| Jacob Golos |
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| CATEGORIES ABOUT JACOB GOLOS | |
| 1890 births | |
| old bolsheviks | |
| american communists | |
| soviet spies | |
| nkvd officers | |
| venona appendix a | |
| 1943 deaths | |
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Jacob Golos was the "main pillar" of the NKVD intelligence network. He had worked with Soviet intelligence from the mid 1930s, and probably earlier. He was not merely a CPUSA official assisting the NKVD (an agent or “probationer” in Soviet intelligence parlance) but held official rank in the NKVD, and claimed to be an oldtime '' Chekist ''. Golos headed the Central Control Commission which planned the execution of Juliet Poyntz , an American defector from the GRU . The code name "Sound" appears in the Venona decryptions as a Soviet source and was identified as Jacob Golos. The reference to Golos in the Venona decrypts as an “illegal colleague” corroborates Elizabeth Bentley 's testimony. The term “nelegal’ny sotrudnik," can be translated as “illegal colleague,” “illegal associate” or “illegal operative." That was Soviet espionage terminology for a Soviet officer or professional agent who operated without the protection of diplomatic or official status with a Soviet embassy, consulate or agency and usually with false documents. Soviet officers with the latter status were said to be “legal.” Golos worked for the Society for Technical Aid to Soviet Russia. Cover name "Zvuk" ("Sound") is from Latin "Vox", or "Voice". Golos established a company called World Tourists with money from Earl Browder , General Secretary of the CPUSA. The firm, which posed as a travel agency, was used to facilitate international travel to and from the United States by Soviet agents and CPUSA members. World Tourists was also involved in manufacturing fake passports. Golos frequently met Bernard Schuster at World Tourist. In March 1940, Golos pled guilty to being an unregistered foreign agent and paid a $500 fine and served probation, in lieu of a four month prison sentence. Soviet intelligence did not like Golos' refusal to allow Soviet contact with his sources. The NKVD suspected Golos of Trotskyism and tried to lure him to Moscow, where he could be arrested. The US government got to him first. But even then, he would not surrender his agents. After Browder went to prison in 1940, Golos took over running Browder's agents. In 1941, Golos had set up a commercial forwarding enterprise, called the U.S. Shipping and Service Corporation, with Bentley, his lover, as one of its officers. In the fall of 1942, a Communist cell of engineers was turned over to Golos for Soviet espionage purposes and Julius Rosenberg was the contact between Golos and the group. Golos believed this cell, the XY Line of engineers was capable of development. The XY Line began enormous efforts to penetrate the Manhattan Project , code-named ENORMOUS (ENORMOZ). Sometime in November of 1943, Golos met in New York with key figures of the Perlo Group , a group working in several government departments and agencies in Washington, D.C. The group was already in the service of Browder. Later that same month, after a series of heart attacks over the previous two years, Golos died in bed in Bentley's arms. Bentley then took over his operations (thus the reference in the decrypts to him as a “former” colleague). SEE ALSO Sources
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