September 01, 2012

On the Brink

Fifty years ago this fall, the senior Soviet KGB resident in Washington helped the world avoid a Third World War. He did it by breaking the rules.

Alexander Semyonovich Feklisov died as a decorated Hero of Russia on October 26, 2007. Exactly 45 years prior, on October 26, 1962, Feklisov quietly helped the world avert nuclear carnage.

No longer on the other side of some strategic threshold, in October 1962 the threat of global annihilation was very real and very near – only as distant as the fingertips of generals awaiting U.S. President John Kennedy’s (or Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s) command to press the proverbial button.

That fall, on October 15, 1962, Soviet nuclear missile sites were discovered and identified in Castro’s Cuba. What were the Americans to do? How could they not punish the Russians and Fidel? The latter brandished his beard, declaring “Homeland or Death,” ready to battle to the death. Khrushchev glowered from beneath his bald pate: there would be no concessions.

A decade later in Paris, after we shared a few glasses of Bordeaux, Alexei Adzhubei, the former editor of Izvestia, who was also married to Khrushchev’s daughter Rada and therefore one of those closest to the Soviet leader at that time, revealed that “Nikita Sergeyevich was certain that in such a war we would rattle the States, yet it was not so clear we would come out the other side as victors...”

Anatoly Dobrynin, Soviet ambassador to the U.S., did everything in his and his embassy’s power to avert a war. Dobrynin was just 41 at the time, yet the young specialist on American affairs had already earned the trust of Andrei Gromyko, the minister of foreign affairs, who extended unprecedented authority to his man in the U.S. Not a single decision or step could be taken by diplomats or any other person – even intelligence agents – without the Soviet ambassador’s agreement.

And yet there were few options open to even the cleverest of diplomats. The world had run down its clock and it seemed as if only war could solve this planetary crisis centered on the Caribbean, a crisis that had no precedent in scale or scope. Something different was needed in order to break the stalemate, something untraditional, something that relied on neither states nor diplomats.

Enter resident of the First Main Directorate (charged with foreign intelligence) Alexander Fomin – the alias adopted (for conspiratorial reasons that are unclear to me) by Alexander Feklisov from 1960-64, while he was in the U.S. Actually, he also worked in the states during World War II, under the protection of the Soviet consulate, maintaining ties with many valuable Soviet assets, including Julius Rosenberg and Klaus Fuchs.

The modest KGB colonel was never promoted to general. I loathe pathos, but I also can’t help but admit that there are people who change history.

I got to know Feklisov when he was already grey-haired, and constantly fumbling with his ever-present and powerful hearing aid. He lived in a tiny apartment not far from Moscow’s Belorussky Station, with a telephone that glowed brilliantly whenever it rang. He could not even hear the sound of a doorbell, and his fellow guardians from the Service had to install a large search lamp that would light up whenever someone pressed the button at the door. When I was preparing this article for Russian Life, I decided to ask his daughter Natasha, “How is it that the intelligence service, which follows the health of its people so closely, allowed a deaf resident to serve?”

It turns out that Feklisov lost most all the hearing in one ear when he was young. The crumbling Moscow barrack he was living in burned to the ground, it was –20º Celsius, and he had to spend the night in some sort of frigid hut. His ear actually froze to the cold floorboards. Yet Feklisov, as his daughter put it, was the sort of person who was not ashamed of his infirmities. He warned everyone about his deafness, and asked the bosses and agents he worked with to speak into his good ear. He often joked about his partial deafness, yet he also so firmly believed in himself, in what he was doing, that it never occurred to him that it could in any way hamper his work. He clearly did not have an inferiority complex.

