Ministry of State Security Hope didn't last long

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In October 1993, the citizens of Russia were in a state of shock after the shooting of the parliament from tanks, perpetrated by the President Yeltsin, and, frankly, they were not up to the events that were taking place at the same time abroad.

And on the black bench, on the dock...

But in vain, because in those same days a real circus was going on in the German court, ahead of the so-called "Basman justice" for years.

In the dock was an 85-year-old man, suffering from a whole bunch of diseases, who was accused of a crime committed in the distant past. No, the accused was not a Nazi executioner, but, on the contrary, a staunch anti-fascist, a member of the Resistance Movement. The crime that he was accused of was committed in 1931, when the Nazis were already rushing to power in Germany. The old man, according to investigators, was guilty of killing two policemen.

One can envy the principles of the German Themis - on October 26, 1993, 62 years after the crime was committed, the old man was sentenced to six years in prison.

If you think that all the criminal offenses of the era of the Weimar Republic are still being investigated in Germany, then you are mistaken. It was just that the authorities of the united Germany needed to condemn this man at all costs. And if it weren't for the 1931 case, the veteran anti-fascist would have been reprimanded for crossing the street incorrectly or loud TV sound disturbing neighbors.

The Stasi will come for you, better lock the door

The fact is that the defendant was Erich Mielke, the former head of the all-powerful secret service of the GDR, the Stasi.

The Ministry of State Security of the GDR, in German Ministerium für Staatssicherheit, which is better known by the unofficial nickname "Stasi", and to this day in the West is presented as the main scarecrow not only East Germany but of the entire socialist bloc.

All Russian writers of the horrors of the Cheka - NKVD - KGB - FSB are pathetic jerks compared to their Western counterparts, who still drive the townsfolk to enuresis with stories about the intrigues of the Stasi, its secret prisons and sophisticated methods of torture.

There is only one problem: there is some truth in all these stories. The Stasi did not have either gloomy burial grounds with thousands of those who were shot, or their own Gulag. The guys of Erich Mielke worked diligently to preserve the socialist system, but much more subtle than the henchmen of a comrade Yezhov.

communist party fighter

The man, whose name will be firmly associated with the Stasi, was born in Berlin on December 28, 1907 in a working-class family. Erich Mielke, the son of a seamstress and woodworker, was 11 years old when the loser of the First world war The German Empire ordered to live long. The country fell into chaos, followed by poverty, fixed by the enslaving terms of the peace treaty, according to which the Germans had to pay for the defeat for decades.

The Weimar Republic with its order did not suit everyone, especially the youth. The young maximalists went either to the right, joining the nationalists, or to the left, joining the communists. Erich was not even 14 when he made his choice by joining the Komsomol.

By the early 1930s, Mielke was a member of the German Communist Party and a reporter for the party newspaper Rote Fahne. Passions ran high in the country. Stormtroopers of the NSDAP Adolf Hitler hunted for left-wing activists, primarily communists. The authorities turned a blind eye to these massacres.

But in the command of the leader of the KKE Ernst Thalmann were collected by no means rags. The demonstrations of the party were guarded by self-defense detachments, made up of determined people who did not let the Nazis down. One of the fighters of such a detachment was Erich Mielke.

Shots in Berlin

After the fall of the GDR, the German media, describing this period of Mielke's life, would call him "a full-time killer of the Communist Party." In fact, Erich did not commit any contract killings. However, quite a few of Hitler's stormtroopers from among the inhabitants who had gone crazy on the basis of Nazism tied up with their hobby, once meeting Erich on the street.

The police of the Weimar Republic differed little from the Nazis in relation to the communists. When the communist self-defense units fought back the Nazis, the police either sympathetically stood aside, or even helped the stormtroopers. On August 9, 1931, during a manifestation of the Communist Party of Germany, a police patrol tried to twist Mielke and his associates. As a result, two policemen were shot and one seriously injured.

A case was brought against Milka, which, after Hitler came to power, ended with a death sentence. The young communist was supposed to end his days on the guillotine, but getting to him was not so easy. The verdict was passed in absentia, since Milke, not counting on a fair trial, left Germany, first for Belgium, and then for the USSR.

