MOSCOW, September 9 – RIA Novosti, Andrey Kots. The Russian Foreign Intelligence Service dedicates this September to Kim Philby, a member of the legendary British “Cambridge Five”, which included high-ranking intelligence officers and the British Foreign Ministry who secretly worked for Soviet Union in 1940-1950. SVR Director Sergei Naryshkin on September 1 congratulated the intelligence officer's widow Rufina Pukhova-Philby on her 85th birthday and said that on September 15 a unique exhibition would open in the building of the Russian Historical Society, which would present declassified archival documents from the department about the life of Kim Philby, his awards and personal things. Most of the stories about the operational past of one of the heads of British intelligence have not yet been made public. But even known facts they say that this man decided the destinies of entire states.

Prevent another war

Kim Philby was recruited Soviet intelligence officer-illegal immigrant Arnold Deitch in 1934. During the Spanish Civil War, he worked in the combat zone as a special correspondent for the Times newspaper, while simultaneously carrying out assignments from curators from Moscow. In 1940, Philby joined the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) and two years later took the post of deputy chief of counterintelligence. It was during the Second World War that he carried out a number of brilliant operations that seriously influenced its outcome.

It's no secret that in Nazi Germany there was an informal “club” of politicians and military men who sought to end the war, including by overthrowing Hitler. These people viewed Great Britain as a possible ally and “intercessor.” SIS constantly maintained contacts with potential conspirators through secret channels. According to the intelligence service, the British government could reach an agreement with the Germans. This was explained by the fact that in SIS and certain British circles there was a shared German point view that both countries were fighting the “wrong war.” Allegedly, Germany and Great Britain were supposed to fight together against the Soviet Union.

The Red Army had not yet marched to the West. The outcome of the war was not yet predetermined. But when the situation on the fronts began to develop in favor of the allies anti-Hitler coalition, people who advocated a separate peace with Great Britain in Germany renewed their attempts to build bridges with Foggy Albion. Looking at the growing power of the Red Army with each victory, part of the British establishment began to see the USSR as a great threat and were inclined to make a deal with the Germans. However, the document proposing such a conspiracy still had to be approved by Philby. He immediately blocked the dissemination of the “peace treaty” to the British government and its allies, saying that it was hypothetical. Later he informed Moscow about what was happening.

“The leadership of the USSR was worried that the war could become a war only against Russia,” said Kim Philby in his last interview in 1988 to the English writer and publicist Philip Knightley. “But one of the reasons for my actions in this direction was that the complete defeat of Germany was a matter of principle for me. I hated the war. Even after it ended, it was difficult for me to forget what the Germans had done. For a long time I could not bring myself to visit East Germany."

Later, Philby repeatedly blocked his colleagues’ attempts to “fraternize” with the German conspirators. It was he who rejected the offer of the head of the military intelligence and counterintelligence service of Nazi Germany, Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, transmitted through secret channels, to meet with the head of SIS Stuart Menzies. Philby rebuked the admiral's representative, saying that the outcome of the war would be determined by force of arms.

The Soviet intelligence officer cut short all possibilities of uniting Germany with Great Britain (and then the USA) into a military alliance directed against Russia. During the war alone, he transferred 914 secret documents to Moscow. Fortunately, Kim Philby was professional and influential enough to successfully complete the difficult task. Otherwise, the map of post-war Europe might have looked very different.

A stranger among his own

In 1944, Kim Philby became head of SIS Section 9, which dealt with Soviet and communist activities in Britain. In the early years cold war the scout was transmitting Soviet side information about the work of British agents on the territory of the USSR. The vast majority of the results of his activities during this period are classified. But it is known, for example, that Philby actually disrupted anti-Soviet protests in socialist Albania. He coordinated a joint CIA/SIS operation to infiltrate agents into that country in the late 1940s and early 1950s in order to foment an insurrection there. Philby reported this operation to the KGB, and the agents were caught and shot after landing.

