Cold War-Era Soviet Spy Gadgets Up For Auction

Cyanide-filled fake teeth (pictured) and cigarette packs concealing cameras are among the hundreds of Soviet spy gadgets going under the hammer at a Beverly Hills auction this week 

Daily Mail: A view to a kill by the KGB: Cyanide-filled fake teeth and cigarette packs containing mini cameras are among Cold War-era Soviet spy gadgets up for auction 

 * Hundreds of Cold War-era spy gadgets and memorabilia, including listening devices and hidden cameras, are going up for auction in Beverly Hills 

 * Most of the items in Saturday's auction at Julien's come from New York's KGB Espionage Museum, which closed last year due to the coronavirus pandemic 

 * The museum's curator had spent decades amassing the Soviet relics and even served as a consultant on the hit TV show Chernobyl 

Cyanide-filled fake teeth and cigarette packs concealing cameras are among the hundreds of Soviet spy gadgets going under the hammer at a Beverly Hills auction this week. 

Many retro espionage devices in the sale by US-based Julien's Auctions - known for Hollywood and pop culture memorabilia - would not be out of place in a classic James Bond movie, including microphones hidden within pens, ashtrays and porcelain plates. 

'The people that actually created these things were the pioneers of miniaturization,' said director of gallery operations Kody Frederick. 

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WNU Editor: Everyone has a hobby. Collecting Cold War-era Soviet spy gadgets is not one of them for me.

Pentagon Drew Up Secret Plans To Invade Britain During The Cold War

America drew up plans to invade Britain in case England became part of Soviet Union

Daily Mail: America drew up secret plans to invade Britain during the Cold War because US generals feared the UK could be taken over by the Soviet Union

* America drew up plans to invade Britain in case England became a part of the Soviet Union during the Cold War
* US generals began preparing a counter-offensive if such an event occurred
* After the end of WWII, British secret service bosses received a request for a topographical survey of UK's coastline and beaches
* Operation Sandstone was approved by the armed forces in August 1946

America drew up plans to invade Britain during the Cold War in case England became part of the Soviet Union, documents have revealed.

US generals feared the 'Reds' would themselves invade the UK and insisted the Admiralty help them prepare a counter-offensive.

In August 1946, British secret service bosses received a request from the US Chief of Naval Operations for a topographical survey of Britain's coastline and beaches.

After WWII, the US feared Soviet expansion into Western Europe after Joseph Stalin aggressively drew the Iron Curtain across the Eastern Bloc. Such was the concern in Washington, it was felt the US should be furnished with a full map for a sea offensive.

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WNU Editor:The plans were drawn up after the Second World War. That was definitely a time when the international situation in Europe was still up in the air.

The Other U-2 Incident During The 1962 October Crisis That Almost Triggered World War III

FoxTrot Alpha: In 1962, A Lost U-2 Spy Plane Nearly Triggered World War III

In October 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis threatened to escalate into global thermonuclear war. The United States and Soviet Union both mobilized over nuclear missiles in Cuba, and a single spark could have effectively ended civilization. But what’s not well-remembered today is that at the height of that dispute, a lost plane near the North Pole nearly led the world down the same path.

On October 4, 1962 a U-S spy plane on a reconnaissance flight over Cuba made a disturbing find: Soviet SS-4 short-range ballistic missiles and SS-5 intermediate range ballistic missiles. Soviet leader Nikita Krushchev had jumped at Cuban leader Fidel Castro’s offer to host missiles in his country, just a few hundred miles from America—and within easy launch range.

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WNU Editor: I grew up during the Cold War, and there are times (like now) I wonder how we survived.

This Is What A Technology Cold War Looks Like

Epoch Times: What a Technology Cold War Could Look Like

During the Cold War, around half of the world ran on the technologies, machinery, and political ideologies developed by the Soviet Union. The other half—the free world—adopted those of the United States and its allies.

As trade war tensions between the United States and China escalate, could we be on the cusp of a new version of the cold war, one which is driven by technology and finance?

Since U.S. President Donald Trump has deemed Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei Technologies as a national security threat and barred it from purchasing key U.S. equipment, Beijing has engaged in an escalating tit-for-tat that could have lasting ramifications on the technology industry going forward.

