[104-10210-10068.pdf — page 258]
343. and asked whether the Russian people had been told about it.GAMKRELIDZE replied that they had not been told officially butknew it had taken place since there was "quite a grapevine" inMoscow. As an example, he said that it was in this way that hehad heard about the NOSENKO defection and its significance. Ex-panding, GAMKRELIDZE stated that the "grapevine" indicated thatthe defection "was very damaging to Soviet Intelligence in thatNOSENKO was the Chief of the American Section, and he knew theidentities of all Soviet agents in the United States."7. GOLITSYNThe defector GOLITSYN is the only source of information onNOSENKO'S KGB career who claims to have been personally acquaintedwith him. GOLITSYN said that he met NOSENKO for the first time in1953 when visiting the American Department of the KGB Second ChiefDirectorate on business, and that he saw and spoke with NOSENKO ona number of occasions subsequently, most recently in 1959. Thisfirst-hand information from GOLITSYN, however, is not always con-sistent either internally or in comparison with that supplied byNOSENKO.CIA has no record that GOLITSYN, prior to the publicityattending NOSENKO's defection, ever mentioned him by name or inconnection with the KGB Second Chief Directorate. On 19 March1962, prior to NOSENKO's first contact with CIA, GOLITSYN wasshown NOSENKO's name among those of other Soviets in Geneva forthe Disarmament Conference. He failed to comment on it.On 26 June 1962, after CIA's initial meetings with NOSENKOand because of the large overlap of NOSENKO's information andcontacts with GOLITSYN's, one of the CIA case officers who hadmet NOSENKO in Geneva met with GOLITSYN to obtain his commentson some of the NOSENKO material. GOLITSYN was told that CIA hadreceived in Switzerland an anonymous letter which reported cer-tain information from within the KGB; the CIA official statedto GOLITSYN that the information so closely overlapped his ownreporting, including prominent mention of GOLITSYN's friends GUK,KOVSHUK, and CHURANOV, that the possibility of disinformationwas suspected, perhaps in relation to GOLITSYN's own defection.Ten major items from NOSENKO were discussed with GOLITSYN, allpertaining to Second Chief Directorate operations, and a listof 15 names was shown him, identified as names of Second ChiefDirectorate personnel whom the letter writer had named. Amongthese names was (inu) NOSENKO, and GOLITSYN indicated he hadpreviously reported on him; CIA records, however, show thatGOLITSYN had reported only on one Aleksandr Fedoseyevich NOSENKO,who had been a KGB officer in Japan when RASTVOROV defected tothe U.S. in 1954. GOLITSYN made no further comments on thesenames, except to say that one identified as KGB had left thatorganization in 1961 for the MVD. GOLITSYN said that in general,lacking the full details necessary for an assessment, he couldsay that there were serious signs of disinformation in what hehad seen; he wanted to see the full information on the case.Subsequently GOLITSYN made numerous demands for this informa-tion, complaining to Attorney General Robert KENNEDY and seniorCIA officials because his request had not been granted.On 10 February 1964 NOSENKO's defection from the Soviet Disarma-ment delegation in Geneva, Switzerland, was publicized, includinghis KGB affiliation. When GOLITSYN heard this news he immediatelyrecalled the June 1962 "letter" in Switzerland and linked NOSENKOto it; he thereupon stated that he recalled NOSENKO as a memberof the Second Chief Directorate working against American citizens.GOLITSYN on 11 February 1964 raised the possibility of hisparticipation in efforts to "break" NOSENKO, and at this time hewas given some background on the case and an indication of CIA's