On May 2, 1952, American penetration agents VOLOSHANOVSKY, KOSHELEV, and KUROCCHKIN, parachuted out of an airplane on May 2, 1952, west of Kyiv in the Tsuman district Volyn region of Ukraine.
This post will focus on the misadventures of one of them: Alexi Pavlovich Kurochin, born in 1927, a native of the village—Dyakovo, Susaninsky district, Kostroma region, a citizen of the USSR, with lower education.
In 1941, he dropped out of elementary school and got a job at the Kostroma industrial complex. After three months, he got in touch with a criminal group and stopped doing socially beneficial work. He was arrested four times by the police for systematic thefts and was tried twice. He was sentenced to two years imprisonment. He served his sentenced was released in early 1945.
He worked as a driver's apprentice in the regional office "Gossortfond" in the mountains of Kostroma. In December of the same year, Kuochkin was called up for military service and sent to the 177th Rifle Division, where he took the military oath. However, his criminal past, promiscuity, and indiscipline took over, and after a few days, he deserted from the Soviet Army. Having bought a birth certificate for 60 rubles in the name of Roman Pavlovich Zakharov, born in 1930, he managed to get a passport, too.
Living under other people's documents, until 1950, he worked in the cities Novorossiysk, Odessa, and Taganrog as an electric welder at various enterprises, and at the end of 1950, he was drafted into the army under the name Zakharov. Still, this time he did not serve in it for long.
While serving in the occupation units of the Soviet Army in Austria, on September 10, 1951, he fled to the French sector of Vienna, where, with the help of the French authorities, he contacted the Americans.
He was afraid that the case of desertion from the army would sooner or later come to the surface and that he would not escape trial. In addition, it so happened that he refused to comply with the order to go to the squad on the eve of the flight. Realizing that this case would not go unpunished, he decided to run away. At that time, he had no anti-Soviet views.
He fled to the western sector of Vienna from Baden, where his military unit was stationed, in which he served as a driver.
On September 10, 1951, having deceived the administration of the garage, he left in a car attached to him and headed along the Baden-Vienna road. About half an hour later, he was in the French sector of Vienna, where he reported to the commandant's office. At the same time, no one exerted a negative influence on him and did not assist in his flight to the west.
He did not set himself the goal of defecting specifically to the French sector. For him, it was indifferent. He fled in the hope of placing himself at the disposal of the authorities of one of the bourgeois states. While at the commandant's office, he told the French about the circumstances of my escape from the unit. He gave them his real name, after which they took away his documents: a Red Army book, a pass to the Headquarters of the Central Group of Forces, a driver's license, and a passport for a car.
On the same day, he was taken to some military unit stationed in Vienna, where he was interrogated in detail about his personality and the circumstances connected with the flight from the Soviet Army. And on the third day, he was handed over to the Americans.
He told the French about his desire to go to America during the interrogations. On September 12, 1951, two Americans came to the location of the French military unit where he was, offered him to sit in a car with them, and took him to their sector. Within four days after that, he arrived in Vienna; he was taken by plane to Munich.
He told the Americans everything he knew about the Soviet military unit in which he served, the field mail number, and where it is located. He gave the Americans information about the company's strength, named its officers, and provided characterizing data on some of them.
Despite this, the Americans persistently and thoroughly interrogated him in Munich until September 27. At the same time, they intimidated him in every possible way and emphasized that he was allegedly an agent of Soviet intelligence.
Convinced that he was a traitor to the Motherland and, in his criminal past, an utterly suitable candidate for espionage tasks, the Americans offered him the chance to become an agent of the US intelligence agencies and carry out espionage work against the Soviet Union on their instructions. They let him know that there was no other way out for him.
He agreed to become an American spy, although he had not previously thought of establishing a connection with foreign intelligence. They offered him to become an agent of the US intelligence agencies and carry out espionage work against the Soviet Union on their instructions.
He attempted to evade espionage work, citing his lack of education, but the Americans said they would train him specially.
No written obligation was taken away from him at the time of recruitment. For the Americans, his testimony was enough that he had twice deserted from the Soviet Army, and having contacted them, he gave out information about the military unit known to him. All this was possible and related to the means of his recruitment.
After he agreed to cooperate with American intelligence, the Americans gave him the nickname "Vladimir" and sent him to an intelligence school, where they photographed him and took his fingerprints. After graduating from the intelligence school, on the eve of being thrown into the USSR, he signed an obligation stating that the Americans would monthly deposit 700 dollars in his name to the Munich Bank for subversive work in the Soviet Union. He was warned that he would be sentenced to eight years in prison for disclosing this money deal with the Americans.
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