Historical story

Fun in cutscenes. How were the super spies of the People's Republic of Poland trained?

The Polish People's Republic was undoubtedly a country of milk and honey. We had the best cars (Fiat 125p set three world speed records), the tallest buildings (PKiN was the second largest in Europe) and the most beautiful women (Aneta Kręglicka became Miss World in 1989). And we trained only spies in at least… bizarre methods.

To become a professional in any field, you need to acquire the necessary knowledge and tools. Espionage is not much different from any other profession in this. One might think that thorough agent training involves months of exhausting physical and paramilitary training, psychological training, language training, memory training.

How to train a super agent?

Hollywood movies like the James Bond adventure series, Recruit or Salt they instilled in us the belief that a good spy should first of all receive military training. It includes learning how to use various types of weapons, self-defense and hand-to-hand combat, or behavior in the event of capture.

Did Polish spies have anything to do with James Bond? Certainly not their training.

The second obligatory point is operational training - and as part of it, learning about the techniques of conspiracy, establishing residencies, secret communications and obtaining information sources.

Patterns of Rotten Capitalists

In the 1970s, CIA spies were trained in Camp Peary in Virginia, in a camp commonly known as the "Farm". They were taught there, among others opening locks and envelopes, paramilitary classes were conducted in the field of light weapons handling, infiltration and parachute jumps.

In the 1960s, agents sent to Cuba received full training in subversive and espionage techniques. The British deployed their spies to a similar extent (physical and field training, reading maps, methods of street fighting, planting loads).

In turn, Japanese agents trained in the Kempei Tai counterintelligence unit were taught, for example, mind control methods . They later became famous for the extreme techniques used to torture prisoners.

A good spy knows when to be silent.

Spies of the brotherly nation

Soviet intelligence, too, made sure that its spies were the best of the best, and only then, with a license to kill, would send them out into the world. The famous head of the KGB counterintelligence, Oleg Kalugin, described the technical training that he himself underwent:

Specialists showed us how to set up radio transmitters , how to use and detect listening devices how to microfilm and hide it in your home.

Learn the basics of coding and cryptology . We have received special instructions on how to find our belongings, dumped into hostile territory.

We were taught how to hide a movie or other items. We spent the whole day in downtown Moscow tracking and being followed by experienced KGB officers. I have gotten to the point where I can spot the tail quite easily and hand over the package to my companion without being noticed .

In a word:there was someone to follow. Meanwhile, in socialist Poland, spies were trained using ... just pre-school methods.

Hans Kloss with scissors and brush

Władysław Bułhak and Patryk Pleskot came to exactly these conclusions. They are the authors of the new book "Spies of the People's Republic of Poland" - the first work on agents of the past regime based directly on unknown and not shared documents of the Institute of National Remembrance.

Historians urge us to forget about comparisons with spy movies. In Polish training courses, you won't find any gadgets characteristic of James Bond, but we have the whole spectrum of an average assortment of ... a stationery shop .

Crayons. Is this another secret weapon of the PRL super spies?

Here is a certain Jan Kaszubowski, pseudonym "Larsen", in an apartment rented just after the war in Warsaw, for a whole month trained in encryption, photocopying and making secret hiding places. He had scissors, glue, a brush and empty medicine boxes at his disposal. He spent days learning to diligently stick a double bottom in the latter.

It turns out that Hans Kloss has not found any worthy successors ...

In his case, it was basically an entire spy school. Once he was glueing fluently, the Polish People's Republic interview decided to send him into action.

The language of his communist grace's agents

Another super spy from the communist era, Eugeniusz Młodowski, pseud. "Steward" has been thoroughly trained in communications. He permanently resided in Great Britain and there he did his "mole job" under the guise of more or less profitable businesses. One of the advanced espionage techniques he used was sending microfilm packets to Poland, which he hid in ... packets of chewing gum.

He corresponded with the headquarters in Warsaw using a code. So he wrote to "Zosia", he called London "the sea", "help from Antoni" meant that the English offered him cooperation, and tuberculosis - an exposition. When he wanted to meet, he wrote about going on vacation, and complaining of rheumatism meant that someone was watching him and trying to figure it out.

Hostile business runs on the home mail

The headquarters in Warsaw waited impatiently for every letter or package from its London agent, but these arrived less and less frequently.

According to Władysław Bułhak and Patryk Pleskot, the correspondence form of communication fell victim to the PRL economy of shortage. The reports, carefully prepared in the form of photomicrographs, stored in attractive packages containing cosmetics and vitamins sought after on the Polish market, were frequently stolen at the post office or in customs offices.

Post. The greatest enemy of the PRL intelligence? The photo shows a frame from the movie "There is no rose without fire".

Craving for imported specialties, officials unexpectedly became the best allies of the enemy services! Nobody had to recruit them. They were stealing by themselves.

It is not hardly surprising that with such methods of training and operation of our "intelligence aces" it is hard to find a dusty Polish Bond file in the archives of the Institute of National Remembrance.