Agent of Influence and Disinformation: Five Lives of Ante Jerkov

Abstract

One of the most interesting thematic areas in intelligence studies is the study of the activities of the numerous double agents that had a significant impact on events and processes in the history of human conflicts and wars. Being a double agent is a highly demanding activity on both personal and professional levels. Examining the Cold War archives of former communist secret policies in Poland and Croatia, the authors integrated data showing that Ante Jerkov, an Italian journalist of Croatian origin with a parallel Ustasha and communist background, was an agent of influence and a source of information for at least five different intelligence and counterintelligence agencies. He worked for several agencies simultaneously. Additionally, he participated as part of a more comprehensive network of journalists who offered and sold information to different secret services in Rome/the Vatican during the Cold War. This article is a short biography of Ante Jerkov and his life in intelligence lies and deception.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

This case will be explained extensively in a forthcoming book by the authors.

Notes

1 Eric V. Larson et al., Foundation of Effective Influence Operations. A Framework for Enhancing Army Capabilities (RAND Arroyo Center, 2009), p. 2. https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monographs/2009/RAND_MG654.pdf, accessed 7 April 2021.

2 Richards J. Heuer, commentary to Strategic Denial and Deception: Twenty First-Century Challenge, by Roy Godson and James Wirtz (Washington, DC: Transaction 2002), pp. 34–35.

3 Jan Henryk Larecki, Wielki Leksykon Tajnych Służb Świata [Great Dictionary of the Secret Services of the World] (Warsaw: Rytm, 2017) s.v. “przedsięwzięcia aktywne”; Vasili Mitrokhin, KGB Lexicon: The Soviet Intelligence Officer’s Handbook (London: Routledge, 2002), s.v. “aktivnye meropriyatiya”; Vitalij F. Nikitchenko et al., Kontrrazvedyvatel'nyj Slovar' [Counterintelligence Dictionary] (Moscow: Nauchno-izdatel'skij otdel, 1972), pp. 161–162, s.v. “aktivnye meropriyatiya.”

4 Yugoslavia was made of six republics and two autonomous provinces (AP). Each of them had, as a part of the Ministry of the Interior, its “own” state security service responsible for (counter)intelligence activities within their borders. On a federal, Yugoslavian level, the main state security service was active, also as a part of the Federal Ministry of Interior. Federal SSS was superior to and maintained oversight over the republic and AP-level SSS. Each republic-level SSS was divided into several centers and detachments. More information about the history, structure, organization, and activities of the Yugoslavian secret services can be found at: Gordan Akrap, “Mač I štit u rukama partije—represivni sustav u funkciji oblikovanja korpusa javnog znanja” [Sword and the Shield of the Party—Repressive System in the Function of Public Knowledge Shaping], National Security and the Future, Vol. 11, No 4 (2010), p. 165; https://nsf-journal.hr/online-issues/case-studies/id/1196 (accessed 8 August 2021).

5 Gordan Akrap, Kardinal Stepinac u dokumentima GESTAPA i OZN-e [Cardinal Stepinac in documents of GESTAPO and OZN-a], (Zagreb, Udruga sv. Jurja, Glas Koncila, Laser-plus, 2016), p. 10.

6 In conversations with one of the authors (G. Akrap), many former members of the SSS, as well as those from various parts of the Yugoslav People’s Army Security Directorate, said that a significant part of the documentation, especially about their operational sources and personal files of people active in the upcoming political changes, was destroyed, hidden, or illegally stolen so that it could be possibly used in later blackmailing processes with the aim of creating new sources/agents of influence in the new political conditions. A significant part of the archives of the republican SSS “survived” on microfilms at the headquarters of the federal SSS in the archives in Belgrade.

7 Władysław Bułhak and Thomas W. Friis, “Shaping the European School of Intelligence Studies,” The International Journal of Intelligence, Security, and Public Affairs, Vol. 22, No. 3 (2020), pp. 139–158. doi:10.1080/23800992.2020.1839727

8 See, for example, http://shieldandsword.mozohin.ru (accessed 24 April 2021).

9 Michael Warner, “Sources and Methods for the Study of Intelligence,” in Handbook of Intelligence Studies, edited by Loch K. Johnson (London and New York: Taylor & Francis, 2007), pp. 17–18, 26.

