Mitrokhin Archive
Uncover the secrets of the KGB with the Mitrokhin Archive, detailed notes on Soviet espionage operations smuggled out by a former archivist.
~11 min readMay 6, 2026 · 06:14 AM
<p>The Mitrokhin Archive is a collection of handwritten notes about secret KGB operations spanning the period between the 1930s and 1980s made by KGB archivist Vasili Mitrokhin which he shared with British intelligence in the early 1990s. Mitrokhin, who had worked at KGB headquarters in Moscow from 1956 to 1985, first offered his material to the US's Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in Latvia, but they rejected it as possible fakes. After that, he turned to the UK's MI6, which arranged his defection from Russia.<br/>Mitrokhin secretly made his handwritten notes by copying archival documents in the period between 1972 and 1984, when he supervised the move of the archive of KGB's foreign intelligence department First Chief Directorate from the Lubyanka Building to their new headquarters at Yasenevo. When he defected to the United Kingdom in 1992, he brought the archive with him, in six full trunks. His defection was not officially announced until 1999.<br/>The official historian of MI5, Christopher Andrew, wrote two books, The Sword and the Shield (1999) and The World Was Going Our Way: The KGB and the Battle for the Third World (2005), based on material from the Mitrokhin Archives. The books provide details about many of the Soviet Union's clandestine intelligence operations around the world. They also provide specifics about Guy Burgess, a British diplomat with a short career in MI6, said to be frequently under the influence of alcohol; the archive indicates that he gave the KGB at least 389 top secret documents in the first six months of 1945, along with a further 168 in December 1949.<br/>The utilization of the Mitrokhin Archive is not without risk because these documents only contain his handwritten notes, and no original documents or photocopies were ever made available to analyze these notes. Many scholars remain skeptical of the context and authenticity of the notes made by Mitrokhin.</p>
<p>Origin of the notes<br/>Vasili Nikitich Mitrokhin originally started his career with the First Chief Directorate of the KGB (Foreign Espionage) in undercover operations. After Nikita Khrushchev's Secret Speech in February 1956, which denounced the previous regime of Joseph Stalin, Mitrokhin became critical of the existing KGB system, and because of his operational failures in Israel and in Australia, he was transferred from Operations to the Archives.<br/>Over the years, Mitrokhin became increasingly disillusioned with the Soviet system, especially after the stories about the struggles of dissidents and the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia, which led him to conclude that the Soviet system was incapable of reform.<br/>By the late 1960s, the KGB headquarters at the Lubyanka Building in central Moscow became increasingly overcrowded, and the Chairman of the KGB, Yuri Andropov, authorized the construction of a new building on the outskirts of Moscow in Yasenevo, which was to become the new headquarters of the First Chief Directorate and all foreign operations.<br/>Mitrokhin, who was by that time the head of the Archives department, was assigned by the director of the First Directorate, Vladimir Kryuchkov, with the task of cataloging the documents and overseeing their orderly transfer to the new headquarters. The transfer of the massive archive of 300,000 files eventually took over 12 years, from 1972 to 1984.<br/>Unbeknown to Kryuchkov and the KGB, while cataloging the documents, Mitrokhin also secretly copied documents by hand, making immensely detailed notes, which he smuggled to his dacha in the countryside and deposited under the floorboards. Mitrokhin retired from the KGB in 1985, just after the move was completed.<br/>During the Soviet era he made no attempt to contact any Western intelligence services, but just after the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 he traveled to Latvia with copies of the material from his archive and walked into the American embassy in Riga. Central Intelligence Agency officers stationed there did not consider him to be credible, concluding that the copied documents could have been faked.<br/>He then went to the British embassy in Vilnius (Lithuania), and a young diplomat there saw his potential. After a further meeting one month later with representatives of MI6 flown in from the UK, operations followed to retrieve the entire 25,000-page cache of files in his country house, which contained details about KGB operations abroad from as far back as the 1930s.</p>
