Victor Perlo

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Victor Perlo (May 15, 1912 -- December 1, 1999) was an American Marxist economist, NKVD agent (code name 'Raider'), and a longtime member of the national committee of the Communist Party USA.

Born in East Elmhurst, New York, Perlo was the son of Russian Jewish immigrants who had both emigrated in their youth from Omsk in Siberia. He received a BA and MA in mathematics and statistics from Columbia University in 1933.

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[edit] New Deal

Perlo served in various New Deal government agencies including the National Recovery Administration (NRA) and the Federal Home Loan Bank Board. Perlo also was an original member of the Ware group. In 1937, Perlo left government to work in the Brookings Institution, and rejoined the government in 1939. He reentered government through the United States Department of Commerce in 1939 to gather data on basic economic decisions he presented to Harry Hopkins, Secretary of Commerce. In 1940, Perlo moved to an agency that became the Office of Price Administration (OPA). By 1943, he was chief of the Aviation Section of the War Production Board. The Perlo group of spies, which he headed, included a Senate staff director, and Perlo's ring supplied the Soviet Union with United States aircraft production figures and shipments to various theaters of war.

In 1943, Perlo divorced his second wife, Katherine Perlo, who told the FBI Perlo "delighted in tormenting their child and in engaging in big talk concerning what he would like to do to Government officials."(1)

[edit] Espionage Career

A dedicated Communist, Victor Perlo headed the Perlo group of Soviet espionage agents in the United States. Before World War II, Perlo had been a member of the Ware spy ring. The Perlo ring included several important U.S. officials, including a Senate staff director, and the ring supplied the Soviet Union with economic, political, and military intelligence, including United States aircraft production figures.

Perlo infiltrated through the United States Department of Commerce in 1938 to gather economic intelligence, and passed on intelligence concerning basic economic decisions he presented to Harry Hopkins, Secretary of Commerce. He transferred to the Division of Monetary Research, and served under Harry Dexter White, followed by Frank Coe and Harold Glasser, all of whom were later found to be Soviet agents.

[edit] Postwar Career

Perlo left the government in 1947. After being named as a Soviet agent by Elizabeth Bentley, Perlo was called before several Congressional Committees investigating Soviet and Communist infiltration, subversion, and espionage within the United States government in the 1930s and during World War II. Perlo invoked the Fifth Amendment when asked to name other espionage agents and Communist party members, telling the House Committee on Unamerican Activities (HUAC) he was "helping in my humble way to carry out the great New Deal program under the leadership of Franklin D. Roosevelt."(2). At the time, the information corroborating Perlo's activities as a Soviet spy was contained in the still-secret Venona project, and could not be revealed for fear of aiding Soviet intelligence.

In 1948, Perlo obtained a job working on the campaign of Henry Wallace, the [[Progressive Party (United States, 1948) |Progressive Party's]] presidential candidate. Unable to find work in the U.S. government after he was named by Elizabeth Bentley as a colleague and fellow Soviet spy, he obtained a job as an economic researcher for the Brookings Institution and wrote the book American Imperialism.

From the 1960s until his death, Perlo, who had a master's degree in mathematics from Columbia University, served as the chief economist of the Communist Party in the United States (CPUSA). He was also a board member of the CPUSA.

[edit] Perlo spy ring members

  • Victor Perlo.
  • Edward Fitzgerald, War Production Board.
  • Harold Glasser, Director, Division of Monetary Research, United States Department of the Treasury; War Production Board; Advisor on North African Affairs Committee.
  • Alger Hiss, Director of the Office of Special Political Affairs United States Department of State.
  • Charles Kramer, Senate Subcommittee on War Mobilization; Office of Price Administration; National Labor Relations Board; Senate Subcommittee on Wartime Health and Education; Agricultural Adjustment Administration; Senate Subcommittee on Civil Liberties; Senate Labor and Public Welfare Committee; Democratic National Committee
  • Harry Magdoff, Statistical Division of War Production Board and Office of Emergency Management; Bureau of Research and Statistics, WTB; Tools Division, War Production Board; Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce, United States Department of Commerce.
  • George Perazich, Foreign Economic Administration; United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration.
  • Allen Rosenberg, Board of Economic Warfare; Chief of the Economic Institution Staff, Foreign Economic Administration; Senate Subcommittee on Civil Liberties; Senate Committee on Education and Labor; Railroad Retirement Board; Councel to the Secretary of the National Labor Relations Board.
  • Donald Wheeler, Office of Strategic Services Research and Analysis division.

[edit] Glasnost

Under the leadership of Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev, the era of Glasnost shed new light on the activities of Soviet intelligence directed against its Allies during World War II. The KGB Archives were opened, and many long hidden secrets came to light. Perlo by this time was openly serving in the leadership of the Communist Party of the United States (CPUSA), an organization he had denied any association with for decades prior. Perlo became a vociferous critic of Gorbachev and his successor, Boris Yeltsin, for their efforts to democratize the former communist state. Perlo wrote several articles for various Communist publications and denounced Gorbachev and Yeltsin for betrayal and treachery.

[edit] Venona

Victor Perlo's code name in Soviet intelligence is "Raider", and is referenced in the following decrypts:

[edit] Notes

  • Note (1): FBI Silvermaster file, 135-143 (PDF pgs. 49-57)
  • Note (2): Perlo testimony, “Hearings Regarding Communist Espionage in the United States Government,” U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on Un-American Activities, 80th Cong., 2d sess., 699–700

[edit] References

  • John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr, Venona: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America, Yale University Press


[edit] External links

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