PHILBY'S OWN STORY I'D DO IT AGAIN TOMORROW,' COMMUNIST SPY SAYS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP70B00338R000300220006-5
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 15, 2005
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: November 15, 1967
• Content Type: NSPR

C1IICAGO DAILY
Approved For Release 2MM : CIA-RDP70B00338R000300220006-5
NOV 15 196,
f Ag~ - T omorrow ,' Communist Spy Says[
s wo
k
n
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-
Lcsh double agent who served the Krem-
lin as a spy in London and Washington for
30 years, broke long months of silence Tues-
day night.
In an interview that ended early Wednes-
day morning, Philby said he had no regrets
over his defection and loyalty to Russia.
Philby, 55, said the Depression and the
split in British socialism in the 1930s led,
him to devote his life to "a fight for cone
munism."
"That's why I did it," Philby said. "I
would do it again tomorrow."
1963 Security Scandal
Philby arrived in the Soviet Union in 1963,
'touching off a security scandal that rocked
British intelligence. He had been a respected
member of M16-,-.the B r i t i s h secret in-
telligence service-and had penetrated every
level of the British and American intelli-
gence networks over the years as an under-
cover agent for the Kremlin.
The Cambridge-educated Briton now holds
.an import.,,,;: post in the Soviet intelligence
`service in Moscow.
`Never Happier'
He told his story Tuesday night'in the first"
interview he has granted to Western corres-
pondents since January, 1963, when he dis-
appeared -:o. ,r, Beirut, Lebanon, wheye he
r
i
a
g as a newsptiper correspondent,
-
and turned up in Mocsow.
Philby said he was "never happier, cer-
tainly never healthier," and added:
"I do miss the casual access to my chil-
dren, although in fact I think I see as much
of them as I would have had I remained a
foreign correspondent."
His 24-year-old son recently visited him in
Moscow.
Philby was a correspondent in Beirut
for the London Observer in 1963 when he
learned the British government had evidence
identifying him as the "third man" in the
1951 defection to Russia by Donald MacLean
and Guy Burgess-two other British intelli-
gence agents.
Interviewed in a Moscow hotel, Philby re-
fused to talk about his reported marriage
to MacLean's former wife, Melinda.. She and
Philby were seen together at a Moscow Con-
cert last week. -
Philby said he is living in a large and com-
fortable apartment supplied by a grateful
Kremlin. He appeared well and was dressed
neatly.
"I was a perfectly genuine socialist up to
1931," Philby said. "But after that I became
disaffected with British- politics and. set out
on another fateful course."
The basic event, he said, was the ` dis-
Ostrous split" of the British Socialist Party
in 1931.
"I can't say that my conversion (to com-
munism) happened at any fixed point in
time," he said. "I had two'pretty hard years,
from 1931 to 1933.
"But I do know that after those two years
of painful thought, I had made up my mind
by June, 1933. 1 was already a Communist.
"The background of my' thinking was the
economic crisis (the Depression) and mas-
sive unemployment in the 'capitalist world,
and the apparent helplessness of existing
forces to deal with it.
"It was a dismal picture and it was the
working man who was the sufferer. The.
dilemma of the working class people was
frightful.
"I myself took part in demonstrations of
workers, but it became clear to me that
more drastic remedies were. needed-rem-
edied 'outside the framework of conventional
bourgeois thinking."
One Point Contradicted
In his description of his road to commu-
nism, Philby contradicted one point reported
by British newspapers.
The version published in London was that
Philby became a Communist in Vienna in-
1934 after watching a workers detonstration,
and was then recruited as a Russian anent.
Philby said Tuesday be was a Commumst!
by June, 1933, and soon after became an
agent..~_. _,_.._~ ._..._.._.. ~.. _ f
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