<p>Content of the notes<br/>Notes in the Mitrokhin Archive claim that more than half of the Soviet Union's advanced weapons were based on US designs, that the KGB tapped Henry Kissinger's phone during the time he was US Secretary of State (1973–77), and had spies in place in almost all US defense contractor facilities.<br/>The notes also allege that some 35 senior politicians in France worked for the KGB during the Cold War. In West Germany, the KGB was said to have infiltrated the major political parties, the judiciary, and the police. Large-scale sabotage preparations were supposedly made against the US, Canada, and elsewhere in case of war, including weapons caches prepared for that event; Mitrokhin's books later claimed several of these have been removed or destroyed by police relying on Mitrokhin's information.</p>
<p>Prominent KGB spies named in the files<br/>Melita Norwood (1912–2005), codenamed HOLA, a British civil servant who had access to state secrets while working at the British Non-Ferrous Metals Research Association between the 1930s and 1960s, and which was involved in developing Britain's nuclear weapons program.<br/>John Symonds (1935–2017), codenamed SKOT, a former Detective Sergeant at New Scotland Yard, who had left the UK under suspicion of corruption in the early 1970s only to be recruited by KGB in Africa. He is described as having worked for the KGB between 1971 and 1980.<br/>Raymond Fletcher (1921–1991), codenamed PETER, a British journalist and subsequently Labour Party MP from 1964 to 1983; also alleged to have been recruited by the Czech secret police StB and the Central Intelligence Agency.<br/>Iosif Grigulevich (1913–1988), an NKVD assassin who under a false identity served as ambassador of Costa Rica to both Italy and Yugoslavia from 1952 to 1954, and was put in charge of an aborted plan to assassinate the Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito<br/>Robert Lipka (1945–2013), a former clerk at the National Security Agency who passed on classified documents to the KGB in the late 1960s. Lipka had denied his involvement until the last moments before his trial was to begin 30 years later, when prosecutors revealed that the prime witness against him was a former KGB archivist.<br/>Salaad Gabeyre Kediye (1933–1972), codenamed OPERATOR, member of Somalia's Supreme Revolutionary Council which took over the country following the 1969 coup d'état, officially styled as "Father of the Revolution" before ending up executed in the ensuing power struggle three years later.</p>
<p>Latin American leaders accused of being informants or agents of the KGB<br/>Christopher Andrew states that in the Mitrokhin Archive there are several Latin American leaders or members of left wing parties accused of being KGB informants or agents. For example, leader of the Sandinistas who seized power in Nicaragua in 1979, Carlos Fonseca Amador, was described as "a trusted agent" in KGB files. Nikolai Leonov was Sub-Director of the Latin American Department of the KGB between 1968 and 1972. In 1998 he gave a lecture where he denied these claims, for instance Leonov claimed that said that the KGB was not called to recruit members from Communist or other left wing parties.<br/>Daniel Ortega agreed to "unofficial meetings" with KGB officers. He gave Nikolai Leonov a secret program of the Sandinista movement (FSLN), which stated the FSLN's intent to lead class struggle in Central America, in alliance with Cuba and the Soviet bloc. Leonov claimed that he became friends with many Latin Americans including some leaders, and that he and other Soviets supported the struggles of left wing groups. But he clarifies that he did not let people know that he was a KGB agent and that his relationships with them did not involve intelligence.</p>
<p>Middle Eastern figures accused of being informants or agents of the KGB<br/>In September 2016, a work by two researchers (Dr. I. Ginor and G. Remez) stated that Mahmoud Abbas (also known as 'Abu Mazen'), the President of the Palestinian National Authority, worked for the Soviet intelligence agency. According to a recently released document from the Mitrokhin Archive, entitled "KGB developments – Year 1983", Abbas apparently worked under the code name "Krotov", starting early 1980s.</p>
