THE HOLLOW COIN

[Music] the atomic bomb the sen muscle and knockout punch of the world's military powers in all it force and fury it did not just appear out of the blue if by some magic we could reverse the process of time and peel Back The Years if we could March back into the history of the ab bomb we would see first of all it has a history a long period of development before it became a weapon of warfare first there had to come the creative breakthrough expressed perhaps in a mathem ma matical formula even that does not emerge full grown but is built on generations of creativity of trial and error and Tiny advances a mathematical formula is many things but this certainly a springboard into a period of further research and development and testing it may and almost always does take years before a prototype is ready the laborious time consuming testing goes on at every phase and then one morning on a New Mexico desert a new kind of bomb a new world of bomb is set off nothing will ever be quite the same again behind the achievement and in the production lines to come from drawing board to finished product are millions of manh hours because these are weapons of immense military significance time is important we try to develop them before effective counter measures can be worked out that's why all along the span of years when a decisive weapon is developed and finally made available to our military forces we try to keep what is going on a secret from potential enemies the longer our military secrets are secrets the more time America will have before an effective countermeasure is ready for use by hostile forces the security program in your plant or office is intended to make our military Secrets last longer your company security officer is the man to go to for guidance in proper security [Music] procedures along with the counterintelligence measures provided by the Department of Defense industrial security program the Federal Bureau of Investigation assists you in protecting classified defense information helping maintain the lead time of many of the projects you're working on is an important part of the FBI's job maintaining lead time is particularly difficult because potential enemies use Espionage and subversion to obtain their [Music] ends Espionage has been a staple of spreading Russian influence and power since the Bolshevik Revolution Americans need no better proof than the atom bomb 1960 that's the year our technical experts thought Russia would finally be able to develop a bomb 1949 is when they had their bomb for much of that 11-year pole vault credit Russian Espionage agents aided by national traitors they did away with much of our lead time on the atom bomb [Music] despite the increasing manifestations of friendship offered by the Russians their unwavering desires are plain can anything be plainer than the flat statement of Nikita kof We will bury you and the U is us but words threatening or whatever are still only words we look for Deeds proof Americans at heart are all from Missouri perhaps there is no better proof of the steady intensity of the Soviet offensive against the security of the United States than an actual documented case that had its start on a Brooklyn New York residential street it was 1953 a young news boy had just finished the weekly collections from his paper route he began to count the nickels and dimes to make sure the total amount was correct a 5-cent piece slipped out of his hand to the pavement he was astonished at what he saw the nickel had split into two equal segments revealing a small piece of microfilm the coin was Hollow the news boy could not understand it but he had the good sense to report the incident to the New York police who in turn passed the hollow coin and its contents to the Federal Bureau of Investigation the microfilm contained a code which Bureau crypto analysts were able to break with the aid of information supplied to the bureau by a former Soviet Secret [Music] Agent his information along with the decoding of the message found in the hollow coin were to lead only a short distance away from the federal courthouse in Brooklyn to a building [Music] nearby on the top floor of 252 Fulton Street a studio had been rented in the name of e goldfus occupation artist or so his neighbors thought did you ever wonder about him what his occupation was or anything well I thought he was an artist he dressed like an artist what how was that how did he look well he most of the time that I've seen him he wore a brown suit and uh tie open you know Sher un button he wasn't too of the man only uh if he walked into my shop he'd sit down and talk to me about Electronics what his problems are on his radios and so forth and I would advise him and he would tell me if he's doing the right thing and I would you know talk back and forth with him much to the surprise of the neighbors of goldfus on August 7th 1957 the tenant of that studio was charged with being a colonel in Soviet intelligence his real name Rudolph Ivanovic Abel [Music] the United States Attorney declared that Colonel Rudolph Ivanovic Abel was the most important Soviet spy ever caught in the United States he was charged with being an active spy over a period of 9 years [Music] the FBI carefully investigated the contents of his apartment and his nearby Studio the search turned up such Espionage items as radio and electronic equipment including microfilm and a shortwave radio set there were hollowed out pencils containing film and numerous cryptic messages some in [Music] code they also found other cleverly fashioned containers for the transmission of Defense Secrets Hollow bolts and Hollow Nails Hollow cufflinks or earrings that could contain secret messages [Music] Colonel Abel had rented a safe deposit box in a New York Bank where agents found $155,000 in Cash when he was arrested Abel had another $66,000 on his [Music] person Abel pleaded not guilty and was defended by one of New York's most prominent attorneys appointed by the bar association to ensure him a fair trial [Music] in a pre-trial statement the attorney made clear what the nature of Able's defense would be it should be sharply distinguished from such a case as that of the rosenbergs who were charged with betraying their own country assuming that the charges in this indictment are true able is quite evidently not only uh a man who has performed uh an exceedingly hazardous mission for his own country the basis of Abel's defense then was that he was an admitted professional spy and had conducted himself within the code of that profession Abel did not testify in the trial and offered no defense Witnesses [Music] the United States Attorney offered several witnesses both Russian and American to make his case against Colonel Abel proving the colonel to be an active operative in the Soviet Espionage apparatus known as the KGB operating directly under orders of the USSR Council of ministers in Moscow the KGB serves as a worldwide collector of information in each country a number of independent spy cells passed information into the apparatus members of One Spy cell do not know of the existence of agents in other Rings after the government's attorney rested his case the defense attorney made his presentation through newspapers radio and television the eyes and ears of a perplexed troubled American people were on this Courthouse then on November 15th 1957 came the verdict Colonel AEL had been found guilty said the US attorney I believe that the jury verdict in this case was more than amply warranted by the evidence which I feel was overwhelming and which strikes a very very severe blow at Soviet Espionage in this country Colonel Rudolph Ivanovic AEL was sentenced to 30 years in prison how many Secrets passed from Colonel Abel to the Soviet Union is not yet publicly known but this is clear Abel and his Russian Confederates were basically intermediaries who collected their information from Americans in a position to know our defense Secrets Colonel Abel was the leader of only one Soviet spy Network in the United States [Music] industrial and Technical workers were ael's major Target AEL did not refute the evidence that Espionage meetings for transfer of information had been held in such important industrial centers as quinsey Massachusetts Long Island New York Newark New Jersey and New York City [Music] targets for the colonel Ables are Americans who work daily at building up America's military strength very few of these men and women convey Secrets willingly to the Russian collectors of information carelessness eases the job of the professional Spies Like Colonel Rudolph Ivanovic AEL and somewhere in this country right now trained agents just as clever just as inconspicuous ous possessing large amounts of money and the most refined tools of Espionage are going on with Colonel ael's job these men are hardworking dedicated to their cause and will stop at nothing to get their hands on classified information the Department of Defense security program is designed to defeat their efforts by complying with these requirements you live up to your security obligations and thereby Aid your country [Music] whether Colonel Abel's successors succeed or fail is strictly up to you [Music]