Operation Gold: The Covert Operation To Dig A Tunnel Into Communist East Berlin
German Federal ArchiveBritish wiretapping and recording equipment in the secret tunnel.
As the Cold War intensified in the 1960s, there seemed to be a real possibility that it would soon grow hot. So, to better predict the Soviet Union’s next move, American and British intelligence decided to build a tunnel into the Soviet-controlled sector of Berlin.
The plan was simple. The tunnel, which would be dug under the recently constructed Berlin Wall, would allow Western intelligence to tap into the phone lines of Russian military and intelligence officials. According to future CIA director Richard Helms, Operation Gold was “the most elaborate and costly secret operation ever undertaken within Soviet-occupied territory.”
But unbeknownst to the U.S. and the U.K., there was a Soviet mole in their mix. His name was George Blake, and he told Soviet intelligence everything he knew about the construction of the “secret” tunnel.
FPG/Archive Photos/Getty ImagesAn East German soldier sits in the British/American tunnel after it was “revealed” by the Soviet Union in April 1956.
However, the Soviet Union didn’t want to risk losing Blake’s intelligence. So they did nothing as American and British operatives toiled to build their tunnel in secret. For 11 months, Western intelligence was able to collect Soviet intelligence just as they had planned.
“In essence,” Steve Vogel, who wrote Betrayal in Berlin: The True Story of the Cold War’s Most Audacious Espionage Operation, explained to The Washington Post, “the KGB foreign intelligence directorate was sacrificing Soviet military, political, and scientific secrets to protect its own secret — George Blake.”
After almost a year, however, the Soviets decided to dramatically reveal the existence of the tunnel. According to Vogel, this backfired by making American and British intelligence seem ambitious and cutting-edge. What’s more, Operation Gold had resulted in the gathering of valuable intelligence.
This covert operation may have been only a short-lived success — but it was a success nonetheless. According to The Washington Post, Helms noted that the intelligence gathered from the Soviets over 11 months “remained valuable for a decade and more.”
