Nikolai Fedorovich Artamonov
Born1922
Leningrad, Soviet Union
DiedDecember 1975 (aged 52–53)
Vienna, Austria
NationalitySoviet Union
Other namesNicholas George Shadrin
OccupationNaval officer
Known fordouble agent

Nicholas George Shadrin, born Nikolai Fedorovich Artamonov (1922 – December 1975[1][2]), was a Soviet naval officer serving in Gdynia, Poland who defected to the United States of America in 1959.

Life

Shadrin was born in the Soviet Union in 1922. After joining the Soviet Navy he received advanced training in nuclear missiles, and at the age of 27 became the youngest destroyer captain in the fleet.[1] Stationed in Gdynia, Poland in 1959, he fell in love with a Polish woman, Ewa Gora. With Navy restrictions and Gora's family's anti-communism making marriage impossible, the two defected by commandeering a naval launch to Sweden.[1] The Central Intelligence Agency then brought Shadrin and Gora to the United States.[1]

Shadrin's information proved particularly useful to the Office of Naval Intelligence.[1] Working with the ONI under new identities, Shadrin gained an MA and PhD in engineering, and Gora opened a dental practice.[1] Later, with ONI unable to gain Shadrin higher level security clearances, he was assigned to translation in the Defense Intelligence Agency.[1]

Shadrin was engaged in various counter-intelligence assignments during the Cold War after being approached by the KGB in 1966. He disappeared on assignment in Vienna, Austria in December 1975, apparently kidnapped by KGB agents.[3][4] Later, Oleg Kalugin stated that Shadrin had died an accidental death during the kidnapping, apparently of a heart attack.[2]

According to former CIA counterintelligence officer Tennent H. Bagley, James Angleton warned Shadrin's American handlers, CIA officer Bruce Solie and FBI agent Elbert Turner, to not let him travel out of the United States, but they disregarded his warning and let Shadrin go to Canada to meet with the KGB, and then let him travel to Vienna to meet again with his ostensible KGB recruiter, Igor Kochnov[5]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Center for the Study of Intelligence (1995), Of Moles and Molehunters: A Review of Counterintelligence Literature, 1977-92, DIANE Publishing, p30
  2. 1 2 Craig Whitney (2 November 1993). "Death of Soviet Defector and Spy Is Tied to Kidnapping by Moscow". New York Times. Archived from the original on 3 December 2013. Retrieved 4 December 2013. A former Soviet intelligence official says a defector from the Soviet Navy who vanished in Vienna while working as a double agent for the C.I.A. in 1975 died in a kidnapping attempt by Moscow's counterspies.
  3. ↑ Boris Volodarsky, The KGB's Poison Factory: From Lenin to Litvinenko, 2009, Frontline Books, pp. 123-36
  4. ↑ Hurt, Henry (1981). Shadrin: The Spy Who Never Came Back. United States: McGraw-Hill. ISBN 978-0-07-031478-8.
  5. ↑ Bagley, Tennent H. (2007). Spy Wars: Moles, Mysteries, and Deadly Games. New Haven @ London: Yale University Press. p. 199. ISBN 978-0-300-12198-8.
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