Charles McCarry - The Miernik Dossier

3. A bit later in the day I learned from Prince Kalash that there may be a reason for Christopher’s anxiety. The prince mentioned casually, in the midst of a description of the Viennese whore he had had the night before, that he is going to drive Christopher over the Czech border tomorrow (16th June)- and leave him there. Christopher has told him that he wants to see a Communist country and will return to Vienna by his own means. Kalash does not accept this explanation, but he is quite willing to do as Christopher has asked. “He is probably on some spy mission,” Kalash says. I declined an invitation to go along, even with a diplomatic passport.

4. I confronted Christopher with Kalash’s information. I must say he is very professional. He must have been devastated by this leak (although I suppose he expected something like it to happen in dealing with Prince Kalash, who is not only an amateur but incapable of keeping a confidence of any kind). But he showed no discomfort whatever. “It’s just a one-day tour behind the Curtain,” he said. “You can come along if you like. I thought someone should stay with Miernik to keep him from falling out the hotel window.” Not surprisingly, no amount of prodding could induce him to tell me more.

5. Speculation: Christopher’s excursion must be illegal (no American is given a Czech tourist visa) and it must therefore have an operational purpose. I assume that he and I are along on this journey for similar reasons. Therefore what he is doing must have something to do with Miernik. He cannot be taking this extraordinary risk merely to gain information. What would the Czechs, even some Czech controlled by the Americans, know about Miernik that would be sufficiently important and urgent that it could not be communicated in a normal way? It is my belief (again instinctive) that Christopher is going in with the idea of bringing somebody out. Putting together his reaction to my doubts about the existence of Zofia Miernik with Miernik’s preoccupation with his sister, I think it is possible that the Americans have laid on a rescue attempt involving Zofia. The purpose obviously would be to cement Christopher’s relationship with Miernik.

6. Recommendation. That we stand aside entirely from this situation. If Christopher is arrested, as seems likely, I will still be in place. If he does turn up with Zofia Miernik in tow, we will have even stronger reason to believe that Christopher is, as we have always assumed, an American agent, and that his current assignment points to the conclusion that Miernik is up to something sufficiently important to justify Christopher’s masters exposing him to very high risks.

1. In accordance with your instructions, we placed S. Kirnov under twenty-four-hour surveillance during his presence in Vienna 9-13 June.

2. Kirnov registered at the Hotel Ambassador in Kaertner Strasse, Room 816. At 2100 hours on 9 June a transmitter was planted in this room, and audio surveillance of the room telephone was maintained throughout Kirnov’s stay at the hotel. Results were negative. Kirnov, as might be expected, used his telephone only for normal calls to room service, valet, et cetera. He entertained no visitors in his room and therefore conducted no conversations. (When alone Kirnov has a habit of singing; the songs are generally in Polish.)

3. At 1320 hours on 10 June Kirnov made a brief call from a public coin telephone in the Café Sacher, Philharmoniker Strasse. Surveillance was unable to overhear the substance of the conversation.

4. At 0127 hours on 11 June Kirnov met Heinz Tanner, a known agent of the Soviet intelligence service, on the Reichsbrucke bridge. Surveillance was unable to approach close enough to overhear the conversation between Kirnov and Tanner, although photographs taken with a telephoto lens and extra-fast film provided positive identification. Kirnov handed an envelope to Tanner at the conclusion of the conversation.

5. At 1750 hours on 13 June Kirnov departed Vienna for Prague aboard Austrian Airlines flight 312. Surveillance was broken off at Vienna airport after the departure of this flight.

COMMENT: Kirnov’s behavior throughout the surveillance was consistent with the supposition that he is a trained agent. The choice of meeting time with Tanner (0127 hours) is consistent with the Soviet practice of meeting not on the hour, half hour, or quarter hour, but at an odd-numbered time. The site of the meeting with Tanner, in the middle of the largest bridge in Vienna at a time when pedestrian traffic is minimal, demonstrates good professional judgment. Kirnov used public transportation exclusively while in Vienna; he made no effort to shake surveillance until the night of his meeting with Tanner, when he changed buses, trains, and taxis several times in following an indirect route to his destination. We have no reason to believe that Kirnov was aware of our surveillance. His eluding tactic is interpreted as a routine precaution on his part.

I have already given the essentials of the Zofia Miernik operation in my verbal report. In the following narrative I’ll begin at the beginning and end at the end in the hope of filling in details that may be useful in case anyone else ever wants to do the one-day tour of Bratislava.

Kalash had no difficulty getting a Czech visa. One of his uncles is ambassador to Austria. “My Uncle Embarak sent some little chap hopping over to see the Czechs with my passport, Kalash explained. “Everything is laid on at the frontier. While you crouch in the secret compartment, your air supply slowly running out, wishing desperately for a lavatory, I shall be sweeping through the customs, decadent jazz playing on my radio. Uncle has given me some pennants for the front wings of the car. All will be well.”

When on the morning of the sixteenth we went downstairs, the Cadillac was waiting, washed and shined by the servants at Kalash’s embassy. Two pennants were attached to the fenders-the flag of Sudan and another one I didn’t recognize. “That is a small replica of the battle flag of the Mahdi,” Kalash explained. “My great-grandfather, as I may have mentioned to you, led the charge of savages who wiped out Hicks Pasha at Kashgil in 1883.I believe he castrated the senior Englishman with his own sword, which was by that time very dull after hacking at the whites and their tame Egyptians all day. Uncle Embarak has explained the significance of the pennant to the Czechs, so I expect to be cheered at the frontier as the descendant of a very effective anti-imperialist.”

Upstairs, there had been an emotional scene as we prepared to leave. Miernik came into our room while we dressed and sat on an unmade bed, watching in silence. As we started to leave, he shook hands with Kalash, who then went downstairs to supervise the loading of a picnic hamper he had ordered from the hotel kitchen. As the door closed behind Kalash, Miernik rose and flung himself across the room at me. With his good arm he embraced me, and he planted a kiss on my cheek. Then he stood back, with his hand on my shoulder, and looked into my face. Behind his glasses his eyes were filled with tears. “My friend,” he said huskily, “I await your return.” He walked briskly out of the room, like a man hurrying off a train platform after saying good-bye to a brother he knows he will never see again.

Kalash and I started off in the Cadillac at about nine o’clock. By ten we were on the outskirts of the city and well on the way to the border. As soon as we were on the right highway, I turned over the wheel to Kalash, who doesn’t like to drive in cities. We rolled over the country along the Donau, making better time than I expected. I didn’t want to approach the frontier much before two o’clock, since my appointment with Zofia was at 3:40 and I did not want to spend several hours wandering around Bratislava. We found a side road and followed it, looking for a place to stop and waste some time. Kalash did not take very kindly to the delay. He wanted to see Czechoslovakia, turn around, and get back to Vienna in time to catch the early evening shift of prostitutes. “After six o’clock they are no longer fresh,” Kalash said. “You must catch them early or they are covered with footprints.” He calculated that he would have to recross the border no later than four o’clock in order to be in the Mozartplatz, where he had arranged to meet a girl he specially liked, by six.