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security organs of socialist countries developed successfully. The mutual exchange of intelligence data increased considerably. In bilateral consultations, prospective plans for intelligence work were periodically shared, joint measures to study enemy intelligence officers for recruitment purposes and to work on and check on those who were suspected of espionage and other hostile activity, were carried out. The security organs of Poland and Hungary gave us assistance in maintaining security of Soviet troops abroad. There was interaction in counterintelligence protection for training exercises of the armies of the Warsaw Pact. Cooperation with the organs of security of Romania was limited to the minor exchange of information. The restored contacts with the MOB [Ministry of Security] of the KNDR [North Korea] have received some further development.

In the last year [the KGB] guaranteed security for leaders of the Communist Party and Soviet government during their 134 trips on the territory of the USSR and abroad. Special measures of a protective nature were also carried out for more than 70 events of the party and the state and during the most important visits by foreign delegations.

Measures were also carried out to raise the quality and reliability of the national system of [internal] government communication, to ensure its further development and automatization, and also to keep it equipped with secure equipment; a new communication network linking government objects was put into effect that increases the combat-ready qualities of the whole communication system.

For the purposes of increasing mobilization readiness, a set of measures to create the conditions propitious for organization of intelligence and counterintelligence work was carried out, and also for timely deployment of organs and troops of the Committee in a special [wartime] period. As far as decisions related to financial and economic activities of the organs and forces of the KGB were concerned, special importance was attached to further reinforcement of the regime of savings of material and financial resources, as well as to strict observation of state and accounting discipline.

Last year more systematic efforts were made to exercise control over the activities of local branches of the KGB and to provide them with assistance in implementing decisions and instructions of the party, state, and KGB. Improvements were made in the way collegiums of the committees of state security and councils advising the heads of KGB directorates worked in that field.

Higher quality of operative-service activities has been achieved in the period under question due to measures to upgrade selection, appointment and education of the Chekist cadres. In 1967 the organs and forces of the KGB enrolled 11,103 new employees, including 4,502 to positions requiring officer ranks. Simultaneously, the KGB laid off 6,582 persons, including 2,102 officers. The new recruits to the KGB included 470 employees who

were recruited from positions in Party, Komsomol [communist youth movement] and soviet organizations. Six hundred one persons were selected and appointed to positions of nomenklatura leadership in the CC CPSU and KGB.

All organizational and educational work with KGB cadres during the last year has been aimed at paying homage to the half-century anniversary of the Great October socialist revolution as well as all-sided improvement of the operative-service activities of the branches of the central apparatus, organs and forces of the Committee of State Security. To commemorate successes in fulfilling the tasks set by the Party and government, 10 military units received awards-memorial banners of the CC CPSU, the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, and the Council of Ministers of the USSR. Seven military units and three educational institutions have been decorated. For exemplary results in work and achievements in building Soviet state security, 5,665 servicemen, workers and employees of the organs and forces of the KGB have been decorated with orders and medals of the USSR; 24 [KGB] officers and generals have been promoted to the ranks of major general, lieutenant-general, colonel general and general by Decree of the Council of Ministers of the USSR.

The measures adopted in accordance with the resolutions of the CC CPSU June (1967) plenum increased the role of the party organizations of the central apparatus, organs and forces of the KGB in the area of more successful implementation of Chekist tasks, in their greater impact on the improvement of work with cadres, in reinforcement of military discipline, and in the growth of political vigilance over personnel.

In their constant building and expanding of their ties with the Soviet people, the organs and forces of the KGB in all their practical activities rely on the assistance and care of the CC CPSU, the CC of the Communist Parties of Union republics, area and regional party committees. Receiving with enthusiasm the congratulation of the Central Committee of the CPSU, Presidium of the Supreme Soviet and the Council of Ministers of the USSR on the 50th anniversary of the VChK-KGB and [gratified] by the high evaluation of the work of the Chekist organs, the personnel of the organs and forces of the KGB continues to toil selflessly in fulfillment of the decisions of the Twenty-Third Party Congress, considering as their main task a further improvement of work to ensure state security.

One of the conditions for a successful resolution of this task is removal of important weaknesses in intelligence and counterintelligence work, as well as in other activities of the Committee of State Security and its local branches.

