Sergey Spigelglas
Encyclopedia
Sergey Mikhailovich Spigelglas or Spiegelglass or Shpigelglas (29 April 1897 - 29 January 1941) was acting head of the Soviet foreign intelligence service, then part of the NKVD
, from February to June 1938.
Spigelglas was born into the family of a Jewish bookkeeper in Mosty
in present-day Hrodna Voblast
, Belarus
. After graduating from Warsaw
Technical High School, he entered the law school at Moscow University. In 1917 he was drafted into the Russian Army and served as an ensign in the 42nd reserve regiment. Following the October Revolution
, he joined the Cheka
, and because of his facility with languages—he spoke French, Polish, German, and Russian—he became a member of the Foreign Department. In 1926 he was stationed in Mongolia
, perhaps reporting to Yakov Blumkin
, where he conducted active intelligence work against China
and Japan
.
In 1930 Spigelglas became the chief undercover agent of the OGPU, later the NKVD
, in Paris
. As a cover for his operations, he worked as the bourgeois proprietor of a fish store near the Boulevard Montmartre. Spigelglas's main task was spying on the White Russian
and Trotskyist organizations in Paris, where he controlled the penetration agents Mark Zborowski
and Roland Abbiate
. He successfully recruited the double agent Nikolai Skoblin
and his wife Nadezhda Plevitskaya
.
Spigelglas returned to Moscow, where he trained new agents in counterintelligence and acted as deputy director of the Foreign Department reporting to Abram Slutsky
. His particular forte was the liternoye (top secret) or liquidation operation. He engineered the assassination of the Ukrainian nationalist Yevhen Konovalets
in Rotterdam in May 1938, the execution of the defector Ignace Reiss in Switzerland in September 1937, and the kidnapping of the leader of Russian All-Military Union
(ROVS), General Evgenii Miller
, in France in September 1937. It has also been suggested that he was the mastermind behind the murder-decapitation of the Trotskyist leader of the Fourth International
, Rudolf Klement, in France in July 1938, and the murder of the defector Georges Agabekov
in France in 1937. When Slutsky died in February 1938, poisoned by order of Nikolai Yezhov
, Spigelglas became the acting director of foreign intelligence.
The head of the NKVD, Lavrenti Beria, had Spigelglas arrested seven months later on November 2, 1938. He was held in Lefortovo prison
and attempted a hunger strike which failed once his jailers began a regimen of intravenous feeding. After "strong pressure," a euphemism for torture, he began to make a confession in May 1939, and a tribunal convicted him of treachery on November 28, 1940. (In his confession, Spigelglas claimed that Lev Sedov died of natural causes, not the victim of NKVD foul play.) He was executed on January 29, 1941.
Historical opinion on Spigelglas is divided. Some, following the lead of Alexander Orlov
, portray him as a "careerist" ready to liquidate dozens of honest people to advance himself, a man who could disingenuously claim that the deaths of those he murdered were necessary in the Bolshevik's struggle against their enemies. Others, following Sudoplatov, believe he was polite, business-like, intelligent, and a patriot. The Russian government rehabilitated him in 1991.
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
, from February to June 1938.
Spigelglas was born into the family of a Jewish bookkeeper in Mosty
Masty, Belarus
Masty or Mosty is a city in Hrodna Voblast, Belarus, the administrative center of the Masty district....
in present-day Hrodna Voblast
Hrodna Voblast
Hrodna Voblast or Grodno Oblast is a voblast in northwestern Belarus.The capital - Grodno is the biggest city of the province. It lies on the Neman River. Grodno's existence is attested to from 1127. Two castles dating from the 14th - 18th centuries are located here on the steep right bank of...
, Belarus
Belarus
Belarus , officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, bordered clockwise by Russia to the northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Its capital is Minsk; other major cities include Brest, Grodno , Gomel ,...
. After graduating from Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
Technical High School, he entered the law school at Moscow University. In 1917 he was drafted into the Russian Army and served as an ensign in the 42nd reserve regiment. Following the October Revolution
October Revolution
The October Revolution , also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution , Red October, the October Uprising or the Bolshevik Revolution, was a political revolution and a part of the Russian Revolution of 1917...
, he joined the Cheka
Cheka
Cheka was the first of a succession of Soviet state security organizations. It was created by a decree issued on December 20, 1917, by Vladimir Lenin and subsequently led by aristocrat-turned-communist Felix Dzerzhinsky...
, and because of his facility with languages—he spoke French, Polish, German, and Russian—he became a member of the Foreign Department. In 1926 he was stationed in Mongolia
Mongolia
Mongolia is a landlocked country in East and Central Asia. It is bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south, east and west. Although Mongolia does not share a border with Kazakhstan, its western-most point is only from Kazakhstan's eastern tip. Ulan Bator, the capital and largest...
, perhaps reporting to Yakov Blumkin
Yakov Blumkin
Yakov Grigoryevich Blumkin was a Left Socialist-Revolutionary, assassin, Bolshevik, Cheka agent, State Political Directorate spy, and adventurer, executed as Trotskyist.-Early life :...
, where he conducted active intelligence work against China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
and Japan
Japan
Japan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
.
