In from the Cold

One foggy morning in Berlin, a yellow Mercedes from the Soviet zone drew up at the tollgate at the Heerstrasse crossing point. Two other Mercedes limousines had already arrived from the British sector, and in the pale light the exchange was effected.

From the Soviet side, walking between two Russian plainclothesmen, came London Businessman Greville Wynne, 45, who last May had been sentenced to eight years as a spy. From the British side came Konon Trofimovich Molody, 40, alias Gordon Lonsdale, who had been sentenced in 1961 to 25 years on the same charge. Wynne and Molody merely glanced at each other. To the British agents, Wynne said, "Good morning. I'm glad to see you." Then, unable to contain himself, he flung his arms around them. The London Times, not sharing Wynne's elation, grumbled that Britain was getting the worst of the deal and, in effect, exchanging a rook for a pawn.

The Times had something. In the spy business, Wynne seems to have been a petulant amateur. He was organizing exhibits of British industrial goods behind the Iron Curtain when the Foreign Office (which still officially denies it) pressured him into service as a courier. Wynne shuttled between British intelligence and one of its top Soviet sources, Civil Servant Oleg Penkovsky, who was later shot for treason. Molody had been a seasoned professional who arrived in Britain in 1955 with a Canadian passport and had set up an elaborate and highly successful spy ring.

The British have never liked the idea of swapping spies, and accepted this trade only for "humanitarian motives," because Wynne was reported ailing--and perhaps also because the government had an uneasy conscience over having used a more or less unwitting nonprofessional. Said one British official: "This sort of trade makes it too bloody easy for the other side--we catch a big fish and they pick up some professor who has been asking about the wheat crop. If one of our real agents gets caught, then it's his duty to shut up and take what's coming and, if necessary, to die for his country."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.