John Vassall - Exposure

Exposure

Vassall was identified as a potential spy after Anatoliy Golitsyn, a senior member of the KGB, defected to the United States in 1961. The KGB, worried that Vassall would be exposed, ordered him to cease operations until further notice. Another defector, Yuri Nosenko, added to the case against Vassall, but doubts about the evidence provided by both Golitsyn and Nosenko persisted. Vassall soon resumed his work. It had become obvious to his work colleagues that Vassall had some other source of income, for he moved to an expensive flat in Dolphin Square and threw lavish parties; but he explained that he had an inheritance from a distant relative.

On 12 September 1962, Vassall was arrested and charged with spying. He made a full confession, and directed detectives to the cameras and films concealed in his flat. The documents which he admitted to stealing did not account for everything believed to have been taken, however, which led to speculation that there was another spy still operating in the Admiralty. Some have suggested that Vassall was deliberately sacrificed by the KGB in an attempt to protect the other (possibly more senior) spy. In October, Vassall was sentenced to 18 years in jail.

The scandal caused the Macmillan government considerable embarrassment, erupting as it did at the height of the Cold War, and only a year before the still more dramatic revelations of the Profumo affair. A tribunal was held to inquire into whether the failure to detect Vassall earlier amounted to a failure of intelligence, as many British newspapers had claimed. It also investigated suggestions that the close relationship between Vassall and Galbraith had been "improper". However, in its conclusions it found no evidence for impropriety, and largely exonerated the government.