Life on the edge

In Moscow, the German communist graduated from the International Lenin School, where he later taught. In 1936 it broke out Civil War in Spain, where he rebelled against the republican government General Franco supported by Hitler.

As part of the international brigade under the pseudonym "Fritz Leisner", he fought the Nazis until the spring of 1939, when the republic fell. And the illegal life began again. Erich moved from country to country. Settling in Belgium, he was forced to flee from there after the Nazi invasion. Several times he miraculously avoided a meeting with the Gestapo, lived, posing as a Latvian émigré, and participated in the Resistance. In 1943, he was nevertheless arrested, but, without revealing his real name, he was sent to construction defensive structures. In December 1944, Mielke fled to territory controlled by the Allies.

After the fall of the Third Reich, he returned to his homeland. The new Germany had to create security structures from scratch, and Mielke, who had been involved in ensuring the security of communist rallies in the 1930s, became a police inspector. When the German Democratic Republic was created in October 1949, it needed its own state security service, and Mielke became one of those who stood at its origins.

"Comrade Milke, the hamster confessed to everything!"

In November 1957, Erich Mielke became Minister of State Security of the GDR.

Even those who consider the Stasi a fiend of evil admit that the East German secret service was one of the strongest in the world. Mielke created a structure that was equally successful in ensuring stability within the country and supplying valuable information from abroad.

KGB officers who worked in close contact with their Stasi colleagues sometimes had frank table conversations with them. Soviet foreign intelligence officials said: “Guys, your agents in the FRG are super, but political investigation inside the country is a real abomination.” To which the Germans, inflamed, replied: “You don’t understand the conditions in which we live! If porridge is brewed and you grapple with the Americans, we will become a battlefield! Therefore, we will not allow any subversive activities in our country!”

Until now, Germany does not know how many full-time and freelance Stasi informers were. Every tenth, every fifth, every second? And maybe even more. When the Stasi archives were opened after the fall of the GDR, members of the same family sometimes found out that they were "colleagues", telling each other where to go.

Here it must be emphasized that the Germans have a somewhat different attitude towards such practice than ours. Most agents worked for the Stasi not out of fear or money, but out of a love of keeping order. It seems that for the time being, East Germans believed in socialism more than the inhabitants of the USSR.

An anecdote from the GDR era sounded like this: once Erich Mielke went hunting for hares. But the day was not successful, and he managed to shoot only a hamster. In the evening, the upset boss was pleased by the subordinate: “Comrade Milke, we interrogated the hamster, and he confessed that he was a hare!”

Erich Mielke, 1959 Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org / German Federal Archives

Something about the "victims of the regime"

Jokes aside, but the subordinate heads of the Stasi smashed the agents of the West German intelligence on the territory of the GDR masterfully. And this task was very difficult, given the fact that relatives lived on both sides of the border of divided Germany, which is an extremely convenient situation for the needs of intelligence.

Once, the Soviet secret services found that information about the number of units of the group was being leaked to the West. Soviet troops in Germany. It was clear that the informant was on the territory of the GDR, but it was not possible to locate him. Stasi operatives took over the case. Scrupulous development went on for many months, and yet gave the result. The informer turned out to be a German woman who worked at an enterprise that supplied food to Soviet military units. Data on the number of products shipped and the places where they were sent, the woman sent by mail to her son, who lived in Germany. When the Frau was detained, it turned out that the guy was asked to help the secret services of West Germany, and he turned to his mother, who could not refuse her beloved offspring. At the same time, the remuneration for the services rendered was scanty. As a result, the lady was sentenced to two years, but it was not long before the fall of the GDR, and she did not fully serve her term. Now, perhaps, members of this family also talk about themselves as innocent victims of the Stasi.

The Stasi never dreamed of such

Without a doubt, Erich Mielke suppressed dissidents and dissidents in the GDR with an iron fist. At the same time, they somehow keep silent about the fact that in Germany the persecution of the Communists took place at the official level, in 1956 the Communist Party was banned, and its activists were tried by the thousands.

