[104-10211-10001.pdf — page 218]
# TOP SECRET813. to Moscow to explain the situation, and when he was unable to do so, the facts were turned over to the KG3 for full-scale investigation.correspondence with an Austrian woman, "they would never have caught him," and that FOPOV was "arrested because of a connection with a girl;" also,was recalled to Moscow "for somethingKGBat the end of 1959 POPOVWhile the foregoing KGB investigation was in progress, the KGB routinely placed under surveillance a U.S. Embassy official in Moscow. This person was observed renting a boat in Gorkiy Park, going to the vicinity of a new bridge near the Moscow Stadium, and there taking photographs of the bridge and surrounding area. Its suspicions aroused, the KGB covered this area and observed POPOV unloading a dead drop. He was arrested, doubled, and "operated" against American Intelligence for a year and one-half.*Eventually, the KGB put in motion a plan to attempt to compromise the American official who was meeting POPOV. The KGB photographed a meeting in a Moscow restaurant, then arrested the official and showed him pictures of his meeting with POPOV and of POPOV unloading the dead drop at the bridge. After the American refused to work for the KGB, he was released and declared *persona non grata*.**CIA questionedon POPOV'S compromise. He said at this time that he had heard POPOV was apprehended through a dead drop. POPOV "apparently was under suspicion there in Berlin, and when they (presumably the GRU) recalled him to Moscow, they wondered who his future contacts would be, and they were told the following: 'KGB workers place American embassy employees under surveillance.' They observed an American at the staircase... and they found a dead drop under the staircase. So they established coverage of the dead drop and observed POPOV come and unload the drop. They made a report, and after this POPOV was under surveillance... Then he was called in and told thus-and-so. They showed him photographs. They told him he was going to work for them to expose his contacts. He agreed to it...**** Since POPOV returned to Moscow in November 1958 and LANGELLE was arrested the following October, he could not have been doubled against CIA for more than eleven months.** Starting on 4 January 1959, POPOV had a series of six brush contacts in Moscow with the CIA officer Russell LANGELLE of the U.S. Embassy, culminating in the detention and interview of LANGELLE by the KGB on 16 October 1959.***As previously stated, no Moscow dead drops were used by CIA in the POPOV operation, but LANGELLE did survey the possibilities for dead drops to be used in other operations. One of these was located in Lenin Hills, an area of Moscow not far from the new bridge near Moscow Stadium, and it was situated beneath a staircase.LANGELLE visited the area of the dead drop site on 24 and 28 May 1959, but the dead drop was loaded by a CIA legal travel agent (on 7 June 1958) rather than by LANGELLE. The CHEREPANOV document, discussed on Pages 563-564, stated, in the course of reviewing LANGELLE's operational activities in Moscow, that this dead drop was for use with an agent named REPNIKOV; in fact, it was not intended for the REPNIKOV case.# TOP SECRET