Release of KGB Files in Latvia Helping Russians to Calculate KGB Presence in Their Regions

Paul Goble

            Staunton, March 5 – When Riga released files from the Soviet KGB left behind after the collapse of the Soviet Union in December, they immediately became the object of intense interest in that Baltic country. But even more than when Vilnius, the only other country in the region to do so, took that step in 2011, the Latvian ones ae having a broader impact.

            That is because the level of detail in the Latvian collection – all on line at kgb.arhivi.lv – is permitting investigators in Russia and other Soviet republics to draw conclusions about the size and structure of KGB operations there, making the KGB files from Latvia a critical source not only for that country but for post-Soviet states as well.

            Indeed, because these files are so suggestive in that regard, they may eventually come to put pressure on these countries to release their holdings, something that could shed enormous light on the operations of that security service and make it possible for these states to overcome the legacy that the organs still cast on them.

            In a 2500-word article entitled “How Many Agents of the KGB were in Riga and Leningrad,” Russian journalist Mikhail Zolotonosov shows how the Latvian holdings can be used to draw conclusions about KGB personnel and operations in his native city in the Russian Federation (gorod-812.ru/skolko-agentov-kgb-byilo-v-rige-i-leningrade/).

            The journalist shows how the Latvian documents are instructive not only about the KGB there but also about its size and activities elsewhere. The key paragraphs in Zolotonosov’s article concerning the size of the KGB’s network in Latvia and what that means for Leningrad are as follows”

“According to preliminary assessments, there were at various times from March 1941 to March 1953 between 8,000 and 12,000 agents. In March 1953, all agents passed through re-registration and the majority from military times were excluded. Between March 6, 1953, and January 12, 1987, the organs of state security of the Latvian SSR recruited 22,926 agents.

“The contingent of agents changed constantly, with some agents being dismissed and others recruited in their place. In the KGB of Latvia worked from 2,000 agents in 1961 to 7500 in 1986.  In 1990, the contingent of agents was no less than 4829; in 1991, the number was reduced to 4141.

“I think,” he says, “that for example in Leningrad the number of agents was many times greater because there were factories, research institutes, higher educational institutions, theaters, medical facilities and schools … [in the original]. So if in Latvia in 1986, there were 7500 agents, then in Leningrad in that year, I would estimate their number at 30,000 to 35,000, certainly no fewer.”