Sergei Kourdakov
Encyclopedia
Sergei Nicholaevich Kourdakov (Russian
: Сергей Николаевич Курдаков; March 1, 1951 – January 1, 1973) was a former KGB
agent and naval officer who from his late teen years carried out more than 150 raids in underground Christian communities in regions of the Soviet Union
in the 1960s. At the age of twenty, he defected to Canada
while a naval officer on a Soviet
trawler
in the Pacific
and converted to Evangelical
Christianity
. He is known for having written The Persecutor
(also known as Forgive Me, Natasha), an autobiography
that was written shortly before his death in 1973 and published posthumously. Since its publication, it has been the source of varied criticism.
, Soviet Union
. His father Nikolai Ivanovitch Kourdakov was a soldier in the Soviet Army
and a political activist who was a very loyal supporter of Joseph Stalin
. He led a brigade in the Winter War
and led a unit under General Konstantin Rokossovsky
in World War II
. After the war, Nikolai helped set up a military base and became the base chief. Although Sergei was told that his father died by being shot, he found out much later from a friend of his father's that when Nikita Khrushchev
became Premier of the Soviet Union
, he had ordered the elimination of important officers who had supported Stalin in order to consolidate his power, and that Nikolai Kourdakov had been one of them. Sergei lived with his mother until her health began to deteriorate and when he was four years old, she became very ill and died. He was invited to live with a family who had known his mother. It was there that he learned to read and count. Sergei got along well with everyone in the family except with their son Andrei, whom he believed to be mentally handicapped
. At the age of six, he decided to run away after Andrei tried to kill him by shoving his head into a filled bathtub.
For ten days, he lived in Novosibirsk
, thieving from food stands until he was caught and sent to the police. He was promptly sent to an orphanage then known as Children's Home Number One, where he joined the Octobrianiks, a Soviet youth organization required for all children grades one through three. After three years, he was transferred to an orphanage for older children forty miles away in Verkh-Irmen. There he joined Youth Pioneers
, the Communist youth organization required for children nine through fifteen. Sergei also joined a gang that turned into a reign of terror for the city. In response to this looming threat, the police ordered the orphanage to be shut down in 1961 and all the children separated to different orphanages.
, he wrote "An atmosphere of fear prevailed throughout the home. We were afraid of the aunts and uncles (orphanage employees). They were afraid of Big Irene and Uncle Nichy, who, in turn were afraid of the party leaders. Barysevo became a camp of hate and fear, divided between the wardens and the children."
He soon discovered that the orphanage at Barysevo had a caste system-esque society created by the orphans, with "slaves" on the bottom, "lieutenants" in the middle, and the "king" at the top. Starting off as a slave, he soon challenged a lieutenant and won his position. By the time he was fourteen years old, he became king, replacing his friend Nikolai who was transferred to a different orphanage. As king, he met a thirteen year old boy whose parents were declared unfit to be parents due to their religious beliefs. Due to the boy's own Christian
beliefs, he was nicknamed "the Deacon". Sergei soon befriended him and ordered any teasing towards him to stop.
, also known as the Communist Union of Youth. The director of the school he attended, known as Comrade Skripko, saw interest in him and had convinced him to join. Sergei cultivated a great interest in Marxism-Leninism
, one that was not particularly shared with his friends in his orphanage. During highschool, he was also excelling in all of his school subjects and learned to speak German
. The school director eventually offered him the opportunity to lecture younger classes about on various subjects, generally subjects having to do with communism.
In the summer of 1966, Kourdakov and two close friends of his obtained a large amount of hashish
from Turkestan
and began a narcotics business
. Initially successful, his business ended after a group of gang members that discovered he was carrying the narcotic took him into an alley and stabbed him the back for it, almost killing him. While recovering from his injury, Sergei realized that he had to make a decision for what he would do with his life: either follow the course of his friends and continue dealing in the underworld or seriously focus on building a career in communism. He chose communism.
By this time Sergei Kourdakov had already become the leader of the Communist Youth League of his area. He graduated from his school in June 1967 and was awarded a silver medal for being the second best student in his grade level. For much of the last year of school, he focused on pushing and improving the League as much as he could, hoping to make it the most successful one in his district
, a position that was indeed awarded to it during the judging of Leagues, which happened annually.
. With high honors and grades, and an outstanding recommendation from his old school director, he applied to and was accepted into the Alexander Popov Naval Academy in Leningrad
. Although a newcomer, he was chosen to be the leader of the school's Communist youth organization due to the record of his leadership in his previous organization. At the academy, Kourdakov met Pavel Sigorsky, a Pole
who taught him Polish
. After completing a year of study at the academy in July 1968, he continued his studies at the Petropavlovsk Naval Academy in Kamchatka, at the Eastern border of Russia.
Before going to the academy and during his military summer vacation, he traveled again to Novosibirsk to visit his old friends, who were all involved in gangs. Shortly after attending a peace conference he was invited to between a gang his friends were in and another nearby gang, Kourdakov was shot in the left breast in revenge by a member of the other gang. Miraculously, he survived because the bullet first shot through multiple layers of clothes and through his thick address book and all of his identification papers before lodging itself in his skin.
Before going to the naval academy, Sergei Kourdakov spent two weeks in Blagoveshchensk
, a city that borders China
, serving in a naval military unit against the Chinese army
. At one point he partook in a small battle. Finally in late September 1968, he arrived at the port city Petropavlovsk
. Again, because of his past experience and record, he was chosen to be the leader of the academy's Communist Youth League. From then on, along with his studies, he was in charge of carrying out orders sent from the Komsomol
headquarters in Moscow
, listening to the grievances of cadet
s and argue in favor of them if he was convinced the cadet was right, and discipline any cadet who appeared to be undermining Communist commitments, often shocking them into performing better. In just that single year at the academy, Kourdakov served as the League leader, performed well in his studies, organized entertainment events for the cadets, lectured at nearby schools on many current events topics, and competed in all of the sports offered by the academy.
official. He came to tell him about a "special-action squad" he was forming as an official but secret branch of the city's police. After telling Kourdakov that he had gone through his record all the way to his days in Children's Home Number One and complimented him on his ability to captivate people so well during speeches, he stated his desire to place him as the leader of this new group. Although Sergei tried thinking of reasons to reject the offer while Azarov was telling him all this, he immediately reconciled after hearing the pay he was to receive for each operation—twenty-five rubles
. At the time he received seven rubles per month as a naval cadet and if he were to become an officer in the Navy, he would still only receive seventy rubles per month.
One of the main duties of being the leader of this organization was to pick the best men from the academy to work in the organization, usually consisting of about twenty men. Kourdakov later wrote that he assumed that with this "special-action squad," he would be dealing with "drunks, murderers, wife beaters, and other lawbreakers the regular police couldn't take time to deal with." And true to his assumptions, that was what he and his team were assigned to deal with. For the most part, they would be sent to bars and clubs to break up fights.
But after a few operations, the group was told that their abilities would be put to a different use, breaking up or raiding secret Christian
home worship services
. Under the leadership and influence of Ivan Azarov, Kourdakov and the others in his group became convinced that Christians, "Believers" as they were always referred to, were a serious threat to the Communist party
and the Soviet Union. Aside from "roughing up" the members of a service, they were also instructed to arrest the leaders of the group and confiscate any bible
s and other religious texts. Sometimes they were told to arrest every participant.
and 35 miles to the north of Petropavlovsk, where a baptism
service was being held. Clubs in hand, the group hid in nearby bushes preparing for the Believers to arrive. Soon after they had finished the baptisms, the squad sprung into action. In just five minutes, all of the Believers were knocked down to the ground, all of the bleeding in one way or another. One girl's ear had been split open, and the group's pastor laid dead and floating down the river. As further torture and humiliation, the bleeding young girls of the group were stripped naked and driven in that state to the police station, an act greatly disapproved of by Ivan Azarov due to the fact that everything conducted by the squad needed to be done in secret, and that doing something like that could turn the people against the police.
