MARINA AND LEE HARVEY OSWALD
Originator: CIA
From: WITHHELD
Document date: 11/29/1990
Document type: PAPER - TEXTUAL DOCUMENT

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2022 RELEASE UNDER THE PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY ASSASSINATION RECORDS ACT OF 1992

OG/DMSE

SECRET NOFORN NOCONTRACT ORCON

COUNTERINTELLIGENCE INFORMATION REPORT

SBCI-6957

29 November 1990

COUNTRY: USSR

SUBJECT: Marina and Lee Harvey OSWALD

1981-1989

DOI:

SOURCE:

A former KGB officer

NOTE

This information is based on reporting from sensitive

sources.

Any further dissemination of this information

beyond the original distribution, including use in briefings

and studies, or inclusion in computer data bases outside of

or inclusion in don

SE Division must first be coordinated with the originating

office.

Normally, it is not releasable outside the do or to

foreign or domestic liaison services.

***

***

[ACTION: Background Information]

1.

According to senior staff officers from theMinsk KGB

Counterintelligence School [Minsk CI School] and Department 1

(American targets] of the Second Chief Directorate (internal

security and counterintelligence--SCD] Headquarters, ex-marine

Lee Harvey OSWALD was an

agent of the KGB, and was one before he

met his future wife, Marina.

The Minsk UKGB had recruited Marina

as a "swallow" [Soviet female prostitutel for use in sexual

entrapment operations. Marina was directed against OSWALD, who

fell in love with her, when he was living in Minsk.

[Headquarters Comment: It was unclear whether the local or

regional UKGB was involved.] Although she was interested in

OSWALD, Marina was more interested in getting away from the USSR

and poverty.

The UKGB considered her an agent, albeit a

reluctant one.

2.

Circa the late 1950s, following his defection to the

USSR,

OSWALD was resettled in an apartment house close to both

the Minsk CI School and Victory Square in a beautiful area on the

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SBCI-6957

Svisloch River where he was placed under full surveillance by the

Minsk UKGB. The Second Department--(foreign counterintelligence)

of the UKGB considered OSWALD an agent because he provided them

with information on his past.

[Source Comment:

It was common

practice in a UKGB to claim a foreigner living in its region as

an agent.

A regional UKGB would forward the subject's physical

description, age,

and any other information it gathered to KGB

Headquarters, claiming the subject as a foreign agent.

Such

regionally claimed agents were not agents in the classic sense,

rather they were an attempt by the regional UKGB to gain

prestige.]

3. Circa 1981 Colonel YURSHAK, then an instructor at the

Minsk CI School, stated that he had

been involved in the OSWALD

Case when he was with the Minsk UKGB.

The Minsk UKGB kept

numerous files on OSWALD which contained agent, surveillance, and

monitoring reports as well as other information. [Headquarters

Comment:

When Source questioned the KGB's rationale for running

OSWALD, an ex-marine with very little access to information, he

was only assured that OSWALD was run in Minsk as an agent.)

YURSHAK, who held a low opinion of OSWALD, stated that OSWALD was

a bit crazy and unpredictable. OSWALD was never required to sign

an agreement to cooperate, even though he was cooperating.

YURSHAK believed that OSWALD knew he was in contact with the KGB.

4. OSWALD was interrogated several times in Moscow by

officers from KGB Headquarters (NFI) •

OSWALD'S KGB handlers

considered passing him to the First Chief Directorate [foreign

intelligence--FCD] to be handled by a KGB Residency in the United

States, but the proposal was ultimately rejected because OSWALD

was considered too unstable.

Upon OSWALD's returned to the u.s.,

his files would have been sent to KGB Headquarters, probably to

Department 1 [American targets] of the SCD.

homesick and wanted to return to the United States.

He

the KGB by refusing to continue cooperating with them.

Their stories were consistent. Each of these officers told

Source that the KGB did not handle OSWALD after his redefection

to the U.S. and had no further contact with him. They also said

that the KGB never tasked OSWALD, and certainly never tasked him

to kill President Kennedy. ] [Source Comment:

The rumors in the

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SBCI-6957

West suggesting that the KGB was involved in KENNEDY'S

assassination were absurd.

The KGB would never risk the scandal

of assassinating a major world leader.]

HEADQUARTERS COMMENT:

This report will be forwarded via separate message to the

Federal Bureau of Investigation.

ALL PORTIONS CARRY CLASSIFICATION AND CONTROLS OF OVERALL

DOCUMENT

Originator: SE/ISG/P - Shirley Powers: cyn

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