Overview
The true story behind the events depicted in Steven Spielberg’s blockbuster Bridge of Spies
On 10 February 1962, Gary Powers, the American pilot whose U2 spy plane was shot down in Soviet airspace, was released by his captors in exchange for one Colonel Rudolf Abel, aka Vilyam Fisher - one of the most extraordinary characters in the history of the Cold War.
Born plain William Fisher at 140 Clara Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, this bona fide British grammar schoolboy was the child of revolutionary parents who had fled tsarist oppression in Russia. Retracing their steps, their son returned to his spiritual homeland, the newly formed Soviet Union, aged just eighteen. Willie became Vilyam and, narrowly escaping Stalin's purges, embarked on a mission to New York, where he ran the network that stole America's atomic secrets.
In 1957, Willie's luck ran out and he was arrested and sentenced to thirty years in prison. Five years later, the USSR's regard for his talents was proven when they insisted on swapping him for the stricken Powers. Tracing Willie's tale from the most unlikely of beginnings in Newcastle, to Moscow, the streets of New York and back again,Abelis a singular and absorbing true story of Cold War espionage to rival anything in fiction.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781785900181 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Biteback Publishing, Ltd. |
| Publication date: | 10/08/2015 |
| Sold by: | Bookwire |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 272 |
| File size: | 2 MB |
| Age Range: | 18 Years |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
A Prologue
It was some days after being given Evelyn Fisher’s Moscow telephone number before I realised that I would have to make the call myself. Did Evelyn speak English? A Russian-speaking Estonian acquaintance had refused to dial and speak for me, to be on hand to interpret if needed. ‘If they’re anything to do with the KGB I just don’t want anything to do with it,’ she had said.
The ringing tone rattled, rather than rang, then a click, and a voice,
‘ ‘allo.’
‘Is that Evelyn Fisher?’
‘Yes.’
‘My name is Arthey. I am calling from Newcastle upon Tyne in the north of England. I am researching the life of your late father. May I ask you some questions about him?’
‘I know nothing of Daddy’s work, but yes.’
‘Do you know where he went to school?’
‘He went to grammar school!’
Her voice lifted with the pride of a woman whose son or brother had been a scholarship boy. I had heard the same tone when my grandmother or aunt had spoken about my father’s achievement in this way. Evelyn’s English was accurate and spoken with confidence; she was enjoying being able to speak in English and to display her knowledge of English culture. The quest had begun.
Chapter 16 Exchange of Prisoners (excerpt)
The eventuality that James B. Donovan had foreseen prior to Judge Byers’ sentencing of ‘Rudolf Abel’ in November 1957 occurred just over two years later. Early on the morning of 1 May 1960 U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers, Frank to his comrades, took off from Peshawar in Pakistan. His mission - the longest and potentially the most dangerous of the U-2 reconnaissance programme so far - was to fly across the Soviet Union photographing key strategic sites. He would fly over the Baikonur missile-testing site in the desert to the east of the Aral Sea and then over the Soviets’ top-secret plutonium production centre some 80 km north of Chelyabinsk. After continuing north over Sverdlovsk, he was then to fly northwest. On this next section of his route the schedule was to photograph a new missile base at Plesetsk in the far north and the submarine yard at Zhdanov before turning to fly south towards base at Bodo in Norway. The nine-hour, 3,800 mile flight was to be at 70,000 feet, out of the range of Soviet aircraft or missile interceptions.
No one is quite sure what happened over Sverdlovsk. It was in the interests of everyone involved to keep the details secret. One story was that a Soviet agent had managed to attach a bomb to the U-2 in Peshawar and that the bomb detonated over Sverdlovsk, but this was never taken seriously. Another was that the plane suffered a flameout and Powers had had to lose altitude to restart his engine. The story that he told his military and KGB interrogators implied that a missile exploded near the tail of his aircraft at 68,000 feet. He brought the disabled U-2 down to 15,000 feet, where he bailed out and parachuted to safety. This version of the events was the one publicly accepted by Powers’ CIA bosses.
The Chairman of the Soviet Union’s Council of Ministers, Nikita Khrushchev, fumed at the penetration of his nation’s defences and air space, but was exultant at such a coup against ‘The Main Adversary’. He used the incident to sabotage the painstakingly arranged summit meeting between the United States, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and France in Paris later that month. In captivity behind the Iron Curtain, Powers coped well with the interrogation. One of the U-2’s most experienced and reliable team members, aware of the role and purpose of his aircraft and its reconnaissance programme, he managed to convince his captors that he was a simple pilot, not really sure about the complex espionage kit that his plane was carrying. He was tried in Moscow and on 19 August 1960 was found guilty of espionage and sentenced to ten years’ ‘confinement’, three years of imprisonment and seven of hard labour.