Many of these raids continued in similar fashions. The leaders of the worship groups were usually arrested and sentenced to many years in Siberia
n labor camp
s. Along with the duties of being the leader of the police group, Sergie Kourdakov continued studying at the naval academy, hoping to become a radio engineer in the Navy. He still retained his position as the leader of the academy's Communist Youth League and continued to compete in the school's sports, primarily consisting of wrestling
, judo
, karate
, and track.
Any religious writings found during raids were confiscated. Any printed materials, including bibles, were sent to Moscow where they were studied and analyzed. In his book, Kourdakov quoted Azarov on the use of printed material: "Another organization and department branch has been established in Moscow to study the teachings of these Believers, so we can better oppose and defeat them. There our finest scholars are studying their literature, including their Bible, in order that they can learn how to better fight their religious beliefs. It's sort of a complete and full-scale Bible college." Another one of Sergei's duties as leader of the squad was getting rid of other religious texts, specifically the handwritten or very old materials, which were usually used to heat furnaces.
The group was able to determine where Believer meetings were happening before they began through use of spies
in the networks of underground churches throughout the region. These people were paid much more than Kourdakov and his men because if they attended a meeting that was going to be raided, they would end up being beaten as much as the Believers. Another part of Kourdakov's job was to prepare reports and record the names of all of the Believers caught, to be entered into a nation-wide database in Moscow. Sergei later wrote that "In addition, a three-by-five-inch card with the Believer's picture, birth date, and other data was sent to the police station. These cards were kept in a special file. Any time the party chose, the Believers could be rounded up and removed from society quickly."
, which was also published as Forgive Me, Natasha.
On April 22, 1970, Sergei Kourdakov attended a live televised major Communist party
convention to celebrate the 100th birthday of Vladimir Lenin
and honor the future leaders of the party. He was invited to receive an award which honored him as the Number-One Communist Youth of Kamchatka Province, for which he prepared and gave a fifteen minute speech, which was broadcast nationwide. There he met Comrade Orlov, the party leader for Kamchatka
. During the banquet following the convention, Orlov, drunk with vodka, invited him into the private dining room reserved for party leaders. What waited inside shocked Kourdakov. Inside he saw all sorts of expensive delicacies he did not expect to see and vodka "flowing like water," but more importantly, he witnessed the state of the party leaders—drunk, passed out, or drinking themselves to unconsciousness. Many of them had their faces in their food and one was lying on the food serving tray. Comrade Orlov had excused himself and when he came back, continued drinking. Soon, he began criticizing Joseph Stalin
, Leonid Brezhnev
, and eventually communism itself, at one point shouting that "Communism is the worst curse that has ever come to man!" This was a turning point in Sergei's life. He later wrote that he had been a genuine and firm believer in communism. But after witnessing the hypocrisy of those top party leaders, his goal in life had changed: "From now on, there was only one goal: Get to the top! If the game was played by cynicism and ruthlessness, I'd play it that way."
By mid-1970, Sergei Kourdakov was beginning to notice new patterns in the ways the Believers worshiped. Although they usually split into groups of around fifteen, they began meeting in groups of ten or less, which required Sergei's group to perform more raids in order to have as much of an effect on the Believers. He also began to notice an increase in Believers, which made it seem to him that the bigger fight the put up, the larger they grew. Soon the group was operating on a tight schedule instead of just being called in whenever they were needed. Another trend he noticed was that may of the new Believers were young people, often as young as him. This made little sense to him, as he had a hard time understanding how Christianity could appeal to young people so much. With all of these operations occurring, news of the group began to spread throughout the public.
and began reading until Victor came back. Kourdakov later wrote in his autobiography about his experience when reading the book for the first time:
In late July 1970, Kourdakov was sent to Novosibirsk for military duty. Although he was to stay in Novosibirsk in case of a military emergency, he took a plane to Moscow to visit the tomb of Vladimir Lenin
for the second time, hoping that being near his body would give him a sense of direction, something the corpse fell short on. Leaving the tomb that day, Sergei made his decision. He would leave Russia. He soon formulated a plan that would involve him swimming across the Tisza
river to Hungary
using an aqua-lung
he acquired at a black market. He even went as far as obtaining Hungarian currency and making his way to the border, but after seeing the immense amount of security at the border, he quickly realized that it would be impossible. With his military leave ending, Kourdakov flew back to Petropavlovsk. Soon enough he was back to conducting raids against the Believers' meetings. He later wrote that because he was dissatisfied and ill at ease at the time, the last raids he led were the most vicious.
During one particularly large raid, Sergei suddenly became emotionally grieved and left in the middle of the raid. On that day he decided to quit working for the KGB and from then on began giving excuses when told to gather up men to perform raids. Eventually he was relieved of his duties and continued as leader of the academy's Youth Organization. To persuade him to stay, Dimitri Nikiforov offered to place him in the Tomsk Academy, a well known school for KGB agents. Kourdakov rejected it.
destroyer
. After more than a month on the destroyer, Sergei was sent back to the naval base for two weeks. There, he asked to be transferred to a ship near the United States
coast, a request that was approved. On March 4, 1971, Sergei Kourdakov left the Soviet Union for the last time to board a Soviet submarine
. A few months later on June 25, Kourdakov was transferred to the Soviet trawler
Ivan Sereda, which was in need of a radio officer.
On the Ivan Sereda, Kourdakov began making preparations to defect to America
. He constructed a makeshift raft and hid food and water provisions for his escape. Soon the trawler was close enough to Los Angeles
so that the city's lights could be seen on the horizon. Kourdakov planned escape that night, but had to perform one more shift as a radio officer before sunset. On that shift, he received a message that greatly hindered that plan. A fisherman named Simas Kudirka had jumped off from a Russian ship and made it to an American ship off the coast of New England
(see The Kudirka incident). From that message, he learned that the United States government
fully cooperated with the Soviet Union and handed him back to his home country, where he was sentenced to ten years in prison. Realizing the fate that could lie ahead of him if he chose to venture into America, he decided to try to escape to Canada
instead.
, he was again transferred to another ship, the Shturman Elagin, which was headed towards Amchitka Island
. During his months at sea, Sergei often secretly listened to Russian
broadcasts of Voice of America
as well as religious broadcasts. He also spent many hours each day exercising in preparation of his escape.
By late August 1971, the Elagin began heading back to the Canadian coast. A few days later, Kourdakov received a message saying that he was to be transferred to the Maria Ulyanova in five days, which would then head back to the Soviet Union. Desperately, Sergei Kourdakov tried thinking of a good escape strategy. During those five days, the ship encountered a severe storm, and the captain ordered him to radio Canadian authorities and request to enter Canadian waters in order to avoid the storm. Sergei quickly realized this would be his very last opportunity. On September 3, 1971 around 10 pm, Kourdakov plunged into the freezing Canadian waters.
In the morning of the next day, Sergei Kourdakov was found staggering half-naked and bleeding onto the shores of Queen Charlotte Island by a woman living near the sea, who quickly called the hospital. Suffering from a cardiac irregularity, he wasn't sure at first whether he was back on a Soviet ship or in Canada. By the time he was at the hospital, he had entered a deep sleep. When he woke up, he was greeted by a translator. Later that day he was flown to Prince Rupert, British Columbia
, where he stayed in the prison section of a hospital. Because no one in the hospital spoke Russian
, he communicated in German
.
On one particular day, an immigration officer offered to give Sergei Kourdakov a tour of Prince Rupert. Kourdakov was so amazed with the city that he stated later that his "eyes almost popped out as I looked at the cars and nice homes. I guess I was staring at them." Being very skeptical, Sergei did not rule out the possibility of the trip being a propaganda tour.