And Huawei may just be the beginning. Several other Chinese companies are being considered to join the blacklist with Huawei.

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WNU Editor: And this tech war is going to get even more intense .... The tech cold war just got a lot more intense after Russia signed a deal to build 5G internet with Huawei (Business Insider).

Here Are 6 Of NATO's Worst Crises In 70 Years

A Polish army PT-91 tank during NATO exercise Silver Arrow 2017 in Latvia. Ints Kalnins/Reuters

Business Insider: These are 6 of NATO's worst crises in 70 years as the world's most powerful military alliance

* During the Cold War, NATO effectively defended Western Europe with US nuclear weapons.
* Twelve countries signed the North Atlantic Treaty in 1949, and NATO has since grown to 29 countries, including former Soviet states bordering Russia, which has angered Moscow.
* Here are six occasions, from the building of the Berlin Wall to the September 11 attacks, that NATO faced a crisis.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, a pact launched 70 years ago in the ashes of World War II to face Stalin's Soviet threat and bind Western Europe and the US together, is the world's foremost military alliance.

The success of its deterrent power can be seen in a simple reality: NATO's first combat mission only came after the Soviet Union's collapse.

During the Cold War, NATO effectively defended Western Europe with US nuclear weapons, as NATO's office of the historian notes.

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WNU Editor: A reminder that the Cold War was not a pleasant experience for all who had to live under it.

Cold War Agreements Are Disintegrating

Pavel Felgenhauer, RCD/Eurasia Daily Monitor: Agreements That Ended the Cold War Are Disintegrating

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) Nuclear Planning Group (NPG) was probably the Alliance’s most important and secretive institution during the Cold War. Notably, it worked out NATO members’ joint strategy and tactics for using non-strategic nuclear weapons in a possible all-European war with the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact. Such a confrontation seemed all too possible—and sometimes almost inevitable—during acute crisis situations that brought the Cold War opponents to the brink in 1949, 1956, 1962, 1973 and 1983. In the last of the aforementioned crises, tensions spiked as the United States deployed nuclear-tipped land-based cruise missiles as well as medium-range Pershing II ballistic missiles on the territory of several European NATO allies to counter the threat of the deployment of hundreds of Soviet SS-20 nuclear intermediary missiles known in Russia as Pioneer. The Soviets produced over 800 Pioneer missiles, and each carried a heavier payload than the Pershing IIs; but their U.S. counterparts were stealthier and much more accurate.

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WNU Editor: I doubt that we will enter into a new nuclear arms race as in the Cold War. But the current trend lines are troubling.

This Is How NATO Had Planned To Use The Autobahn In The Event That Their Bases Were Destroyed During The Cold War

Popular Mechanics: Watch A-10 Warthogs Landing on the German Autobahn During the Cold War

The alliance prepared for a future war when real air bases were smashed into bits.

During the Cold War, the prospect of war with the Soviet Union forced NATO to consider drastic measures to keep planes flying in wartime, including using stretches of the famous West German Autobahn as temporary airstrips. The destruction of friendly airbases would have sent aircraft such as the mighty A-10 Warthog and West German Alpha Jet onto freeways to continue their mission of destroying Russian tanks.

This Air Force news video, taken in 1984, shows NATO forces temporarily using a stretch of the West German federal highway system, also known as the Autobahn, as an airstrip for a variety of aircraft. The video shows American A-10 Warthogs and F-16D twin-seater jets, as well as West German Tornado IDS strike jets, Alpha Jet close air support aircraft, and C-160 Transall transport aircraft all taking off and landing from the 7,000 foot stretch of highway.

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WNU Editor:  For some reason I doubt that in the event of a nuclear breaking out in Europe during the Cold War the priority would be to fly into Germany .... on the contrary .... the priority would be to fly out and never look back.

The Soviet Union Also Had A Secret Fleet Of American Fighters

Hush Kit: Red Star: The incredible story of the American fighter jet that fell into Soviet hands

Much has been written about USAF’s secret fleet of Soviet fighters, but far less known is the counter story of the American fighter that ended up deep in Russia during the Cold War.

