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| "Boris Chilikin"-class ship (Picture I) |
Kimmo Huosionmaa
As you might know, I visited Estonia a couple of days ago, and there I started to think about the shape of the KGB, the security service, what still have very much influence in the life of normal people in the former Eastern block. millions of people were forced to work for the security service, and there were many informers, who worked secretly for that system. The KGB was or is very effective because it has the contacts in every layer of the Russian society.
When we are thinking about the places, where KGB members met their informers, those places were not actually the headquarters of that organization. Those safehouses might look like normal houses, but when they are seen in the normal light, that safe house is always something different than other houses in the city. The members of the KGB must separate those places because if their identities were uncovered, the work of those officials would get difficult.
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| Same colors with "Chilikin" (Illustration photo) (Picture II) |
One of the greatest problems of the intelligence officer is, that if that officer would be uncovered, the opponent could transmit the false information using this person. And that false-information can be deadly. If somebody claims that the second director or nuclear weapon specialist of the KGB would be the Western spy, and uses the trusted line for delivering that information, that could send this person even to death. In the Soviet Union was the death penalty for the persons, who were spying for western intelligence.
There are also many other ways to meet the informer, and one of them would be meet them under the protection of the ships, what were operated by KGB or GRU. In 1980's some Soviet Naval tankers of the "Boris Chilikin" class were lost their deck armament, and the reason for that was wondered until the somebody saw tanker or support ship "Boris Chilikin" in the British harbor. Not all those vessels were converted, and that was suspicious. The reason for stripping those weapons was clear, the ship transformed use as the spy ship. Under the sealine were supposed to build the airlock, what allowed the special forces scuba-divers operate unseen at some harbors.
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| "Boris Chilikin"-class ship photographed at Istanbul (Picture III) |
Those improved or converted "Boris Chilikin"-class ships are actually the top of the iceberg. The KGB and other intelligence agencies have many spy ships, what is sometimes used only to carry agents to some areas. Those ships don't have any special equipment, what makes them capable to make recon missions, and that's why they are allowed to come to the harbors. But there are also AIV (Auxiliary Intelligence Vehicles), what are normally trawlers. Those spy trawlers have normally systems, what would record the radar signals and other electronic voices. And they can also collect data from enemy submarines by recording the propel voices.
But the big spy ships are sometimes using the midget submarines and other equipment in their missions. Sometimes I see the same kind of colors as the Russian Navy uses in their ships in some other vessels. And I think is this similar colors with those ships only coincidence. Or are those colors painted in purpose? This means that is the grey and white so nice colors, that somebody accidentally paints the yacht with similar colors, what are used in the Soviet naval tanker. But that is, of course, every person's own business. Even if the "Chilikin" is mentioned as the tanker, there might be secret areas in the ship, and that ship can also take the normal load of oil from the harbors.
Picture I
https://cdn10.picryl.com/photo/1989/07/25/a-starboard-beam-view-of-the-soviet-boris-chilikin-class-replenishment-oiler-719d97-1024.jpg
Picture III
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C_NUJ_mXUAE596B.jpg
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