CIA Debriefed Soviet H-Bomb Eye-Witness in 1957

Secret CIA interviews with defectors, former German POWs, and previously detained German scientists and technicians in the mid-1950s yielded invaluable insights into Soviet nuclear capabilities, according to recently declassified intelligence records posted today by the George Washington University-based National Security Archive. 

One riveting account came from an eye-witness to a late 1955 nuclear blast near Semipalatinsk, which analysts subsequently concluded was the first Soviet test of a two-stage thermonuclear device – developed by the so-called father of the Soviet hydrogen bomb, Andrei Sakharov.

Today’s posting highlights several reports of interviews with well-placed sources, some of whom were targeted by a joint British-American intelligence activity code-named Operation DRAGON, aimed at persuading key figures to defect to the West.