First of all, one should mention that the intelligence service of the KGB has not yet established the necessary agent access to governmental, military, intelligence and ideological centers of the enemy. Therefore it is not

possible to obtain information on the enemy's plans and designs, to inform in a timely manner the CC CPSU and Soviet government about the most important actions of imperialist states along the major lines of their foreign and domestic policies. For the same reason the intelligence service of the KGB exercises, as yet, only weak influence on the development of political events in crisis situations in the direction advantageous for the Soviet Union, and it is not always able to exploit weaknesses in the imperialist camp and contradictions among capitalist countries.

The counterintelligence service of the KGB, possessing data on the presence of an enemy agent network [agentura] inside the USSR, failed to achieve during the period under review any substantial results in unmasking these agents, in revealing and plugging all possible channels for leaks of state secrets. One still has to work out a system of effective countermeasures to thwart the enemy, who is using illegal means to penetrate our country. The organization of the work of the counterintelligence service needs further improvement, including broader use of active measures to spot and foil subversive plans and designs of the enemy.

The struggle with the enemy's ideological subversion is still not sufficiently capable and effective. Chekist work along these lines could not as yet be unfolded in full because of weak development of agent networks of the KGB organs in those layers of the population which might provide a good breeding ground for the acts of ideological subversion. This in part can explain the fact that the KGB organs failed to prevent in a timely manner individual antiSoviet and anti-public manifestations, including mass. disorders that took place in several cities.

One should also note that, because of insufficient quality and the not always timely manner of initial investigations and because of weaknesses in the operativeinvestigative work in local branches of the KGB, it failed to uncover over 50 crimes, on which the preliminary investigation had to be suspended and the culprits were not found.

In the practical work of some of the KGB organs there were examples of superficial study of persons suspected of committing state crimes. This resulted in three arrests of people without sufficiently checked materials, who then were released in the course of investigation.

The potential of counterintelligence for acting against the enemy's attempts to carry out acts of ideological subversion by encouraging politically and morally unstable persons to defect [while abroad], was weakly employed. This factor largely explains the fact that in 1967 seventeen persons stayed abroad; it also failed to prevent 3 cases of betrayal of the Motherland by servicemen of the Soviet Army.

There are a number of shortcomings in the practice of selection, appointment and education of cadres. Of special importance is the problem of preparation of officer cadres for the organs and troops of the KGB. For years there was no well-organized practical system in this field. As a

result officer personnel fell short of the required number by 7% (about 4,000), and perhaps will do so even more, when one considers increasing demand in cadres and expected retirement of officers in view of the new law of universal military conscription. Meanwhile, the existing sources of replenishment of officer cadres do not meet current demand and will not do so in the future. To this effect testifies the relative decrease, for various reasons, of the number of graduates of the educational institutions of the KGB in the new cohorts of officers (from 75% in 1966 to 51% in 1967). The task of persuading young officers to remain on service in the organs and forces of the KGB still remains problematic: recently, on the average, about 140 of them submitted resignations annually, and moreover half of this number are graduates of the educational institutions of the KGB.

The Committee of State Security and its local branches suffer from visible lack of other cadres: a certain delay in wage increases for a number of categories of the personnel of state security, particularly technical personnel, not only creates certain difficulties in their recruitment, but also affects negatively the maintenance of security in certain aspects of operational work, and also the attitude of this part of the personnel to their fulfillment of service duties.

In taking measures to remove the above-mentioned and other shortcomings, the Committee of State Security attaches particular importance to the practical solution of tasks related to reinforcement of the Chekist cadres, improvement of their selection, appointment and increasing qualification to meet the present-day requirements.

The Committee deems necessary first of all to attract the most promising workers from the periphery to the central apparatus of the KGB and the apparats of the republican committees of state security, as part of the process of retraining and promotion. It is advisable also to send to the peripheral organs some experienced officers of the central apparatus of the KGB and the republican committees of state security, as part of the process of promotion to command positions, and to make them aware of the local working conditions. In order to increase the quality of selection and training of national (natsional'nye) cadres, there are plans to expand the practice of promotion of Chekists from the major national [Union] republics to positions in the central apparatus of the KGB, having in mind their preparation for subsequent employment as leading cadres in the organs of the KGB in those republics. In resolving the tasks of qualitative improvement of cadres, particularly the directorates of intelligence, counterintelligence and investigation, the Committee of State Security acts on the assumption that these cadres should by their qualifications and Chekist acumen be able to ensure under modern conditions further upgrading of methods and means of struggle with the enemy on the basis of the newest achievements in the social science and scientific-technological spheres.