Sometimes, during my visits to Gruzinskaya ulitsa, the master of the house would rely on a stick to get about. But he was a fit fellow, always wearing a tie that matched his well-pressed, dark-blue suit. And Alexander Semyonovich’s memory was uncommonly sound. Though well beyond his 75th year, he effortlessly rattled off names, dates and events. He treated his second wife Margarita (his first wife had long since passed away), who was considerably younger than he, not merely with the grateful love of a well-cared-for pensioner, but with obvious and deeply masculine feelings. And when Margarita unexpectedly left him, he remarried a few years later. As a man and a person, he was both happy and content.

We got together at both his place and mine. Sometimes, Alexander Semyonovich visited me at work, not merely to spend hours being interviewed for my books, but often so that I might help him in his literary work, which he pursued zealously. We would walk together from Belorussky Station along (as he called it) Gorky Street, long since renamed Tverskaya, to the Kremlin. A couple of times we traveled together to Poklonnaya Gora on Victory Day. By that time, he had been awarded the honor of Hero of Russia, and people constantly pestered him, asking how he earned his star. And even though he had received the award years after the fact, in 1996, for acquiring huge quantities of atomic secrets, Alexander Semyonovich invariably replied that he got it “for the atomic bomb and for work on averting the Caribbean Crisis.”

The crisis arrived with the speed of a hurricane. And Soviet resident Feklisov was one of the first to hear about it.

On Sunday, October 21, 1962, a known and trusted Soviet correspondent bowled him over with news that, in spite of the fact that it was the weekend, a crowd of American journalists was waiting at the White House for a possible news conference by President John Kennedy. A cabinet meeting was in progress, at which an uncommonly large number of generals was present. Feklisov quickly sent off a coded message to Moscow Center. Shortly thereafter, our military attaché delivered troublesome news to the USSR embassy: in the southern region of the U.S. the military had been placed on the highest level of military alert. It was completely inexplicable even to the all-knowing Dobrynin. The intent of establishing land-based missiles in Cuba was even at this late date unknown even to those close to Gromyko, the minister of foreign affairs.

On Monday, the alarm was raised in the Soviet embassy. Something strange was going on in the White House. On the morning of October 22, Feklisov made an urgent breakfast invitation to John Scali, the famous ABC television journalist with whom he had maintained contact for more than a year and a half. Scali’s TV program, Questions and Answers, interviewed leading U.S. analysts and was very popular. Scali himself was known to be sympathetic to and close to the Kennedys. He was a friend of Bobby Kennedy (then Attorney General), met frequently with Secretary of State Dean Rusk, and was impressive for his knowledge of the subtleties of American foreign policy.1

Truth be told, I tried to pin Feklisov down several times: “Could it not be that Scali was our agent or at least an agent of influence? Otherwise, why would he decide to meet with you, Alexander Semyonovich, knowing that you were quite probably the senior legal intelligence officer in the U.S.?”

Feklisov, who held back little in our talks, rejected the notion that Scali was in any way connected with espionage, or at least Soviet intelligence. He was certain that all the information he and Scali exchanged in their frequent conversations was immediately reported by the American to his State Department. Or perhaps even to the CIA. That is, he acted just as Feklisov did, informing the Center directly of all his conversations. The colonel explained: “They knew what I was, and the younger Kennedy’s [Bobby’s] hands were, if not untied, at least freer than those of his elder brother, the president. Original, non-diplomatic channels of communication and discussion were needed.”

At the end of October, no other way out of the crisis was forthcoming, so the Americans decided to act in a non-standard manner, on the level of intelligence services. And so the clever Scali was put forward. Both sides laid their cards on the table, for in a few days, perhaps a week, there would be no cards left to play.

The first meeting at the Occidental restaurant began with Scali’s nervous speech. He directly accused Khrushchev of threatening to fire Cuban-based rockets at the U.S. Feklisov reminded Scali of the unsuccessful U.S. backed attempt to invade the island in April 1962, at the Bay of Pigs. In short, the two had more than sufficient bases for mutual recriminations. Towards the end, Scali warned Feklisov that in the evening Kennedy was going to deliver a speech to the American people. Scali clearly was in a hurry to get somewhere, yet it was also clear that both sides were leaving the door open; this would not be their last meeting.

