Spymaster, page 48
From the very beginning this private company received unofficial backing of the Soviet authorities. Its staff consisted of respected engineers and scientists, but most of its foreign operations were controlled by the KGB. Although I was vice president of the company in charge of foreign contacts, I was not approached by my former colleagues for fear of unwanted publicity. They dealt directly with the president, and he would say to me apologetically that I should understand his problem; if he refused their requests, then the company would be in trouble.
Understanding his predicament, I bargained for the right to provide my experience as a public relations expert to other companies, and he agreed. Soon I became an adviser to an oil company based in Siberia and then to a French company involved in purchasing nonferrous metal and ore. My relations with the French allowed me to travel across the country, to visit all the Russian republics of the North Caucasus, where we made mutually advantageous deals. Farther south, in Armenia, my efforts to promote French commercial relations with now independent republics were welcomed and facilitated by President Levon Ter-Petrosyan. While traveling to remote mountainous areas of Armenia, I had a unique opportunity to get acquainted with the ancient culture of this small country, to better understand the problems of that part of the world. I succeeded in making more deals for my French partners. On several occasions I asked them not to take advantage of local officials who would expect bribes from their foreign counterparts. I did not want to be involved in any such deal, since bribes were an inevitable part of business transactions. I learned later that my French friends paid $5,000 to one of the ministers of the Armenian government for his amenable stand in negotiations.
In the fall of 1992 my business activity was briefly interrupted by another telephone call, not unlike the one I had gotten two years earlier. It was from a group of voters in the Krasnodar region asking me to run for a seat in the Russian parliament. I immediately agreed, thinking I had an excellent chance of winning and reentering Russian politics. How wrong I would prove to be.
By that time Yeltsin’s reforms had stumbled, and Russia was turning into a corrupt and criminalized state. The so-called privatization, conducted irresponsibly, ignoring the psychology of people who had lived for nearly seventy-five years in a totalitarian paternalistic environment, turned them against the reformers, against Yeltsin’s erratic, unpredictable rule. But I did not realize the depth of the disappointment and wrath in the society and was puzzled by the reluctance of my former political friends to enter the election campaign. One day I visited my sponsor in the democratic movement, Yuri Afanasiev, who had become president of a new university in Moscow, and asked him why he did not participate in the elections.
“It does not make sense to run again,” said Afanasiev sadly. “We are doomed to lose. Our time is over, Oleg.”
I could not believe my ears. A year after the collapse of the Communist system I was still quite popular in my country and basked in the public recognition. I traveled across Russia from its new western borders to the mining regions of the Altai and the Kuril Islands in the Far East. Wherever I spoke publicly, I would get standing ovations. I made a lot of friends among the Moscow political elite and intellectuals. In 1991 my birthday celebration was attended by, among others, Alexander Yakovlev, Vadim Bakatin, Eugene Primakov, and Nikas Safronov, a rising star in Russian art who would later become a Kremlin favorite.
Like many Russians, I was critical of Yeltsin’s botched reforms and spoke out against the lack of genuine changes in the Russian security services. Viktor Barannikov, who was then chief of the Federal Security Service, once approached me at a public gathering and said, “I’m aware of your public criticism of our agency. What bothers you? Why don’t you stop by my office and we’ll talk about our common problems.”
Barannikov never called back and was dismissed in 1993 by President Yeltsin in the wake of a major corruption scandal and his participation in the revolt against Yeltsin.
Why not run again? Afanasiev’s words rang in my ears. It was not even a matter of popularity; it was a matter of principle. We must not give up. We must persevere. How can we ever win if we do not try?
But I misjudged the mood of the Russian people. Moscow always differed from the rest of the country, as did Leningrad, now called St. Petersburg. Some industrial centers remained essentially loyal to the reforms, though they were also disgusted by Yeltsin’s performance. But the rest of the population felt betrayed by the new breed of Russian politicians. They grew nostalgic about the old days of “law and order.” In the Krasnodar region, the mostly rural voters would turn away from me too. And yet I tried.
