About the book: 2014 / One of the prominent cultural figures once said that an artist cannot become an intelligence officer overnight, but every intelligence officer must be an artist. In the history of Soviet and Russian intelligence, intelligence officers are known who were ambassadors of foreign countries in foreign countries, and businessmen, and gangsters, and simply street sellers, like, say, the “milkmaid” Marina Kirina on the streets of Vienna. Everything presented in the book is based solely on archival documentary materials. Illegal intelligence officers are people of extraordinary destiny. What makes them this way is the specific nature of working far from their homeland, their secret life under false names and with fictitious documents. The book will talk about the wonderful Soviet intelligence officers who, in the harshest times, carried out very difficult tasks in the enemy’s lair, and always risking their lives.