"There should be no regrets. Yes, I played a certain role in disrupting the Western plan to organize carnage in the Balkans,” Philby said in an interview with Philip Knightley. “But those who conceived and planned this operation, just like me, accepted the possibility of bloodshed for political purposes. The agents they sent to Albania were armed and determined to carry out acts of sabotage and murder. Therefore, I do not regret that I contributed to their destruction - they knew what they were doing. Do not forget that earlier I was also involved in the liquidation of a significant number of Nazis, thus making my modest contribution to the victory over fascism."

In 1949, Philby received an appointment in Washington, where he oversaw the joint activities of the British intelligence services, the FBI and the CIA to combat the “threat of communism.” By receiving the latest information about Soviet defectors, he ensured that key Soviet intelligence agents could be taken out of harm's way. One can only guess how much he helped the Soviet intelligence network in Western countries and how many British and American spies he handed over to the KGB. At the same time, he enjoyed the almost complete confidence of his immediate superiors. In the future, he was even predicted to be the deputy head of SIS.

Beirut business trip

However, all luck runs out. In 1951, the first two members of the Cambridge Five were exposed: Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess. Philby warned them of the danger, but he himself came under suspicion. In November 1952, he was interrogated by the British counterintelligence MI5, but due to lack of evidence, Philby was released. And in 1955 he was dismissed. But a year later, Kim Philby is taken under the wing of MI6, the British intelligence service. Under the cover of a correspondent for The Observer newspaper and The Economist magazine, he was sent to Beirut, where he continued to collect for the USSR for several years. important information about the political situation in the Middle East. This part of his life is a mystery even to the most seasoned experts in the history of the intelligence services.

“From 1956 to 1963 I was in the Middle East,” recalled Kim Philby at the end of his autobiography “My Secret War.” “The Western press published many fabrications about this period of my work, but for now I will leave them on the conscience of the authors. The fact is , that the British and American intelligence services managed to fairly accurately reproduce the picture of my activities only before 1955, and, according to all data, they know nothing about my further work. And I do not intend to help them with this. The time will come when it will be possible to write another one. book and tell about other events in it. In any case, it was of interest to Soviet intelligence to know about the subversive activities of the CIA and SIS in the Middle East."

On January 23, 1963, Kim Philby was evacuated by the Soviets from Beirut - he again fell under the suspicion of his immediate superiors and could have been exposed. Until the end of his life he lived in an apartment in the center of Moscow. Philip Knightley, the only Western publicist who visited Philby's home, recalled that the intelligence officer's library occupied three walls and contained 12 thousand books. Surely full story operational work Kim Philby's account of the Soviet intelligence services would take at least a dozen volumes. But many of its details will remain classified as “secret” for a long time.


Englishman Kim Philby - legendary intelligence officer, who managed to simultaneously work for the governments of two competing countries - England and USSR. The work of the brilliant spy was so highly appreciated that he became the only recipient in the world of two awards - the Order British Empire and the Order of the Red Banner. Needless to say, maneuvering between two fires has always been very difficult...




Kim Philby is considered one of the most successful British intelligence officers, he held a senior post in the SIS intelligence service and his main task was to track down foreign spies. While “hunting” for specialists sent from the USSR, Kim himself was at the same time recruited by the Soviet intelligence services. Working for the Country of Soviets was due to the fact that Kim ardently supported the ideas of communism and was ready to cooperate with our intelligence, refusing remuneration for his work.



Philby did a lot to help the Soviet Union during the war; through his efforts, sabotage groups were intercepted on the Georgian-Turkish border, and the information received from him helped prevent an American landing in Albania. Kim also provided assistance to Soviet intelligence officers, members of the Cambridge Five, who were on the verge of exposure in Foggy Albion.



Despite the numerous suspicions put forward to Kim Philby, the British intelligence services were never able to obtain confessions about cooperation with the USSR from their intelligence officer. Kim spent several years of his life in Beirut, officially he worked as a journalist, but his main task was, of course, collecting information for British intelligence.



