Military Liaison Missions

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The Military Liaison Missions arose from reciprocal agreements formed immediately after the Second World War between the Western allied nations (US, UK and France) and the USSR. The agreements permitted the deployment of small numbers of military intelligence personnel - together with associated support staff - in each other's territory in Germany, ostensively for the purposes of monitoring and furthering better relationships between the Soviet and Western occupation forces. Although not widely known to the general public, they played a significant intelligence gathering role during the Cold War.

The missions persisted through-out the Cold War period and ended in 1990 just prior to German reunification. The missions were;

British Commanders'-in-Chief Mission to the Soviet Forces in Germany (BRIXMIS)
La Mission Militaire Francaise de Liaison (FMLM, more properly MMFL in French)
US Military Liaison Mission (USMLM)

and their reciprocal Soviet missions (SOXMIS/SMLM).

The British-Soviet missions were the first to be established (16 September 1946) under the terms of the Robertson-Malinin Agreement (the respective commanders-in-chief). It also had the largest contingent of personnel with 31 officers. Later agreements with the US (Huebner-Malinin, March,1947) and France (April,1947) had significantly fewer permitted personnel, presumably because those Allied powers did not want large Soviet missions operating in their zones and vice versa.

The Allied liaison missions, having quasi diplomatic status, were relatively free to roam around East Germany save for specifically designated restricted areas and were largely 'untouchable' either by the law or military personnel. However some of their officers were killed in accidents or 'incidents' which gave rise to significant military and political tensions.

Little is publicly documented about the Soviet missions.