Semyon Markovich Semyonov (; 1 March 1911–1986) was a

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

intelligence agent, best known for handling convicted Soviet spy

Julius Rosenberg Julius Rosenberg (May 12, 1918 – June 19, 1953) and Ethel Rosenberg (born Greenglass; September 28, 1915 – June 19, 1953) were an American married couple who were convicted of spying for the Soviet Union, including providing top-secret inf ...

Background

Semyonov was born Samuil Markovich Taubman in

Odesa Odesa, also spelled Odessa, is the third most populous List of cities in Ukraine, city and List of hromadas of Ukraine, municipality in Ukraine and a major seaport and transport hub located in the south-west of the country, on the northwestern ...

and graduated from the Moscow Textile Institute in 1936 with a specialty in power engineering.

Career

Of Jewish ancestry, for which he would suffer career-wise in the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

following the Stalinist purges, Semyonov joined the

NKVD The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (, ), abbreviated as NKVD (; ), was the interior ministry and secret police of the Soviet Union from 1934 to 1946. The agency was formed to succeed the Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU) se ...

in 1937 and was sent quickly to the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

as an

intelligence officer An intelligence officer is a member of the intelligence field employed by an organization to collect, compile or analyze information (known as intelligence) which is of use to that organization. The word of ''officer'' is a working title, not a r ...

. He enrolled at the

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of moder ...

, from which he graduated in June 1940 and shortly thereafter began working for

Amtorg Amtorg Trading Corporation, also known as Amtorg (short for ''Amerikanskaya Torgovlya'', ), was the first trade office, trade representation of the Soviet Union in the United States, established in New York City, New York in 1924 by merging Armand ...

. Semyonov had a mastery of French and English. Semyonov worked first as a purchasing agent for the Soviet agency Machinoimport and then as head of the engineering department of the Soviet Purchasing Commission during World War II, with offices both at the commission and at Amtorg while specializing in scientific and technical espionage. A

Russian Foreign Intelligence Service The Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) is the civilian foreign intelligence agency of Russia. The SVR succeeded the First Chief Directorate of the KGB in December 1991.The Security Organs of the Russian Federation: A Brief History 1991–2004' ...

history quotes his KGB personnel files as stating, "While working from 1938 through 1944 in the United States, Major Semyonov showed himself to be one of the most active workers in the rezidentura tationand credits him with connecting to 20 agents along the scientific and technical line". In 1942 Semyonov persuaded

Vasily Zarubin Vasily Mikhailovich Zarubin () (4 February 1894 – 18 September 1972) was a Soviet Union, Soviet intelligence officer. In the United States, he used the cover name Vasily Zubilin and served as the chief Soviet intelligence Rezident from 1941 ...

to transfer

and his contacts from the

CPUSA The Communist Party USA (CPUSA), officially the Communist Party of the United States of America, also referred to as the American Communist Party mainly during the 20th century, is a communist party in the United States. It was established ...

Jacob Golos Jacob Golos (born Yakov Naumovich Reizen, Russian: Яков Наумович Рейзен; April 24, 1889 - November 27, 1943) was a Ukrainian-born Bolshevik revolutionary who became an intelligence operative in the United States on behalf of the U ...

channel to the direct control of the ''Rezidentura'', with himself as the assigned case officer. The actual transfer occurred on Labor Day weekend, 7 September 1942, at a meeting in Central Park. Bernard Schuster brought Rosenberg to the meeting. Rosenberg was then subjected to a thorough vetting and recruitment process to include training in tradecraft and a probationary period. Aleksandr Feklisov was assigned to assist in managing Rosenberg. Once the formal recruitment of Rosenberg was completed Semyonov used Rosenberg to conduct formal recruitments of two of Rosenberg's friends from City College of New York,

Joel Barr Joel Barr (January 1, 1916 – August 1, 1998), also Iozef Veniaminovich Berg and Joseph Berg, was part of the Soviet Atomic Spy Ring. Background Born Joyel Barr in New York City, to immigrant parents of Ukrainian Jewish origin. He attended ...

and

William Perl William Perl (1920–1970), whose original name was William Mutterperl, was an American physicist and Soviet spy. Background While a student at the City College of New York, Perl joined the Steinmetz Club, the campus branch of the Young Commun ...

