Background and Origin Vasili Mitrokhin worked for decades cataloging and preserving KGB foreign intelligence files at the esteemed archival center in Yegoryevsk. Over the course of more than a decade, he clandestinely copied thousands of pages of documents by hand into notebooks and memoranda. In 1992, as the Soviet Union had already collapsed, Mitrokhin defected to Britain with his notes and later collaborated with British intelligence and historian Christopher Andrew to organize, translate, and analyze the material. The result was the multi-volume Mitrokhin Archive database and the book The Mitrokhin Archive: The KGB in Europe and the West (1999), followed by The Sword and the Shield and other works drawing on the material.
Publications and Access Christopher Andrew’s books—based on the Mitrokhin material with official British assistance—presented curated narratives and analyses aimed at both scholarly and general audiences. Portions of the archive were made available to researchers under controlled access arrangements in the years following Mitrokhin’s defection; other parts remain classified or restricted in various jurisdictions. The archive contributed to subsequent documentary, archival, and legal inquiries into Cold War espionage, but access has never been as unfettered as with some declassified government records. mitrokhin archive pdf top
This is the most "official" digital release of the archive. When Mitrokhin defected to the UK, the FBI later reviewed and declassified large portions of his notes regarding KGB activities in the United States. Background and Origin Vasili Mitrokhin worked for decades
The archive, later chronicled by Professor Christopher Andrew , shattered the West's understanding of the Cold War . The result was the multi-volume Mitrokhin Archive database
, but they turned him away, dismissing his handwritten notes as potential fakes. The British Acceptance
: Efforts to portray the civil rights leader as a "government stooge."