This report has been discussed and approved at a

meeting of the Collegium of the Committee of State Security of the Council of Ministers of the USSR.

THE CHAIRMAN OF THE COMMITTEE OF STATE SECURITY

ANDROPOV

[Source: TsKhSD f. 89, op. 5, d. 3, II. 1-14. Translated by Vladislav Zubok who thanks Ray Garthoff for his kind assistance.]

Andropov's Report to Brezhnev on the KGB in 1967

by Raymond L. Garthoff

Although, with a few exceptions, the archives of the KGB remain closed, a number of KGB reports in the files of the Communist Party are now available. Among the most revealing are several annual reports sent by the head of the KGB to the paramount Soviet leader, the Secretary of the Central Committee of the USSR Communist Party. The report covering the year 1960, although the text is not available, has been read and reported on in the Bulletin. (See the discussion of that report, together with other contemporary KGB reports, in Vladimir Zubok, "Spy vs. Spy: The KGB vs. the CIA, 1960-62," CWIHP Bulletin 4 (Fall 1994), pp. 22-33.) The annual KGB reports covering 1985, 1986, 1988 and 1989 are now also available and have been summarized and analyzed elsewhere. (See Raymond L. Garthoff, “The KGB Reports to Gorbachev," Intelligence and National Security 11:2 (April 1996), pp. 224-244.)

The report on the work of the KGB in 1967 is the only other such report now available. It is presented below in full translation. It was submitted by Iurii Andropov, his first annual report since becoming chairman of the KGB, to General Secretary Leonid I. Brezhnev, on 8 May 1968. Brezhnev, in turn, had the report circulated to members of the Politburo. (Gorbachev, incidentally, did not circulate the reports he received twenty years later.) The reports on 1967 (and 1960) were more detailed than the later reports on 1985-89. In all cases, the sensitivity of the information is reflected not only in the highest classification and single-copy distribution, but also in the fact that virtually all of the specific details on numbers of recruitments, agents, hostile penetrations, and the like had been left blank in the typed version of the report and subsequently filled in by hand, so that even the KGB typist would not see them.

I will not summarize the contents since the full text is provided, but it may be useful to note some of the key

disclosures and their implications. Perhaps first of all, although not surprising, is the explicit reaffirmation at the outset that the KGB was working on the basis of Communist Party guidance and direction. In addition to routine references to the most recent Party Congress and Central Committee plenum, for 1967 this included the creation in accordance with a Central Committee decree of 17 June 1967, of a new special directorate with local branches to counter more actively "ideological diversions of the enemy," in practice, to suppress dissidence. This infamous Fifth Directorate carried on the struggle against ideological and political nonconformity until it was abolished under Gorbachev in 1989.

A substantial portion of the report deals with the concerns and activities of the KGB with respect to the situation inside the country. This no doubt reflected the concern of the political leadership as well, and of course is a reminder that the major part of the KGB was devoted to ensuring internal security. One reference in the report indirectly indicates that the total number of KGB “agents" within the USSR in 1967 was 167,000 people. The total number of KGB staff officers, in foreign intelligence and counterintelligence as well as internal security, was evidently about 57,000-judging by a reference that the KGB was then 4,000 officers short, representing seven percent of the total authorized complement.

Incidentally, this report (and the others we have seen) pays a great deal of attention to statistics, rather than to qualitative assessments. Perhaps that is understandable in an annual accountability report (as indeed they were called in the 1980s). But it also reveals something of the Soviet mindset. For example, learning that the KGB had sent nearly 5,000 "informational reports" to the Central Committee (and similar numbers of reports to departments of the Central Committee, to the Foreign Ministry, to the Defense Ministry, and to the General Staff) is less interesting and important than knowing what they had learned. (Having seen a number of these KGB "informational reports," I can attest that they varied greatly in quality, competence, and value-and many look as though they were designed to meet and beat quantitative quotas.)