10 “The KGB vs. Vatican City. Folder 29. The Chekist Anthology.” History and Public Policy Program Digital Archive (June 2007), Contributed to CWIHP (Cold War International History Project) by Vasili Mitrokhin. http://digitalarchive.wilsoncenter.org/document/110705, p. 1 (accessed 14 April 2021).

11 “O novyh tendencijah v politike Vatikana” [“On New Trends in the Politics of the Vatican”], KGB Report shared with Polish MIA, 24 April 1959, file 0648/31, 40–49, Archive of the Institute of National Remembrance (AIPN), Warsaw, Poland.

12 “KGB Report No. 2072—sh.,” 6 August 1960, Chairman of the KGB Alexander Shelepin to Central Committee (CC) of Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), fond 3, description 12, file 753, 166-70, The Russian State Archive of Contemporary History (RGANI), Moscow, Russia, declassified 2 March 2011.

13 Bułhak, Wywiad PRL a Watykan, 1962–1978 [Intelligence Services of the Polish People’s Republic and Vatican, 1962–1978] (Warsaw: IPN, 2019), pp. 58–60.

14 Ibid., pp. 74–76.

15 Ibid., pp. 291–392, s.v. “kapturowe wykorzystanie osób” (kaptur: hood in Polish); 415, s.v. “kontakt informacyjny.”

16 Bułhak, Wywiad PRL, p. 274.

17 Skripta UDB-e Hrvatske: Saradnička mreža [Scrypt: Network of sources; written by SSS in Croatia around 1960, copy in the possession of authors, further: Skripta], p. 4.

18 Akrap, Kardinal Stepinac, pp. 65–66.

19 Skripta, p. 10.

20 Operativne analize 2: Obrada “Jevrej” [Operational Analysis 2: Operational Development “Jevrej”], Belgrade, September 1983, p. 6 (top secret document of 124 pages, prepared by V Directorate of SSS, copy in the possession of authors, further: Operativne Analize).

21 Croatian ultranationalist organization, headed by Ante Pavelić, active between 1929 and 1945. During WWII they were on the Axis side and were responsible for many war crimes against their political opponents, as well as Jews, Serbs, and others.

22 Nedjelja means Sunday in English.

23 Jakov Blažević, foreword to Victor Novak, Magnum crimen, pola vijeka klerikalizma u Hrvatskoj [Magnum Crimen, Half a Century of Clericalism in Croatia] (new edition with Blažević’s foreword) (Zagreb–Beograd: Nova knjiga, 1986), p. 11.

24 See, for example, Rory Yeomans, Visions of Anihilation: The Ustasha Regime and the Cultural Policy of Fascism. 1941–1945 (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh, 2013), p. 295.

25 Radoje Arsenić and Miodrag D. Pešić, “Hrvatski pravoslavci na temeljima 'endehazije'” [Croatian Orthodox on the Foundations of ISC], Politika, 22 October 2009. http://www.politika.rs/scc/clanak/116863/Hrvatski-pravoslavci-na-temeljima-endehazije (accessed 8 April 2021).

26 Marko Sinovčić, “Izdajnički put Ante Jerkova” [The Treacherous Path of Ante Jerkov], Nova Hrvatska, Vol. 10 (1984), p. 11.

27 Serbian troops loyal to King Karađorđević, led by general Draža Mihailović, who was accused and sentenced to death after WWII as a war criminal. Chetniks in Croatia committed multiple war crime massacres closely collaborating with the Italian and German armed forces.

28 Marić, Zašto je Pavelić, p. 89.

29 Operativne Analize, p. 7.

30 The Pontifical Croatian College of St. Jerome is a Roman Catholic college, church, and a society in Rome, Italy, responsible, among others, for education of clerics from Croatia. See http://www.sveti-jeronim.org/ (accessed 9 August 2021).

31 At the time the secret political police of Yugoslavia were called the Department for the Protection of the People (Odjelenje za Zaštitu Naroda), known as the OZN-a (acronym according to Croatian name). Organizationally, it was part of the Yugoslav armed forces.

32 Dren is Croatian for cornel.

33 All pseudonyms were personal male or female names, except Jevrej, Serbian for Jew.

34 Operativne Analize, p. 9.

35 Ibid., p. 10.

36 Pavelić left Italy in October 1948, almost two months before Jerkov was arrested.

37 Servizio informazioni forze armate (SIFAR), Italian military secret service, dealing with both intelligence and counterintelligence, in 1966 renamed to Servizio informazioni difesa (SID).

