The BBC's first Man in Moscow
The BBC tried to open a bureau in Russia during World War II but only succeeded some 20 years later - in 1963. In the last half century, much has changed for the BBC's Man in Moscow.
It was the summer of 1942 and Winston Churchill had flown to Russia to cement his wartime alliance with Joseph Stalin.
"We will continue hand in hand like comrades and brothers," Churchill declared on arrival, "until every vestige of the Nazi regime has been beaten into the ground."
Talk like this gave BBC bosses an idea. If Blighty and the Bolsheviks were suddenly best buddies, perhaps now was the moment to have a BBC correspondent based full-time in Moscow? So they sounded out the Soviets. And the answer came back: "Nyet!"
A memo from the Assistant Controller of News written at the time reads: "The DG and editor-in-chief went to see the Soviet ambassador the other day and got no change at all. The Ambassador was extremely chilly. DG was left with the impression that nothing is likely to come of it."
Mind you, it wasn't only Stalin who poured cold water on the idea.
"I think all Moscow cover is a waste of time and money," argued the BBC Central European Correspondent. It was his job to report on Russia from the safety, and coffee-shop comfort of Vienna.
The opportunities for being a journalist are very slight indeed
Ian McDougall, BBC Central European Correspondent, 1961
In 1961 he tried to knock the whole idea on the head in a memo to his editor:
"It is impossible in the USSR to get either official or unofficial reaction to anything except through the pages of the press the next day. Though this is often forgotten in London where it is naturally assumed correspondents will be able to go and talk to the renowned man-in-the-street. They can't. The opportunities for being a journalist are very slight indeed and to an experienced man this is very annoying."
But when Soviet censorship eased under Nikita Khrushchev, the temptation to establish a permanent presence behind the iron curtain became irresistible and in 1963 the BBC finally opened a Moscow bureau.
Erik de Mauny was the obvious choice for the BBC's first resident correspondent in the USSR. Not only did he have plenty of foreign reporting experience (previous postings included Vienna, Beirut and Washington), he also had a university degree in Russian. The BBC bought him a car, a dark green Humber Super Snipe, which had been specially adapted to cope with the cold. And to keep himself warm, the intrepid reporter had brought with him two key items - an ankle-length suede coat from Moss Bros and a pair of RAF flying boots.
De Mauny wrote about his Moscow experiences in a book, Shouting Through the Static. Sadly, he died before it could be published. The manuscript reads like the screenplay for a James Bond film. Particularly the account of a scoop with a spook - his exclusive interview in 1964 with the spy, Kim Philby.
The two men spent six hours in Philby's hotel suite getting drunk on vodka, wine and Armenian cognac, while Philby's KGB minder waited patiently in the corridor. Then de Mauny had a tough decision to make.
I woke at 09:00 next morning with throbbing temples and with a realisation that I was in a dilemma. Should I send a news despatch to London about my meeting with Kim? What was more, should I mention it to any of my close colleagues? I knew I had a scoop, if I chose to play it that way, because apart from one brief sighting by a Reuters' correspondent some months earlier, no-one had tracked Kim down, still less talked to him at length as I had done. Nevertheless, I decided to wait. A news despatch would certainly make an impact, but it was highly likely to prove a nine-days wonder. I seemed to me sensible to keep my powder dry and wait to see whether my encounter with Kim might yield long-term benefits.
Kim Philby (1912 - 1988)
Double agent Kim Philby defected to the Soviet Union in 1963
*.High-ranking member of British intelligence who worked as double agent for Soviet authorities
*.Revealed to be a member of the spy ring now known as the Cambridge Five, in 1963
*.Other identified members of the group are Donald Maclean, Guy Burgess and Anthony Blunt
*.Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) from 1946 to 1965
*.Published memoir about career as spy - My Silent War - in 1968
A Point of View: Kim Philby and the evanescence of power
It was the summer of 1942 and Winston Churchill had flown to Russia to cement his wartime alliance with Joseph Stalin.
"We will continue hand in hand like comrades and brothers," Churchill declared on arrival, "until every vestige of the Nazi regime has been beaten into the ground."
Talk like this gave BBC bosses an idea. If Blighty and the Bolsheviks were suddenly best buddies, perhaps now was the moment to have a BBC correspondent based full-time in Moscow? So they sounded out the Soviets. And the answer came back: "Nyet!"
A memo from the Assistant Controller of News written at the time reads: "The DG and editor-in-chief went to see the Soviet ambassador the other day and got no change at all. The Ambassador was extremely chilly. DG was left with the impression that nothing is likely to come of it."
Mind you, it wasn't only Stalin who poured cold water on the idea.
"I think all Moscow cover is a waste of time and money," argued the BBC Central European Correspondent. It was his job to report on Russia from the safety, and coffee-shop comfort of Vienna.
The opportunities for being a journalist are very slight indeed
Ian McDougall, BBC Central European Correspondent, 1961
In 1961 he tried to knock the whole idea on the head in a memo to his editor:
"It is impossible in the USSR to get either official or unofficial reaction to anything except through the pages of the press the next day. Though this is often forgotten in London where it is naturally assumed correspondents will be able to go and talk to the renowned man-in-the-street. They can't. The opportunities for being a journalist are very slight indeed and to an experienced man this is very annoying."
But when Soviet censorship eased under Nikita Khrushchev, the temptation to establish a permanent presence behind the iron curtain became irresistible and in 1963 the BBC finally opened a Moscow bureau.
Erik de Mauny was the obvious choice for the BBC's first resident correspondent in the USSR. Not only did he have plenty of foreign reporting experience (previous postings included Vienna, Beirut and Washington), he also had a university degree in Russian. The BBC bought him a car, a dark green Humber Super Snipe, which had been specially adapted to cope with the cold. And to keep himself warm, the intrepid reporter had brought with him two key items - an ankle-length suede coat from Moss Bros and a pair of RAF flying boots.
De Mauny wrote about his Moscow experiences in a book, Shouting Through the Static. Sadly, he died before it could be published. The manuscript reads like the screenplay for a James Bond film. Particularly the account of a scoop with a spook - his exclusive interview in 1964 with the spy, Kim Philby.
The two men spent six hours in Philby's hotel suite getting drunk on vodka, wine and Armenian cognac, while Philby's KGB minder waited patiently in the corridor. Then de Mauny had a tough decision to make.
I woke at 09:00 next morning with throbbing temples and with a realisation that I was in a dilemma. Should I send a news despatch to London about my meeting with Kim? What was more, should I mention it to any of my close colleagues? I knew I had a scoop, if I chose to play it that way, because apart from one brief sighting by a Reuters' correspondent some months earlier, no-one had tracked Kim down, still less talked to him at length as I had done. Nevertheless, I decided to wait. A news despatch would certainly make an impact, but it was highly likely to prove a nine-days wonder. I seemed to me sensible to keep my powder dry and wait to see whether my encounter with Kim might yield long-term benefits.
Kim Philby (1912 - 1988)
Double agent Kim Philby defected to the Soviet Union in 1963
*.High-ranking member of British intelligence who worked as double agent for Soviet authorities
*.Revealed to be a member of the spy ring now known as the Cambridge Five, in 1963
*.Other identified members of the group are Donald Maclean, Guy Burgess and Anthony Blunt
*.Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) from 1946 to 1965
*.Published memoir about career as spy - My Silent War - in 1968
A Point of View: Kim Philby and the evanescence of power
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