Just as Kourdakov began looking ahead to the bright future, he was given disturbing news that he might be handed back to the Soviet government. Canada was conducting trade agreement
with the Soviet Union, and his staying there could hinder relations between the two countries. In addition, Soviet Union Premier
Alexei Kosygin was visiting Canada and the government didn't want to offend him. He was subsequently flown to Vancouver and placed in the Vancouver Central Jail. Alone in his cell, Sergei began rethinking his decision to attempt to defect to Canada instead of America. He tried talking to God, although he felt embarrassed because he didn't know any prayers.
In the middle of the night one day, Kourdakov was taken on a "tour of the city" which led him to an airport, where he was boarded on a plane that flew to Montreal
. From there he was taken to a prison on an island on the Saint Lawrence River
in Quebec City
. This was done in preparation for potentially deporting
Kourdakov, since a Russian liner
was set to travel up the Saint Lawrence River and dock only a few hundred yards from the prison.
As soon as Sergei Kourdakov was whisked away in the night, Canadian radio talk show
host Pat Burns
, who had taken interest in Sergei and had broadcast his case on the radio, was informed of all of this. While on the air, he called Member of Parliament
Harold Edward Winch
and explained Kourdakov's situation. Subsequently, Winch demanded a public statement regarding Kourdakov from Prime Minister
Pierre Trudeau
.
Soon enough, he was told he could stay in Canada permanently. Although he had to stay in jail for a few more weeks, he was released as soon as his documents were processed.
As soon as he was released from jail, he had two main intentions: firstly to keep his promise to God and serve Him, and secondly to find a job and settle in Canada. Many people offered to help him, give him a job, or give him a place to live. The first church he went to was Saint Ann's Catholic Church in Quebec
. Trying to do the same as others there, he knelt and began praying for three hours.
When he went back to his place of residence, he received a message from someone seeking to hire him, and an address to reach him. He left a note to where he was going to his two Bulgarian
friends and translators and went to the interview. But when he went to the address, he found out that it was a set-up and the members were part of the Front de libération du Québec
, a nationalist and socialist revolutionary group responsible for hundreds of bombings, with strong Communist ties. According to Kourdakov, they warned him that if he would raise his voice one more time and say things he shouldn't, he would be silenced. As soon as his two friends found his note, they knew it was a trap and rushed there.
With the strong presence of the FLQ in Quebec and the Russian embassy in Ottawa
, Sergei decided to move to Toronto
and stay with a Russian family who offered him a place to live. He began studying English
at a university in the city. He also went to a church in Toronto which was always open for prayer, where he stayed for two days only praying and drinking water. Sergei also began attending Ukraine churches in Toronto. With the aid of a pastor, he went through a religious conversion. One day the pastor gave him a small bible
printed in Russian. Immediately, he recognized it as the same kind of bible he saw many times during raids in the Soviet Union. When he asked where it came from, the pastor told him that Underground Evangelism (now known as Mission Without Borders), a California
n organization that helped in the smuggling
of Christian materials into the Soviet Union and other Communist countries.
While leaving the subway station one day, Kourdakov sensed that he was being followed. When he turned around, he saw three powerfully built Russians
who warned him saying, "If you know what is good for you, Kourdakov, you will keep silent and say nothing more. If you open your mouth, you will have a 'final accident.' Remember, you have been warned." He chose not to tell anyone about this at the time because he felt that because of the way he treated Christians in the Soviet Union, he owed it to them to speak out for them now.
On May 1, 1972, Kourdakov joined Underground Evangelism and moved to California
where he moved in with a family that had heard his story and offered him a place to stay. He spent his time traveling all over the United States speaking in schools, universities, and bible studies about his life and the state of Christian communities in the Soviet Union. He also spent much of his time making live radio broadcasts about Christianity and the evils of Communism in Russian
, which were broadcast to the Soviet Union. While living in the United States, Kourdakov spent three weeks in The Pentagon
demonstrating how Soviet submarines are made.
, Kourdakov moved in with a Christian family. Because he began making public appearances so often, he started worrying for his safety, so he began taking a revolver that belonged to the family's father with him whenever he traveled anywhere. To celebrate the New Year, Sergei went on vacation with Ann Johnson, the seventeen year old daughter of the family he was living with first to Disneyland
, then to a ski lodge in Running Springs, California
. On January 1, 1973, Sergei Kourdakov was found dead in his motel room in Running Springs, California
, killed by a gunshot to the head. In his room was an unfinished typewritten paper (which he was preparing for Senator Strom Thurmond
in regards to receiving permanent residency in the US), a champagne bottle, and the gun borrowed from the family's father.
Due to the circumstances, Sergei Kourdakov was initially announced to have died by suicide
. Many, notably Underground Evangelism founder and then-president L. Joe Bass, repudiated this claim. After a more thorough investigation, Kourdakov's death was ruled an accident on March 1, 1973, stating that while Sergei was playing with his revolver, he probably accidentally shot himself. But due to Kourdakov's status as a former high-rank KGB agent who defected to North America and publicly opposed Communism, some believe that he was assassinated] by another KGB member in order to silence him. Sergei himself had considered the possibility of an assassination attempt, hence the revolver, stating that he "was in the Soviet Intelligence. They do not warn twice." and that if anything were ever to happen to him, "it would have all the appearances of an accident." L. Joe Bass was quoted on an Underground Evangelism newsletter saying that "What better than midnight on New Year's Eve, and what better place than that small, tourist-packed resort area for Sergei Kourdakov to have an 'accident'?"
After his death, his body was sent to Washington, D.C.
on January 10, 1973 where an English funeral service by Reverend Richard Halverson
, a Presbyterian pastor, and a Russian service at a Russian Orthodox
church were held. Sergei Kourdakov was buried in a Russian section of Rock Creek Cemetery
in Washington, D.C., USA on January 11, 1973.
, himself a defector from Soviet controlled Romania, accused Underground Evangelism of exploiting the young defector. On January 4, he wrote an open letter
to the organization stating that Sergei Kourdakov "should not have been brought on the stage [into publicity] with its perils before having been a member of a church growing in grace and knowledge." Andrew Semenchuk, the west coast
representative of the Slavic Gospel Association stated that he and other Russian Baptist church members who heard Sergei speak at a Santa Ana
felt that he "should not have been thrust into such a situation—speaking on subjects 'completely beyond him.'"
Some of the criticism towards Underground Evangelism was its alleged exploitation of Kourdakov for profit. According to the Los Angeles Times
, by 1973, the young Christian "had become the feature of the organization's literature." In addition to placing Kourdakov on a tour of over twenty speaking engagements during his short time in the organization, Underground Evangelism sold taped versions of his story priced at four dollars. Myrus Knutson, board chairman of Jesus to the Communist World, made a statement saying that "it may be unfair to say it, but they [Underground Evangelism] smelled money."
There has also been some conflicting claims regarding Kourdakov's actual religion. While Sergei Kourdakov identified himself as an Evangelical Christian during his time living in North America to the point of his death, Father Sergius Shukin, an Orthodox priest, claimed that during an interview Kourdakov revealed to him that he was an Orthodox Christian. This claim was first made public in The Orthodox Word nearly two years after Kourdakov's death.
