I have posted here several times about Richard sorge, a soviet foreign intelligence officer before and during World War 2. I believe he was the greatest intelligence officer in history, a conclusion shared by the spy museum in Washington, DC.
sorge's father was German and his mother Russian. After serving in the German Army during the first world war he became a communist. He went to moscow and was trained in intelligence tradecraft. Then he developed a cover as a pro-Nazi journalist. After working in China he was sent to Japan.
It will help understand sorge's work if I briefly detail the situation in Japan. Japan occupied vast territories in manchuria (the northern part of China) and coastal China. Officers of its large Kwantung Army in manchuria wanted to push into soviet territory, thinking back to the relative ease of Japan's defeat of Russia in the war of 1904-1905.
stalin was a student of history and knew that it was incredibly dangerous for a nation to fight a war on two fronts. he absolutely did not want to fight both Japan to his East and Nazi Germany to his West. He was therefore very interested in Japan's intentions. He was equally interested in Germany's intentions.
In Japan's war cabinet there was a major difference of opinion between those who wanted to attack North, into the soviet union, and those who wanted to attack south, into the British, Dutch, and american colonies. manchuria had mineral wealth but points south had rubber and oil, which were both important for war.
sorge ran a spy ring in Tokyo. He obtained excellent information about both Germany's and Japan's intentions. One of his men was an aide to Prince Konoye, a key figure in the upper reaches of Japan's government. sorge himself had thoroughly penetrated the Germany embassy in Tokyo. He gathered a great deal of information from the German military attache, the ambassadors wife (with whom he was rumored to be having an affair), and the ambassador himself.
First to German intentions. The German military attache, believing sorge was a rabid nazi, showed him Germany's battle plan for Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the soviet union. sorge radioed this to his GRU (soviet military intell. agency), who relayed it to stalin. sorge's intelligence was very detailed, providing even the week the invasion was planned and how many German units would be involved. stalin dismissed the warnings, with profane written remarks in the margin. stalin had received many such warnings, one professor totalled them up to be 88, but ignored them all. sorge was spot on. Germany invaded the soviet union on June 22, 1941.
Perhaps convinced of sorge's worth, stalin believed his report that Japan decided not to attack the soviet union but would proceed south. stalin by then had sufficient faith in sorge that he shipped a huge number of troops and tanks from the Far East to help in the counterattack against the Germans around moscow. Until sorge's report they had been held in the Far East in order to defend against a possible Japanese attack.
These divisions, commanded by Georgi Zhukov, the General who had trained and led them in the Far East, were instrumental in throwing back the German invasion.
I'm posting this today because I came across two articles that were published on Nov. 7, the anniversary of sorge's execution. Japan had a thoroughgoing police state and it was difficult for intelligence rings to operate. sorge's was discovered by Japanese police. He and members of his ring were arrested in October, 1941. He was tried for espionage, and executed on Nov. 7, 1944.
Here are links to the articles:
http://www.pravdareport.com/history/20-10-2011/119387-richard_sorge-0/http://www.executedtoday.com/2007/11/07/1944-richard-sorge-and-hotsumi-ozaki/Here is a good bit from the second article. If you're going to read only one of the two I suggest reading it. If you want even more information I suggest reading "Target Tokyo", a very readable and interesting book by University of maryland history professor Gordon Prange.
The spies in history who can say from their graves, the infomation I supplied to my masters, for better or worse, altered the history of our planet, can be counted on the fingers of one hand. Richard Sorge was in that group.
-Spy novelist Frederick Forsythe
After the war sorge was awarded the order of Hero of the soviet union. His widow was paid a pension for the rest of her life.
