Instead of a means of gleaning secrets, sex is now used as a method of subverting the loyalty of the individual. Painstakingly constructed sex snares are devised to produce evidence that can then be used as blackmail evidence to force the victims to work against their country’s best interests. Such entrapments are frequent in Soviet bloc countries. They are often complicated and costly, involving scores of skilled operatives and the most advanced electronic and photographic equipment. They are always carried out with a cynical disregard for the feelings of those involved. Usually, they are successful. This modern, technologically sophisticated use of an age-old espionage technique has been called “sexpionage.”
After the war the SIS employed prostitutes in Germany and Austria to wheedle pillow secrets from Russian soldiers, but the value of this intelligence was minimal, and the British were never enthusiastic about such operations. The French, on the other hand, set considerable store by it and, according to a former British intelligence officer, there were at one time more than 400 prostitutes in the pay of French military intelligence “doing their best on their backs in the Vienna Woods.”* |
In 1951, the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) launched Operation REDCAP as a "systematic and concentrated program of penetration and defection inducement operations directed at Soviet official installations outside the USSR."
The program included:
· Agent recruitment in place for local intelligence and counterintelligence coverage.
· Agent recruitment in place for USSR coverage.
· Immediate defection for intelligence procurement.
· Agent recruitment for return to the USSR under official cover.
· Immediate defection for employment as an agent to be dispatched under illegal cover to the USSR.
The program focused on individual Soviet officials and military posted outside Soviet territory, especially in occupied Austria and Berlin. Specifically, the CIA station in Vienna was tasked with learning;
· characteristics,
· habits,
· weaknesses (whether sex or alcohol),
· places of residence,
· restaurants they frequent,
· shops they patronize, and
· names and addresses of their secretaries and mistresses, if any.
We should eventually be able to find those in real trouble who are fearful of being recalled. Once we spot them, we can approach them and win their confidence. We must first find out which of them are in a mess, whether in the embassy, consulate, or purchasing mission. Each must be dealt with on his own merits, per his character, temperament, mental equipment, and background. They must be approached individually by our best-trained men who have all the imagination, personality, ingenuity, and linguistic ability to contact these men after we have found out all we possibly can about them.
CIA chose Rostislov Lvovich Antonov, born in Leningrad, USSR, on November 30, 1920. CIA used the cryptonyms CATARATA, CACHINO-4, and GRALLSPICE 1 to identify him.
During World War Two, 1941-1942, Antonov surrendered as a prisoner to the Germans in the region of the city of Rostov on the Don. Later he entered into service with the Russian Liberation Army (ROA), which was created to fight against the Soviets under General Andrei Vlasov's leadership. He eventually became the confidential assistant to General Vlasov.
After the war, he was on the Soviet list of “War Collaborators.” He avoided the Soviet army and settled in Kempten, Germany. He avoided forced repatriation to the USSR, bx using the name of a fellow ROA officer Sergei Froehlich for several weeks in May or June 1945. Froehlich was later active with American and German intelligence agencies.
Antonov legally changed his name to Sergei Lvovich Shebalin, which he used for the rest of his life. He also used the aliases: Tonny CHZIMEK and Alfred DELLINGER.
From 1945 to 1951, Shebalin was in a displaced persons (D.P.) camp in Kempten and Memmigen, Germany. He also became involved with the local black market. He was arrested in November 1945 on a charge of being a "Russian Nazi" and was found not guilty. In 1947 he again was arrested for possession of false documents but released without a trial.
On the recommendation of Froehlich, Shebalin was recruited from the Memmigen DP camp and began working for the CIA in June 1951. One CIA officer wrote, "Shebalin loves adventure and interesting deals, loves the black market and plays it with rare skill, and was a combination of a sincere anti-Bolshevik and black marketeer."
His first assignment was to examine the possibility of establishing a net of exiled Russian agents who could release propaganda balloons into Iron Curtain countries. He succeeded in organizing this net and did preparatory work for the CIA, but both of these projects were abandoned due to a lack of funding. Shebalin's second assignment was to train agents to penetrate the Soviet Zone of Germany.
One CIA cryptonym for operations in Austria was GROOVY. Shebalin was sent to Vienna as a spotter with the specific tasks:
· Exploration of Vienna black market channels for Redcap possibilities. Soviet citizens dealing in the black market would be relatively easy to approach and, with careful planning, to blackmail.
· Exploration of the Vienna underworld for possible REDCAP contacts. The use of Vienna prostitutes for possible contacts has thus far fallen through mainly because we have been unable to find a reliable Austrian to exploit this possibility; other contact means may also be gambling, drug addiction, etc.
His cover was that of a businessman working for a Munich company LINDEX, co-run by Sergei Froehlich.
At a meeting on July 29, 1952, Shebalin and his CIA contact discussed various possibilities of successfully finding Russian-speaking Austrian girls for potential operational use, including newspaper advertisements. He explained, "In attempting to find an Austrian girl with a knowledge of Russian, he had tried a number of gimmicks, none of which seemed to offer any hope of concrete results. He hoped that sooner or later, he would come up with some idea that would enable us to find the type of girls necessary for successful operations against the Soviets."
In March 1953, during a meeting with his CIA case officer, Shebalin casually mentioned that he might have to go to the Linz area in Austria to operate in the black market to find targets against the Soviets. The case officer noted Shebalin's suggestions that girls could profitably be used in such work. The case officer mentioned in passing, "it should be borne in mind that in any dealings with such girls, the necessary precautions should be taken against contracting any disease. The warning was presented in general terms so as not to make the agent think it was directed solely at him (although it actually was). "
Shebalin was unsuccessful for the CIA in Vienna, and the operation was terminated. Shebalin moved to Salzburg to await emigration. before leaving with his wife and child for the United States in February 1954 under CIA sponsorship. The rationale for CIA sponsorship was:
Subject, a former captain of the Soviet Army and later General VLASSOV'S adjutant, has been utilized under various projects of the S.R. Division since November 1951. Subject perforated the groundwork in two of the projects, but due to a lack of funds, these projects were abandoned. At present, the Subject is still connected, although indirectly, with REDCAP and counter-espionage operations. Reports from the field by the Subject's case officers speak well of his capabilities, motivation, and suitability for intelligence work. The Subject will be employed as an interrogation specialist by the Assessment and Recruitment Section of the S.R. Domestic Operations Base in this country. It is felt that his immigration to the United States is desired to assure his valuable services indefinitely and to secure his continued allegiance to American interests.
He was under contract with the CIA until October 31, 1954, when the CIA decided that his operational usefulness to the Agency was minimal, and he became a" disposal/resettlement "case. While in Washington, D.C., he and his wife attended the “Americanization School“ to learn English for U.S. citizenship. They then moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. In 1960 he became a U.S. citizen.
On January 11, 1977, Shebalin reportedly died in an automobile accident and was buried in the Oakland cemetery in Philadelphia.
* David Lewis, Sexpionage: The Exploitation of Sex by Soviet Intelligence