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
: Сергей Николаевич Курдаков; March 1, 1951 – January 1, 1973) was a former KGB
KGB
The KGB was the commonly used acronym for the . It was the national security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 until 1991, and was the premier internal security, intelligence, and secret police organization during that time.The State Security Agency of the Republic of Belarus currently uses the...
agent and naval officer who from his late teen years carried out more than 150 raids in underground Christian communities in regions of the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
in the 1960s. At the age of twenty, he defected to Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
while a naval officer on a Soviet
Soviet Navy
The Soviet Navy was the naval arm of the Soviet Armed Forces. Often referred to as the Red Fleet, the Soviet Navy would have played an instrumental role in a Warsaw Pact war with NATO, where it would have attempted to prevent naval convoys from bringing reinforcements across the Atlantic Ocean...
trawler
Naval trawler
A naval trawler is a vessel built along the lines of a fishing trawler but fitted out for naval purposes. Naval trawlers were widely used during the First and Second world wars. Fishing trawlers were particularly suited for many naval requirements because they were robust boats designed to work...
in the Pacific
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...
and converted to Evangelical
Evangelicalism
Evangelicalism is a Protestant Christian movement which began in Great Britain in the 1730s and gained popularity in the United States during the series of Great Awakenings of the 18th and 19th century.Its key commitments are:...
Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
. He is known for having written The Persecutor
The Persecutor
The Persecutor, also known as Forgive Me Natasha and less commonly as Sergei, is the autobiography of Sergei Kourdakov, a former KGB agent who persecuted Christians in the Soviet Union in the 1970s, but defected to Canada in 1971 and converted to Evangelical Christianity...
(also known as Forgive Me, Natasha), an autobiography
Autobiography
An autobiography is a book about the life of a person, written by that person.-Origin of the term:...
that was written shortly before his death in 1973 and published posthumously. Since its publication, it has been the source of varied criticism.
Early life
Sergei Kourdakov was born on March 1, 1951 in Novosibirsk OblastNovosibirsk Oblast
Novosibirsk Oblast is a federal subject of Russia located in southwestern Siberia. Its administrative and economic center is the city of Novosibirsk. Population: -Overview:...
, Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
. His father Nikolai Ivanovitch Kourdakov was a soldier in the Soviet Army
Soviet Army
The Soviet Army is the name given to the main part of the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union between 1946 and 1992. Previously, it had been known as the Red Army. Informally, Армия referred to all the MOD armed forces, except, in some cases, the Soviet Navy.This article covers the Soviet Ground...
and a political activist who was a very loyal supporter of Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
. He led a brigade in the Winter War
Winter War
The Winter War was a military conflict between the Soviet Union and Finland. It began with a Soviet offensive on 30 November 1939 – three months after the start of World War II and the Soviet invasion of Poland – and ended on 13 March 1940 with the Moscow Peace Treaty...
and led a unit under General Konstantin Rokossovsky
Konstantin Rokossovsky
Konstantin Rokossovskiy was a Polish-origin Soviet career officer who was a Marshal of the Soviet Union, as well as Marshal of Poland and Polish Defence Minister, who was famously known for his service in the Eastern Front, where he received high esteem for his outstanding military skill...
in World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. After the war, Nikolai helped set up a military base and became the base chief. Although Sergei was told that his father died by being shot, he found out much later from a friend of his father's that when Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...
became Premier of the Soviet Union
Premier of the Soviet Union
The office of Premier of the Soviet Union was synonymous with head of government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics . Twelve individuals have been premier...
, he had ordered the elimination of important officers who had supported Stalin in order to consolidate his power, and that Nikolai Kourdakov had been one of them. Sergei lived with his mother until her health began to deteriorate and when he was four years old, she became very ill and died. He was invited to live with a family who had known his mother. It was there that he learned to read and count. Sergei got along well with everyone in the family except with their son Andrei, whom he believed to be mentally handicapped
Mental retardation
Mental retardation is a generalized disorder appearing before adulthood, characterized by significantly impaired cognitive functioning and deficits in two or more adaptive behaviors...
. At the age of six, he decided to run away after Andrei tried to kill him by shoving his head into a filled bathtub.
For ten days, he lived in Novosibirsk
Novosibirsk
Novosibirsk is the third-largest city in Russia, after Moscow and Saint Petersburg, and the largest city of Siberia, with a population of 1,473,737 . It is the administrative center of Novosibirsk Oblast as well as of the Siberian Federal District...
, thieving from food stands until he was caught and sent to the police. He was promptly sent to an orphanage then known as Children's Home Number One, where he joined the Octobrianiks, a Soviet youth organization required for all children grades one through three. After three years, he was transferred to an orphanage for older children forty miles away in Verkh-Irmen. There he joined Youth Pioneers
Young Pioneer organization of the Soviet Union
The Young Pioneer Organization of the Soviet Union, also Vladimir Lenin All-Union Pioneer Organization The Young Pioneer Organization of the Soviet Union, also Vladimir Lenin All-Union Pioneer Organization The Young Pioneer Organization of the Soviet Union, also Vladimir Lenin All-Union Pioneer...
, the Communist youth organization required for children nine through fifteen. Sergei also joined a gang that turned into a reign of terror for the city. In response to this looming threat, the police ordered the orphanage to be shut down in 1961 and all the children separated to different orphanages.
Barysevo orphanage
Sergei then went back to Novosibirsk to once again live in the train station and steal from the food stalls. Eventually he was caught and sent to another orphanage, this one in Barysevo. He later said that living in that orphanage had been a turning point in his life. In his autobiographyThe Persecutor
The Persecutor, also known as Forgive Me Natasha and less commonly as Sergei, is the autobiography of Sergei Kourdakov, a former KGB agent who persecuted Christians in the Soviet Union in the 1970s, but defected to Canada in 1971 and converted to Evangelical Christianity...
, he wrote "An atmosphere of fear prevailed throughout the home. We were afraid of the aunts and uncles (orphanage employees). They were afraid of Big Irene and Uncle Nichy, who, in turn were afraid of the party leaders. Barysevo became a camp of hate and fear, divided between the wardens and the children."
He soon discovered that the orphanage at Barysevo had a caste system-esque society created by the orphans, with "slaves" on the bottom, "lieutenants" in the middle, and the "king" at the top. Starting off as a slave, he soon challenged a lieutenant and won his position. By the time he was fourteen years old, he became king, replacing his friend Nikolai who was transferred to a different orphanage. As king, he met a thirteen year old boy whose parents were declared unfit to be parents due to their religious beliefs. Due to the boy's own Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
beliefs, he was nicknamed "the Deacon". Sergei soon befriended him and ordered any teasing towards him to stop.
Interest in communism
At the age of fifteen, Sergei Kourdakov joined KomsomolKomsomol
The Communist Union of Youth , usually known as Komsomol , was the youth division of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The Komsomol in its earliest form was established in urban centers in 1918. During the early years, it was a Russian organization, known as the Russian Communist Union of...
, also known as the Communist Union of Youth. The director of the school he attended, known as Comrade Skripko, saw interest in him and had convinced him to join. Sergei cultivated a great interest in Marxism-Leninism
Marxism-Leninism
Marxism–Leninism is a communist ideology, officially based upon the theories of Marxism and Vladimir Lenin, that promotes the development and creation of a international communist society through the leadership of a vanguard party over a revolutionary socialist state that represents a dictatorship...
, one that was not particularly shared with his friends in his orphanage. During highschool, he was also excelling in all of his school subjects and learned to speak German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
. The school director eventually offered him the opportunity to lecture younger classes about on various subjects, generally subjects having to do with communism.
In the summer of 1966, Kourdakov and two close friends of his obtained a large amount of hashish
Hashish
Hashish is a cannabis preparation composed of compressed stalked resin glands, called trichomes, collected from the unfertilized buds of the cannabis plant. It contains the same active ingredients but in higher concentrations than unsifted buds or leaves...
from Turkestan
Russian Turkestan
Russian Turkestan was the western part of Turkestan within the Russian Empire , comprising the oasis region to the south of the Kazakh steppes, but not the protectorates of the Emirate of Bukhara and the Khanate of Khiva.-History:-Establishment:Although Russia had been pushing south into the...
and began a narcotics business
Illegal drug trade
The illegal drug trade is a global black market, dedicated to cultivation, manufacture, distribution and sale of those substances which are subject to drug prohibition laws. Most jurisdictions prohibit trade, except under license, of many types of drugs by drug prohibition laws.A UN report said the...
