Top Soviet spy Dmitri Polyakov was betrayed by CIA double agents

WHEN the CIA lost contact with one of their best sources deep inside Soviet intelligence, Dmitri Polyakov, it would be two years before they learnt of his fate.

Russian-born CIA spy Dmitri Polyakov (centre) was arrested in Moscow in 1986 and executed in 1988.

FOR more than 20 years the CIA had been reliant on a source deep within Soviet intelligence. Known by the codename Top Hat, among others, General Dmitri Polyakov revealed a stream of important secrets that gave the CIA some of their biggest triumphs in the 1960s and ’70s, but in 1986 he suddenly went silent.

It was not until two years later that the Soviet newspaper Pravda published on March 15, 1988, the news that Polyakov had been executed for treason — 30 years ago today.

It was another sign that although the cold war was fought without armies on a battlefield, there were still soldiers who died. Polyakov had fallen victim to a mole within the CIA, but it would take years for the American spy agency to discover who sent Polyakov to his death.

Dmitri Fyodorovich Polyakov was born in the Ukraine on July 6, 1921, the son of a bookkeeper. Set on a career in the military he went to artillery school and graduated in June 1941, just as the Nazis invaded the Soviet Union. Fiercely patriotic to his homeland the artilleryman fought with some distinction during the war, winning medals for bravery.

After the war he went to officer training where he was selected to train as an intelligence officer at the GRU (or Main Intelligence Directorate). Focusing on military intelligence, the GRU operated separately from the KGB, which focused on political intelligence.

From 1951 to 1956 he was with the Military Staff Committee, which was part of the Soviet delegation to the UN. His job was to run spies who were not operating under cover of the Soveit diplomatic corps.

Dmitri Polyakov, a Russian-born CIA spy, was executed in 1988.

In the ’50s Polyakov watched Nikita Krushchev’s rise to power with some alarm, fearful that his belligerence would bring the world to war. On Polyakov’s second assignment to the UN from 1958 to 1961 he decided he would do what he could to prevent war from breaking out.

He proved his value at a UN cocktail party in 1961 when he asked General Edward O’Neill what would happen if the Soviet Union invaded West Berlin. The General told him “It would mean an all-out war”. Just days later the Soviets began building a wall to divide East and West Berlin. The private conversation had been tapped by an FBI agent. It is believed that Polyakov stopped the Soviets invading.

Shortly after he approached the FBI and was recruited as a spy, initially for the FBI, while still stationed in the US, but when he returned to Russia he spied for the CIA. He refused offers of money, saying he was doing it for his country. The only thing he asked for was power tools, pens and other mementos, which he gave to friends, also fishing equipment and shotguns.

Even while posted in Burma in the ’60s and India in the ’70s he still managed to pass on useful information. Initially by dead drops, placing messages in hollow fake rocks in public places, but later by means of a small handheld transmitter (known as Buster) that was capable of transmitting 1500 coded letters from a distance of 300m of a designated base station. Which meant he often did not have to meet operatives eye-to-eye.

Polyakov was able to provide some very useful information on a range of subjects. While in Burma he provided information on Vietnamese and Chinese military forces. He provided technical data on Soviet antitank missiles and gave the US names of several officers in the US military who were working as Soviet spies. One of his greatest coups was sending information about tensions between the Soviet Union and China, which allowed Richard Nixon to visit there in 1972 to establish diplomatic relations between the two powers.

Former CIA officer Aldrich Ames was arrested as a double agent in 1994.

FBI double agent Robert Philip Hanssen.

The CIA became suspicious when he was suddenly recalled to Russia in 1980. Before leaving India a CIA officer talked to Polyakov and told him “if anything happens, you are always welcome in our country”. But Polyakov said: “Don’t wait for me. I am never going to the United States. I am not doing this for you. I am doing this for my country. I was born a Russian, and I will die a Russian.”

Fears seemed to be allayed when Polyakov rose to the rank of general and was placed in charge of training at the GRU. What wasn’t known then was that FBI operative and double agent Robert Hanssen had already alerted the KGB that Polyakov was working for them. Polyakov continued to pass secrets, but it is now believed that he was used to spread disinformation.

In 1985 CIA officer, Aldrich Ames, also began working for the KGB and gave away Polyakov’s identity, not knowing that someone had beaten him to it. Because Polyakov was arrested in 1986 and executed in 1988, Ames, who was revealed as a double agent in 1994, was originally blamed for Polyakov’s execution. It was only when Hanssen was finally caught in 2001 that the whole truth was revealed.