kozhevnikov ‘an old Chekist’. However, there is no publicly available documentary confirmation that Kozhevnikov was ever an officer or an agent of Soviet state security, though there is no doubt that his work was financed by the KGB.

49. Just like Kozhevnikov’s novel Shield and Sword, Ardamatsky’s Saturn Was Almost Invisible was also translated into English. In contrast, Fisher’s novella Demise of the ‘Black Knights’ has never been translated into English.

50. The quoted fragment of this letter is included in Dolgopolov, 591 (in the e-book).

51. ”Перспективный план,” 45. A veteran intelligence officer, Liagin was based in the U.S. from July 1939 until June 1941. After the start of World War II, he was covertly sent to the Ukrainian city of Mykolaiv [Nikolaev] where he headed the anti-Nazi underground. He was captured and executed in 1943. In 1944, he was posthumously awarded the title of the Hero of the Soviet Union. See Bondarenko. Viktor Liagin.

52. ‘Grant’ was Liagin’s code name. See Ardamatsky. ‘Грант’ вызывает Москву. The novel was reissued in the post-Soviet period by the Moscow publishing company Veche in 2008.

53. The film titles were the following: Путь в ‘Сатурн’ [Path to ‘Saturn’] (1967), Конец ‘Сатурна’ [Demise of ‘Saturn’] (1967) and Бой после Победы [Fight after Victory] (1972). Saturn was the name of the World War II German military intelligence spy school.

54. Semichastny, Беспокойное сердце [Restless Heart], 265 (in the e-book). A photo of the drawing is also included, 617 (in the e-book).

55. Peshkova, Ставка больше, чем фильм [The Bet Higher than the Film], 90–119, esp. 109–12.

56. Dolgopolov, 591 (in the e-book).

57. The fragment of this letter is included in Dolgopolov, 592 (in the e-book). Fisher joked: ‘A good film might come out of it. I need to collect royalties and buy a car’. The novella was indeed made into a black and white feature film by the Central Soviet TV in 1969, but it is unlikely that the royalties received were large enough to buy a car. In any case, the opening credits made no mention of either Abel or Fisher and the film was quickly forgotten. See ТВ фильм [TV Film].

58. Lebedev [Fisher], Конец ‘чёрных рыцарей’ [Demise of the ‘Black Knights’]. According to his daughter Evelyna, Fisher also published a short story about a Soviet World War II deception operation against the Germans in the journal Krugozor [Horizon] using the pseudonym of ‘Colonel’. It appears that this story concerned Operation Berezino in which, as already pointed out, Fisher actively participated. However, I was not able to obtain the published version of this short story. Dolgopolov, 187 (in the e-book).

59. Arthey, 9; and Dolgopolov, 566 (in the e-book).

60. Dolgopolov, 494 (in the e-book).

61. Lebedev [Fisher], Demise of the ‘Black Night’, 5 (in the e-book). All English translations from the novella are my own.

62. Ibid., 17–18 (in the e-book).

63. Ibid., 79–80 (in the e-book).

64. Ibid., 156–7 (in the e-book).

65. Dolgopolov, 190–1 (in the e-book). Evelyna also stated that her father ‘could not bear political conversations’. Dolgopolov, 141 (in the e-book).

66. ”Oleg Lyalin, 57, A KGB Defector: Obituary.”

67. See, for instance, the CIA document “Language Assistance for Lyman Kirkpatrick,” declassified in 2005.

68. I filed a FOIA request with the CIA asking for their written analyses of Soviet spy fiction, if any. As of this time, however, my request has not been answered.

69. Arthey, 211.

70. Dolgopolov, 561–2 (in the e-book).

71. Arthey, 212–3.

72. Dolgopolov, 131 (in the e-book).

73. Ibid., 217 (in the e-book).

74. The stamp can be purchased on amazon.com for $8. “Rudolf Abel 5k Russia Postage Stamp A2863.”

Additional information

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Filip Kovacevic

Filip Kovacevic teaches at the University of San Francisco and specialises in Soviet/Russian intelligence and counterintelligence history, education, and spy fiction. He previously taught and lectured in several European countries, including Russia, Ukraine, Romania, North Macedonia, and Montenegro. He has published in top intelligence studies journals and is writing a book on KGB officers’ spy stories.