More importantly, Scali made evident, and Feklisov understood with certainty, that Scali was reporting on his meetings with the Soviet resident to Robert Kennedy, who in turn reported to his brother the president.

In Kennedy’s television speech he issued a threat. In order to prevent a nuclear attack from Cuba onto the U.S., the island was blockaded;2 the powerful American army was readied for a swift invasion.

Since October 21, the Soviet embassy had been working around the clock. Intelligence officers surveyed the White House, the Pentagon, State Department, CIA and FBI by car and reported back that the lights were on all night in all the main buildings, that the parking lots were packed full of cars, signaling that tense work was continuing non-stop.

Khrushchev and Kennedy exchanged telegrams daily. At first, the telegrams were coded. But it was quickly realized that valuable time was being wasted on coding and uncoding, and the leaders began to negotiate in straight text. Yet the feverish activity still did not return any results.

This is when Feklisov took the initiative. On October 26th he called Scali and invited him to the Occidental once again. Scali openly announced that the military was insisting on an immediate invasion of Cuba, and if Khrushchev thought Kennedy was an inexperienced, indecisive leader,* then he would soon have a chance to be convinced of the opposite. Moreover, he told Feklisov that the Pentagon had guaranteed to the president that, upon his command, the situation with both the Soviet rockets and the Castro regime would be ended within 48 hours.

*In June 1961, the two leaders met for the first time in Geneva. Kennedy was put on the defensive by Khrushchev’s aggressiveness. After the summit, Kennedy remarked to journalist James Reston, “I think [Khrushchev] did it because of the Bay of Pigs. I think he thought anyone who was so young and inexperienced as to get in that mess could be taken, and anyone who got into it and didn’t see it through had not guts. He just beat the hell out of me”). Grappling over Berlin continued throughout 1961 and 1962 (the Berlin wall was erected in August 1961).

Feklisov now played his role exactly the way a real intelligence officer should. He began with compliments and assurances that the Soviet leadership considered John Kennedy a leader of great vision. Yet it was he – not some general or admiral – who was drawing the U.S. into this supreme gamble, one with extraordinarily catastrophic consequences. Further, the colonel paid tribute to the Cubans. They would, he said, defend their homeland to the death.

“And at this moment a sort of inspiration took hold of my soul,” Feklisov said. Every time he retold this story to me, his reserved, cold-blooded nature was overcome with emotion; even his voice changed, from somewhat muffled to high-pitched. “No one empowered me to say this to Scali, absolutely no one, but I decided to anyway: ‘An invasion of Cuba will tie Khrushchev’s hands. Our divisions would need less than 24 hours, with the help of troops from the GDR, to overcome the resistance of the American, British and French garrisons.’ Scali did not foresee this rebuke. He looked me in the eyes for a long time and then asked, ‘Do you think, Alexander, it [Khrushchev’s response] would be West Berlin?’ And I agreed: ‘Entirely possible, as a reprisal. Imagine, John, an avalanche of thousands of Soviet tanks and assault planes, attacking at ground level.’”

Scali clearly did not expect this.3 In Washington, Feklisov acted based on his own fear and sense of risk. Yet he did not regret his actions. He was certain that the two powers going head to head over Cuba would cascade to Europe. As it was learned later, the colonel’s instincts did not deceive him. A few years after returning to Moscow, Feklisov found out about the existence of a secret plan, which foresaw that, if circumstances required it, Soviet and GDR troops would take West Berlin not in 24 hours, but in six or eight!

Scali sat staring into his rapidly cooling cup of coffee. He asked Feklisov if war was really so close. Feklisov confirmed that it could easily be started by the mutual fear that had gripped the superpowers.

What Feklisov did not expect was that his words would be delivered to the inhabitant of the White House and that within two or three hours Scali would be offering to him a compromise solution for resolving the Caribbean Crisis.

