Code Name “Krüger”
“Krüger” was a source for KGB information from 1972 to 1986, but he did not report to or
work for the KGB. His story has an interesting twist.
“Krüger” was born in 1922 to Russian émigrés in Belgrade. He graduated from Belgrade
High School. During World War II, he went to Berlin in 1941 and studied at the Film Technical
School for two years. In 1943, he became an officer of the Russian anti–Soviet army of General
Vlasov in Germany. He spoke fluent Russian, Serbian, German, and good English. Because of a
war injury, his left leg was amputated at the knee in 1944, and he remained in a military hospital
until February 1946. Afterwards while living in various displaced persons’ camps in Austria, he
was able to get various jobs with the U.S. Army occupation forces as a film projectionist until he
successfully got a job as a monitor with Radio Liberty in 1955, because of his language abilities.
He was known to have continuous and serious financial problems in the fifties and sixties
until sometime in 1972. While employed in the Russian Monitoring Section, he was also
controlled and paid by the former DDR (East Germany) intelligence service (MfS). The MfS
was, apparently, operating in behalf of the KGB, since the MfS normally would have had little,
if any, interest in RFE/RL. “Krüger” was paid 1,000 DM on the average per month. In return he
was to supply personal information about RFE/RL’s employees and provide documents
especially from his own department, which monitored and transcribed Russian language radio
broadcasts.
Also part of his task was reporting on the large and active Ukrainian exile community in
Munich. He used his RFE/RL employment to maintain contact with them. “Krüger” met his
handler in various locations in Munich and Bavaria. The initial information given to the RFE/RL
security office in 1991 did not give concise details of what “Krüger” was to have allegedly done,
or what information he might have provided to the MfS, or if he acted alone in the MfS tasking.
The MfS was directly involved in various activities with non–German émigré groups in the
West (presumably for the KGB), including employees of RFE/RL. In January 1992, the RFE/RL
Bavarian counterintelligence contact finally had the opportunity to meet with the former MfS
intelligence officer, Karl-Hermann Mueller, responsible for “Krüger.” He said the KGB had
originally recruited “Krüger,” but in 1972 they turned over the operation to the MfS. The MfS
was tasked with gathering information about the CIA, and they wanted to use “Krüger” to gather
information about presumed CIA involvement and personnel at RFE/RL. “Krüger” was then
given his code name. He was a member of the Works Council and one can assume that this was
his prime source of information on RFE/RL: hirings, firings, promotions, demotions,
disciplinary action, etc. He provided copies of internal RFE/RL memoranda, the telephonebooks,
and any other written information. In total, the amount of information provided by “Krüger” was
about forty inches thick.
The MfS used him to gather materials and information about RFE/RL until February 1986,
when Gundarev defected in Athens and was flown to the United States. At the same time, the
MfS sent a message to Moscow asking if Gundarev’s defection could jeopardize the “Krüger”
operation. The KGB answered yes, that Gundarev had knowledge of the KGB’s prior control of
“Krüger.” The MfS thereupon stopped the “Krüger” operation.
“Krüger” met his contacts on a monthly basis in a Wienerwald restaurant in the town where
he lived. The MfS and the KGB had conducted a “false flag” operation with “Krüger” as he
apparently thought all along that he was providing information to the British Intelligence
Agency MI5. Mueller later said that “Krüger” was never told his information was going to the
MfS or KGB. He thought that “Krüger” was possibly originally recruited by a KGB agent or
officer named Grynov, who also was at one time possibly controlled by the British intelligence
agency M15. Grynov had previously been an officer in “Krüger’s” detachment during World
War Two, and the two of them maintained contact after the war.
Over the years, “Krüger” was paid in excess of DM 100,000 for his information, which
totaled over 2,500 pages. “Krüger” was last known to have met with his MfS contacts in
February 1986. The statute of limitations in these cases was five years, thus there was no
prosecution possibility.
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