There are several interesting sidelights on foreign policy. The West, and in particular the United States, was of course "the main enemy." (Incidentally, Western analysts frequently state that the United States was identified as "the main enemy"; sometimes it was, but the term was also applied to the West as a whole, as in this report which refers specifically to "the USA and other countries of the main enemy.") Western efforts at subversion were taken for granted and the KGB report indicates that enough real or apparent cases were found to warrant that assumption, although it was clearly much exaggerated in scope and as an element in Western policy.

One foreign policy matter of particular concern to the KGB was the hostile activity of the People's Republic of China, the "anti-Soviet splitting activity" of which clearly referred to the then ongoing struggle within the fractured

world communist movement. The KGB also reported that in 1967 it had almost tripled its borderguard posts on the Chinese frontier. While several references were made to routine cooperation and exchanges of information with Warsaw Pact allies, it was noted that KGB cooperation with the security services of Romania was extremely limited.

The statistics on KGB interception and decoding of foreign communications is quite interesting. Although in this report the countries whose systems were compromised are not identified, the statement that the KGB was reading communications in 152 ciphers of 72 capitalist countries, and in 1967 had decoded in all 188,400 telegrams, shows the wide scale of this activity. So, too, do the reports of microphone plants at 36 installations and the stealing of 7 Western codes (as well as, apparently, "breaking" four others).

During the year, the KGB recruited in all 218 foreigners, of whom 64 were believed to have potential for operational work against the United States. In addition, in targeting possible penetration of Western intelligence services they had recruited 47 foreigners, including 8 diplomats. In attempting to neutralize and control enemy and emigre penetration of the USSR, KGB counterintelligence was conducting nine “operational games,” as they called them, involving infiltration of such channels, intended for subversive or intelligence penetration of the Soviet Union. (The report says that of these 9 operational games, 4 involved U.S. intelligence, 8 the Russian emigre organization NTS, and 2 Ukrainian nationalist emigres. Although there could have been an overlap, as U.S. intelligence did have ties to the NTS, more likely the person writing in the numbers by hand made a mistake and wrote "8" instead of "3" for the NTS; if that was the case, the numbers total nine.)

The KGB also reported on the successes of its counterintelligence in unmasking Soviet traitors who were found to have passed secret information to the enemy, naming three cases and referring to others in various categories (34 tried for "treason and attempted treason," three attempting to sneak out of the country, and one for espionage). Nonetheless, despite all its statistics on successes, in an admission of shortcomings toward the conclusion of the report, it was said that despite "possessing data on the presence of an enemy agent network (agentura) inside the USSR" KGB counterintelligence had "failed to achieve during the period under review any substantial results in unmasking these agents." Moreover, "the struggle with the enemy's ideological subversion is still not sufficiently capable and effective," in part because of "weak development of agent networks of the KGB organs in those layers of the population which might provide a good breeding ground for acts of ideological subversion." And this notwithstanding 167,000 KGB agents!

Similarly, in its foreign intelligence work the KGB had "not yet established the necessary agent access in

government, military, intelligence and ideological centers of the enemy," and as a result could not "obtain information on the enemy's plans and designs" or influence the development of events in crisis situations to the advantage of the Soviet Union or to exploit contradictions in the enemy camp.

The report, then, while reviewing in some statistical detail the accomplishments of the KGB in its foreign intelligence, counterintelligence and internal security functions, still had to acknowledge considerable shortcomings. We do not have subsequent annual reports by Andropov over his long incumbency as chairman of the KGB for comparison, but it seems likely that they too would have described the large-scale efforts, and cited extensive accomplishments, but would still have had to acknowledge incomplete success.

The report on the work of the KGB in 1967 in any case provides a window not only into the Soviet security and intelligence services, but more broadly into the Soviet political world of that day. The flavor and general impression that the report provides can, of course, best be appreciated by reading the full text.

Raymond Garthoff is a retired senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. He is the author of many books on the Cold War.