In 1930 Spigelglas became the chief undercover agent of the OGPU, later the NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
, in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
. As a cover for his operations, he worked as the bourgeois proprietor of a fish store near the Boulevard Montmartre. Spigelglas's main task was spying on the White Russian
White movement
The White movement and its military arm the White Army - known as the White Guard or the Whites - was a loose confederation of Anti-Communist forces.The movement comprised one of the politico-military Russian forces who fought...
and Trotskyist organizations in Paris, where he controlled the penetration agents Mark Zborowski
Mark Zborowski
Mark Zborowski was an anthropologist and an NKVD agent...
and Roland Abbiate
Vladimir Pravdin
Vladimir Pravdin or Roland Lyudvigovich Abbiate codename LETCHIK was a senior NKVD assassin working in Europe during the Great Terror. He later became a KGB agent, stationed in the United States....
. He successfully recruited the double agent Nikolai Skoblin
Nikolai Skoblin
Nikolai Skoblin was a general in the counterrevolutionary White Russian army, a member of the expatriate Russian All-Military Union , a Soviet double agent, and husband to the gypsy folk-singer Nadezhda Plevitskaya ....
and his wife Nadezhda Plevitskaya
Nadezhda Plevitskaya
Nadezhda Vasilievna Plevitskaya was the most popular female Russian singer of the White emigration.-Early life and career:Plevitskaya was born Nadezhda Vasilievna Vinnikova to a peasant family in the village of Vinnikovo near Kursk...
.
Spigelglas returned to Moscow, where he trained new agents in counterintelligence and acted as deputy director of the Foreign Department reporting to Abram Slutsky
Abram Slutsky
Abram Aronovich Slutsky headed the Soviet foreign intelligence service , then part of the NKVD, from May 1935 to February 1938.-Biography:...
. His particular forte was the liternoye (top secret) or liquidation operation. He engineered the assassination of the Ukrainian nationalist Yevhen Konovalets
Yevhen Konovalets
Yevhen Konovalets was a military commander of the UNR army and political leader of the Ukrainian nationalist movement...
in Rotterdam in May 1938, the execution of the defector Ignace Reiss in Switzerland in September 1937, and the kidnapping of the leader of Russian All-Military Union
Russian All-Military Union
The Russian All-Military Union was founded by White Army General Pyotr Wrangel in the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes on September 1, 1924...
(ROVS), General Evgenii Miller
Evgenii Miller
Evgeny Karlovich Miller was a Russian general and one of the leaders of the anti-communist White Army during and after Russian Civil War.-Biography:...
, in France in September 1937. It has also been suggested that he was the mastermind behind the murder-decapitation of the Trotskyist leader of the Fourth International
Fourth International
The Fourth International is the communist international organisation consisting of followers of Leon Trotsky , with the declared dedicated goal of helping the working class bring about socialism...
, Rudolf Klement, in France in July 1938, and the murder of the defector Georges Agabekov
Georges Agabekov
Georges Agabekov , was a Soviet Red Army soldier, Chekist, OGPU Agent, Chief of OGPU Eastern Section...
in France in 1937. When Slutsky died in February 1938, poisoned by order of Nikolai Yezhov
Nikolai Yezhov
Nikolai Ivanovich Yezhov or Ezhov was a senior figure in the NKVD under Joseph Stalin during the period of the Great Purge. His reign is sometimes known as the "Yezhovshchina" , "the Yezhov era", a term that began to be used during the de-Stalinization campaign of the 1950s...
, Spigelglas became the acting director of foreign intelligence.
The head of the NKVD, Lavrenti Beria, had Spigelglas arrested seven months later on November 2, 1938. He was held in Lefortovo prison
Lefortovo prison
Lefortovo prison is a prison in Moscow, Russia, which, since 2005, has been under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Justice of the Russian Federation. It was built in 1881...
and attempted a hunger strike which failed once his jailers began a regimen of intravenous feeding. After "strong pressure," a euphemism for torture, he began to make a confession in May 1939, and a tribunal convicted him of treachery on November 28, 1940. (In his confession, Spigelglas claimed that Lev Sedov died of natural causes, not the victim of NKVD foul play.) He was executed on January 29, 1941.
Historical opinion on Spigelglas is divided. Some, following the lead of Alexander Orlov
Alexander Orlov
Alexander Mikhailovich Orlov , born Lev Feldbin, 21 August 1895–25 March 1973), was a General in the Soviet secret police and NKVD Rezident in the Second Spanish Republic. In 1938, Orlov refused to return to the Soviet Union because he realized that he would be executed, and fled with his...
, portray him as a "careerist" ready to liquidate dozens of honest people to advance himself, a man who could disingenuously claim that the deaths of those he murdered were necessary in the Bolshevik's struggle against their enemies. Others, following Sudoplatov, believe he was polite, business-like, intelligent, and a patriot. The Russian government rehabilitated him in 1991.
Further reading
- John Costello and Oleg Tsarev, Deadly Illusions, Crown, 1993 ISBN 0-517-58850-4
- Walter KrivitskyWalter KrivitskyWalter Germanovich Krivitsky was a Soviet intelligence officer who revealed plans of signing Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact before defecting weeks before the outbreak of World War II....
, In Stalin's Secret Service, Enigma Books, 2000 ISBN 1-929631-03-0 - Alexander Orlov, The March of Time, St. Ermins Press, 2004. ISBN 1-903608-05-8
- Pavel Sudoplatov, Special Tasks, Little, Brown and Company, 1994. ISBN 0-316-82115-2