38 On 13 March 1946, from the parts of Section 1 of the OZN-a, a separate foreign intelligence service, called the Research and Documentation Service (Služba za Istraživanje i Dokumentaciju [SID]) was organized as a part of the Foreign Ministry. See Akrap, Informacijske strategije i operacije u oblikovanju javnog znanja, doktorska disertacija, [Information Strategies and Operations in Shaping Public Knowledge], Ph.D. dissertation (University of Zagreb, 2011), pp. 209–210. The same abbreviation, SID, was used since 1966 by Italian military intelligence and counterintelligence for Servizio informazioni difesa. Therefore, in the text: SID-Y (for the Yugoslav service) and SID-I (for the Italian one).

39 In 1954, he received a total of 4.5 million liras. To these costs should be added the monthly allowances to his parents in Yugoslavia, which were in the amount of the average salary. See Operativne Analize, pp. 27–28.

40 Bułhak, Wywiad PRL, pp. 279, 282–284, 286–287, 289.

41 Operativne Analize, pp. 33–35.

42 Bułhak, Wywiad PRL, pp. 288, 293–301.

43 Ibid., pp. 280–281.

44 Operativne Analize, pp. 35–40.

45 One of the six socialist republics that existed within SFRY (Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia).

46 Milisavljević, “Valjevo–NDH–Vatikan.”

47 Arsenić, Pešić, “Hrvatski pravoslavci na temeljima “endehazije'.”

48 State Security Service in Socialist Republic of Macedonia.

49 Preventivna operativna obrada (Preventive operational development [POO])—status given to those suspected of conducting illegal activities.

50 Center Ljubljana is a territorial, organizational part of the SSS in the Socialist Republic of Slovenia.

51 Operativne Analize, p. 6.

52 Ibid., p. 90.

53 For more detailed description of the second phase of Jerkov’s collaboration with the 1st Department, see (in Polish) Bułhak, Wywiad PRL a Watykan, pp. 275–341 and in English, Bułhak, “Treason in the Holy See? Key Sources of Polish intelligence in Rome during the Formation of the Vatican’s Ostpolitik,” in Need to Know, vol. 2, edited by Władysław Bułhak, Thomas W. Friis, and Przemysław Gasztold (Warsaw: IPN, forthcoming 2022).

54 Bułhak, Wywiad PRL, p. 290.

55 Polish for writer, literary man, or man of letters.

56 Okresowa analiza o przebiegu współpracy z “Literatem” i “Gustawem” oraz dalszy kierunek pracy z nimi [Periodic Analysis of the Course of Cooperation with “Literat” and “Gustaw” and the Further Direction of Work with Them], Report by Maj. Kazimierz Olech and Maj. Michal Paul, Warsaw, 17 January, file 003195/122, p. 83, AIPN.

57 Bułhak, Wywiad PRL, pp. 352–353.

58 Unsigned handwritten annotation on the report by Maj. Eugeniusz Szczepanik, code name “Aldo” from the meeting with “Literat,” Rome, after January 14, 1966, file 003195/122, 178, AIPN.

59 Raport kpt. Stanisława Boreckiego z Wydziału VI Departamentu I MSW z podróży służbowej do Budapesztu [Report by Capt. Stanisław Borecki of 6th Division of 1 Dept. on his working trip to Budapest], Warsaw, 23 February 1962, file 01069/678, pp. 79–81, AIPN.

60 Bułhak, Wywiad PRL, pp. 295–296.

61 Memo regarding Carlo Falconi, editor of “L’Espresso,” by Maj. Tadeusz Lemieszko, Warsaw, 17 June 1964, file 003195/122, 68-9, AIPN.

62 Prorok is Polish for prophet.

63 Raport kpt. Klaudiusza Kajzera “Laszeckiego” z Wydziału III Departamentu I MSW o zatwierdzenie Daniele Cametti Aspri w charakterze KI “Prorok” [Report of Capt. Klaudiusz Kajzer Code Name “Laszecki” from 3rd Section of 1st Department MIA asking for approval of Daniele Cametti Aspri code name “Prorok” as KI], Warsaw, 27 May 1981, file (jacket) 003195/48, pp. 13–17, AIPN.

64 Marian Chabros, Przyczynek do historii Departamentu I MSW [A Contribution to the History of the 1st Dept. MIA], undated script, file 002559/1, pp. 279–285, AIPN.

65 Extracts from the registration records of Department I of the Interior Ministry concerning the case code name “Dita” [formerly “Alessandro”], ref. 7073, case type: KI reclassified to RO, 3 February 1972.

