Shadrin, Nicholas

(Artamonov, Nikolai Fedorovich)

(1924–1975)

   After having defected from the Soviet Navy, Artamonov was resettled in the United States under the name Nicholas Shadrin. He was sentenced to death in absentia by a Soviet military court. But while working for the U.S. Naval Department as an analyst, Shadrin was recruited by the KGB rezidentura in Washington. He was also working for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) as a double agent. For several years, Shadrin met Soviet case officers in a dangerous game. When the KGB learned they were being duped, they convinced him to meet case officers in Vienna, where he was kidnapped. Shadrin died as a result of a drug administered during the kidnapping. The KGB leadership were delighted with the success of the operation, however, and awarded the officials involved medals for military valor.

   Shadrin’s role as a double agent and his death remain contentious issues to this day. Many believe that he should never have been run as an agent by the FBI. Moreover, despite rumors that Shadrin redefected to the Soviet Union, evidence from defectors such as Vitaliy Yurchenko and Oleg Kalugin established that he died as a result of a KGB blunder. President Gerald Ford asked Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev about Shadrin and was told that Shadrin had never met the KGB in Vienna. President Jimmy Carter received the same story.