programme:

14 October 2024

16.00 – 17.30 Young Researchers Forum

Chair: Jacek Tebinka (University of Gdańsk)

Suzanne Freemann (Massachusetts Institute of Technology): Soviet KGB during the Contemporary War in Ukraine: Insights Gained from a Broader Archival Approach

Jesper Jørgensen (University of Southern Denmark/ABM): Intelligence and Activism in the Short 20th Century

Mary Barton (University of Washington): Intelligence and proliferation of small arms in the 1920s

Matteo Giurco (University of Florence): No One, and One Hundred Thous The arduous pursuit of sources for the history of Italian intelligence services

18.00-19.00 Annual meeting IIHA
(members only, there is a possibility to join IIHA during the conference)

15 October 2024

8.00-9.00 Registration

9.00-9.30 Introduction

Karol Nawrocki (President of the Institute of National Remembrance, IPN)

Shlomo Shpiro (Chairman of the International Intelligence History Association, IIHA).

9.30 – 12.00 Panel I: Intelligence in Central and Eastern Europe (Intermarium) and the Soviet (Russian) Factor

Chair: Bernd Schaefer (Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars)

9.30-9.50 Władysław Bułhak (Institute of National Remembrance); Thomas Wegener Friis (University of Southern Denmark): Russian/Soviet Espionage in Intermarium. Past and Present.

9.50-10.10 Tomas Sniegon (Lund University): The Ideology of Chekism' in the Soviet Union (and Post-Soviet Russia)

10.10-10.30 Mark Kramer (Harvard University): The Soviet KGB and Moscow’s Concerns about Western Attempts to Undermine the USSR

10.30-10.50 Elena Grossfeld (King’s College London): Bio-geese and combat mosquitoes - the revival of KGB's strategic narratives

10.50-11.10 Barak Bouks/Shlomo Shpiro (Bar-Illan University): Russian and Iranian Intelligence Influence Operations in the Ukraine and Gaza Wars

12.00-12.20 Coffee Break

12.20- 14.00 Panel II: Soviet/Russian Intelligence and Counterintelligence Operations in the Region

Chair: Sylwia Szyc (Institute of National Remembrance)

12.20-12.40 Magdolna Baráth (Historical Archives of the Hungarian State Security): A failed attempt to build a Hungarian-Soviet intelligence network in South-Eastern Europe in the late 1940s

12.40-13.00 Kevin Riehle (Brunel University London): The KGB’s Use of Austria as a Facilitation Venue for Illegals Operations

13.00-13.20 Tomasz Kozłowski (Institute of National Remembrance): From reshuffle to coup d'état. KGB plan to overthrow the First Secretary of the Polish Communist Party in 1981

13.20-13.40 Douglas Selvage (Bundesarchiv): Active Measures in Service of Empire: the KGB, its fraternal Organs, and the Intermarium, 1966-1989

14.00- 15.00 Lunch Break

15.00-16.30 Panel III: The Communist intelligence community

Chair: Anna Abelmann (IIHA)

15.00-15.20 János Kemény (National University of Public Service in Budapest): “The Soviet Files”. The Hungarian (communist) intelligence Looking Eastwards through the West

15.20-15.40 Przemysław Gasztold (Institute of National Remembrance): No Longer Friends, Not Yet Enemies? The Relationship Between Polish and Soviet Military Intelligence, 1989-1990

15.40-16.00 Paul Maddrell (Loughborough University): Big brother, little brother: the Stasi and the MGB/KGB, 1950-1989

16.00-16.20 Nadia Boyadiyeva (Harvard University): Bulgaria’s Intelligence Connections with the Soviet KGB and GRU

16.40-16.50 Coffee break

16.50-18.20 Panel IV: Lessons in Counterintelligence

Chair: Shlomo Shpiro (Bar-Illan University)

16.50-17.10 Dieter Bacher (Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Research on the Consequences of War): CIC activities against Soviet Intelligence is Cold War Austria 1953 to 1957

17.10-17.30 Benjamin B. Fischer (former CIA chief historian): Master of the Spy Game: Rem Krasilnikov and the Destruction of CIA Moscow Station

17.30-17.50 Ines Reich, Enrico Heitzer (Brandenburg Memorials Foundation): All spies? On persecution practices of the Soviet Secret Services in the years after WWII using the example Soviet Military CounterIntelligence in Potsdam and the Soviet Special Camp No 7/No 1 in Weesow and Sachsenhausen (1945-1950)

16 October 2024

9.00-10.50 Panel V: Intelligence in Intermarium in Interwar period

Chair: Wolfgang Krieger (University of Marburg)

9.00-9.20 Andrejs Gusachenko (University of Latvia): Interaction Between Secret Services and Anti-Bolsheviks in Latvia in the First Half 1920s

9.20-9.40 Igor Kopõtin (University of Latvia): Bureau Cellarius: the Abwehr in the Eastern Baltic on the eve of the Second World War

9.40-10.00 Juho Kotakallio (University of Helsinki):Observing Soviet Russia on the Shores of the Baltic Sea. The Anglo-Finnish Intelligence Cooperation 1918-1939

10.00-10.20 Tilman Lüdke (Arnold-Bergstraesser-Institut) Near and Middle East Arnold-Bergstraesser-Institut, Soviet Muslim Nationalists in Poland and Beyond: Coveted by Hostile Parties

10.50-11.10 Coffee break

11.10 – 12.30 Panel VI: Intelligence and Counterintelligence Operations against Soviet/Russian Intelligence and Russian state and community

Chair: Charlotte Backerra (University of Göttingen)

11.10-11.30 Aiga Bērziņa-Kite (University of Latvia): Political police of the Republic of Latvia 1919-1924: introduction of civilian counterintelligence

11.30-11.50 Mika Sounpää (University of Turku): State Police Counterintelligence Practices and Surveillance of the Russian Émigré community in Finland, 1939-1944

11.50-12.10 Richard Skaife (Lieutenant Colonel (Retired) British Army): German Planning and Intelligence Limitations – Operation Barbarossa

12.30-13.30 Lunch break

13.00-15.20 Panel VII: Soviet/Russian Intelligence Operations in Border Regions (cases)

Chair: Peer Henrik Hansen (Museum Langeland)

13.30-13.50 Zi Yang (Nanyang Technological University): Stalin’s Spies Versus Stalin’s Puppet: The Rise of Soviet Influence in Interwar Xinjiang

13.50-14.10 Aleksandar Životić (Belgrade University): Soviet military intelligence and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1934-1941)

14.10-14.30 Marek Hańderek (Institute of National Remembrance): The role of Polish intelligence in Soviet intelligence assessment of the situation in People's China during the Cultural Revolution.

14.30-14.50 Catalin Costea (University of Bucharest): The Soviet Union military intelligence (GRU) activities and its role in the Romanian Revolution

15.20-16.00 End of the conference and presentation of the next conference venue & idea

If you have any questions about this year´s conference, pleace don not hesitate to contact us here.