The Second World War is the worst in the history of mankind. As you know, it was impossible to win it with the help of tanks alone - it required ingenuity, resourcefulness and a huge amount of effort. In this regard, each country trains and trains intelligence officers. The Soviet Union brought up one of the best intelligence officers of the century. It was Richard Sorge. He was truly a great man and intelligence officer. Richard worked undercover in Japan for about 7 years, which no one else could do. Working as an intelligence officer in Japan is quite difficult, because the authorities are extremely careful to ensure that no information is leaked. However, during this time, no one was able to understand who Richard Sorge was.
Childhood and family of a scout
Due to circumstances in 1944, Richard Sorge managed to declassify the secret services of Japan. At that moment, even the authorities of the country expressed a hidden respect for him due to the fact that for many years they could not find out who Richard Sorge was.
The scout's biography begins 4October 1898 in the Baku province of the Russian Empire (now Baku - Azerbaijan). Richard's father was a German Gustav Wilhelm, and his mother was a Russian woman Kobeleva Nina Stepanovna. The scout's family had many children, but nothing is known about sisters and brothers. Richard's grandfather was the leader of the First International and the secretary of Karl Marx himself. When Richard was 10 years old, his family moved to live in Germany.
First battles, injury and acquaintance with Karl Marx
An interesting fact is that while living in Germany, Richard voluntarily joined the German army during the First World War. He fought his first battles as part of the artillery troops. Some time later (in 1915) he was wounded in another battle near Ypres. Richard was sent to the hospital, where he passed the exams and received the next rank - corporal. After these events, Sorge was sent to another front - to the east, to Galicia. There, the scout participated in the battles against the Russian army. Later, he was severely wounded by shrapnel from an artillery shell and lay on the ground for several days. After he was taken to the hospital, the scout underwent a major operation, as a result of which one leg became shorter than the other. Because of this, Richard was put on disability leave.
In between heavy fights, Richard Sorge got acquainted with the works of Karl Marx. It was then that he became an ardent communist. Thanks to active party activity in 1924, Sorge moved to the USSR, where he received Soviet citizenship. As a result of unknown events, Richard was recruited by the Sovietintelligence services. Richard Sorge is an intelligence officer of the highest level, and many of his colleagues understood this. Thanks to the profession of a journalist and the German name, he could practically work in many countries of the world.
The pseudonym and the first arrest of Sorge
And yet, who was Richard Sorge in the countries he worked for?
Most often he worked under the codename Ramsay and was called a journalist or a scientist. This gave him the right to ask questions that ordinary people could not even say aloud. First of all, Sorge was sent to England to meet with the head of the secret intelligence service MI6. Her boss was supposed to tell Sorge secret data, about which nothing is known to this day. However, the meeting between Richard and the British intelligence officer did not take place. Sorge was arrested by the police. Fortunately, even then, his connections and himself were not declassified.
Intelligence Directorate of the Red Army
In 1929, Sorge was transferred to work in the Intelligence Directorate of the Red Army. In the same year he received an important special assignment. After Richard was sent to China, to the city of Shanghai, where his task was to create an operational intelligence group and search for reliable informants about the country's plans. In Shanghai, he was able to make friends with a journalist and part-time spy - Agnes Smedley. Sorge also met the born communist Hotsumi Ozaki. In the future, these people became the most important and main informers of the Soviet Union.
Sending a scout to Japan
Later, Sorge placed himself well in Nazi circles. Because of this, the Soviet command made a difficult decision - to send Richard to Japan. The task was complicated by the fact that none of the agents managed to gain a foothold and work well there. Many do not know who Richard Sorge was in Japan. However, official sources assure that the intelligence officer arrived there as a journalist of one authoritative German publication. For this, before the trip, Sorge needed to visit the United States. Within a short period of time, he received good recommendations from the Japanese embassy in America. Apparently, thanks to this, his career has developed well in Japan itself.
There, Sorge was able to get a job as an assistant to the German ambassador Jugenn Otto, who at that time was a general.
The indifference of the Soviet government to the fate of the intelligence officer
However, Sorge was shamelessly abandoned by the Soviet government in Japan to the mercy of fate. The USSR had a suspicion that Sorge's information was not true and now she is working against them. All letters to Sorge with a request to return to the Union were ignored by the General Staff. At that time, they were not interested in who Richard Sorge was - an ordinary ordinary soldier or a high-class spy. He was just abandoned.
October 18, 1941 Richard Sorge was declassified and arrested by the Japanese police. For three years he was under investigation. In 1944, the intelligence officer was shot along with his agents.
So, after many years, not one journalist and scientist asks himself who Richard Sorge was. The answer to this question can only be given by those who were well acquainted with his life and work.