The district in which I was running was smaller than my old Krasnodar district and, I thought, more advantageous for a reform candidate since it included the city of Krasnodar and the big cities of the Russian Black Sea coast. But as I began to campaign in November 1992, I realized that the situation had swung 180 degrees since my last race in August 1990. Battered by rising prices, confused by a market economy, and fed up with Yeltsin and his fellow reformers, the electorate I faced was nothing like the one I saw during my first campaign. In August 1990, I was drawing hundreds, sometimes thousands, of people to my speeches and rallies. In November 1992, 1 was lucky if I could get a few dozen people to come and hear me. The voters were angry and apathetic and sick of hearing about the shining promise of market reforms. I soon realized I had a real fight on my hands. My chief opponent was Nikolai Kondratenko, a former regional Communist Party official who had become chairman of the Krasnodar legislature.
As the three-week campaign wore on, I grew more and more pessimistic about my chances. On election day, even I was stunned by the results. Only 37 percent of the voters came to the polls, and the former Communist governor received 70 percent of the vote. I finished third with a mere 7 percent, compared to the 57 percent I had won just two years before. Since less than 50 percent of the voters had turned out, the election was declared invalid and rescheduled for the spring of 1993. But I had learned my lesson and was not about to run for office again, at least not in Krasnodar. Now I had no choice but to intensify my business involvement, though Russian politics did not inspire much confidence in my business projects.
In 1993 I watched with dismay as Russia became increasingly paralyzed by a power struggle between Yeltsin and his opponents, parliament chairman Ruslan Khasbulatov and Vice President Rutskoi. That September, Russia’s political conflict reached the breaking point when Yeltsin disbanded the Russian parliament. On October 3, our worst fears came true as armed followers of Rutskoi and the parliament rampaged through Moscow’s streets, killing policemen and citizens. Believing that the armed revolt against Yeltsin had begun, Rutskoi and Khasbulatov called on followers to seize the central TV tower in Moscow and storm the Kremlin. That night—a Sunday—dozens died and more than one hundred were injured as pro-Yeltsin troops fought off an attack on the television center.
The Russian president and his top military commanders had no choice but to quell this rebellion. The next morning I, along with the rest of the world, watched in amazement as Russian tanks pounded the White House. It was a shocking and humiliating spectacle, but I felt Yeltsin had been given no choice; I only wished that he had acted more forcefully against his opponents months earlier. With the taking of the White House and the arrest of Rutskoi, Khasbulatov, and other leaders of the revolt, Yeltsin had done militarily what he had been unable to do politically—crush the opposition. I didn’t like the methods, but I was not unhappy with the result. Over the spring and summer of 1993, it had become increasingly clear that the Communist and nationalist opposition had one overriding goal: to depose Yeltsin by any means, roll back reforms, recreate an autocratic Russian government and, if possible, reinstate the Soviet Union. The men who tried to pull off the October 1993 uprising were not unlike those who carried out the August 1991 coup and—thank God—utterly incompetent. Yeltsin was lucky that his opponents were so mediocre.
Within months, however, we seemed to be sliding back into lawlessness and conflict. In February 1994, I was stunned when the newly elected Russian parliament (featuring the nationalist and KGB creature Vladimir Zhirinovsky) voted to grant amnesty to not only Khasbulatov and Rutskoi but also the motley crew that pulled off the coup of August 1991. Nothing could have more sharply underscored the lawlessness that plagued Russian society. So, I had to live with new realities and look for new opportunities. In the first year of Yeltsin’s rule, I was contacted by a guy who introduced himself as a senior adviser to the chief of Yeltsin’s administration. I had met the chief earlier through my friends in the Moscow Party apparatus and we spent one evening together drinking and dancing. On behalf of the administration, this adviser, a recent graduate of the Moscow Institute of International relations, specializing in world finance, suggested that I become chairman of a major bank attached to his office. I declined, explaining that I had no knowledge or experience of banking. But I agreed to work as a consultant who would promote international contacts and carry out specific missions for the bank.
