Every now and then, while researching other materials being translated, I’ll bump into a curious news article that catches the eye and won’t let it go. For example, this gem from the Ph…

Every now and then, while researching other materials being translated, I'll bump into a curious news article that catches the eye and won't let it go. For example, this gem from the Philadelphia Inquirer from 10 January 1986: As I was living and working in West Berlin at the time, many kilometers within the bowels of East Germany, I should have caught wind of this information and not have been surprised some 40 years later.

Earlier this week, the official website for the Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation published an article on newly revealed activities of the nuclear industry’s counterintelligence organs…

Earlier this week, the official website for the Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation published an article on newly revealed activities of the nuclear industry's counterintelligence organs. We're translated the article and are happy to provide it to our readers. Nuclear Secrets of Department "K": Counterintelligence Activities in the Development of Russia’s Nuclear Industry 1 December 2025 Eighty years ago, on November 15, 1945, Department "K" was created within the People's Commissariat of State Security (NKGB) of the USSR.

An earlier article from TranslatingHistory offered some details from a brief interrogation of Aleksandr Lakhno, who was trained in West Germany in the early 1950s along with several other émigrés f…

An earlier article from TranslatingHistory offered some details from a brief interrogation of Aleksandr Lakhno, who was trained in West Germany in the early 1950s along with several other émigrés from the Soviet Union to carry out, at best, an anti-Soviet propaganda campaign. Lakhno spent months learning tradecraft from US and British intelligence specialists in the Bavarian countryside, with the objective of eventually being air-dropped into Soviet territory to conduct subversion, sabotage, and intelligence collection activities.

The Central Archives of the Russian Federation Federal Security Service (FSB) recently declassified documents from criminal cases against members of a group of American intelligence agents — Aleksa…

The Central Archives of the Russian Federation Federal Security Service (FSB) recently declassified documents from criminal cases against members of a group of American intelligence agents — Aleksandr Lakhno, Aleksandr Makov, and Sergei Gorbunov — who served in Nazi penal establishments during the Great Patriotic War and were arrested in April 1953 by Soviet state security elements in Ukraine. Aleksandr Lakhno, a native of Lisichansk, crossed sides in 1942 as a Soviet soldier, voluntarily joining the German punitive unit Sondergruppe Peter [

One factor preventing wider recognition of the Holodomor as a central moment in 20th century history is the lack of compelling treatment in film.

On 22 August 1948, the Minister of State Security (MGB) of the Ukrainian SSR, General-Lieutenant Sergey Savchenko wrote a lengthy report to his USSR counterpart, General-Colonel Viktor Abakumov reg…

On 22 August 1948, the Minister of State Security (MGB) of the Ukrainian SSR, General-Lieutenant Sergey Savchenko wrote a lengthy report to his USSR counterpart, General-Colonel Viktor Abakumov regarding efforts to entrap two young men of Jewish ancestry believed to have arrived in the Soviet Union from China attempting to gain entry into the Ukrainian resistance organization OUN (Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists…

In 2020, the official periodical of the Russian FSB carried a lengthy but interesting breakdown of the history and successes enjoyed by the Finnish Radio Intelligence Service (Radiotiedustelukeskus, or RTK) during the Winter War between Finland and the USSR (1939-1940), as Germany's ally during World War II (1941-1944), and during the Lapland War (1944-1945) against Germany. The article also details Finland's collaboration with Sweden via…

1956 was a difficult year for the Soviet Union. February saw Khrushchev’s Secret Speech, and within months, the Warsaw Pact nations were made aware of Stalin’s overall shabby behavior, …

1956 was a difficult year for the Soviet Union. February saw Khrushchev's Secret Speech, and within months, the Warsaw Pact nations were made aware of Stalin's overall shabby behavior, to put it lightly. Poland was particularly vocal through its media in badmouthing Soviet culture, fashion, and life in particular. On 26 September 1956, Soviet Embassy counsellor P.P. Turpitko in Warsaw dashed off a five-page encrypted telegram to Moscow to the Central Committee of the CPSU filling in Committee members and seniors in the Foreign Ministry on Poland's apparently free reign in openly mocking and casting aspersions at all things Soviet.

Until 13 May 1961, the Soviet Union had officially (albeit secretly) been working on a project to built a spacecraft armed with a nuclear weapon which would be sent to be detonated on the surface o…

Until 13 May 1961, the Soviet Union had officially (albeit secretly) been working on a project to built a spacecraft armed with a nuclear weapon which would be sent to be detonated on the surface of the moon. The project also called for the creation of the appropriate device to record the detonation, presumably to allow Earth-bound scientists to analyze the results, including the impact of the moon's gravity and negligible atmosphere, and study the subsequent debris cloud and its spread as it moves away from the moon.

On November 22, 1963, US President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. The event shocked the entire world and elicited waves of sympathy on both sides of the Iron Curtain. The genera…

On November 22, 1963, US President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. The event shocked the entire world and elicited waves of sympathy on both sides of the Iron Curtain. The generally positive attitude in the USSR towards the young American president was finally solidified after the publication in Pravda on June 11, 1963, of his keynote speech "Reconsidering Our Attitude Towards Peace."  His openly expressed sympathies for the Russian nation and culture, and his firm conviction that it was possible and necessary to reach an agreement with the Communists on peace and cooperation, despite the ideological divide – all this seemed to open a new page in world history.

On 6 March 1953, a massive warm front struck otherwise icy northern Europe, and wound its way east- and westward, eventually circling the globe. The reason for the warmer than normal air temperatur…

On 6 March 1953, a massive warm front struck otherwise icy northern Europe, and wound its way east- and westward, eventually circling the globe. The reason for the warmer than normal air temperatures was the massive sigh of relief simultaneously exhaled from the entire population of the Soviet Union upon learning that Josef Stalin was dead. And not only merely dead, but clearly most sincerely dead.

Hopes were certainly high when Stalin declared a census be taken in 1937 across the entire Soviet Union. As the illustration above shows, gigantic success was anticipated for socialism in the USSR.…