. Initially successful, his business ended after a group of gang members that discovered he was carrying the narcotic took him into an alley and stabbed him the back for it, almost killing him. While recovering from his injury, Sergei realized that he had to make a decision for what he would do with his life: either follow the course of his friends and continue dealing in the underworld or seriously focus on building a career in communism. He chose communism.
By this time Sergei Kourdakov had already become the leader of the Communist Youth League of his area. He graduated from his school in June 1967 and was awarded a silver medal for being the second best student in his grade level. For much of the last year of school, he focused on pushing and improving the League as much as he could, hoping to make it the most successful one in his district
Novosibirsk Oblast
Novosibirsk Oblast is a federal subject of Russia located in southwestern Siberia. Its administrative and economic center is the city of Novosibirsk. Population: -Overview:...
, a position that was indeed awarded to it during the judging of Leagues, which happened annually.
Post-school
After graduating school, Kourdakov faced the decision on what career path to take for his military obligation and chose the NavySoviet Navy
The Soviet Navy was the naval arm of the Soviet Armed Forces. Often referred to as the Red Fleet, the Soviet Navy would have played an instrumental role in a Warsaw Pact war with NATO, where it would have attempted to prevent naval convoys from bringing reinforcements across the Atlantic Ocean...
. With high honors and grades, and an outstanding recommendation from his old school director, he applied to and was accepted into the Alexander Popov Naval Academy in Leningrad
Saint Petersburg
Saint Petersburg is a city and a federal subject of Russia located on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea...
. Although a newcomer, he was chosen to be the leader of the school's Communist youth organization due to the record of his leadership in his previous organization. At the academy, Kourdakov met Pavel Sigorsky, a Pole
Poles
thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...
who taught him Polish
Polish language
Polish is a language of the Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages, used throughout Poland and by Polish minorities in other countries...
. After completing a year of study at the academy in July 1968, he continued his studies at the Petropavlovsk Naval Academy in Kamchatka, at the Eastern border of Russia.
Before going to the academy and during his military summer vacation, he traveled again to Novosibirsk to visit his old friends, who were all involved in gangs. Shortly after attending a peace conference he was invited to between a gang his friends were in and another nearby gang, Kourdakov was shot in the left breast in revenge by a member of the other gang. Miraculously, he survived because the bullet first shot through multiple layers of clothes and through his thick address book and all of his identification papers before lodging itself in his skin.
Blagoveshchensk
Blagoveshchensk is a city and the administrative center of Amur Oblast, Russia. Population: -Early history of the region:The early residents of both sides of the Amur in the region of today's Blagoveshchensk were the Daurs and Duchers...
, a city that borders China
People's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...
, serving in a naval military unit against the Chinese army
People's Liberation Army
The People's Liberation Army is the unified military organization of all land, sea, strategic missile and air forces of the People's Republic of China. The PLA was established on August 1, 1927 — celebrated annually as "PLA Day" — as the military arm of the Communist Party of China...
. At one point he partook in a small battle. Finally in late September 1968, he arrived at the port city Petropavlovsk
Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky
Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky is the main city and the administrative, industrial, scientific, and cultural center of Kamchatka Krai, Russia. Population: .-History:It was founded by Danish navigator Vitus Bering, in the service of the Russian Navy...
. Again, because of his past experience and record, he was chosen to be the leader of the academy's Communist Youth League. From then on, along with his studies, he was in charge of carrying out orders sent from the Komsomol
Komsomol
The Communist Union of Youth , usually known as Komsomol , was the youth division of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The Komsomol in its earliest form was established in urban centers in 1918. During the early years, it was a Russian organization, known as the Russian Communist Union of...
headquarters in Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
, listening to the grievances of cadet
Cadet
A cadet is a trainee to become an officer in the military, often a person who is a junior trainee. The term comes from the term "cadet" for younger sons of a noble family.- Military context :...
s and argue in favor of them if he was convinced the cadet was right, and discipline any cadet who appeared to be undermining Communist commitments, often shocking them into performing better. In just that single year at the academy, Kourdakov served as the League leader, performed well in his studies, organized entertainment events for the cadets, lectured at nearby schools on many current events topics, and competed in all of the sports offered by the academy.
As a KGB agent
While working at his Communist Youth League office in May 1969, Sergei Kourdakov was visited by Ivan Azarov, a well-known KGBKGB
The KGB was the commonly used acronym for the . It was the national security agency of the Soviet Union from 1954 until 1991, and was the premier internal security, intelligence, and secret police organization during that time.The State Security Agency of the Republic of Belarus currently uses the...
official. He came to tell him about a "special-action squad" he was forming as an official but secret branch of the city's police. After telling Kourdakov that he had gone through his record all the way to his days in Children's Home Number One and complimented him on his ability to captivate people so well during speeches, he stated his desire to place him as the leader of this new group. Although Sergei tried thinking of reasons to reject the offer while Azarov was telling him all this, he immediately reconciled after hearing the pay he was to receive for each operation—twenty-five rubles
Russian ruble
The ruble or rouble is the currency of the Russian Federation and the two partially recognized republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Formerly, the ruble was also the currency of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union prior to their breakups. Belarus and Transnistria also use currencies with...
. At the time he received seven rubles per month as a naval cadet and if he were to become an officer in the Navy, he would still only receive seventy rubles per month.
One of the main duties of being the leader of this organization was to pick the best men from the academy to work in the organization, usually consisting of about twenty men. Kourdakov later wrote that he assumed that with this "special-action squad," he would be dealing with "drunks, murderers, wife beaters, and other lawbreakers the regular police couldn't take time to deal with." And true to his assumptions, that was what he and his team were assigned to deal with. For the most part, they would be sent to bars and clubs to break up fights.
But after a few operations, the group was told that their abilities would be put to a different use, breaking up or raiding secret Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
home worship services
Service of worship
In the Protestant denominations of Christianity, a service of worship is a meeting whose primary purpose is the worship of God. The phrase is normally shortened to service. It is also commonly called a worship service...
. Under the leadership and influence of Ivan Azarov, Kourdakov and the others in his group became convinced that Christians, "Believers" as they were always referred to, were a serious threat to the Communist party
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union was the only legal, ruling political party in the Soviet Union and one of the largest communist organizations in the world...
and the Soviet Union. Aside from "roughing up" the members of a service, they were also instructed to arrest the leaders of the group and confiscate any bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
s and other religious texts. Sometimes they were told to arrest every participant.
Christian persecutions
The first of these operations, as Kourdakov puts it, ended in disaster. When they arrived at the house where the meeting was, none of the members put up a fight, leaving the group in a very awkward and uncomfortable position. For a while from then on, the group received mostly orders to break up more fights. The squad's first major operation was in small village called Elizovo, near the Avacha RiverAvacha River
Avacha is a river in the southwestern part of the Kamchatka Peninsula, Russia. It flows southeast into Avacha Bay. The river has a length of 122 km and a watershed of 5,090 square km...
and 35 miles to the north of Petropavlovsk, where a baptism
Believer's baptism
Believer's baptism is the Christian practice of baptism as this is understood by many Protestant churches, particularly those that descend from the Anabaptist tradition...
service was being held. Clubs in hand, the group hid in nearby bushes preparing for the Believers to arrive. Soon after they had finished the baptisms, the squad sprung into action. In just five minutes, all of the Believers were knocked down to the ground, all of the bleeding in one way or another. One girl's ear had been split open, and the group's pastor laid dead and floating down the river. As further torture and humiliation, the bleeding young girls of the group were stripped naked and driven in that state to the police station, an act greatly disapproved of by Ivan Azarov due to the fact that everything conducted by the squad needed to be done in secret, and that doing something like that could turn the people against the police.