If someone thinks that everything is somehow different in a united Germany, then he is a naive romantic. From year to year, German journalists reveal the facts of surveillance by the secret services of their own politicians. Behind the representatives of the left-wing parties, tacit supervision was established. And in 2013, Germany was rocked by a huge scandal when it became known that German intelligence The BND and the Federal Service for the Protection of the German Constitution carried out total surveillance of their citizens in the interests of the United States. According to Spiegel magazine, with the help of a special program "X-Keyscore" American intelligence agencies monthly received data on five hundred million contacts of German citizens, including correspondence in Internet chats, email, as well as phone calls and SMS messages. Under the "cap" was even German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

There was a lot of noise and indignation, however President of the Federal Service for the Protection of the Constitution (in fact, the political police) Hans-Georg Maasen, with whose knowledge all the private lives of the Germans were made available to the secret services, is still at his post. Head of BND Gerhard Schindler resigned in 2016, but it had nothing to do with the wiretapping scandal.

But just as the Russians are frightened by the “villain Lenin”, ignoring what happened in the post-Soviet period, so the Germans are still frightened by Milke and the Stasi, saying nothing about the realities of today.

Why judge him?

Unlike iron Erich Honecker, whom the dungeons of prison were not forced to renounce his convictions, Mielke did not show such fortitude in his old age. In October 1989, the head of the Stasi personally took part in the removal of an old friend and colleague of Honecker, accusing him of all mortal sins.

And already on November 7, 1989, Milke himself was removed from the post of minister, expelled from the Politburo and deprived of the deputy mandate of the People's Chamber of the GDR, and a month later he ended up in prison, where he met the end of the country he served.

The press of West Germany was looking forward to the "second Nuremberg", expecting that the head of the Stasi would be convicted of persecution of dissidents, torture, secret reprisals and other crimes.

But then there was an embarrassment - it turned out that there was nothing to judge Erich Mielke for. From the point of view of the laws of the GDR, he did not commit crimes. At the very least, it was extremely difficult to prove the existence of such. To declare the GDR itself criminal? But this country was a member of the UN, it signed a lot of agreements, including with Germany. Declaring East Germany a criminal state would entail so many consequences that German politicians clutched their heads and closed the topic.

Mielke and Erich Honecker, 1980. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org / German Federal Archives

Retired from Berlin

And here the case files from the 1930s came in handy, which, as it turned out, Erich Mielke kept in the safe of his office as a souvenir. On their basis, he was convicted.

It turned out clumsily, because the judiciary modern Germany followed the path of the judges of the Third Reich. To complete the picture, all that remained was to drag a guillotine from the museum and cut off the head of the head of the Stasi. Without a doubt, there would be many who would applaud this.

It didn't come to that. In 1994, all other cases opened on Milka were closed for humanitarian reasons, due to advanced age and poor health. Not the worst way out in a situation where there is no evidence and never will be. On August 1, 1995, also due to poor health, Erich Mielke was released early from prison.

He lived out his days in Berlin, in a modest two-room apartment, with his wife. When in the spring of 2000, the state of health no longer allowed to be at home without constant medical supervision, Mielke was placed in a nursing home where his son worked.

Twice Hero of the GDR and Hero Soviet Union passed away on May 21, 2000. A modest funeral ceremony took place at the Friedrichsfelde Central Cemetery, which since the beginning of the 20th century has had a second name - the “Cemetery of the Socialists”.

By the way, until his death, Erich Mielke received a pension as a victim of Nazism and a veteran of the Resistance Movement. As the first president of Russia used to say, this is, you know, a squiggle.

The sensational event that took place on September 24, 1991 on the Austrian-German border was reported by the world's leading media. On this day, the former head of the former foreign intelligence service of the GDR, Colonel-General Markus Wolf, was arrested there. The talented ace of one of the most effective intelligence services on the planet was arrogantly greeted by the Prosecutor General of the already united Germany, who managed to hastily qualify his actions as “betrayal”. In an armored Mercedes, Markus Wolff was taken to Karlsruhe and soon sent to prison for eleven days. With what kind of "unifying euphoria" did the famous intelligence officer get thrown into the dungeons?

Let us recall the biography of the "man without a face", as the Western intelligence services called Markus Wolf, hunting for his personality.

He was born on January 19, 1923 in the family of a doctor, writer and communist Friedrich Wolf. After the Nazis came to power in Germany, the Wolf family emigrated to Switzerland, then to France and in 1934 to the USSR.

