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Spying on spies
The other side of the spy ring – the communications experts – have developed the perfect cover story. To their neighbors in the quiet suburbs of London, Peter and Helen Kruger were antique booksellers specializing in Americana and housewives. This was the perfect cover for their activities because it explained their regular trading trips abroad through their books, even behind the Iron Curtain. Inside their apparently nondescript house, they have built an advanced communications center equipped with a hidden radio transmitter and microdot equipment. Their real names were Maurice and Luna Cohen, both American citizens who were veteran Soviet agents.
In between, the KGB contact running the operation on behalf of Moscow was known throughout London as Gordon Lonsdale, a Canadian businessman who specialized in the supply of jukeboxes and vending machines. He enjoyed the rewards of capitalism, as his profitable company paid for a fleet of cars and yachts. In fact, his name was Konon Molody, a Russian-born KGB agent. His role in the Portland spy ring was to take information from two insiders at the research facility and pass it to the Kruger family. This activity continued for several years without being discovered until the intelligence services received information that could not be ignored.
One of the most important Cold War spies, Polish intelligence officer Michal Goleniewski, also known as The Sniper, was a triple agent who supplied the CIA with Soviet and Polish secrets. He told them that the Soviets had a high-ranking British informant involved in marine research. Although this information was vague, it was disturbing enough to prompt MI5 to send investigators to the Portland facility. Suspicions soon fell on Harry Houghton, whose secret trips to central London with Ethel Gee were being watched with great interest. On one occasion they were seen handing a bag to a man later identified as Gordon Lonsdale. The trail led into the suburbs, where Lonsdale was followed to the high-tech home of Krogers.
Over the next two months, MI5 and the police set a trap for the Kruger family at the house across the road owned by their friends, the Research Family. This surveillance operation was so sensational that Judi Dench later starred in a hit 1983 West End play about it called Pack of Lies. Officers monitored the Kruger family’s comings and goings while searches maintained a facade of normalcy. Jay Search’s daughter, who was 15 at the time, told the BBC’s Witness History program in 2014: “It’s amazing that my mum was so effective. I think at first it wasn’t clear to my parents that the Krugers were a big part of the investigation. Little by little, MI5 allowed my mum to see that Peter and Helen were not the people they claimed to be.”
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