So, the opportunity for an exchange of prisoners was now a clear reality, but the preparation for such an exchange had begun well before Powers’ conviction. Although all appeals and a request for a rehearing of the Abel case had been exhausted by 16 May 1960, when the United States Supreme Court ruled that the conviction and sentences should stand, James Donovan had a communication channel with ‘Mrs Abel’ in place. She had written as early as February 1959 from an address in Leipzig in East Germany to thank Donovan for his work on behalf of her husband, and the payment of legal fees was underway. The moment Powers’ U-2 was shot down, CIA lawyers started work on a basis for a Powers/Abel exchange: not only was it quite clear to the Agency that the ‘Mrs Abel’ letters were coming from the KGB, but also that Moscow would be prepared to negotiate through Donovan. Even as early as 11 May 1960, when he first spoke publicly about the Powers case, President Eisenhower had countered the Soviet charges of the United States ‘deliberately spying’ by reminding them of Colonel Abel and the evidence brought against him in 1957. Just days later, weeks before the Powers trial in Moscow, American newspapers were calling for an Abel for Powers swap and in early June Oliver Powers, the U-2 pilot’s father, wrote to Colonel Abel in Atlanta Penitentiary offering to intercede with the State Department and the President of the United States for his release. In return, he asked if Abel would give his blessing and also approach the authorities in his own country for his son’s release. Abel was sympathetic to the father’s request, but used the opportunity to let Mr Powers know that the United States Department of Justice was not letting him write to his own family. Oliver Powers’ and Colonel Abel’s letters were available to the American authorities and on 24 June, two months before the Powers trial in Moscow, the US Department of Justice began to allow Abel to correspond with his family.
Dwight D. Eisenhower’s presidency was drawing to its close and in November 1960 John Fitzgerald Kennedy was elected President of the United States. Khrushchev welcomed the change and at the time of Kennedy’s election signalled to the incoming administration that he felt the U-2 incident should become ‘a thing of the past’ and hoped that ‘a fresh wind will begin to blow’. So Donovan was not surprised to receive a letter from Abel in the first week of January 1961:
… in one of her last letters my wife suggested that I appeal to the new President. I stated that I did not think it possible, in the present circumstances, for me to do so but suggested that she do so herself, much in the same way as the relatives of Powers and the others have done.…I would be indebted to you if you could find it possible to offer her some counsel on this matter.
Donovan followed his usual practice and forwarded the communication to the CIA and the Justice Department. He also wrote to Abel’s wife advising her to give the new administration a little time and then to send the President a simple letter, petitioning for her husband’s release. Just over a month passed before Mrs Abel, writing from Leipzig, sent her appeal. Khrushchev had already released two Americans detained after another incident and it seemed that Mrs Abel’s letter was an invitation for President Kennedy to respond with the release of the Colonel, but there was no immediate reply. However, there was some action, for a few weeks later FBI officers visited Abel in Atlanta to interrogate him further, no doubt probing to see if he would give them anything before a possible release. Abel gave them nothing. Three months later Mrs Abel wrote to Donovan again, but this time there was something new. A delicate game was being played:
Thinking over the question whether there is something that could be done to precipitate the solution of the question, I remembered of the letter sent to my husband last year by the father of the pilot Powers. I have not read it but if I am not mistaken, he suggested to my husband that some mutual action be taken to help his son and my husband be released. Rudolf wrote to me then that Powers’ case had nothing to do with him and I did not consider myself that any benefit could come of it for us or the Powerses…
I wanted to write about it to Mr Powers at once but was afraid that all the affair could be given publicity which would influence unfavourably the fate of my petition. Not knowing how to act, I have decided to ask your advice … what should be done to accelerate our case? Please, do not leave my letter without reply.
Donovan and the CIA were now convinced that Mrs Abel’s letters were from the KBG and that the Soviets were offering a deal - a swap of Powers for Abel. This was indeed the case, for a detailed strategy and tactical plans for an exchange were in place in Moscow. It was no coincidence that ‘Mrs Abel’s’ letters were being sent from Leipzig. Germany was a focus of Cold War activity and the KBG had its major headquarters for German and broader western Europe operations in the fashionable Potsdam Neuer Garten on the banks of the Havel River, close to Cecilienhof where Churchill, Truman and Stalin had met in the summer of 1945. The exchange itself was given the codename LYUTENTSIA by the KGB and co-ordinated by Vladimir Pavlovich Burdin, who had been the rezident in Ottawa for much of Willie’s time in New York and who was working with forty-three-year-old Boris Yakovlevich Nalivaiko, a KGB officer with experience in Germany, Austria and Czechoslovakia and who was now heading illegals work in Berlin. There was more correspondence before ‘Mrs Abel’ wrote again to Donovan in September 1961. Included in the envelope was a letter for Mrs Powers urging her to petition President Kennedy once more to take measures that would secure the release of her pilot husband. The letter to Donovan indicated movement on the part of the Soviet government:
On your advice I visited the Soviet embassy in Berlin and showed them your letter of July 26. I am glad to tell you that as before the Soviet representative showed great understanding of my case and reassured me of their willingness to help…
I gathered from our talk that there is only one possible way to achieve success now - that is simultaneous release of both F. Powers and my husband which can be arranged.