66 Notatka dotycząca przebiegu rozmowy Pawła VI z prezydentem USA Johnsonem [Memo on the Course of Talks of Paul VI with U.S. President Johnson], Warsaw, 23 January 1968, file 02011/1100/1, pp. 749–758, AIPN; compared with: Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS), vol. XII, 1964–1968, Memorandum on Conversation [Lyndon B. Johnson–Paul VI], Vatican City, 23 December 1967, pp. 660–666.

67 Stenogram rozmowy papieża Pawła VI z kanclerzem NRF Willym Brandtem, Watykan, 13 VII 1970 r. [Transcript of Talks between Pope Paul VI with FRG Chancellor Willi Brandt in the Vatican on 13 July 1970], file 02011/1110/3, 69-77e, pp. 836–845, AIPN; compared with Reiner A. Blasius et al. (Eds.), Akten zur Politik Auswärtigen der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (AAPBD), 1970, Vol. II (Munich: Oldenbourg, 2001), pp. 1144–1150.

68 Sprawozdanie ppłk. Macieja Dubiela, rezydenta “Disa,” z pracy rezydentury w Rzymie na rzecz “R” (Wydziału III) od 20 II 1984 do 15 I 1986 r. [Report by Lt. Col. Maciej Dubiel, resident “Dis”] concerning the work of the residentura in Rome for “R” [Division III] in the period from 20 February 1984 to 15 January 1986, file 003171/5/1, p. 207, AIPN.

69 Bułhak, Wywiad PRL a Watykan, p. 48.

70 Based on the interviews, conducted by one of the authors (W. Bułhak), with former officers of the 1st Department MIA, among others with late Col. Leszek Guzik, former deputy director of the Polish service, and main promotor of Jerkov and his allegedly “high profile” information.

71 Carlo Falconi, Il silenzio di Pio XII. S. Sede e Polonia. S. Sede e Croazia [The Silence of Pius XII. Holy See and Poland and Croatia] (Milan: Sugar, 1965), pp. 1–556; Falconi, Le silence de Pie XII, 1939–1945; essai fondé sur des documents d'archives recueillis par l'auteur en Pologne et en Yougoslavie [The Silence of Pius XII, 1939–1945; essay based on archival material collected by the author in Poland and Yugoslavia] (Monaco: Rocher, 1965), 1–398; Falconi, The Silence of Pius XII (Boston: Little, Brown, 1970), pp. 1–430.

72 Miroslav Tuđman, Programiranje istine—rasprava o preraspodjelama društvenih zaliha znanja, Hrvatska sveučilišna naklada [Programming of the Truth—A Discussion of Redistribution of Social Knowledge Stock], Hrvatska sveučilišna naklada: Zagreb 2012, p. 207.

73 D. Selvage, “Operation ‘Denver’: The East German Ministry of State Security and the KGB’s AIDS Disinformation Campaign, 1985–1986,” Journal of Cold War Studies, Vol. 21, No. 4, pp. 71–123; D. Selvage, Ch. Nehring, Operation “Denver”: KGB and Stasi Disinformation regarding AIDS. https://www.wilsoncenter.org/blog-post/operation-denver-kgb-and-stasi-disinformation-regarding-aids (accessed 9 August 2021).

74 Falconi, Il silenzio di Pio XII.

75 Komisija za vjerske poslove [Commission for Religious Affairs] was an institution that served as a parastatal body managed and run by secret political police officials. The aim of the KVP was to cover up the aggressive activities of the repressive system toward religious groups and churches.

76 Ive Mihovilović, aka Spectator (1905–1988), journalist and formally the author of: Vatikan i fašizam [Vatican and Fascism], Glas rada: Zagreb, 1950 and Tajni dokumenti o odnosima Vatikana i ustaške NDH ["Secret documents on the relation between the Vatican and the Ustasha NDH], Library of the Croatian Journalists' Association: Zagreb, 1952; see also Aleksandar Vojinović, Ive Mihovilović Spectator—Biografija (Zagreb: Profil International, 2005).

77 Vlasti su se više bojale Stepinca mrtvoga nego živoga (interview with Dr. Miroslav Akmadža conducted by Tomislav Vuković), “Glas Koncila,” 17 February 2009. https://www.ktabkbih.net/hr/iz-katolickog-tiska/glas-koncila-19383/19383 (accessed 9 August 2021).