<p>Alleged KGB operations revealed in the files<br/>Blackmailing Tom Driberg (code-named Lepage), British MP and a member of the executive committee of the Labour Party in the 1950s. Driberg had spied on the Communist Party of Great Britain for MI5 in the 1930s. In 1956, while visiting Moscow to interview his old friend Guy Burgess for a biography, he was blackmailed by the KGB into removing references to Burgess's alcoholism, due to their having photos of him in a homosexual encounter.<br/>Attempts to increase racial hatred in the US by mailing forged hate letters to militant groups<br/>Bugging MI6 stations in the Middle East<br/>Bugging Henry Kissinger when he was serving as United States Secretary of State<br/>Obtaining documents from defense contractors including Boeing, Fairchild, General Dynamics, IBM, and Lockheed Corporation, providing the Soviets with detailed information about the Trident and Peacekeeper ballistic missiles and Tomahawk cruise missiles<br/>Soviet industrial espionage of Concorde supersonic passenger airliner<br/>Supporting the Sandinista movement. The leading role in this operation belonged to the General Intelligence Directorate of Communist Cuba.<br/>KGBs direct link to Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi (code-named Vano). "Suitcases full of banknotes were said to be routinely taken to the Prime Minister's house. Former Syndicate member S. K. Patil is reported to have said that Mrs. Gandhi did not even return the suitcases". Systematic control of the Indian Media was also revealed- "According to KGB files, by 1973 it had ten Indian newspapers on its payroll (which cannot be identified for legal reasons) as well as a press agency under its control. During 1972 the KGB claimed to have planted 3,789 articles in Indian newspapers – probably more than in any other country in the non-Communist world. According to its files, the number fell to 2,760 in 1973 but rose to 4,486 in 1974 and 5,510 in 1975. In some major NATO countries, despite active-measures campaigns, the KGB was able to plant little more than 1 per cent of the articles which it placed in the Indian press" In 1981 the Soviets had launched "Operation Kontakt", which was based on a forged document purporting to contain details of the weapons and money provided by the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) to Sikh militants who wanted to create an independent country. In November 1982, Yuri Andropov, the General Secretary of the Communist Party and leader of the Soviet Union, approved a proposal to fabricate Pakistani intelligence documents detailing ISI plans to foment religious disturbances in Punjab and promote the creation of Khalistan as an independent Sikh state. Indira Gandhi's decision to move troops into the Punjab was based on her taking seriously the information provided by the Soviets regarding secret CIA support for the Sikhs.</p>
<p>Accused but unconfirmed<br/>Richard Clements, journalist and editor of the Tribune, and later an advisor to Michael Foot and Neil Kinnock as leaders of the British Labour Party. Clements was not named in Andrew and Mitrokhin's book in 1999, but an article in The Sunday Times made the allegation that he was the unidentified agent of influence codenamed DAN. According to the Mitrokhin Archive, DAN disseminated Soviet propaganda in his articles in the Tribune, from his recruitment in 1959 until he severed contact with the KGB in the 1970s. Clements denied the allegation, saying that it was an over-inflated claim and "complete nonsense", and that the allegation was not subsequently repeated. Those defending Clements against the charges included David Winnick and Andrew Roth.<br/>Romano Prodi, former Prime Minister of Italy and president of the European Commission. The allegations were evaluated by the Mitrokhin Commission, which was established in 2002 by the centre-right coalition majority.</p>
<p>Disinformation campaign against the United States<br/>Andrew described the following active measures by the KGB against the United States:</p>
<p>Promotion of false John F. Kennedy assassination theories, using writer Mark Lane. Lane denied this allegation and called it "an outright lie".<br/>Forged letter from Lee Harvey Oswald to E. Howard Hunt, attempting to incriminate Hunt in the Kennedy assassination.<br/>Discrediting the CIA using the ex-CIA case officer and defector Philip Agee.<br/>Spreading rumors that the FBI director J. Edgar Hoover was a homosexual.<br/>Attempts to discredit Martin Luther King Jr. by placing publications portraying him as an "Uncle Tom" who was secretly receiving government subsidies.<br/>Stirring up racial tensions in the United States by mailing bogus letters from the Ku Klux Klan, by placing an explosive package in "the Negro section of New York" (operation PANDORA), and by spreading conspiracy theories that the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. had been planned by the US government.<br/>Fabrication of the story that the AIDS virus was manufactured by US scientists at the US Army research station at Fort Detrick (Operation Denver). The story was spread by Russian-born biologist Jakob Segal.</p>