At the end of the war in Vietnam, the USSR received several samples of US aviation equipment captured by the victorious Vietnamese communists, among them was a F-5E light fighter-bomber (of a total of 27 that the North Vietnamese found). The F-5E, serial number 73-00807, was delivered to the Soviet Union. It was an extremely valuable intelligence coup that could tell the Communist super state much about American design and this mass produced aircraft’s capabilities, and how to counter it.

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WNU Editor: I was a teenager at the time, but I do remember my uncle (he was a senior manager in the Soviet Union's satellite program at the time) talking to another one of my uncles at the dinner table on how excited he was (and he was a man who rarely got excited, which is probably the reason why I remember this) on the intelligence coups that the Soviet Union got after the fall of Vietnam. I guess this was one of them.

This Is The Story Behind The Famous Photograph Of An F-4 Flying Inverted Near A Soviet Tu-95 Bear Bomber

"We Did Barrel Rolls Around Tu-95s At The Request Of The Soviets": F-4 WSO Explains The Story Of The Phantom Upside Down Near Bear https://t.co/AMiAaJt5M9 pic.twitter.com/2pTtZPkwBw

— The Aviationist (@TheAviationist) December 9, 2017

The Aviationist: “We Did Barrel Rolls Around Tu-95s At The Request Of The Soviets”: F-4 WSO Explains The Story Of The Phantom Upside Down Near Bear

Here are some memories from the Weapon Systems Officer who shot the famous photograph of the F-4 flying inverted near a Soviet Tu-95 Bear bomber.

Last week we have published a blurry shot of a U.S. Air Force F-4 Phantom flying inverted during an intercept mission on a Russian Tu-95 Bear. The photograph went viral and reached Robert M. Sihler, the author of the shot, who was so kind to provide some interesting details about the image that brought to mind one of the most famous scenes in Top Gun movie.

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WNU Editor: Even the Russians are acknowledging this event .... Cold War fun: Pilot reveals Soviet bomber crews asked US jets to barrel-roll & took pics (PHOTO) (RT).

The U.S. Army Had a Special 'Suicide Squad' Ready to Strike Soviet Forces During The Cold War

Checkpoint Charlie 1963 (Wikipedia)

Michael G. Peck, National Interest: The U.S. Army Had a Special 'Suicide Squad' Ready to Strike Russian Forces

Had the Cold War turned hot, there would have been no escape for the U.S. garrison in West Berlin. Marooned in a city more than 100 miles inside Communist East Germany, the U.S. Berlin Brigade—and the British and French garrisons as well—would certainly have been overwhelmed by Soviet and East German troops. Their presence helped keep half of Berlin free from Communist rule. But it was no secret that theirs was a suicide mission.

Yet there was a unique American unit with an even more hazardous mission: a small Special Forces detachment whose job it would during wartime to conduct guerrilla warfare against the Soviets and their puppet armies. That sentence bears repeating: Deep inside East Germany, in the midst of a vast Soviet military and secret police apparatus, a small group of U.S. commandos would attempt to blow up Russian supply depots and lead local resistance groups.

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WNU Editor: "Suicide squad" is the proper designation for such a squad if they ever tried to implement their mission.

Did The Soviet Union Have A Chance To Win The Cold War?

For one of the last times, the Soviet flag flies over the Kremlin at Red Square in Moscow, on Saturday night, December 21, 1991. The flag was replaced by the Russian flag on New Year's. (AP Photo/Gene Berman)

Robert Farley, National Interest: Did Russia Ever Have a Shot at Winning the Cold War?

Could the Soviets have won the Cold War? In retrospect, Soviet defeat seems overdetermined. The USSR suffered from a backwards economy, an unappealing political system, and unfortunate geography. But even into the 1980s, many Cold Warriors in the West worried that Red Victory was imminent.

We can think of Red Victory in two ways; first, if the fundamental rules of the competition between the United States and the USSR had operated differently, and second if Moscow and Washington had made different strategic decisions along the way.

Changing the Rules

The idea of socio-political “rules” that dictate how the world works runs counter to a lot of work in the social sciences. Still, certain social and political experiments initiated at the start of the Cold War ran aground on the shoals of social and human capacity. If we imagine the loosening of some of these “rules” then the Soviet and American experiments might have performed differently.