In Moscow, Markus studied first at the German school named after Karl Liebknecht, then at the Russian school named after Fridtjof Nansen. With the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, the Wolf family was evacuated to Kazakhstan, from where Markus was sent to the Comintern school in Kushnarenkov near Ufa, where agents were trained to be sent behind enemy lines. Due to a series of failures, it was decided to keep the main cadres from among young German emigrants for work in post-war Germany. In 1943, Markus Wolf went to study at the Moscow aviation institute. He did not have a chance to graduate from the MAI: at the end of May 1945, he was sent to work in Germany together with the Walter Ulbricht group, which was supposed to prepare the communists to come to power.

Upon arrival in Berlin, Ulbricht recommended Marcus to work for the Berlin Radio, which was located in Charlottenburg (in the British sector of Berlin). On this anti-fascist radio, which was created instead of the imperial radio of the Goebbels era, Markus Wolf wrote foreign policy comments under the pseudonym Michael Storm, worked as a reporter and directed various political editorial offices.

Since September 1945, Wolf was sent by a correspondent of the Berlin Radio to Nuremberg to cover the international tribunal over the main war criminals. And after the formation of the GDR in October 1949 and its recognition by the Soviet Union, Wolf was offered the position of the first adviser to the embassy in the diplomatic mission of the GDR in Moscow. For the sake of such a career, Markus Wolf was forced to renounce Soviet citizenship and flew to Moscow in November. His diplomatic career lasted only a year and a half, and in August 1951 he was recalled to Berlin by Anton Ackermann, who, on behalf of the party leadership, created a political intelligence service. Markus Wolf went to work in foreign policy intelligence, which, for the purpose of disguise, was located under the "roof" of the Institute for Economic Research, created on August 16, 1951. In December 1952, Markus Wolf was appointed head of the GDR's foreign intelligence service. At the beginning, the number of its employees and agents was small. Of particular difficulty in this work was the fact that many Western countries refused to recognize the GDR, and had to use only illegal methods.

What was the purpose of the Stasi? Wolf did not hide this:

“The number one issue for us was the problems of nuclear missile weapons, and we made attempts to establish contacts with the entourage of von Braun and other scientists who were already in America at that time. But at that time, our hands did not reach the USA, so, in order to find out what was happening there, we mainly used contacts in West Germany. Over time, we got more and more of this information, and we were quite well aware of what was happening both in West Germany itself and in America. In particular, when in the late 1970s and early 1980s the deployment of Pershing-2 missiles and cruise missiles began in Germany and other countries of Western Europe, we were quite well informed about the technology itself and about it. dislocations. All this information, of course, was sent to Moscow, because for the GDR it was of no particular importance.

International terrorism was also targeted by the Stasi. On this occasion, Wolf noted:

“In one or another of its manifestations in the post-war period, it made itself felt - and rather loudly - in many countries of the world. On September 11, 2001, a terrible tragedy occurred in New York. And what happened in the Chilean capital of Santiago on the same day, only almost three decades earlier? Then the planes bombed the residence of the legitimately elected President Allende. Don't blame everything on Pinochet. Today the world is well aware that the US CIA was behind it. It's proven. The bombing of the residence of Allende - the palace of La Moneda - caused a shock in the world, quite comparable to air attack on the symbol of American capitalism - the International Trade Center in New York ... But an attempt on the legitimate head of the Chilean state is already a terrorist act. This should be remembered."

Speaking about the fight against terrorism, M. Wolf stated:

“The purpose of our contacts with terrorists was the same: to identify and analyze possible threats, to obtain information about the plans of terrorists and their actions. And all so that these actions do not spill over into the territory of the GDR and its allies. There were also contacts with some Arab groups. Even with the completely adventurous group "Jackal" Carlos. But all this, I repeat, is only to penetrate the plans of the terrorists, and by no means to support them. How else? Let's take al-Qaeda, for example. Today, it is no secret to anyone that American intelligence agencies worked closely with her in the fight against the Soviet military presence in Afghanistan. Why did the US intelligence agencies not acquire their own agents in this organization? For me it is inexplicable, incomprehensible. If they had their agent network in Al-Qaeda, the tragedy of September 11, 2001 in New York might not have happened.”