<p>Installation and support of communist governments<br/>According to Mitrokhin's notes, Soviet security organizations played key roles in establishing puppet Communist governments in Eastern Europe and Afghanistan. Their strategy included mass political repressions and establishing subordinate secret police services at the occupied territories.<br/>The KGB director Yuri Andropov took suppression of anti-Communist liberation movements personally. In 1954, he became the Soviet ambassador to Hungary, and was present during the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. After these events, Andropov had a "Hungarian complex":</p>
<p>... he had watched in horror from the windows of his embassy as officers of the hated Hungarian security service were strung up from lampposts. Andropov remained haunted for the rest of his life by the speed with which an apparently all-powerful Communist one-party state had begun to topple. When other Communist regimes later seemed at risk—in Prague in 1968, in Kabul in 1979, in Warsaw in 1981, he was convinced that, as in Budapest in 1956, only armed force could ensure their survival.<br/>Andropov played a key role in crushing the Hungarian Revolution. He convinced reluctant Nikita Khrushchev that military intervention was necessary. He convinced Imre Nagy and other Hungarian leaders that the Soviet government had not ordered an attack on Hungary while the attack was beginning. The Hungarian leaders were arrested and Nagy was executed.<br/>During the Prague Spring events in Czechoslovakia, Andropov was a vigorous proponent of "extreme measures". He ordered the fabrication of false intelligence not only for public consumption, but also for the Soviet Politburo. "The KGB whipped up the fear that Czechoslovakia could fall victim to NATO aggression or to a coup." At that moment, Soviet intelligence officer Oleg Kalugin reported from Washington that he had gained access to "absolutely reliable documents proving that neither CIA nor any other agency was manipulating the Czechoslovak reform movement." But, Kalugin's messages were destroyed because they contradicted the conspiracy theory fabricated by Andropov. Andropov ordered many active measures, collectively known as operation PROGRESS, against Czechoslovak reformers.</p>
<p>Assassinations attempts and plots<br/>Attempted poisoning of the second President of Afghanistan Hafizullah Amin on 13 December 1979. Department 8 of KGB succeeded in infiltrating illegal agent Mitalin Talybov (codenamed SABIR) into the presidential palace as a chef. However, Amin switched his food and drink (as if he expected to be poisoned), and his son-in-law became seriously ill; he was flown to a hospital in Moscow. The poison was manufactured in the secret KGB laboratory which had prepared ricin for the attack on Bulgarian writer Georgi Markov in London in 1978.<br/>Preparations to assassinate Josip Broz Tito, the president of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. In the late 1940s, the same KGB laboratory manufactured a powdered plague for use by an assassin who had been vaccinated against plague. This assassination was prepared by the famous KGB agent Iosef Grigulevich, who had previously organized the assault on Leon Trotsky's villa in Mexico. However, Grigulevich was recalled at the last moment, due to the sudden death of Joseph Stalin.<br/>In 1962, plans to assassinate several "particularly dangerous traitors," including Anatoliy Golitsyn, Igor Gouzenko, Nikolay Khokhlov, and Bohdan Stashynsky were approved by the KGB head Vladimir Semichastny. Khoklov was poisoned by radioactive thallium, allegedly due to his refusal to work as a KGB assassin and kill George Okolovich, chairman of the National Alliance of Russian Solidarists.</p>
<p>Penetration of churches<br/>The book describes establishing the "Moscow Patriarchate" on order from Stalin in 1943 as a front organization for the NKVD, and later, for the KGB. All key positions in the Church, including bishops, were approved by the Ideological Department of CPSU and by the KGB. The priests were used as agents of influence in the World Council of Churches and in front organizations such as World Peace Council, Christian Peace Conference, and the Rodina ("Motherland") Society founded by the KGB in 1975. The future Russian Patriarch Alexius II said that Rodina was created to "maint</p>
<hr/><p><em>Based on Wikipedia article: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitrokhin_Archive" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mitrokhin Archive</a> – licensed under CC BY-SA.</em></p>
