Historical Dictionary of Russian and Soviet Intelligence

in 1939–1940, based on reporting from agents within the Nazi for-

eign service. But Proskurov quickly lost Stalin’s favor. Stalin blamed

Proskurov for the failure of the Red Army in the Russo–Finnish

“Winter War” of 1939–1940 and had him reassigned to a provincial

command. In the first days of World War II, Proskurov and several

other commanders—many of them veterans of the Spanish Civil

War—were arrested. He was shot in October 1941 without a trial, as

were more than 150 other “inconvenient witnesses” of Stalin’s gross

military incompetence. His wife and two daughters were exiledto

Central Asia. He was posthumously rehabilitated in 1954, and his ac-

complishments in rebuilding the military intelligence service have

been recognized. See also BARBAROSSA.

PUGO, BORIS IVANOVICH (1942–1991). Born into a family of

Latvian Old Bolsheviks, Pugo had a successful career in the Kom-

somol, the KGB, and the party. He joined the KGB and rose to head

of the Latvian KGB in the mid-1980s. As Latvia’s chief Chekist,

Pugo had a reputation for prosecuting religious and ethnic dissi-

dents. Even within the KGB, he was known as a hardliner. Recog-

nized as a tough, efficient bureaucrat, he was removed from the

KGB and promoted to head of the Latvian Communist Party in the

late 1980s. In 1990 Party General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev

made Pugo minister of internal affairs, responsible for the police

and the MVD’s paramilitary Internal Troops. The appointment was

one of the most disastrous the reformist leader ever made; it left an

ideological enemy in charge of a key power ministry. Pugo, who did

not accept Gorbachev’s reforms, repaid his mentor by joining the

cabal planning the August putsch.Following the failure of the

putsch, Pugo and his wife committed suicide.

PUTIN, VLADIMIR VLADIMIROVICH (1952– ).Putin, the cur-

rent president of the Russian Federation, was an intelligence officer

for 15 years. After serving in Leningrad with the KGB, Putin was

posted to Dresden, in East Germany, where he operated with the Stasi

in collecting scientific and technical intelligence. Putin returned to

Leningrad in 1990 with the rank of lieutenant colonel. Putin report-

edly targeted Western businesspeople who had access to proprietary

industrial information.

PUTIN, VLADIMIR VLADIMIROVICH (1952– )• 211

06-313 P-Z.qxd 7/27/06 7:57 AM Page 211