Annual Report of the KGB to Leonid Brezhnev on its Operations for 1967 by Amy Knight

This document, submitted to Brezhnev in May 1968 by KGB Chairman Iurii Andropov, is one of five annual KGB reports now available from the former Central Committee archives, the others being reports for the years 1985, 1986, 1988 and 1989. As Raymond Garthoff pointed out in his analysis of the four reports for the 1980s, these materials provide unique insights into the activities of the KGB at home and abroad, as well as new perspectives on its relationship to the party leadership.1

1967 was a key year for the KGB, in large part because of the appointment of Andropov to the chairmanship in May. Widely considered to be a "party man" because of his years of service in the Central Committee Secretariat overseeing relations with socialist states, Andropov was made a candidate member of the Politburo in June 1967. His expertise in foreign affairs (he had served as ambassador to Hungary in the 1950s before moving to the Central Committee) and the fact that he was not linked to any faction or coalition within the party leadership conferred a new legitimacy and professionalism upon the KGB.

This did not mean, however, that Andropov would attempt to reform the KGB in a liberal direction. By 1967 Brezhnev had consolidated much of his power as party leader and was able to implement his program of reStalinization without obstacles. A harsh crackdown on dissent and curbs on cultural freedom at home were accompanied by an increasingly aggressive and antiWestern foreign policy, all of which were implemented effectively by Andropov in 1967.

The report reveals that, just a month after Andropov became KGB chairman, a new directorate, the Fifth Directorate, was created within the KGB, with divisions and departments in the KGB's local branches. This Directorate, charged with struggling against "ideological subversion," carried out a ruthless campaign of repression against political, ethnic and religious dissent for the next twenty years. The statistics presented in this document confirm that the KGB was devoting significant resources to suppressing any manifestations of discontent within the Soviet system. In 1967 the KGB not only arrested and charged 96 citizens with anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda, it also searched 2,293 persons and shadowed 6,747. In addition, over 12,000 individuals were subjected to socalled prophylactic treatment, which means the KGB called them in for a "chat" and threatened them with severe sanctions if they manifested any anti-Soviet tendencies.

Because the Soviet regime considered internal security problems to be inspired by foreign subversion, a crackdown domestically usually went hand in hand with increased suspicion of and hostility toward the West. The document claims that in 1967 the KGB identified over 270 foreigners in Russia with links to western intelligence services and uncovered 22 double agents. The KGB also carried out an active program of foreign intelligencegathering, strengthening its agent network in the United States and other enemy countries by recruiting 218 foreigners, 64 of whom possessed “operational capacities for work against the USA." The KGB also obtained the codes of seven capitalist countries and had intercepted coded messages from 2,002 radio transmitters from 115 countries. On the basis of its intelligence-gathering abroad, the KGB sent over 4,000 informational reports to the party's Central Committee and several thousand reports to various ministries.

In addition to providing the party leadership with information about the KGB's accomplishments, the 1967 report also contains the requisite "self-criticism." There were, it seems, three arrests without sufficient justification, and several Soviet citizens did not return from abroad, which was considered treason. The biggest problem, according to the report, was in recruitment. The KGB's officer corps fell significantly short of the required numbers, and greater attention was required, it seems, to attract and train qualified personnel.

The 1967 annual report offers concrete evidence, often in terms of numbers, that the KGB was engaged in a

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The KGB has learned that in many of Moscow's establishments of higher education ([Moscow State] University, Institute of History and Archives, Radiotechnical Institute...) anonymous posters have appeared calling for all interested persons to take part on 21 December at 11:00, on the esplanade of the university, in a demonstration organized in memory of the English singer, John Lennon, composer and founder of the "Beatles." The tragic disappearance [murder] of the singer was announced in a number of major newspapers (Komsomolskaia Pravda, Sovetskaia Rossiia. Moskovskii Komsomolets), as well as on major television broadcasts.

The KGB has taken the necessary measures to identify the instigators of this gathering and is in control of the situation. The management of the cited establishments is cooperating in the prevention of all participation by their students in this unauthorized meeting Communicated for informational purposes only. Iu. V. Andropov

KGB Chairman

[Source: TsKhSD, f.5, op.77, d.994, l.164 obtained by Gael Moullec and translated by Christa Sheehan Matthew.]

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