There are 80 & nbsp; years, October 18 & nbsp; to & nbsp; Tokyo, Soviet intelligence officer Richard Sorge was arrested. He had 1,100 days ahead of him in Sugamo Prison, accompanied by endless torture and interrogation.
The verdict & nbsp; & mdash; death penalty & nbsp; & mdash; he & nbsp; greeted in cold blood, not forgetting to thank the prison guards, those of & nbsp; who have kept a human face in & nbsp; communication with the prisoner.
Helped to save Moscow
Sorge made history in & nbsp; by the fact that & nbsp; reported & nbsp; the impending attack of Hitler against & nbsp; USSR. He also transmitted information about & nbsp; that in 1941 Japan was not going declare war on the Soviet Union.
The intelligence officer sent this information to the & nbsp; Center on 6 & nbsp; September 1941. In the & nbsp; Sorge report it was said about & nbsp; that Tokyo plans to start hostilities in the & nbsp; south, and & nbsp; not & nbsp; & nbsp; in the & nbsp; Soviet Far East, which the Soviet leaders feared. This was the very moment the Germans had already approached Moscow. After receiving the encryption from & nbsp; Ramsay (code name Sorge), divisions and & nbsp; tank brigades, ready to repel the attack of the Kwantung army, have been transferred from our Far Eastern borders to Moscow and & nbsp; have played a colossal role in & nbsp; save capital.
Sorge operated under the nose of the Japanese authorities for nearly 10 & nbsp; years & nbsp; & mdash; he was & nbsp; was a resident of the Soviet Secret Service in & nbsp; Tokyo from & nbsp; 15 & nbsp; February 1932 to & nbsp; October 1941. All this time he was under surveillance. Every day the scout walked the & nbsp; blade & nbsp; knife, arranging to get classified information and & nbsp; transfer them & nbsp; to & nbsp; Moscow. This became possible thanks to the assistants & nbsp; with which he & nbsp; started working in & nbsp; China & nbsp; & mdash; journalist Hodzumi Ozaki and & nbsp; radio operator Max Clausen . In & nbsp; further on, the journalist joined the & nbsp; reconnaissance groupBranko Vukelic and & nbsp; artist Yotoku Miyagi.
Japan as the last stop
The uniqueness of the situation was & nbsp; the fact that, being a Soviet intelligence officer, Sorge worked as an advisor to the German Ambassador to & nbsp; Tokyo. The future resident got carried away by ideas from the left to & nbsp; Berlin during & nbsp; while he was studying at the University of & nbsp ;. Making a scientific career, he simultaneously carried out active party activity, creating a Socialist Group, which in 1919 became part of the German Communist Party. Over time, Sorge becomes the head of the Communist Party school in Germany. And & nbsp; in & nbsp; 1924, a German activist was invited to & nbsp; Moscow to work in & nbsp; structures of the Comintern, where it & nbsp; would stay for & nbsp; five years, until & nbsp; until, in & nbsp; 1929, it is & nbsp; invited to the military intelligence service & nbsp ;. p>
He begins his activities as a resident in China under the guise of a journalist, writes articles for the German press. Sorge's papers are popular with readers. He made a name for himself in international journalism. And & nbsp; go to the next step & nbsp; & nbsp; & mdash; prepare a springboard to work at & nbsp; Japan. This is exactly the goal set by the Soviet leadership.
To do this, the intelligence officer had to return to Germany, where Hitler came to power the day before. Miraculously, Sorge straightens a new passport, since the old one has expired. He was taking a colossal risk if his old acquaintances, who knew him as a fiery socialist, met on his way. But & nbsp; everything went well. Sorge, if any, mentioned the & nbsp; sins of youth, ensuring that in the & nbsp; now he fully shares the views of the Führer. Having finally received a new passport, he begins to bypass the main newspapers in Germany, offering himself as a correspondent for the Land of the Rising Sun. And & nbsp; Sorge manages to get to the & nbsp; Japan as a journalist. And & nbsp; then incredible luck awaits him & nbsp; & mdash; the post of the press officer of the German Embassy in Tokyo.
Why Stalin Didn't Trade Sorge
People around saw in & nbsp; Richard a fun lover and & nbsp; ladies' man, who twisted the novels to the right and & nbsp; to the left. Where & nbsp; was not going appear Sorge, he & nbsp; became the soul of the company. Even with & nbsp; those who carried out external surveillance for & nbsp; (in Japan a detailed file was kept on every foreigner), I managed to make friends. With & nbsp; someone from & nbsp; Spiks drank from a & nbsp; bar, presented someone gifts on time. According to & nbsp; Tokyo Sorge was driving a motorbike in & nbsp; great speed. It was hard to imagine that behind the facade of a man's shirt lay hard work, upon which the course of world history depended.
Soviet leaders appreciated Sorge & nbsp; more than once convinced of the & nbsp; fidelity of the information given to it.
>
It is all the more surprising that Stalin did not attempt to get his spy out of the bowels of a Japanese prison. Tokyo offered to exchange for & nbsp; two admirals who are in & nbsp; Soviet captivity. And & nbsp; it is by no means a & nbsp; myth & nbsp; & mdash; Says the journalist and & nbsp; intelligence historian Nikolai Dolgopolov : “ After the war, the undisputed fact of the proposed exchange was confirmed by a prominent German intelligence officer, who was detained at & nbsp; Moscow. The Gestapo soldier also revealed & nbsp; another option: to & nbsp; Tokyo was not & nbsp; opposed to the exchange of Zorge for & nbsp; several of their officers captured somewhere on the islands by the Americans who fought with & nbsp; Japan by the Americans.
Execution on & nbsp; on the day of the October Revolution
But & nbsp; Joseph Vissarionovich on & nbsp; it & # 39; s not & nbsp; go. Why he & nbsp; did this, and & nbsp; remained blurry until the end. In & nbsp; as one of the versions of & nbsp;, they call the doubts of the leader: they say that Stalin could have regarded Sorge as a double agent, working at the same time & nbsp; for & nbsp; USSR, and & nbsp; for & nbsp; Germany. However, & nbsp; this version didn't even have circumstantial evidence & nbsp; & mdash; ni & nbsp; in & nbsp; 1940 & ndash; 1950s, ni & nbsp; much later, when the Japanese intelligence documents and & nbsp; German have been declassified and & nbsp; have become available. The answer, rather, lies in the friend. Suffice it to remember that during the & nbsp; wartime and & nbsp; after the Victory, hundreds of thousands of Soviet servicemen were waiting, who were & nbsp; captured by the & nbsp; enemy & mdash; suspicions, new trials in the camps. Maybe this rule worked and & nbsp; compared to & nbsp; a single intelligence officer.
The Japanese showed particular sophistication in setting the day of Sorge & # 39; s execution at & nbsp; 7 & nbsp; November & nbsp; & mdash; feast of the October Revolution. The & nbsp; this day, in & nbsp; 1944 & nbsp; year, Ramsay was hanged. The body of the scout was buried in a & nbsp; mass grave with & nbsp; other prisoners. In & nbsp; USSR, l & nbsp; Sorge's feat has become widely known throughout the world. time of Khrushchev . Zorge's posthumous glory became a reward for his achievement. Usually, the names of the residents die for the sake of history so that the scouts themselves stay alive. In the case of & nbsp; with & nbsp; Sorge, the opposite has happened.