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~~. KIM PHILBY cominued How'd they get Burgess out? Three traffic tickets did it There was already Foreign ie trated Both Krivitsky and Volkov {Swret defectors} had said go. There was. of course. nothing to suggesi that the three sources referred 10 the same man There ts stil} nc basis for that supposuon But if the assump- ton had been made. if ip particular the Krivstsh) material had been stud- wd in relation 10 the Washingion jeal, » search among the diplomats would have started without toss of ume — perhaps even before ] appeared on the scene But another feature of the case Was even more puzzling oF must confess to have enjoyed a great advantage in that 1] was pretty certain from the beginning who was in- volved But even discoun- ing that advantage, it s¢emed to me quite ob wous. irom the nature of the reports thal we were nat dealing with the petty ageni emptying Waate- Papet baskets and snatch- ing ibe odd carbon. Some of the seports dealt with potincal problems of some complexity There could be no real doubt that we were dealing with a man of stature The reluctance fo ihitrate inquiries along there lines can only be Stiribuied to a genuine menial block which stub. bornls resisied the belief that a members of the Establishment eguld do such things The exist ence of such a block was amph borne out by the commentaries that fol- lowed the disappearance of Macleat. and Burges, — and. for thar matier, my own Eaplanations of ex- traardinary silliness were offered in preference to The obvsous simple truth Yet J knew qune well thal the bizarre situation could not go on for ever. Once investigation ed ij ed. i a . [ts certainly yield the right ans“er, sooner of later The great question was: How soon” How late? From discussion with my friends a1 meetings out- ade Washingion. wo main Ponts emerged First, 1 was essential ta rescue Maclean before the net closed on him That was accepted as an axiom No question was raised shout his future potential to the Soviet Union in the event of his escape. It Was quve enough that he was an #Crene Krevitsky, a Red Army imtedh- gence officer. defected io the West in 1037, wrove 2 hoot celled } Chose Free dom and later. when living in the US. commited suicide Volkov wane Russian agent who tried 10 defect 10 the West, Philby handled the case VWalhav never Made it, old comrade. Some readers. prisoners of prejudice. may find this hard to swallow. Ido net ask them to do so. But they cannot blame me if they suffer unpleasant shocks in future cases Second. i( was desirable that Maclean should stay in his post as dong as possible After his departure, i owas said blandly (hai he was “only” head of the American Depariment of itn Mali oe i - the Foreign Office, and thus had litle access 10 high-grade information. But His nonsense (o suppose thel a reso- Jute and experienced Operator oecupy- ing & senior posi in the Foreign Office tan have access only io the Papers thal are placed on fis desk in the ordinary coure of duty. 1 have already Ghown that I gained access 10 the files of British agents in the Soviet Union when I was supposed io be chiveying Germans in Spain In short, Gur duly was to get Maclean te safety, but not before it was Recessary. Hollandia -the Dutch pipe that’s kind to every to Bul there were two further compli- cations | had been sent to the United States for a two-year tour of duty. and I could therefore expect to be replaced in the autumn of 1951. ] had no idea whal my next posting would be: it could easily have been Cairo or Singe- Pore. far oul of touch with the Mac- fean case. Groping in Parual darkness as we were, it ot Aromenuc Pipe 1 Salle a Maclean away by a the Intest. The second complication arose from Burgess’: position He wat emphatically ool af home in the Foreign Office. for which he had neither the right temperament nor the right personality. He had heen think- ing for some time of getting oul, and had one or two irons in the fire in Ficet Street As a result, his work for the Foreign Office had suffered. #0 much 60 thal it looked like # close thing between resignation and dis- Thissal from his post. In any case, he ¢ middie of 195] Tope. eg, ip was anxious to get back to Ebgland. In somebody's mind — JT do not know whose — the two ideas merged Burgess’ return to London and the rescue of Meclesr B Te- turned 10 London from the British Embassy in Washingion. it seemed mature] that he should call on the head of the American Depatimem. He would be well placed to se! the ball rolling for the rescue operation. 1 would have been possible for him 1 have resigned in Washington. and returned to London without fuss. Bul it might have looked a bit odd if he had gone back voluntarily shomh before the disappearance of Mac- lean. Matters had to be @© arranged thal he was went back, willy-nilly. 1 was the sort of project in which Burgess delighi- ed, and he brought it off in the simplest possible way. Three times in one day he was booked for Speeding in the State of Virginia. and the governor reacted just as we had hoped. He sent a furious Protest to the Sta De- pariment against this fla- grant abuse of diplomaue privilege, which was then brought to the attention of the ambassador Within a few davs, Burgess was re- gretfulls informed that he would have to jeave AS s00n as the possibil- ity of Burgess helping in the rescue operation emerged from our discus. sion, great attention was Paid 10 my awd position Despite all precaunons. Burges be seen with Maclean, and inquiry into his activity might lead 16 doubts about me. There seemed very little thal could be done about it. but H occurred to me thai | could help tn divert sus- picion by making a pos. tive contribution to the solution of the British Erm- bassy case Hitherto. | had lain Jow. lecung the FHI and MIS do what they could. Now that the rescue Plan was taking shape. there was no reason whi T should not give the vesbgation a nudge in the Hight direction Te a To that end. I wrote « Pees shower and vo memorandum to Head Of- qeery pouch of Hotere Peper fice, suggesting thal we might be wasting our ame exhaustive investiga- tions of ihe embassy me- tals T recalied the atmtemenis of Krrrisky io the best of my abdilits from memory. He had said that the Soviei intelligence for Western Europe had recruited in the middle thirnes a young man who had gone into the Foreign Office. He was of good fam- ity, and had been educated al Eton and Oxford. He was an working withoul payment. J suggested that these data, such as they were. should be matched against the records of diplomats stationed in Washington between the relevant dates in 1944-45 MACLEAN'S a rrr ef a NPP Sener