The game of nudges and nuances continued, with the United States and Soviet governments signalling their moves through their intermediaries: Donovan and, on the Soviet side, the East German Wolfgang Vogel. (Vogel was an East Berlin lawyer who acted for the German Democratic Republic in a range of their international dealings. He was to become an expert in cross-border links and exchanges during the Cold War, making himself a considerable fortune in the process.) Meanwhile, Powers and Abel corresponded with their families, and the families with each other, under the watchful eye or the bidding of their respective governments.
By early 1962 the deal was close. Telling friends and colleagues that he was off to the United Kingdom to act for a client involved in an international life insurance merger, Donovan headed for a meeting with Vogel in East Germany. He broke his journey in London, and British intelligence smoothed his secret departure and flight from eastern England to Berlin. After briefings from the CIA, Donovan presented himself at the Soviet embassy on the morning of Saturday, 3 February. He was directed to the consulate next door, where he was greeted by a woman in her mid-thirties, Evelyn Fisher, who introduced herself as Rudolf Abel’s daughter. ‘Miss Abel’ introduced her mother and a male relative, her mother’s cousin, Herr Dreeves. Donovan took the taciturn Dreeves to be an East German police officer, but he was actually Yuri Drozdov, Willie’s KGB boss. At noon, Ivan Schischkin, ‘Second Secretary of the Soviet Embassy’, entered and the meeting proper, or rather meetings, began. For five days Donovan shuttled between West and East Berlin, and in East Berlin between the Soviet embassy and Wolfgang Vogel’s office. The Americans were pushing for two other detainees to be released and the Soviets were exploiting the East German role in the negotiations. Vogel needed to maintain his own government’s profile, all the while realising that he was in the process of cornering a very specialised international market. The negotiators, with their masters in the background, edged closer together and as Donovan and Schischkin raised their glasses to clinch the deal on 8 February, Donovan knew that Colonel Abel had been moved from the penitentiary in Atlanta to New York in preparation for his flight to Berlin.
Less than twenty-four hours later, it was agreed that the Glienicke Bridge would be the transfer point and the time of the exchange was fixed for 8.30 a.m. on Saturday, 10 February. Abel arrived in West Berlin and Donovan met with his client in the United States military compound early on the Saturday morning. He seemed to have aged since Donovan had last seen him. They chatted informally while Abel enjoyed an American cigarette and thanked Donovan for everything he had done for him. They travelled to the Glienicke Bridge in separate cars, Abel under heavy guard. Donovan walked onto the bridge with a West Berlin based United States diplomat and, in civilian clothes, Brigadier General Leo Geary, the USAF/CIA liaison officer who knew Powers and could identify him. Schischkin approached from the East Berlin side, also accompanied by two men. At 8.45 Schischkin and Donovan shook hands to complete the formalities and signalled Powers and Abel, both under guard, to come onto the bridge. As the observers confirmed the prisoners’ identities, Donovan and Schischkin gestured simultaneously and the crossing began. Powers moved first and, after exchanging greetings with Leo Geary, the two men walked into the western sector and off the bridge. Powers was driven quickly to Tempelhof, where he and his party were flown to Frankfurt in West Germany and then on to the United States.
Abel paused at the crossover point and asked for his official pardon from Fred Wilkinson, the warden of Atlanta Penitentiary, who had accompanied his prisoner and stood on the bridge as one of his guards. Wilkinson had made a point of talking regularly with his famous prisoner throughout his captivity and had no intention of missing this historic moment. Abel turned to Donovan, shook his hand for the last time and bade him farewell. He walked off the bridge into East Germany and was driven just a few hundred metres into ‘The Forbidden City’, the term Potsdam locals used for the KGB headquarters.
A covert KGB unit was sent to West Berlin to keep watch on the Glienicke Bridge from the American side, whilst armed KGB men were hidden in the East German customs office on the bridge and more KGB men commanded the armed Soviet soldiers at the checkpoint. Ellie and Evelyn were staying at a house in the Forbidden City, awaiting Willie’s return, but there was a delay so they decided to make the most of their time in Germany and went shopping in Potsdam. When Willie arrived at the house, his wife and daughter were gone, and agitated KGB men rushed out to bring them back. When they returned Willie, Ellie and Evelyn were together again for the first time in more than seven years.
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements viiList of abbreviations ix
A note on the Fisher names xi
Prologue xiii
1 German-Russian beginnings 1
2 Newcastle upon Tyne 9
3 Gun-running 18
4 To the coast 32
5 Return to Russia 45
6 Recruitment 55
7 Scandinavian mission 68
8 Home again – Moscow and London 80
9 The Great Purge 93
10 Special Tasks 104
11 Training for a new assignment 123
12 First US missions 131
13 Undercover artist 141
14 Testing times 156
15 Trial 170
16 Exchange of prisoners 182
17 An unquiet death 194
Epilogue 202
Bibliography 207
Notes 216
Index