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WNU Editor:  I never believed that the Soviet Union had a chance to win the Cold War .... nor did anyone else that I knew at the time in the Soviet Union. If there was a conventional war .... no invading army would succeed in conquering the Soviet Union .... that was universally believed in the Soviet Union (myself included). But the Cold War evolved into an economic and ideological conflict .... a conflict that President Reagan accelerated .... and one that I knew that the Soviet Union could not hope to win for the simple that at the time I was one of the few Soviet citizens who had the opportunity to really know what the West was all about .... its strengths and its resilience .... and not what the Soviet media was trying to portray. And when the lines of communication between the West and Russia opened up even further under Gorbachev .... when the people in the Soviet Union could finally compare their standard of living to those in the West .... I knew that the ideological battle would be lost. The only surprised that I had from the Cold war was at the end .... when I stood with my father in Red Square and we saw the Soviet flag brought down from the Kremlin, and the Russian flag put in its place. We both knew that the Soviet Union had to change ..... it is that we never thought it would happen so quickly.

Russians Are Laughing At Western Fears Of A New Cold War

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov (L) listens to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry during a news conference at the United Nations Headquarters in Manhattan, New York, December 18, 2015. REUTERS/EDUARDO MUNOZ

WNU Editor: Yup .... this AP post is spot on .... Ordinary Russians think Western fears of a new Cold War are 'laughable' (Nataliya Vasilyeva, Associated Press). But for the Kremlin, the Russian military, and the Russian Foreign office .... they are taking the threat of a new Cold War very seriously.

Is A New Cold War Starting?

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov (L) listens to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry during a news conference at the United Nations Headquarters in Manhattan, New York, December 18, 2015. REUTERS/EDUARDO MUNOZ

Michael Weiss, Daily Beast: Barack Obama’s Wrong: The New Cold War's Only Just Begun

From propaganda to missile deployments, Russian leader Vladimir Putin is testing Obama’s resolve—while claiming to be America’s victim.

In one of the better studies of Putinology to appear in the last year, Mikhail Zygar’s All the Kremlin’s Men does much to upend the conventional wisdom about U.S.-Russian relations, particularly as offered by the American architects of those relations over the past eight years.

“Vladimir Putin,” Zygar writes, “did not like the new American president from the start. For him, Barack Obama was both soft and intractable… Paradoxically, Obama, the most idealistic and peace-loving U.S. president in living memory, became a symbol of war in Russia, a target for Russian state propaganda and racist jokes, and a hate figure for millions of patriotic Russians. He was caricatured as an ill-fated enemy doomed to be defeated by Vladimir Putin.”

Surveying some much-buried news over the last seven days, one begins to appreciate the weight of this grim appraisal.

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WNU Editor: I had to choke on this line from Michael Weiss' commentary ....

.... Obama, the most idealistic and peace-loving U.S. president in living memory.

President Obama has (via through his actions) not been peace-loving .... as for being idealistic .... I have seen him to be more fanatical in pursuing his statist/globalist/cultural agenda and being  uncompromising whiel doing it.

As for Cold War Two .... while Moscow has a lot to be blamed for this rise in tensions .... Washington has not been as innocent as some may like to think it is.

For a contrary point of view that IMHO puts everything in perspective .... Are We Facing 'Cold War Two'? (May 18, 2016).

NATO's Strategy To Deter The Soviet Union (And Now Russia) Has Been Unchanged Since The Late 1940s

Robert Farley, National Interest: Why NATO Expected to Lose Most of Europe to Russia

Cold War lessons on the promise—and nuclear peril—of escalation

A recent RAND wargame on a potential Russian offensive into the Baltics brought talk of a “new Cold War” into sharp focus. The game made clear that NATO would struggle to prevent Russian forces from occupying the Baltics if it relied on the conventional forces now available.