Many of these raids continued in similar fashions. The leaders of the worship groups were usually arrested and sentenced to many years in Siberia
Siberia
Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...
n labor camp
Labor camp
A labor camp is a simplified detention facility where inmates are forced to engage in penal labor. Labor camps have many common aspects with slavery and with prisons...
s. Along with the duties of being the leader of the police group, Sergie Kourdakov continued studying at the naval academy, hoping to become a radio engineer in the Navy. He still retained his position as the leader of the academy's Communist Youth League and continued to compete in the school's sports, primarily consisting of wrestling
Wrestling
Wrestling is a form of grappling type techniques such as clinch fighting, throws and takedowns, joint locks, pins and other grappling holds. A wrestling bout is a physical competition, between two competitors or sparring partners, who attempt to gain and maintain a superior position...
, judo
Judo
is a modern martial art and combat sport created in Japan in 1882 by Jigoro Kano. Its most prominent feature is its competitive element, where the object is to either throw or takedown one's opponent to the ground, immobilize or otherwise subdue one's opponent with a grappling maneuver, or force an...
, karate
Karate
is a martial art developed in the Ryukyu Islands in what is now Okinawa, Japan. It was developed from indigenous fighting methods called and Chinese kenpō. Karate is a striking art using punching, kicking, knee and elbow strikes, and open-handed techniques such as knife-hands. Grappling, locks,...
, and track.
Any religious writings found during raids were confiscated. Any printed materials, including bibles, were sent to Moscow where they were studied and analyzed. In his book, Kourdakov quoted Azarov on the use of printed material: "Another organization and department branch has been established in Moscow to study the teachings of these Believers, so we can better oppose and defeat them. There our finest scholars are studying their literature, including their Bible, in order that they can learn how to better fight their religious beliefs. It's sort of a complete and full-scale Bible college." Another one of Sergei's duties as leader of the squad was getting rid of other religious texts, specifically the handwritten or very old materials, which were usually used to heat furnaces.
The group was able to determine where Believer meetings were happening before they began through use of spies
Espionage
Espionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
in the networks of underground churches throughout the region. These people were paid much more than Kourdakov and his men because if they attended a meeting that was going to be raided, they would end up being beaten as much as the Believers. Another part of Kourdakov's job was to prepare reports and record the names of all of the Believers caught, to be entered into a nation-wide database in Moscow. Sergei later wrote that "In addition, a three-by-five-inch card with the Believer's picture, birth date, and other data was sent to the police station. These cards were kept in a special file. Any time the party chose, the Believers could be rounded up and removed from society quickly."
Meeting Natasha
During one of these raids, Kourdakov took particular notice of one of the Believers, Natasha Zhdanova, whom he at the time saw as particularly attractive. At that particular raid, one of the squad's members Victor Matveyev had smashed her against a wall. Sergei had usually assumed that Believers, especially younger ones, would distance themselves greatly from Christian meetings after experiencing the wrath of his group. But only three days later, he found her at another meeting. This time he decided to take matters into his own hands, delivering a very severe beating. After reading her records and discovering that she had been part of the Communist Youth League, Kourdakov saw it as his duty to set her straight and had her come to the police station to have a talk with her, in hopes of frightening her into breaking off from the underground Christian church. But only one week later, during yet another meeting, they found her again. Alex Gulyaev, another member of the squad, moved to attack her with his club, when Victor jumped between them. When Alex demanded that he get out of the way, Victor said, "Alex, I'm telling you, don't touch her! Nobody touches her! [...] She has something we don't have! Nobody touches her! Nobody!" The raid ended abruptly as all of the meeting's members were sent out. Natasha Zhdanova's name was later used in the alternate title for Sergei Kourdakov's autobiography The PersecutorThe Persecutor
The Persecutor, also known as Forgive Me Natasha and less commonly as Sergei, is the autobiography of Sergei Kourdakov, a former KGB agent who persecuted Christians in the Soviet Union in the 1970s, but defected to Canada in 1971 and converted to Evangelical Christianity...
, which was also published as Forgive Me, Natasha.
On April 22, 1970, Sergei Kourdakov attended a live televised major Communist party
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union was the only legal, ruling political party in the Soviet Union and one of the largest communist organizations in the world...
convention to celebrate the 100th birthday of Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...
and honor the future leaders of the party. He was invited to receive an award which honored him as the Number-One Communist Youth of Kamchatka Province, for which he prepared and gave a fifteen minute speech, which was broadcast nationwide. There he met Comrade Orlov, the party leader for Kamchatka
Kamchatka Oblast
Kamchatka Oblast was, until being incorporated into Kamchatka Krai on July 1, 2007, a federal subject of Russia . To the north, it bordered Magadan Oblast and Chukotka Autonomous Okrug. Koryak Autonomous Okrug was located in the northern part of the oblast...
. During the banquet following the convention, Orlov, drunk with vodka, invited him into the private dining room reserved for party leaders. What waited inside shocked Kourdakov. Inside he saw all sorts of expensive delicacies he did not expect to see and vodka "flowing like water," but more importantly, he witnessed the state of the party leaders—drunk, passed out, or drinking themselves to unconsciousness. Many of them had their faces in their food and one was lying on the food serving tray. Comrade Orlov had excused himself and when he came back, continued drinking. Soon, he began criticizing Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
, Leonid Brezhnev
Leonid Brezhnev
Leonid Ilyich Brezhnev – 10 November 1982) was the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , presiding over the country from 1964 until his death in 1982. His eighteen-year term as General Secretary was second only to that of Joseph Stalin in...
, and eventually communism itself, at one point shouting that "Communism is the worst curse that has ever come to man!" This was a turning point in Sergei's life. He later wrote that he had been a genuine and firm believer in communism. But after witnessing the hypocrisy of those top party leaders, his goal in life had changed: "From now on, there was only one goal: Get to the top! If the game was played by cynicism and ruthlessness, I'd play it that way."
By mid-1970, Sergei Kourdakov was beginning to notice new patterns in the ways the Believers worshiped. Although they usually split into groups of around fifteen, they began meeting in groups of ten or less, which required Sergei's group to perform more raids in order to have as much of an effect on the Believers. He also began to notice an increase in Believers, which made it seem to him that the bigger fight the put up, the larger they grew. Soon the group was operating on a tight schedule instead of just being called in whenever they were needed. Another trend he noticed was that may of the new Believers were young people, often as young as him. This made little sense to him, as he had a hard time understanding how Christianity could appeal to young people so much. With all of these operations occurring, news of the group began to spread throughout the public.