Feklisov was still briefing Ambassador Dobrynin – who had just returned to the city – when Scali phoned, asking him to quickly come to the coffee shop in the basement of the Statler Hotel. Feklisov understood that time was running out: the hotel was exactly midway between the embassy and the White House. Dobrynin nodded, proposing that they continue their debriefing after the meeting.

Ten minutes later, Scali and Feklisov were once again sitting before cups of coffee. Scali did not hesitate, saying that on behalf of “higher powers,” he was putting forward the following conditions for the stabilization of the Caribbean Crisis: The USSR would, under UN control, disassemble and remove from Cuba its rocket installations. The U.S. would remove its blockade and publicly vow not to invade Cuba. ** [SEE BOX 1]

Feklisov noted everything down verbatim, then repeated it, so as not to make any errors in translation, and Scali confirmed it was correct. For a Russian, the words “higher power” did not sound familiar, so the colonel asked what this meant. Scali clearly pronounced every word: “John Fitzgerald Kennedy, President of the United States of America.”

Feklisov rushed back to the embassy, assuring Scali that his proposal would be swiftly telegraphed to Moscow. Rapidly composing a telegram over the signature of Ambassador Dobrynin concerning his two meetings with Scali, the colonel handed his dispatch to Dobrynin.

But Dobrynin spent at least three hours studying the proposed, detailed telegram, and did not want to sign it. The Foreign Ministry did not give its diplomats authority to conduct such negotiations. Things got ugly in the ambassador’s office for Feklisov-Fomin. Alexander Semyonovich forbade me to write about it specifically, noting only with bitterness (for he would not use profanity) that “they treated me like a child.”

Dobrynin, in the presence of three prominent diplomats, put the excessively resourceful intelligence officer in his place. And Feklisov left, returning to his office. There, neglecting for the sake of his job all diplomatic niceties, he sent a coded message over his own name to the Soviet head of foreign intelligence. Soon thereafter, the members of the Politburo, led by Khrushchev, who had been on a pre-war footing in the barracks of the Kremlin, studied Feklisov’s communique.

Here I would ask the American reader to consider the time when this risky act by Feklisov took place. The Khrushchevian “Thaw” had ended, bureaucratism and official subservience were complete, all the more so abroad, where any diplomat considered himself to be, if not one annointed of God, then at least of Khrushchev.

The following morning, Feklisov received a telegram from the Center: Message received.

On October 27, Scali and Feklisov again met, yet on that same day Robert Kennedy met twice with Ambassador Dobrynin and Kennedy’s official reply to Khrushchev was sent that evening. Khrushchev’s own reply, which satisfied both sides’ demands, arrived on the morning of October 28.

The world was saved. I would not claim that it was saved by the journalist Scali and the Soviet intelligence officer Feklisov. Yet their role in the resolution of the crisis was huge.

Feklisov returned to the USSR soon thereafter. He did not receive a promotion to the rank of general, but he did continue operational work in the First Main Directorate, and was later quietly transferred to a teaching position, where he could pass on his immense experience to future officers.

It should be noted that Feklisov showed daring, acumen and decisiveness well before the Caribbean Crisis. I will not here describe how, with the assistance of foreign intelligence and agents during and after WWII in the U.S. and England, he obtained secrets related to the atomic bomb. He was driven forward by a sort of hard, strict discipline, and not some mindless servitude or, if you will, feelings of guilt. This could be seen in particular during WWII, in connection with Julius and Ethel Rosenberg in 1953, during the McCarthy Era – the first instance in American history of civilians convicted of espionage and sentenced to execution, by the electric chair.

In an extraordinarily gruesome outcome, Ethel Rosenberg, after receiving three jolts at 2000 volts, was still alive. Two more shocks were delivered, and eyewitnesses reported that smoke rose from her head in the execution chamber. The heavens themselves, it seemed, were objecting to this innocent sacrifice. The Soviets, who argued for the commutation of the couple’s death sentences, nonetheless refused to ever acknowledge that the Rosenbergs were their agents.

