Czechoslovak Intelligence in Austria

Immediately after the end of the Second World War, the newly formed Czechoslovak intelligence service began to operate in neighbouring Austria. Shortly after the communist takeover in February 1948, these activities intensified Austria became an important hub for operations against "the West". In the 1950s, during the occupation of Austria, many of Moscow`s crucial operations in Austria were carried out using Czechoslovak networks and operatives. According to the American Counterintelligence Corps (CIC), the Czechoslovakian services were among the "most active" of all Eastern European intelligence services, playing an important role on Austrian soil during the dawning of the Cold War. The activities of Czechoslovak intelligence in Austria have so far attracted little in the way of research. Funded by the Austrian Science Fund FWF, this project aims to produce a systematic analysis of the operations and personnel in the Czechoslovak rezidentury (intelligence stations) in Vienna and Salzburg during the first half of the Cold War, comparing them with what was going on in other important stations of the Czechoslovak services. It will deal with questions such as how these clandestine networks were created, maintained and secured, what operational methods were applied and what tasks were pursued. The results will therefore make an important contribution to Cold War Studies and will help to EINSCHÄTZEN to what extend these operations had a significant impact on political, economic, military and scientific developments both in Austria and Czechoslovakia in particular and on the overall progress of the Cold War in Central Europe. Interpretation of a broad combination of sources attesting the roles played by all the parties involved in this "hidden conflict" will, it is hoped, throw light on these activities and serve to clarify the general policy of Czechoslovak (and Eastern European) intelligence in Austria. Barbara Stelzl-Marx, Director of the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Research on Consequences of War and Professor of European History at the University of Graz, will oversee this project, drawing on her experience in the study of the Soviet presence and counterintelligence in Austria. Dieter Bacher will be responsible for coordination and the input of US and British materials, and Philipp Lesiak will add his expertise on Czechoslovak and Austrian archives. The three-year project will be based at the Institut für Geschichte of the Karl-Franzens-Universität Graz in collaboration with the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Consequences of War, Graz Vienna Raabs, and the City of Graz.

The project aimed to analyze the activities of Czechoslovak intelligence services in Austria, their methods, strategies, networks, and impact. At the same time, it was also important to communicate the project's results and information on historical intelligence studies on Austria to both the academic community and the general public. The project collected and categorized approximately 560,000 pages of relevant files from Czech, US, British, Austrian, Hungarian, and Swiss archives, to determine the goals, methods, and impact of these activities in Austria from 1948 to 1960. Since the information primarily relates to operations in the field of "human intelligence" (HUMINT), a database was designed to collect and link documentation and information on approximately 1,000 individuals who played a central role in these activities, to fill missing links in the documents and more detailed insights. The reproductions of the files were stored in a central digital project archive following the respective recording system of the archive to be able to link these documentations with the working database. The most interesting results: It became apparent that the services became active in Austria very soon after the communist seizure of power in Czechoslovakia in February 1948. By the summer of that same year, activities in Austria had already increased significantly. Their objectives were comparable to those of other Eastern European services: monitoring the activities of Western intelligence, observing escape and emigration from Czechoslovakia to Austria, and observing and infiltrating emigrant circles. Economic and technological espionage played a smaller role. Structurally, until at least 1952, stations in Austria apparently played only a supporting role - the operational centers for Austria were located in Brno (for all of Austria, especially the British occupation zone in the south of the country and Vienna) and Ceske Budejovice (for the US and French zones in the west). Bratislava played a less important, more supportive role for Vienna. Also because of that, Czechoslovak liaison officers made extensive use of Austrian "assets". From 1953 onwards, the residency in Vienna gained importance and was from 1955 onwards mainly responsible for the activities, with a second important residency in Salzburg. From the 1950s on, cooperation between Eastern European intelligence services was more important than initially assumed. Cooperation with Hungarian intelligence was particularly important, which is why this was also analyzed in the project. Due to the good access to files on the US side, the project also yielded significant new insights into the activities of US counterintelligence in Austria, especially the Country Intelligence Corps (CIC). By utilizing the project's comparative research approach, the results also provide a better and deeper insight into Austria's role as a theater of operations for intelligence services during the first half of the Cold War.