Exposure to the Gospel of Luke
By July 1970, the group had accumulated many handwritten religious texts. On one particular day, the police captain Dimitri Nikiforov asked Kourdakov and Matveyev to go to the basement of the police station and burn some of the texts for heat. While Victor left to get some vodka for themselves, Sergei sat down there trying to figure out what "young people see in this trash." As he thought of Natasha, a sense of curiosity overcame him and he picked up a text, which happened to be an incomplete copy of the Gospel of LukeGospel of Luke
The Gospel According to Luke , commonly shortened to the Gospel of Luke or simply Luke, is the third and longest of the four canonical Gospels. This synoptic gospel is an account of the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth. It details his story from the events of his birth to his Ascension.The...
and began reading until Victor came back. Kourdakov later wrote in his autobiography about his experience when reading the book for the first time:
In late July 1970, Kourdakov was sent to Novosibirsk for military duty. Although he was to stay in Novosibirsk in case of a military emergency, he took a plane to Moscow to visit the tomb of Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...
for the second time, hoping that being near his body would give him a sense of direction, something the corpse fell short on. Leaving the tomb that day, Sergei made his decision. He would leave Russia. He soon formulated a plan that would involve him swimming across the Tisza
Tisza
The Tisza or Tisa is one of the main rivers of Central Europe. It rises in Ukraine, and is formed near Rakhiv by the junction of headwaters White Tisa, whose source is in the Chornohora mountains and Black Tisa, which springs in the Gorgany range...
river to Hungary
Hungarian Soviet Republic
The Hungarian Soviet Republic or Soviet Republic of Hungary was a short-lived Communist state established in Hungary in the aftermath of World War I....
using an aqua-lung
Aqua-lung
Aqua-Lung was the original name of the first open-circuit free-swimming underwater breathing set in reaching worldwide popularity and commercial success...
he acquired at a black market. He even went as far as obtaining Hungarian currency and making his way to the border, but after seeing the immense amount of security at the border, he quickly realized that it would be impossible. With his military leave ending, Kourdakov flew back to Petropavlovsk. Soon enough he was back to conducting raids against the Believers' meetings. He later wrote that because he was dissatisfied and ill at ease at the time, the last raids he led were the most vicious.
During one particularly large raid, Sergei suddenly became emotionally grieved and left in the middle of the raid. On that day he decided to quit working for the KGB and from then on began giving excuses when told to gather up men to perform raids. Eventually he was relieved of his duties and continued as leader of the academy's Youth Organization. To persuade him to stay, Dimitri Nikiforov offered to place him in the Tomsk Academy, a well known school for KGB agents. Kourdakov rejected it.
In the Navy
In January 1971, Kourdakov graduated from the Petropavlovsk Naval Academy as a radio officer and was assigned to duty on a Soviet NavySoviet Navy
The Soviet Navy was the naval arm of the Soviet Armed Forces. Often referred to as the Red Fleet, the Soviet Navy would have played an instrumental role in a Warsaw Pact war with NATO, where it would have attempted to prevent naval convoys from bringing reinforcements across the Atlantic Ocean...
destroyer
Destroyer
In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast and maneuverable yet long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy or battle group and defend them against smaller, powerful, short-range attackers. Destroyers, originally called torpedo-boat destroyers in 1892, evolved from...
. After more than a month on the destroyer, Sergei was sent back to the naval base for two weeks. There, he asked to be transferred to a ship near the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
coast, a request that was approved. On March 4, 1971, Sergei Kourdakov left the Soviet Union for the last time to board a Soviet submarine
Submarine
A submarine is a watercraft capable of independent operation below the surface of the water. It differs from a submersible, which has more limited underwater capability...
. A few months later on June 25, Kourdakov was transferred to the Soviet trawler
Naval trawler
A naval trawler is a vessel built along the lines of a fishing trawler but fitted out for naval purposes. Naval trawlers were widely used during the First and Second world wars. Fishing trawlers were particularly suited for many naval requirements because they were robust boats designed to work...
Ivan Sereda, which was in need of a radio officer.
On the Ivan Sereda, Kourdakov began making preparations to defect to America
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. He constructed a makeshift raft and hid food and water provisions for his escape. Soon the trawler was close enough to Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
so that the city's lights could be seen on the horizon. Kourdakov planned escape that night, but had to perform one more shift as a radio officer before sunset. On that shift, he received a message that greatly hindered that plan. A fisherman named Simas Kudirka had jumped off from a Russian ship and made it to an American ship off the coast of New England
New England
New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...
(see The Kudirka incident). From that message, he learned that the United States government
Federal government of the United States
The federal government of the United States is the national government of the constitutional republic of fifty states that is the United States of America. The federal government comprises three distinct branches of government: a legislative, an executive and a judiciary. These branches and...
fully cooperated with the Soviet Union and handed him back to his home country, where he was sentenced to ten years in prison. Realizing the fate that could lie ahead of him if he chose to venture into America, he decided to try to escape to Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
instead.
Defecting to Canada
A few weeks later, Sergei Kourdakov was transferred to another trawler, the Kolivan, which was traveling North towards the Canadian coast. While off the coast of VancouverVancouver
Vancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...
, he was again transferred to another ship, the Shturman Elagin, which was headed towards Amchitka Island
Amchitka
Amchitka is a volcanic, tectonically unstable island in the Rat Islands group of the Aleutian Islands in southwest Alaska. It is part of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge. The island is about long, and from wide...
. During his months at sea, Sergei often secretly listened to Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
broadcasts of Voice of America
Voice of America
Voice of America is the official external broadcast institution of the United States federal government. It is one of five civilian U.S. international broadcasters working under the umbrella of the Broadcasting Board of Governors . VOA provides a wide range of programming for broadcast on radio...
as well as religious broadcasts. He also spent many hours each day exercising in preparation of his escape.
By late August 1971, the Elagin began heading back to the Canadian coast. A few days later, Kourdakov received a message saying that he was to be transferred to the Maria Ulyanova in five days, which would then head back to the Soviet Union. Desperately, Sergei Kourdakov tried thinking of a good escape strategy. During those five days, the ship encountered a severe storm, and the captain ordered him to radio Canadian authorities and request to enter Canadian waters in order to avoid the storm. Sergei quickly realized this would be his very last opportunity. On September 3, 1971 around 10 pm, Kourdakov plunged into the freezing Canadian waters.
In the morning of the next day, Sergei Kourdakov was found staggering half-naked and bleeding onto the shores of Queen Charlotte Island by a woman living near the sea, who quickly called the hospital. Suffering from a cardiac irregularity, he wasn't sure at first whether he was back on a Soviet ship or in Canada. By the time he was at the hospital, he had entered a deep sleep. When he woke up, he was greeted by a translator. Later that day he was flown to Prince Rupert, British Columbia
Prince Rupert, British Columbia
Prince Rupert is a port city in the province of British Columbia, Canada. It is the land, air, and water transportation hub of British Columbia's North Coast, and home to some 12,815 people .-History:...
, where he stayed in the prison section of a hospital. Because no one in the hospital spoke Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
, he communicated in German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
.
On one particular day, an immigration officer offered to give Sergei Kourdakov a tour of Prince Rupert. Kourdakov was so amazed with the city that he stated later that his "eyes almost popped out as I looked at the cars and nice homes. I guess I was staring at them." Being very skeptical, Sergei did not rule out the possibility of the trip being a propaganda tour.
Just as Kourdakov began looking ahead to the bright future, he was given disturbing news that he might be handed back to the Soviet government. Canada was conducting trade agreement
Trade pact
A trade pact is a wide ranging tax, tariff and trade pact that often includes investment guarantees. The most common trade pacts are of the preferential and free trade types are concluded in order to reduce tariffs, quotas and other trade restrictions on items traded between the signatories.-By...
with the Soviet Union, and his staying there could hinder relations between the two countries. In addition, Soviet Union Premier
Premier of the Soviet Union
The office of Premier of the Soviet Union was synonymous with head of government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics . Twelve individuals have been premier...
Alexei Kosygin was visiting Canada and the government didn't want to offend him. He was subsequently flown to Vancouver and placed in the Vancouver Central Jail. Alone in his cell, Sergei began rethinking his decision to attempt to defect to Canada instead of America. He tried talking to God, although he felt embarrassed because he didn't know any prayers.
In the middle of the night one day, Kourdakov was taken on a "tour of the city" which led him to an airport, where he was boarded on a plane that flew to Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
. From there he was taken to a prison on an island on the Saint Lawrence River
Saint Lawrence River
The Saint Lawrence is a large river flowing approximately from southwest to northeast in the middle latitudes of North America, connecting the Great Lakes with the Atlantic Ocean. It is the primary drainage conveyor of the Great Lakes Basin...
in Quebec City
Quebec City
Quebec , also Québec, Quebec City or Québec City is the capital of the Canadian province of Quebec and is located within the Capitale-Nationale region. It is the second most populous city in Quebec after Montreal, which is about to the southwest...
