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New page: '''Harold Adrian Russell 'Kim' Philby''' (1912-1988) was a British traitor who worked as an agent of Soviet intelligence while occupying a senior position in the British Secret Intelligenc...
'''Harold Adrian Russell 'Kim' Philby''' (1912-1988) was a British traitor who worked as an agent of Soviet intelligence while occupying a senior position in the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS).
Philby was born in India where his father, later a well-known Orientalist, was a district magistrate. He was educated at Westminster School and the [[University of Cambridge]], where he encountered other men who were to form the [[Cambridge Five]] spy ring. He was almost certainly recruited by the [[NKVD]] (predecessor of the [[KGB]] in the early 1930s, and during that decade worked as a journalist. In 1940 he was recruited to SIS on the recommendation of [[Guy Burgess]], another member of the 'Five', and rose to be controller of SIS activity in the Iberian peninsula and Africa. Following the war he was head of station in [[Istanbul]] and subsequently in [[Washington]].
In 1951 Guy Burgess and [[Donald Maclean]], another of the 'Five', fled to the Soviet Union on the eve of exposure. Philby was questioned by [[MI5]] and dismissed from the service, but maintained his front story, was eventually vindicated by British Prime Minister [[Harold Macmillan]] and reappointed to MI6, who made him station chief in [[Beirut]]. Again fearing exposure, he defected from Beirut to the Soviet Union in 1963.
Philby was born in India where his father, later a well-known Orientalist, was a district magistrate. He was educated at Westminster School and the [[University of Cambridge]], where he encountered other men who were to form the [[Cambridge Five]] spy ring. He was almost certainly recruited by the [[NKVD]] (predecessor of the [[KGB]] in the early 1930s, and during that decade worked as a journalist. In 1940 he was recruited to SIS on the recommendation of [[Guy Burgess]], another member of the 'Five', and rose to be controller of SIS activity in the Iberian peninsula and Africa. Following the war he was head of station in [[Istanbul]] and subsequently in [[Washington]].
In 1951 Guy Burgess and [[Donald Maclean]], another of the 'Five', fled to the Soviet Union on the eve of exposure. Philby was questioned by [[MI5]] and dismissed from the service, but maintained his front story, was eventually vindicated by British Prime Minister [[Harold Macmillan]] and reappointed to MI6, who made him station chief in [[Beirut]]. Again fearing exposure, he defected from Beirut to the Soviet Union in 1963.