Kim Philby | |
|---|---|
 Philby in 1955 | |
| Born | Harold Adrian Russell Philby 1 January 1912 |
| Died | 11 May 1988 (aged 76) |
| Burial place |
|
| Nationality | British, Soviet |
| Education | Westminster School |
| Alma mater | Trinity College, Cambridge |
| Spouses |
|
| Parent | St John Philby |
| Awards | Order of Lenin Order of Friendship of Peoples |
| Espionage activity | |
| Country |  United Kingdom |
| Allegiance |  Soviet Union |
| Codename | Sonny, Stanley |
Harold Adrian Russell "Kim" Philby (1 January 1912 – 11 May 1988)[2][3] was a British intelligence officer and a double agent for the Soviet Union. In 1963 he was revealed to be a member of the Cambridge Five, a spy ring that had divulged British secrets to the Soviets during the Second World War and in the early stages of the Cold War. Of the five, Philby is believed to have been the most successful in providing secret information to the Soviets.[4]
Born in British India, Philby was educated at Westminster School and Trinity College, Cambridge. He was recruited by Soviet intelligence in 1934. After leaving Cambridge, Philby worked as a journalist, covering the Spanish Civil War and the Battle of France. In 1940 he began working for the United Kingdom's Secret Intelligence Service (SIS or MI6). By the end of the Second World War he had become a high-ranking member. In 1949 Philby was appointed first secretary to the British Embassy in Washington and served as chief British liaison with American intelligence agencies. During his career as an intelligence officer, he passed large amounts of intelligence to the Soviet Union, including the Albanian Subversion, a scheme to overthrow the pro-Soviet government of Communist Albania.
Philby was suspected of tipping off two other spies under suspicion of Soviet espionage, Donald Maclean and Guy Burgess, both of whom subsequently fled to Moscow in May 1951. Under suspicion himself, Philby resigned from MI6 in July 1951 but was publicly exonerated by then-Foreign Secretary Harold Macmillan in 1955. He resumed his career as both a journalist and a spy for MI6 in Beirut, but was forced to defect to Moscow after finally being unmasked as a Soviet agent in 1963. Philby lived in Moscow until his death in 1988.
- ^ "Kuntsevo Cemetery at Kim Philby's Grave". passportmagazine.ru.
- ^ Kim Philby in the Encyclopædia Britannica Online, retrieved 16 November 2009.
- ^ "Obituary of Kim Philby: Briton who became Soviet super-spy." Times [London, England], 12 May 1988.
- ^ "The Cambridge Five". International Spy Museum. Archived from the original on 19 April 2019. Retrieved 11 August 2019.