These wargames have great value in demonstrating tactical and operational reality, which then informs broader strategic thinking. In this case, however, the headlines generated by the game have obscured more about the NATO-Russian relationship than they have revealed. In short, the NATO deterrent promise has never revolved around a commitment to defeat Soviet/Russian forces on NATO’s borders. Instead, NATO has backed its political commitment with the threat to broaden any conflict beyond the war that the Soviets wanted to fight. Today, as in 1949, NATO offers deterrence through the promise of escalation.

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WNU Editor: Being one who grew in the Soviet Union .... later Russia .... I always found these "war scenarios" uncomfortable and strange. The reason why is simple .... among my many family members, friends, associates, colleagues, people I knew in the military or government,  etc. .... I never met anyone who openly advocated for an invasion of NATO. Everyone saw such a scenario as a lose-lose situation .... hence to be avoided. Flash forward to today .... the situation is different .... Russia would invade the Baltics if they felt that the Russian minority that lives there were in danger .... Putin (or his successor) would enjoy overwhelming support because such an action would be viewed as protecting Russians. Ditto with the support that Russia is giving to the Russian Ukrainians in eastern Ukraine .... right or wrong the perception in Russia is that they must protect their Russian cousins ,,,, and international opinion be damned. But is it worthwhile for NATO to got to war against Russia if the reason why Russia is acting in such a manner is to protect people whose nationality is Russian .... I am willing to wager that they will not (but only under such a situation).

U.S. Nuclear Target List From The 1950s Reveals That Population Centres In The Soviet Union Were Prime Targets

SSBN-726 Ohio-Class FBM Submarines. FAS.org

New York Times: 1950s U.S. Nuclear Target List Offers Chilling Insight

WASHINGTON — Target category No. 275 from the nuclear target list for 1959 may be the most chilling. It is called simply “Population.”

For the first time, the National Archives and Records Administration has released a detailed list of the United States’ potential targets for atomic bombers in the event of war with the Soviet Union, showing the number and the variety of targets on its territory, as well as in Eastern Europe and China.

It lists many targets for “systematic destruction” in major cities, including 179 in Moscow (like “Agricultural Equipment” and “Transformers, Heavy”), 145 in Leningrad and 91 in East Berlin. The targets are referred to as DGZs or “designated ground zeros.” While many are industrial facilities, government buildings and the like, one for each city is simply designated “Population.”

Update: US aimed to nuke civilian populations in enemy cities during Cold War – declassified document (RT).

WNU Editor: The Soviet Union had a similar list when it came to targeting U.S. sites .... population centres were prime targets. But the question that needs to be asked is .... in terms of targeting what has changed since the 1950s .... are population centres still prime targets? My money is on a "yes" answer.

Here Are 12 Confrontations And Close Calls With The Russians Over the Years

Mark Stout and B.J. Armstrong, War On The Rocks: 12 Other Clashes And Close Calls With The Russians

The shootdown yesterday of a Russian aircraft by a Turkish F-16 is a worrisome development, but historically speaking, incidents involving the United States or NATO countries and Soviet or Russian forces have been fairly common. These include ground, naval, and air incidents. Indeed, there was a long tradition of the Soviet Union shooting at aircraft and people who entered their territory or even come close to it. Even in the post-Soviet era there have been similar incidents with Russian forces. As bad as these events can be, they have yet to lead to war and are usually either swept under the rug or dealt with on a diplomatic level.

Consider 12 of the more notable confrontations:

WNU Editor: No mention of the Cuban Missile Crisis. No mention of Soviet pilots in North Vietnam during the Vietnam war. No mention of accidental nuclear alerts like this one.

How U.S. Intelligence Analysts Were Able To Figure Soviet Air-plane Capabilities With Just Graph Paper And A Calculator

Russian Tu-95 Bear Strategic Bomber. © Sputnik/ Jakutyn

Bill Sweetman, AIR & SPACE MAGAZINE: Spying on the Soviets, With Graph Paper and a Calculator

Figuring out the specs of Cold War Soviet airplanes was educated guesswork, if you had the right tools.