In 1963, a special commission from Britain arrived in Beirut and managed to establish Kim’s closeness to the Soviet Union. It is very interesting that the only irrefutable evidence was a bas-relief presented to the intelligence officer... by Stalin. It was made of noble wood and inlaid with precious metals and stones. The bas-relief depicted Mount Ararat, which made it possible for Philby to come up with a legend that this curiosity was allegedly purchased in Istanbul. The British managed to guess that the point from which the majestic mountain was captured could only be located on the territory of the USSR.



After the exposure, Philby disappeared. It took a long time to find him, but then it became known that Khrushchev had granted him political asylum. Until his death in 1988, Kim Philby lived in Moscow. The fascination with the Soviet Union passed when the intelligence officer settled in the capital; much remained incomprehensible to him. For example, Philby was genuinely perplexed how the heroes who won the war could lead such a modest existence.

Another legendary Soviet intelligence officer who made a lot of efforts to defeat fascism is.

(real name Philby Harold Adrian Russell) was born on January 1, 1912 in India, in the family of a British official. He studied at the exclusive Westminster School, and in 1929 he entered Trinity College, Cambridge University. Here he became close to left-wing circles and, under their influence, joined the University Socialist Society.

According to Philby, the real turning point in his worldview was 1931, which brought a crushing defeat to Labor in the parliamentary elections, showing their helplessness in the face of the growing forces of fascism and reaction. The future intelligence officer became close to the Communist Party, sincerely believing that only communism was able to block the road to the fascist threat.

Philby's progressive views were drawn to the attention of illegal Soviet intelligence officer Arnold Deitch, and in 1933, Soviet intelligence attracted him to cooperation.

After graduating from Cambridge University, Philby worked for some time in the editorial office of The Times newspaper, and then during the Spanish Civil War he was sent as a special correspondent for this newspaper under the Francoist army. There he carried out important tasks for Soviet intelligence.

Philby in 1940, on the recommendation of the station, joined the British intelligence service Secret Intelligence Service (SIS). Thanks to his extraordinary abilities, as well as his noble origin, a year later he was appointed deputy chief of counterintelligence of this service (Department B).

The intelligence officer received a promotion in 1944 and was appointed to the post of head of the 9th department of the SIS, which was engaged in the study of “Soviet and communist activities” in Britain. As SIS Resident, Philby served in Turkey and then headed the SIS Liaison Mission in Washington. Established contacts with the leadership of the CIA and FBI, including Allen Dulles and J. Edgar Hoover. He coordinated the activities of American and British intelligence services in the fight against the “communist threat.”

Philby retired in 1955. In August 1956, he was sent to Beirut under the guise of a correspondent for the British publications The Observer and The Economist.

In 1962, Flora Solomon, who knew Philby from working together in the Communist Party, told the British representative in Israel that in 1937 Philby tried to recruit her for the benefit of Soviet intelligence. Due to the threat of failure in early 1963, Philby, with the help of Soviet intelligence, illegally left Beirut and arrived in Moscow.

From 1963 to 1988, he worked as a foreign intelligence consultant for Western intelligence agencies and participated in the training of intelligence officers. Awarded Soviet government awards.

According to Western estimates, Kim Philby is the most famous Soviet intelligence officer. He was considered for appointment to the post of head of SIS. When Philby's true role was made public in 1967, former employee CIA Miles Copeland, who knew him personally, stated: "Philby's activities as liaison officer between SIS and the CIA resulted in the entire extremely extensive Western intelligence effort between 1944 and 1951 being fruitless. It would have been better if we had didn't do anything."

Kim Philby was born on January 1, 1912 in the family of a colonial official in India, a famous Arabist (Philby's father later converted to Islam and married a second time to a Saudi slave). He lived with his mother in England, but was very close to his father, who gave him the nickname Kim, after the title character of the novel by R. Kipling. Later the nickname replaced the real name.