At the same time, M. Wolf resolutely stated:

“Fighting terrorism with aircraft carriers, bombers, missiles is ineffective. As shown by the next two or three years. The only effective means is intelligence. First of all, undercover intelligence. No amount of billions invested in setting the gigantic military machine into motion will solve the problem, will not allow penetration to where plans are made and secrets are kept. This is possible only by acquiring valuable agents. A spetsnaz operation can only be carried out when it is clear where the blow is to be delivered. And for this you need reliable sources ...

It is difficult to fence off terrorism. But you can deal with it - if you want. There would be a will. And both. The Palestinian-Israeli confrontation is a special case. There is no evidence that the Palestinians are in any way involved in the crimes of al-Qaeda. There are active people from other countries.

When I was in Israel, I exchanged views with former heads of the local special services. Of course, I can’t say that after that I own the topic in full, I know all the subtleties and nuances. But I am sure that today's military confrontation will not solve either the problem of security for Israel, or the issue of creating their own state for the Palestinians. Of course, there are good plans. They are known. But mutual terror - and I consider terror in the Israeli-Palestinian confrontation precisely mutual - postpones the implementation of these plans for an indefinite time.

The following conclusions of M. Wolf are also instructive:

“In contrast to the common stereotypes that they worked for us for money or were blackmailed, for example, by sexual abuse, etc., I can say with full confidence that we mainly received valuable information from agents who worked from political beliefs. Not communists, not Marxists in worldview, but people of various political persuasions with whom we found a commonality of views.

At first it was a great dislike of American politics when they were an occupying power; then - to the atomic policy of the Americans, who threatened a new war. Then it began to turn more to questions of detente in international relations, the unification of Germany - this was one of the points that brought us together: the GDR for many years stood for a united Germany.

In the 1960s, it was the foreign intelligence of the GDR, in close cooperation with the KGB, that supported the revolutionary movement in the countries of Asia and Africa. By 1986, up to 1,500 infiltrated agents worked for foreign intelligence of the GDR, not counting legal agents at embassies and auxiliary agents. Many of them had great intelligence capabilities, for example, agent Gunther Guillaume was an assistant to German Chancellor Willy Brandt.

Possessing invaluable intelligence material and being a talented analyst, Markus Wolf shrewdly saw the need for the democratization of society in the German Democratic Republic. He did not hide the fact that at first he was attracted by the slogans of perestroika that sounded in the USSR. He warned of the dangers of empty rhetoric about socio-economic transformations. Once Wolf confessed to Russian journalist Viktor Skvortsov:

“I experienced the time of the so-called perestroika very painfully. Because I felt: everything that has become for us an integral part of life and our thinking is turning over and leading not to good, but to the deterioration of the lives of many people close to us. We spent a significant part of 1990-1991 in Moscow, and it was simply painful to watch how the capital of Russia becomes dirty, becomes impoverished, poor. As for politics, there was a lot that was not to my liking.”

There were many reasons for such an assessment. Here is how the cry of the soul his observation:

“There was an acute shortage of democratic regulators in the life of the party itself, and in the life of the state and society. This was the main reason. Intelligence provided, of course, information, analytical documents that corresponded to reality and related to the fundamentals, especially on economic problems. And counter-intelligence, which usually embellished the situation a little, recently gave an objective picture of the situation and mood in the country. We hoped that these materials would wake up someone in the leadership. This did not happen... I still believe that neither socialist ideas, nor what was conceived by Karl Marx and other socialists, are something unreal, a utopia. Concerning political system, then democracy should be characteristic of socialism. And the laws of the market are not "attached" only to capitalism. There were elements of the market in the socialist countries, after the 20th Congress of the CPSU, and in the GDR there were interesting ideas and practical steps towards a market economy, but then it was turned back again. And as far as culture, creativity, individual freedom, the realization of talents are concerned, here too socialism provides all the possibilities.”

The great courage with which Markus Wolf endured the trials that fell to his lot after his forced return to united Germany on September 24, 1991 is admirable.