. Semyonov persuaded into collaboration a large group of young scientists and specialists, through whom was obtained a significant quantity of valuable materials on "ENORMOZ" (

Manhattan Project The Manhattan Project was a research and development program undertaken during World War II to produce the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the United States in collaboration with the United Kingdom and Canada. From 1942 to 1946, the ...

), radio electronics, jet aviation, chemistry, medicine. Semyonov received from

Bruno Pontecorvo Bruno Pontecorvo (; , ''Bruno Maksimovich Pontecorvo''; 22 August 1913 – 24 September 1993) was an Italian–Russian nuclear physicist, an early assistant of Enrico Fermi and the author of numerous studies in high energy physics, especially o ...

in January 1943 an extensive report on the first nuclear chain reaction. Pontecorvo also relayed to Semyonov in early 1943 that "

Fermi Enrico Fermi (; 29 September 1901 – 28 November 1954) was an Italian and naturalized American physicist, renowned for being the creator of the world's first artificial nuclear reactor, the Chicago Pile-1, and a member of the Manhattan Project ...

was prepared to provide information." In 1943 the active intelligence operation of Semyonov drew the attention of American counter espionage, and Semyonov was recalled to the

. Later he had assignments in France and in Moscow and was promoted to the rank of lieutenant-colonel. In 1950, in association with the

Doctors' plot The "doctors' plot" () was a Soviet state-sponsored anti-intellectual and anti-cosmopolitan campaign based on a conspiracy theory that alleged an anti-Soviet cabal of prominent medical specialists, including some of Jewish ethnicity, intend ...

, the foreign intelligence agency began dismissing persons of Jewish ethnicity. In spite of significant positive results in his record, Semyonov was discharged. He worked as translator in the publishing house Progress. Semyonov was rehabilitated in the 1970s. For the successful completion of special missions concerning scientific and technical intelligence, including on the atomic programs, Semyonov was awarded the

Order of the Red Star The Order of the Red Star () was a military decoration of the Soviet Union. It was established by decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR of 6 April 1930 but its statute was only defined in decree of the Presidium of the ...

and awarded the

Order of the Red Banner of Labour The Order of the Red Banner of Labour () was an order of the Soviet Union established to honour great deeds and services to the Soviet state and society in the fields of production, science, culture, literature, the arts, education, sports ...

References

*Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR

*

John Earl Haynes John Earl Haynes (born 1944) is an American historian who worked as a specialist in 20th-century political history in the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress. He is known for his books on the subject of the American Communist and anti- ...

and

Harvey Klehr Harvey Elliott Klehr (born December 25, 1945) is a professor of politics and history at Emory University. Klehr is known for his books on the subject of the American Communist movement, and on Soviet espionage in America (many written jointly with ...

, ''Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America'' (New Haven:

Yale University Press Yale University Press is the university press of Yale University. It was founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day and Clarence Day, grandsons of Benjamin Day, and became a department of Yale University in 1961, but it remains financially and ope ...

, 1999). .

Allen Weinstein Allen Weinstein (September 1, 1937 – June 18, 2015) was an American historian, educator, and federal official who served in several different offices. Under the Reagan administration, he was cofounder of the National Endowment for Democracy i ...

and

Alexander Vassiliev Alexander Yuryevich Vassiliev (; born 1962) is a Russians, Russian-British people, British journalist, writer and espionage historian living in London who is a Subject-matter expert, subject matter expert in the Soviet KGB and Russian Foreign In ...

, The Haunted Wood, New York: Random House 1999.

External links

An Interactive Rosenberg Espionage Ring Timeline and Archive

{{DEFAULTSORT:Semyonov, Semyon 1911 births 1986 deaths People from Odesa Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni Moscow State Textile University alumni Recipients of the Order of the Red Banner of Labour Recipients of the Order of the Red Star KGB officers NKVD officers Nuclear secrecy Soviet Jews Soviet spies against the United States