In 1933, Philby graduated from Trinity College, Cambridge, with a degree in economics. While still in college, he became imbued with leftist ideas thanks to economics teacher M. Dobbs, who brought Philby together with W. Munzenberg, head of the International Committee for Relief to Victims of German Fascism. Münzenberg, who voluntarily collaborated with the NKVD (1930-1935), attracted Philby to this work in 1934. In the same year, 1934, Philby married A. Friedman (Kolman), who was an agent of the Comintern in Vienna. One of Philby's first tasks on his return from Vienna was to recruit agents to create a primary cell: the first were Cambridge graduates Guy Burgess, who later recruited Donald MacLane, and Anthony Blunt, who in turn recruited John Cairncross. This is how the Cambridge Five emerged, whose members never considered themselves spies; they were confident that they were fighting fascism and that only the Soviet Union could really defeat it.

In 1937, as a correspondent for the Times newspaper, he went to Spain, where the Civil War. There Philby obtained valuable information about the extent of Italian and German aid to the Franco regime. At the same time, his correspondence was pro-Franco in nature, which attracted the attention of right-wing circles. During the Second World War, Philby, on the recommendation of Burgess, entered the Mi-6 in the fall of 1941, where he trained specialists in propaganda, sabotage and sabotage. Later he became head of the European department of MI6, dealing with Spain. Philby seriously undermined the German spy network on Spanish soil. He took the initiative to eliminate F. Canaris, who was scheduled to visit Spain, but his proposal was categorically rejected. In 1942-1943, the range of his activities expanded ( North Africa and Italy), at the end of 1944, Philby, at the insistence of Moscow, tried to take the post of head of the department for the study of Soviet and communist activities and managed to achieve this appointment. Thanks to Philby, the Kremlin became aware of all the activities to combat communism.

At the end of the war, Philby officially divorced his first wife, although they separated much earlier, and married Eileen Fears, from whom he had four children.

In 1947-1949 he worked in Turkey, recruiting former Soviet citizens to send them to the USSR; all information on recruited persons was immediately transmitted to Moscow. In 1949, he was appointed representative of the British Secret Service to the CIA in Washington. Mainly thanks to Philby's information Western intelligence services failed to overthrow the regime of E. Hoxha in Albania, although they made such attempts several times in the early 1950s.

In the early 1950s, the CIA intensified its work under code name"Venona" on deciphering reports of Soviet agents during the war. Philby tried to stop this process, but as progress was made in deciphering, in May 1951, serious suspicion fell on the British embassy employee MacLane. Philby managed to warn him, with the help of Burgess, about the impending interrogation. As a result, McClain and Burgess, who accompanied him, escaped to the USSR.

After their escape, Philby's situation worsened sharply; he was immediately recalled to England at the urgent request of CIA Director W. Smith. Upon his return from Washington, Philby retired. The leadership as a whole was convinced of his betrayal, but there was no significant evidence.

For three years (1951-1954) Philby had no contact with Moscow. But when the passions subsided, he resumed communication. In 1956, he was helped to get a job as a correspondent for the Economist and Observer magazines in Beirut. But new evidence of Philby’s connection with the USSR continued to emerge. Constantly experiencing stress, he tried to drown it out with alcohol. This aggravated family problems, he separated from his second wife, and there were also problems with his third. Unexpectedly, at the beginning of 1963, he admitted to his former colleague his connections with Moscow and, by decision of the Center, was transferred to the Soviet Union on January 23. Nine months later, his wife came to him, who was never able to adapt to the conditions of Moscow life and left after some time.

Philby began working on a book of his memoirs, My Silent War (published in 1968). Formally, Philby was listed in the KGB apparatus as a consultant. In 1965 he was awarded the order Lenin. In 1971, Philby married a Soviet citizen for the fourth time, but this marriage did not bring him any peace. He perceived the ideas of perestroika negatively and sharply criticized M. S. Gorbachev.

In the spring of 1988, Philby had his first heart attack, followed by a second, and on May 11 he died. The outstanding intelligence officer was buried with honors at the Kuntsevo cemetery in Moscow.