Being at the head of the intelligence service of the GDR for almost thirty years, that is, at the forefront of the struggle against capitalism, he understood better than others the essence of the notorious Western consumer society, its strengths and weak sides:

“The power of money resorts to violence no less than the power of the state. She acts less explicitly, but no less cruelly. If the abuse of power under "real socialism" begins with the manipulation of the ideal, then capitalism abuses the ideal of individual freedom in the interests of the power of money and to the detriment of the majority of society.

Often the missions of Markus Wolf were wider than intelligence. He participated in secret negotiations with some official and high-ranking figures of the FRG. For example, with Minister of Justice Fritz Schaeffer, who outlined his ideas for the reunification of the two Germanys. Or (through intermediaries) with the Minister for All-German Affairs in Adenauer's cabinet, Ernst Lemmer. He maintained confidential political contacts with the Prime Minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, Heinz Kühn, and with the chairman of the SPD faction in the Bonn Parliament, Fritz Erler. His analysis of the processes taking place within NATO, as well as reports on the plans of the Washington "hawks" were invaluable.

To make friends in higher spheres Bonn Markus Wolf used a variety of methods. So, in order to establish contact with a prominent figure in the Bundestag, who then went under the pseudonym "Julius", he organized his trip along the Volga, and then a visit to a fishing house near Volgograd, where in the most relaxed atmosphere, under the Russian button accordion, dumplings, vodka , caviar and stories of a fisherman who lost two sons at the front, found a common language with him.

When repressions against former GDR intelligence officers poured in an avalanche in uniting Germany, M. Wolf went to Austria with his wife. From there, on October 22, 1990, he wrote a letter to Mikhail Gorbachev, in which he asked him to raise the question of the fate of his fellow intelligence officers there, who were treated worse than prisoners of war, before the upcoming visit of the then Soviet leader to Germany. The letter ended with the words: “You, Mikhail Sergeevich, will understand that I stand up not only for myself, but also for many for whom my heart hurts, for whom I still feel responsible ...”. However, Gorbachev, who played with the West, not only did not take any measures, but also did not answer this letter. Moreover, having arrived in Moscow after that, Wolf was convinced of all kinds of evasions regarding his stay in the USSR. Gorbachev's and Yeltsin's entourage did not want to spoil relations with the gaining weight new Germany. Therefore, M. Wolf made a strong-willed decision to return to his homeland and share the fate of his former colleagues who were in trouble.

During the trial, he behaved with dignity, expressed indignation at the very fact of bringing to justice people who acted in the interests of their legally existing state, a member of the UN. During the investigation and trial, M. Wolf pleaded not guilty, did not disclose any of the "sources" and any operations of the Stasi.

On December 6, 1993, Markus Wolf was sentenced to six years in prison, but released on bail. In the summer of 1995, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled in the case of Markus Wolff's successor, General Werner Grossmann, according to which it was established that GDR intelligence officers were not subject to prosecution in the FRG for treason and espionage. On this basis, the Federal Court of Justice overturned the sentence of the Düsseldorf Court against Wolf.

He spent the rest of his life in his apartment in the center of Berlin, doing literary work. The books of the general, whose name alone caused the horror of "respectable" burghers, turned out to be unexpectedly romantic. He devoted the collection "Friends Don't Die" to stories about German, Soviet and American comrades with whom fate brought him together. I was lucky to be at the presentation of this talented work in Central house journalist of the Russian Federation, where the author excitedly recalled life in the Soviet country and the peculiarities of working in the Stasi.

The general invariably spoke respectfully of Russia, especially liked to visit the Volga region, renewed Moscow, and visited Siberia three times. He spoke Russian well and appreciated Soviet and anti-fascist German songs.

The legendary head of the Stasi passed away on November 9, 2006 in Berlin. Several thousand people accompanied him on his last journey: former executives The GDR and the leaders of the left parties in Germany, his associates and cultural figures, student youth.

The highly professional intelligence officer Markus Wolf remained true to the ideas to which he devoted his life. He was persistently courted, trying to win over to their side, walkers from the US Central Intelligence Agency, promising a villa in evergreen California and millions of rewards. The Israeli Mossad, as well as the British special services, also called. He was not tempted by any promises. Honor and glory to the Stasi super-professional Markus Wolf!

Vyacheslav LASHKUL, Scientific Secretary of the Society for the Study of the History of Russian Special Services

KGB and Stasi. Two shields, two swords