INCREDIBLE VANISHING SCIENTIST

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000201520002-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 19, 2012
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: May 13, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201520002-3
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RALPH
DE TOLEDANO
Incredible
vanishing
scientist
The disappearance of Vladi-
mir Valentinovich Alexan-
drov, about which I wrote
many months ago, remains
a mystery. His role in the Soviet "nu-
clear winter" hoax, to which he con-
tributed the mathematical "calcula-
tions," should have prompted
considerable and continuing media
interest, but hardly a word has been
written about him since I reported
the results of my research into the
case.
When he disappeared in Madrid
on March 31, 1985, European intelli-
gence sources were convinced he
had defected to the CIA, but after
publication of my column the
agency categorically denied this.
It was assumed by some at that
time that Mr. Alexandrov was in the
custody of Britain's MI-6. However,
an American academician who
called me insisted that Mr. Alexan-
drov was kidnapped by the KGB, by
two men who forced him into a car
on the night of his disappearance. I
was told there were at least two wit-
nesses who could verify this - and
I was promised their names and
statements. That evidence was
never forthcoming.
T he case fascinated me, and
since then I have been putting
together all the known facts
on the Alexandrov disappearance.
1. On March 29, Mr. Alexandrov
arrived in Madrid, where he was met
at the Barajas airport by Soviet di-
plomatic officials. After a brief visit
to the Soviet Embassy, he was driven
by a representative of Cordoba to
that city, where he was scheduled to
attend an anti-nuclear conference.
His lecture on nuclear winter was
well-received. He was quartered at
the Colegios Mayores, where the
conference was being held.
WASHINGTON TIMES
13 May 1986
2. On the morning of March 31,
Alfonso Caballos, personal secre-
tary to Cordoba's Communist mayor,
Julio Anguita, telephoned the Soviet
Embassy and made arrangements
for Mr. Alexandrov's return to Mad-
rid.
3. Two municipal council
chauffeurs drove him to Madrid in a
Seat 132 and at 9 p.m. delivered him
to the first secretary of the Soviet
Embassy. He then was taken by So-
viet officials in a Mercedes van to a
hotel on the Paseo de la Habana
where the embassy kept an
apartment for the use of visiting dig-
nitaries.
4. Mr. Alexandrov checked into
the Hotel Habana and was not seen
again except, if they exist, by the two
witnesses to his "kidnapping" by the
KGB.
5. On April 1, the Soviet Embassy
made unofficial inquiries to Madrid
authorities as to Mr. Alexandrov's
whereabouts. On April 17, it made a
formal request to the Spanish gov-
ernment for a "missing persons"
search.
6. At about the same time, Vitaly
Yurchenko - the high-ranking KGB
official who later defected to the
United States, redefected, and re-
portedly has been executed in Mos-
cow - was dispatched to Rome to
intercept Mr. Alexandrov, who was
scheduled to speak at another anti-
nuclear conference in Italy.
7. At the time of Mr. Alexandrov's
disappearance, Soviet Embassy offi-
cials and the Communist mayor's of-
fice in Cordoba told the Spanish
press that he was drunk throughout
his stay in Spain - a standard tactic
to discredit defectors - though no
one had noticed this when he deliv-
ered his nuclear-winter lecture.
8. Sources close to the CIA have
merely smiled knowingly when
asked about the Alexandrov case.
Question: If the Soviet Embassy
had Mr. Alexandrov safely tucked
away in its suite at the Hotel Habana,
why would it kidnap him on the
street in the presence of witnesses?
Question: Why would the Soviet
Embassy make inquiries about Mr.
Alexandrov's whereabouts when no
one knew, or cared, that he had dis-
appeared?
Question: Why would the KGB
have tried to intercept Mr. Alexan-
drov in Rome if he were already in
its hands?
Question: Why would the Soviets
have kidnapped a good and obedient
servant when all they had to do was
summon him back to Moscow?
The international scientific com-
munity has, uncharacteristically,
shown no interest in the Alexandrov
case. He has not surfaced in Moscow
for the pro forma press conference.
The CIA says nothing. Are we
therefore to presume that Vladimir
Alexandrov simply vanished into
thin air like Lewis Carroll's Cheshire
cat? Or does the CIA know some-
thing it is not telling us?
Perhaps William F Buckley will
incorporate Vladimir Alexandrov
into his next Blackford Oakes
thriller. That may give us answers to
the host of unanswered questions.
Ralph de Tbledano is a nationally
syndicated columnist.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/19: CIA-RDP90-00965R000201520002-3