78 Carlo Falconi in Yugoslavia, file A. Stepinac, box 4, cover 63, 005.jpg-014.jpg, collection: HR-HDA-1561, Služba državne sigurnosti Republičkog sekretarijata za unutrašnje poslove SR Hrvatske [State Security Service of Republican Secretariat of Internal Affairs of Socialist Republic of Croatia] (SDS RSUP SRH), Hrvatski Državni Arhiv [Croatian State Archive] HDA, Zagreb, Croatia.

79 See Carlo Falconi in Yugoslavia, file A. Stepinac, box 4, cover 63, 005.jpg-014.jpg, collection: HR-HDA-1561. In these documents, Mihovilović admitted that those books were created and written in the SSS as a propaganda product while he just signed them. Mihovilović was very close to Frane Barbieri (see endnote 82).

80 Although in some analyzes it was mentioned that the author of this document is unknown, Akrap (Kardinal Stepinac u dokumentima, p. 49) proves that the real author of the document is in fact Srećko Šimurina, who at the time was the head of the “Office for the Clergy,” because the document has a signature “1/II-SŠ” where “1/II” means an organizational unit within the SDS (in this case the “Office for the Clergy”), while “SŠ” represents the initials of the author of the document.

81 Srećko Šimurina, aka Houston (1922–2007) had been a member of the SSS since its establishment. He was a former seminarian of the Catholic Church. He performed various duties in the secret police of communist Yugoslavia. From 1979–1985 he was the head of the State Security Service of the then Socialist Republic of Croatia. He is best known as the person who directly ran the SSS activities against the Catholic Church and was responsible for the case of Archbishop Stepinac during his stay in prison and house arrest in Krašić, as well as planning and organizing operations against Stepinac and the Catholic Church after Stepinac’s death.

82 Frane Barbieri (1923–1987), journalist. After World War II, he hired Ive Mihovilović as the editor-in-chief of a newspaper, Vjesnik. In the period 1953–1957, Barbieri resided in Rome as a correspondent for the official Yugoslav news agency TANJUG. It should be noted that at that time most of the correspondents of the federal news agency that were sent abroad were, as a rule, sources of either the SID-Y or the military secret service, depending on the targets for which they were sent abroad. From 1960 to 1964 he was a correspondent for the Vjesnik in Moscow. In the mid-1980s, his name was on a list of Central Intelligence Agency agents distributed by the Soviet bloc security services. No other data are available on the latter.

83 See Akrap, Kardinal Stepinac u dokumentima.

84 Vesna Ivanović, book review of: Krunoslav Stjepan Draganović—svećenik, povjesničar i rodoljub [Krunoslav Stjepan Draganović—priest, historian and patriot], edited by Miroslav Akmadža, Darko Tomašević, and Glas Koncila (Sarajevo and Zagreb 2014); in Međunarodne studije, Vol. 2, No. 15 (2015), p. 108.

85 Raport [Mjr. Michała Paula] o pozwolenie na przeprowadzenie werbunku w charakterze informatora obywatela włoskiego Pistone Matteo Renato ps. “Stefan” [Report by Maj. Michael Paul for Permission to Recruit Italian Citizen Pistone Matteo Renato Code Name “Stefan” as an Informant], Warsaw, 6 March 1956, file 003195/2, 14, AIPN.

86 Ibid.

87 Bułhak, Wywiad PRL, pp. 684–687.

88 Dossier SIFAR (Milan: KAOS, 2004), pp. 96, 197.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Gordan Akrap

Gordan Akrap is the Founder and President of the Hybrid Warfare Research Institute and the Zagreb Security Forum in Croatia. He is the Editor-in-Chief of the journal National Security and the Future. He received a Ph.D. at the University of Zagreb in the field of Information and Communication Sciences. During his career in Croatia’s diplomatic and intelligence communities, he completed several professional courses, including Diplomatic Academy. The author can be contacted at [email protected].

Władysław Bułhak

Władysław Bułhak is a Senior Researcher at the Historical Research Office at the Institute of National Remembrance in Warsaw, Poland, and Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Aparat Represji w Polsce Ludowej 1944–1989. He is a lecturer at the University of Warsaw and Collegium Civitas in Warsaw, Poland. He is a former analyst at the Centre for Eastern Studies and the Polish Institute of International Relations in Warsaw and a former correspondent of the Polish Press Agency in Moscow. The author can be contacted at [email protected].