At that time I also resumed my relationship with the French and worked with them until I left for the United States in 1995 after Rosnet struck a deal with AT&T, the prestigious U.S. telecommunications company. Our relations with AT&T had begun to unfold a year earlier, and I played an important role in the negotiations which culminated in a major agreement signed in Moscow. On the U.S. side, AT&T was represented by several individuals, including the vice president of the company and a former U.S. Senate aide, Paul Joyal, who would later become my partner in the Russian-American joint venture Intercon. A graduate of Catholic University based in Washington, D.C., Joyal asked me if I would be interested in teaching for one semester in America and simultaneously consulting for AT&T on marketing prospects in Russia and the former Soviet republics. With Rosnet growing ever more dependent on KGB support in external relations, especially with Western European telecommunication companies, I felt that my absence for a few months would not hurt the company’s interests. My boss did not object, and in late 1993 I landed at Washington’s Dulles airport to take up a new assignment in the United States—teaching and consulting.
Paul Joyal turned out to be a loyal partner and a good friend. Within months we became fully operational as the consulting company Intercon. Our ties with AT&T and Russian telecommunications converted our company into a Russian outlet in the United States. The U.S. interests were fully represented by Paul. Through his connections at Catholic University, I received a temporary position as a professor of contemporary Russian history. Three times a week I would be engaged at the university with lectures and seminars. Some of my lectures were open to the general public, and within weeks I met distinguished representatives of the U.S. intelligence community. Among them was former CIA director Richard Helms. He attended two of my lectures, talked to me afterward, and then invited my wife and me to dinner at his home. For nearly ten years after that, we would meet regularly. The last time I saw him was at a prestigious club in the Washington area. He looked frail and exhausted. He died a few weeks later, and I went to his funeral to pay my respects to the outstanding American intelligence officer.
Before I met Helms I was lucky to become friendly with yet another remarkable man, former CIA director William Colby. During one of my first trips abroad after I became People’s Deputy of the USSR, I got acquainted with Colby at a seminar in Berlin devoted to the problems of international terrorism. Colby invited me to join him at a nearby restaurant, and the next day we were both interviewed in Treptow Park by German television. As we walked in the park and answered questions on camera, our interviewer asked me pointedly, “What do you think of Mr. Colby as a former leading figure in U.S. intelligence?” It was May 1991, and the KGB still exercised full control of the USSR. Yet my answer was unequivocal and defiant. “Had I had a choice in my earlier life, I would have gladly worked under Mr. Colby rather than under KGB Chairman Kryuchkov.”
Colby traveled to Russia in late 1991 and this time I hosted him at a dinner in my home. We would become friends and collaborators in a Hollywood-produced videogame, Spycraft. Colby’s untimely death shocked me. We had planned to meet at his country home on the Chesapeake Bay in a week or so. I lost a friend whom I deeply respected and trusted.
I knew that many people in the intelligence community disliked Colby, largely because of his testimony on Capitol Hill in which he had disclosed some “family” secrets to U.S. legislators. When I talked to Colby about his problems, he readily admitted that. I’ll never forget what he told me: “We belong to a very special part of the federal government. We are a supersecret agency, but when I face the elected representatives of the American people, I have no right to lie. I work for the people of my country, not some corporation. I have no right to lie to them.”
My business tour of America ended in the summer of 1994. I enjoyed my new engagements. I was well treated both by the people and the authorities. Russia continued to be a major attraction from both economic and political perspectives. The tragic events of 1993 marred the optimistic view of Russia’s progress toward democracy, but did not radically change the Western assessment of developments in the country.
In 1994, St. Martin’s Press published my book in the United States—the same year it went on sale in the United Kingdom under a different title. In 1995, the original version of my book in Russian finally appeared in bookstores in Russia. My Moscow editors had warned me that they had to substantially abridge my manuscript because it contained sensitive material which could lead to legal or other problems with the authorities. But I was happy anyway.