Feklisov, for his part, without permission from higher ups, later in his life publicly admitted that Julius was a spy.4 He explained in simple terms, with proof for all to understand, that the pair never supplied any secrets related to the making of the atomic bomb. Julius supplied a wealth of extremely useful information on electronic systems, Feklisov said, yet Ethel had absolutely nothing to do with espionage: she was sick and could barely cope with raising her two sons.

Of course, just like her husband, leader of a spy cell and a committed communist, Ethel believed in the radiant ideals, but that is all. Yes, it is possible that Julius informed her of his actions, but it is just as likely he did not. Feklisov said that, while he enjoyed a close bond with Julius (the singular case in his long history of the agents he ran), he was not even acquainted with Ethel: she was a housewife, was sick, and did not work outside the home. As Alexander Semyonovich put it, in spy jargon, “I met regularly with Julius, but with Ethel there was not a single approach [podkhod].”

In 1983, Feklisov traveled to the U.S. and was interviewed for the ABC documentary The Rosenberg Affair. In it, he declared that, by executing two innocents, American intelligence was trying to settle accounts with the Soviets for their service’s greatest failure (the loss of atom bomb secrets). “Yes, I broke the rules,” Feklisov said, “in order that the truth would be known about Julius and Ethel. It is forbidden, it is not acceptable to say who has worked for us. But God and the Service will just have to forgive me. I hope that, as the years pass, my actions will be seen to be justified, and, most importantly, that the Rosenbergs will be cleared.” The film was shown throughout the world, even in the Soviet Union.

There was another time he broke the well-established and unwritten rules of his profession. During WWII and into the late 1940s, he was running the invaluable German anti-fascist agent and theoretical physicist Klaus Fuchs, who transferred to the USSR (from both the U.S. and UK) secret information about the atomic bomb. Convicted to 14 years in prison in 1950 for his crime, Fuchs was released after 10 years for good behavior, after which he immediately left for East Germany. There he headed the Institute for Nuclear Research, and traveled to the USSR as a leading scientist.

The Soviet Union never acknowledged Fuchs’ collaboration with its foreign intelligence services. But in 1989, a year after Fuchs’ death, the retired colonel Feklisov traveled to Berlin on his own initiative. He placed flowers on the deceased agent’s grave, and looked up Fuchs’ widow in order to express his sincere thanks. Frau Fuchs, for her part, said that her husband waited to his dying day for some sort of recognition from the Soviets of his service. In order to justify the actions of his Russian colleagues, Feklisov suggested to the grieving widow that perhaps none of the Soviets with whom he collaborated was still alive. Thus did Alexander Semyonovich take the blame on himself for the Service’s “forgetfulness.”

He was an unusual person who violated the laws of espionage to its and our benefit. I can still hear his high voice, trembling slightly in his old age, “Well then, Nikolai Mikhailovich, we still have plenty to remember and record about our heroes.” He gave me some notebooks with his handwritten memoirs about the main events of his life, such that I could say to him: Feklisov wrote his own books. But the only thing in these notebooks is that which is already known or can be known. He only took liberties three times: during the Caribbean Crisis, rescuing the peace, and in the Rosenberg and Fuchs affairs.

And now Feklisov is gone. He was the last among the living of the six atomic spies who in 1996 were awarded the honor Hero. Three received the honor posthumously. Three of them I knew, and two of them – Feklisov and Vladimir Barkovsky – I visited often.

Our history is fading away. No archive can tell us what these people – they who saved us many times – could tell us, yet they are not allowed to speak. One can’t help wanting to dig deeper and discover final truths about how things really were. Yet we cannot. As a historian of espionage, I well know that there is no statute of limitations when it comes to government secrets. RL