Abstract
In order to illustrate the agency activity of Stalin’s intelligence service abroad in the 1940s I have selected a notorious case of the assassination of a prominent Soviet spy, Ignace Reiss, which took place on 4 September 1937 near Lausanne. I have set three main research objectives: 1. to verify the current state of knowledge on the assassination of Ignace Reiss; 2. to establish the possible involvement of Sergei Efron in the assassination; 3. to evaluate to what extent the fate of Sergei Efron in relation to the assassination of Ignace Reiss influenced the lives of his own family members (Marina Tsvetaeva, Ariadna Efron and Georgy Efron) and his immediate agency circle. As for today, there are strong grounds to state that Sergei Efron was not directly involved in Reiss’ killing – presumably, he did not shoot him. Following the unmasking of the espionage network in Paris led by Efron, his family and Efron himself were forced to abandon France in a hurry. Soon after that Efron and his relatives experienced Stalin’s repression of the Great Terror. Efron was executed by the NKVD, Marina Tsvetayeva committed suicide, Ariadna Efron was placed in prison for many years and Georgy Efron, 19 years old at the time died in Belarus in August 1944, merely two months after having fought at the front in the Second World War.
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