CovertCouncil

People

PERSON FILE · 19 January 1923 – 9 November 2006

Markus Wolf

Head of East Germany's foreign intelligence service, the HV A, for more than three decades. The West had no usable photograph of him until 1978. After unification he was convicted of treason, a verdict later quashed.

1923–2006

3 min read · 7 sources, 1 primary

Portrait: Markus Wolf, former head of East German foreign intelligence, Berlin, December 1989. Elke Schöps. Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 de.

For most of the Cold War, Western services hunting East Germany's spymaster did not know what he looked like. In 1978 Sweden's security police photographed a visitor in Stockholm, and a defector from the HV A, Werner Stiller, identified the man as Markus Wolf. By then Wolf had run East German foreign intelligence for a quarter of a century7,6.

A Moscow upbringing

Wolf was born on 19 January 1923 in Hechingen, in southwest Germany, the son of the communist writer and doctor Friedrich Wolf. When the Nazis took power the family left for Switzerland and France, and in April 1934 settled in Moscow. Markus went to the German Karl Liebknecht school there and in 1936 became a Soviet citizen1,5.

He studied aircraft engineering in Moscow, was evacuated with his institute to Alma-Ata after the German invasion, and in 1942 joined the German Communist Party and the Comintern school at Kushnarenkovo. From 1943 to 1945 he was an editor and announcer for the "German People's Radio," a Soviet station broadcasting to Germany1,7.

He returned to Berlin in May 1945, worked for the Soviet-controlled Berliner Rundfunk, and in 1945–46 reported on the Nuremberg trial of the major war criminals. From October 1949 to August 1951 he served as a counselor at the new East German mission in Moscow1,5.

Building the HV A

In September 1951 he joined a small foreign intelligence service disguised as an Institute for Economic Research. He took charge of it in September 1953, when it became Main Department XV of the state security apparatus; from 1956 it was the Hauptverwaltung A, or HV A. He was also a deputy minister under Erich Mielke1.

By 1989 the HV A had some 4,600 full-time staff, and it concentrated on West Germany: the Chancellery, the ministries and the parties, NATO, and industry2,1. Wolf's methods included the long placement of agents among the stream of refugees moving west, and the use of "Romeo" agents who courted government secretaries in the West. He later wrote that if he went down in espionage history it would be for perfecting the use of sex in spying5,6.

His most famous agent, Günter Guillaume, became an aide to Chancellor Willy Brandt. The Stasi's own records show Guillaume's reporting was of modest value; his arrest in April 1974 was followed by Brandt's resignation, which the Stasi recognized as a setback for East German policy. Wolf later called the affair an "own goal"4,5. See the Guillaume affair.

Retirement and revolution

Wolf left the HV A in February 1986 but remained on its books to write its history. He published a book about his Moscow childhood and in 1989 aligned himself with reformers. In November 1989 he spoke at the mass demonstration on Berlin's Alexanderplatz, where part of the crowd booed him1,7.

In court

As unification approached he left for the Soviet Union by way of Austria. He returned in September 1991 and surrendered at the border in Bavaria; he was briefly held in custody1,6.

In 1993 the Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court convicted him of treason and bribery and sentenced him to six years. On 15 May 1995 the Federal Constitutional Court ruled, in cases brought by other former East German intelligence officers, that prosecuting people who had spied on West Germany from East German soil, and who lived in the GDR at unification, for treason and espionage was disproportionate and generally barred. Wolf's conviction was set aside1,3,7.

He was tried again on other charges and in 1997 was convicted of deprivation of liberty, coercion and bodily harm, receiving a two-year suspended sentence and a fine1.

Wolf died in his sleep at his Berlin home on 9 November 20066,5.

Key dates

  1. April 1934 Arrives in Moscow with his émigré communist family.
  2. May 1945 Returns to Germany and works for Berlin radio; reports on the Nuremberg trial.
  3. September 1953 Takes charge of East Germany's foreign intelligence service (from 1956 the HV A).
  4. 24 April 1974 His agent Günter Guillaume is arrested in Bonn.
  5. 1978 Swedish security photographs him in Stockholm; a defector identifies the picture.
  6. February 1986 Retires as head of the HV A.
  7. 1993 Convicted of treason and bribery by the Düsseldorf Higher Regional Court and sentenced to six years.
  8. 15 May 1995 The Federal Constitutional Court rules on the prosecution of former GDR spies; his conviction is set aside.
  9. 1997 Convicted of deprivation of liberty, coercion and bodily harm; two years suspended.

Sources

  1. Other Wolf, Markus (glossary), Bundesarchiv, Stasi-Unterlagen-Archiv.
  2. Other What was the State Security? Introduction, Federal Archives, Stasi Records Archive.
  3. Court record Beschluss des Zweiten Senats vom 15. Mai 1995, 2 BvL 19/91 u.a., Bundesverfassungsgericht (Federal Constitutional Court of Germany) (1995-05-15).
  4. Other Die Affäre Guillaume, Bundesarchiv, Stasi-Unterlagen-Archiv.
  5. Other Former East German spy chief dies, BBC News (2006-11-09).
  6. Other Markus Wolf, spy chief dubbed The Man Without a Face, dies at 83, The Guardian (2006-11-10).
  7. Wikipedia Markus Wolf, Wikipedia.
  8. Wikipedia English Wikipedia article (used for cross-checking).

Elsewhere in the files

Read next

East Germany · 1950–1990 Stasi (Ministry for State Security) East Germany's secret police and foreign intelligence service, 1950 to 1990: by the end 91,000 staff and 189,000 informers, answerable only to the ruling party, with a spy placed beside Willy Brandt. 1956 – 6 May 1974 The Guillaume affair An East German intelligence officer, planted in the West in 1956, rose to become an aide to Chancellor Willy Brandt. His arrest in April 1974 was followed two weeks later by Brandt's resignation. 1927–1995 Günter Guillaume East German intelligence officer who posed as a refugee, rose through the Social Democratic Party and became an aide to Chancellor Willy Brandt. Convicted of treason in 1975, he was returned to East Germany in 1981. 1907–2000 Erich Mielke East Germany's minister for state security from 1957 to 1989, who built the Stasi into a vast surveillance machine. After unification he was convicted not for its crimes but for a 1931 police murder. Soviet Union · 1954–1991 KGB The Soviet Committee for State Security, 1954–1991: foreign intelligence, counter-intelligence, border troops and political police under one roof, from Khrushchev's reforms to the failed coup of August 1991. 1920s–1980s Illegals and legends Soviet officers who lived abroad as private citizens under borrowed identities, with no diplomatic protection. The Abel and Portland court records show how their legends were built and how they came apart.