Duuring the cold war, I worked for Flight International in London. Along with my colleague Doug Richardson—every aviation magazine needs a Leica-toting, Scottish, philhellene former-teenage-apprentice-in-a-radar-factory—I was frustrated about our coverage of Soviet technology. One of our competitors was friendly with U.S. Air Force intelligence, another was getting fed snapshots of the latest aircraft from the Military Liaison Missions (MLM)—the Western allies’ legal spies in East Germany—and another employed a chap with a Russian name but a didactic manner that nailed him as Schweizerdeutsch if not German. He seemed to have a source in someone’s intelligence community. And us? We were nowhere.

We found a source who passed us the MLM pictures and plotted over pints in the Rose & Crown. I invested in some graph paper and a Sinclair Cambridge calculator, and we got to work.

WNU Editor: The math, numbers, and data never lie .... how people interpret that data .... well .... that is another story.

A Look At How The Former Soviet Union Mapped The U.S. For Invasion

A 1980 map of San Diego made by the Soviet military. Kent Lee / East View Geospatial

Wired: The Soviet Military’s Eerily Detailed Guide to San Diego

During the Cold War, the Soviet military mapped the entire world in one of the most ambitious mapping projects ever undertaken (see this feature article for more about these amazing maps, and the unlikely group of scholars trying to figure out how they were made—and why). The maps are fascinating to look at, and for those of us who grew up during the paranoid days of the Cold War, seeing your hometown covered in cyrillic text is a bit unsettling.

But the Soviets didn’t stop at just making some of the most accurate and detailed maps of the day. Some of the medium scale maps of include extremely detailed descriptions of the area–everything from the load-bearing capacities of bridges to the paving materials of the roads. (Yes, comrade, they will accommodate your tanks!)

WNU Editor: I am sure the U.S. also has somewhere in their archives detailed maps on what the Soviet Union looked like during the height of the Cold War.

How The CIA Used ‘Doctor Zhivago’ To Undermine The Soviet Union

During Cold War, CIA Used ‘Doctor Zhivago’ As A Tool To Undermine The Soviet Union -- Peter Finn and Petra Couvée, Washington Post

A secret package arrived at CIA headquarters in January 1958. Inside were two rolls of film from British intelligence — pictures of the pages of a Russian-language novel titled “Doctor Zhivago.”

The book, by poet Boris Pasternak, had been banned from publication in the Soviet Union. The British were suggesting that the CIA get copies of the novel behind the Iron Curtain. The idea immediately gained traction in Washington.

“This book has great propaganda value,” a CIA memo to all branch chiefs of the agency’s Soviet Russia Division stated, “not only for its intrinsic message and thought-provoking nature, but also for the circumstances of its publication: we have the opportunity to make Soviet citizens wonder what is wrong with their government, when a fine literary work by the man acknowledged to be the greatest living Russian writer is not even available in his own country in his own language for his own people to read.”

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My Comment: When I was a teenager growing up in the Soviet Union .... I got my hands on the book and I loved reading it. It was only a few years ago that I got the chance to see the movie .... sighhh ... it is not the same. As to undermining the Soviet Union .... LOL.

U.S. Intelligence Has Been Spying On Americans For A Very Long Time

CIA And FBI Spied On Americans And Immigrant Refugees As Early As The Late ’50s -- Richard Rashke, Daily Beast

Since the early days of the Cold War, the FBI and CIA have bent the law to spy on American citizens, starting with Eastern European refugees who had sought sanctuary in this country, writes Richard Rashke.

The National Security Agency isn’t the only intelligence group that has collected data on Americans and hidden the truth from the public. The FBI and CIA engaged in the same strategy following World War II. In each instance, the government bent the law or secretly enacted dubious legislation to make the snooping appear legal.

Soon after World War II ended, the Department of State recognized that there was a huge, untapped pool of Eastern European refugees. Harnessing them to fight the communists they hated was the brainchild of Frank Wisner, a former Wall Street lawyer turned Office of Strategic Services spy and the State Department’s expert on European war refugees. In a secret February 1948 policy paper, Wisner and his study group recommended that the National Security Council sanction the “systematic” use of such refugees. The NSC took Wisner’s advice.

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My Comment: Using this pool of refugees for intelligence purposes was very smart. These people spoke the language, understand the culture, and harbored deep resentment towards (at that time) communist regimes. Considering the "atmosphere" of the time, the fact that they were also watched and spied upon should not have surprised anyone.