That year I celebrated my sixtieth birthday at the Rossia nightclub in downtown Moscow. With some four dozen friends attending the event, I felt as confident as ever. The future looked bright to me. But several months later, on the eve of the new year, the Russian army invaded rebellious Chechnya, trying to restore absolute rule in this autonomous republic in the North Caucasus. Russian Defense Minister Pavel Grachev boasted, “We will crush the rebels in a few days with a regiment of our troops.”
A week later, the Russian military adventure turned into a fiasco. The Russian army was routed and withdrew. Yeltsin would admit later that the invasion of Chechnya was the worst mistake of his presidency. The events in Chechnya made me feel sick, and I could not remain silent. I worked with a number of Russian politicians to organize a rally in Moscow protesting Yeltsin’s adventurism. And it was a flop. Some two hundred Muscovites turned up at the meeting shouting, “Hands off Chechnya! Give them freedom!” Compared to huge demonstrations in Gorbachev’s era and in the aftermath of the armed uprising in 1993, the antiwar rally was a failure. The mood of the nation had changed. Few people were now interested in anything but their own survival.
On May 1, the traditional Soviet and Russian holiday, I walked near the Kremlin wall toward the National Hotel, where I was supposed to have lunch with a foreign correspondent. In the distance I saw a huge crowd of demonstrators under red banners pouring into the square next to the Kremlin. A young man, apparently one of the demonstrators, was walking toward me and stopped suddenly when he recognized me. He came close to me and hissed, “You traitor. I’ll kill you now.” He started fumbling in his pockets and I immediately understood that he was deadly serious.
My first reaction was to strike him, but he looked stronger and huskier than I. So I engaged him in a conversation.
“Whom did I betray?” I asked as calmly as I could. “I have always been and remain loyal to my people.”
“You betrayed our cause, our leader Stalin,” he responded, looking furtively around.
“But I admired Stalin when I was young,” I replied, also looking around for help.
A hundred yards away I saw a policeman walking in our direction. “Here comes a policeman,” I said. The man saw him too and hurried away.
That evening I told my wife about the encounter near the Kremlin walls. She was scared. She told me she had received several anonymous telephone calls in the past months with curses and threats, but she never told anyone about them. For the first time since August 1991, I felt uneasy.
The solution to my new problems came soon from the United States. In August 1995, a contract was signed in Moscow to launch Rosnet International JSC.
On October 3 of that year, with a three-year contract in my pocket, I arrived in the United States as a Russian partner of AT&T. I never thought that my temporary status would transform into a new life. In Russia I left many friends, bittersweet memories, lots of property and personal belongings. I did not plan to stay in America beyond the contract obligations.
Yes, I felt disillusioned over Russia’s progress toward democracy. Yes, I felt betrayed like millions of my countrymen by Yeltsin’s bungled reforms, by the ineptitude, corruption, and lies of the new regime. But I intended to return and contribute to Russia’s eventual rebirth, help resolve her staggering problems. I remained an optimist, and to those who persisted in seeing a gloomy future for Russia, I could only say, Look how far we have come since 1985, when Mikhail Gorbachev took power. In the space of a decade, the Soviet and Russian people have broken free of the bloodiest totalitarian system the world has ever seen. We have reversed nearly seventy-five years of terrifyingly centralized rule and have begun to dismantle the gigantic contraption that was the Soviet economy. We are creating a market economy, albeit one that is often wild, unprincipled, and infiltrated by the Mafia. And despite a history of centuries of autocratic rule, be it under the czars or the Bolsheviks, we have been trying to build a real democracy with a new constitution, legislature, and balance of powers. In short, we have been trying—in the space of a decade or two—to do something that has taken countries like America centuries to accomplish. It is a process that is at once ugly and inspiring. I am sure it will not be completed in my lifetime, but I am equally sure that in the years to come Russia will be a democratic and increasingly prosperous state.