. This was done in preparation for potentially deporting
Deportation
Deportation means the expulsion of a person or group of people from a place or country. Today it often refers to the expulsion of foreign nationals whereas the expulsion of nationals is called banishment, exile, or penal transportation...
Kourdakov, since a Russian liner
Ocean liner
An ocean liner is a ship designed to transport people from one seaport to another along regular long-distance maritime routes according to a schedule. Liners may also carry cargo or mail, and may sometimes be used for other purposes .Cargo vessels running to a schedule are sometimes referred to as...
was set to travel up the Saint Lawrence River and dock only a few hundred yards from the prison.
As soon as Sergei Kourdakov was whisked away in the night, Canadian radio talk show
Talk show
A talk show or chat show is a television program or radio program where one person discuss various topics put forth by a talk show host....
host Pat Burns
Pat Burns (broadcaster)
Patrick "Pat" Burns was a radio talk show host and newspaper reporter. He was born in Montreal, Quebec, but began his radio career in England with the BBC as a sports reporter covering the world hockey championships in London in 1949...
, who had taken interest in Sergei and had broadcast his case on the radio, was informed of all of this. While on the air, he called Member of Parliament
Member of Parliament
A Member of Parliament is a representative of the voters to a :parliament. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, the term applies specifically to members of the lower house, as upper houses often have a different title, such as senate, and thus also have different titles for its members,...
Harold Edward Winch
Harold Edward Winch
Harold Edward Winch was a Canadian politician active with the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and its successor, the New Democratic Party ....
and explained Kourdakov's situation. Subsequently, Winch demanded a public statement regarding Kourdakov from Prime Minister
Prime Minister of Canada
The Prime Minister of Canada is the primary minister of the Crown, chairman of the Cabinet, and thus head of government for Canada, charged with advising the Canadian monarch or viceroy on the exercise of the executive powers vested in them by the constitution...
Pierre Trudeau
Pierre Trudeau
Joseph Philippe Pierre Yves Elliott Trudeau, , usually known as Pierre Trudeau or Pierre Elliott Trudeau, was the 15th Prime Minister of Canada from April 20, 1968 to June 4, 1979, and again from March 3, 1980 to June 30, 1984.Trudeau began his political career campaigning for socialist ideals,...
.
Soon enough, he was told he could stay in Canada permanently. Although he had to stay in jail for a few more weeks, he was released as soon as his documents were processed.
Life in North America
While still in jail, Sergei Kourdakov received letters from people all over Canada who had heard his story. He was visited by many people, usually new friends and acquaintances. Additionally, he was visited by representatives of the Russian embassy in Canada. They informed him that if he were to come back, they would forgive everything and give him his old position.As soon as he was released from jail, he had two main intentions: firstly to keep his promise to God and serve Him, and secondly to find a job and settle in Canada. Many people offered to help him, give him a job, or give him a place to live. The first church he went to was Saint Ann's Catholic Church in Quebec
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
. Trying to do the same as others there, he knelt and began praying for three hours.
When he went back to his place of residence, he received a message from someone seeking to hire him, and an address to reach him. He left a note to where he was going to his two Bulgarian
Bulgarians
The Bulgarians are a South Slavic nation and ethnic group native to Bulgaria and neighbouring regions. Emigration has resulted in immigrant communities in a number of other countries.-History and ethnogenesis:...
friends and translators and went to the interview. But when he went to the address, he found out that it was a set-up and the members were part of the Front de libération du Québec
Front de libération du Québec
The Front de libération du Québec was a left-wing Quebecois nationalist and Marxist-Leninist paramilitary group in Quebec, Canada. It was active between 1963 and 1970, and was regarded as a terrorist organization for its violent methods of action...
, a nationalist and socialist revolutionary group responsible for hundreds of bombings, with strong Communist ties. According to Kourdakov, they warned him that if he would raise his voice one more time and say things he shouldn't, he would be silenced. As soon as his two friends found his note, they knew it was a trap and rushed there.
With the strong presence of the FLQ in Quebec and the Russian embassy in Ottawa
Ottawa
Ottawa is the capital of Canada, the second largest city in the Province of Ontario, and the fourth largest city in the country. The city is located on the south bank of the Ottawa River in the eastern portion of Southern Ontario...
, Sergei decided to move to Toronto
Toronto
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...
and stay with a Russian family who offered him a place to live. He began studying English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
at a university in the city. He also went to a church in Toronto which was always open for prayer, where he stayed for two days only praying and drinking water. Sergei also began attending Ukraine churches in Toronto. With the aid of a pastor, he went through a religious conversion. One day the pastor gave him a small bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
printed in Russian. Immediately, he recognized it as the same kind of bible he saw many times during raids in the Soviet Union. When he asked where it came from, the pastor told him that Underground Evangelism (now known as Mission Without Borders), a California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
n organization that helped in the smuggling
Smuggling
Smuggling is the clandestine transportation of goods or persons, such as out of a building, into a prison, or across an international border, in violation of applicable laws or other regulations.There are various motivations to smuggle...
of Christian materials into the Soviet Union and other Communist countries.
While leaving the subway station one day, Kourdakov sensed that he was being followed. When he turned around, he saw three powerfully built Russians
Russophone
A Russophone is literally a speaker of the Russian language either natively or by preference. At the same time the term is used in a more specialized meaning to describe the category of people whose cultural background is associated with Russian language regardless of ethnic and territorial...
who warned him saying, "If you know what is good for you, Kourdakov, you will keep silent and say nothing more. If you open your mouth, you will have a 'final accident.' Remember, you have been warned." He chose not to tell anyone about this at the time because he felt that because of the way he treated Christians in the Soviet Union, he owed it to them to speak out for them now.
On May 1, 1972, Kourdakov joined Underground Evangelism and moved to California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
where he moved in with a family that had heard his story and offered him a place to stay. He spent his time traveling all over the United States speaking in schools, universities, and bible studies about his life and the state of Christian communities in the Soviet Union. He also spent much of his time making live radio broadcasts about Christianity and the evils of Communism in Russian
Russian language
Russian is a Slavic language used primarily in Russia, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. It is an unofficial but widely spoken language in Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Turkmenistan and Estonia and, to a lesser extent, the other countries that were once constituent republics...
, which were broadcast to the Soviet Union. While living in the United States, Kourdakov spent three weeks in The Pentagon
The Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect...
demonstrating how Soviet submarines are made.
Death
Sergei Kourdakov's death had been dubbed as "strange and uncertain." Upon moving to CaliforniaCalifornia
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
, Kourdakov moved in with a Christian family. Because he began making public appearances so often, he started worrying for his safety, so he began taking a revolver that belonged to the family's father with him whenever he traveled anywhere. To celebrate the New Year, Sergei went on vacation with Ann Johnson, the seventeen year old daughter of the family he was living with first to Disneyland
Disneyland Park (Anaheim)
Disneyland Park is a theme park located in Anaheim, California, owned and operated by the Walt Disney Parks and Resorts division of the Walt Disney Company. Known as Disneyland when it opened on July 18, 1955, and still almost universally referred to by that name, it is the only theme park to be...
, then to a ski lodge in Running Springs, California
Running Springs, California
Running Springs is a census-designated place in San Bernardino County, California, United States. The population was 4,862 at the 2010 census, down from 5,125 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Running Springs is located at ....
. On January 1, 1973, Sergei Kourdakov was found dead in his motel room in Running Springs, California
Running Springs, California
Running Springs is a census-designated place in San Bernardino County, California, United States. The population was 4,862 at the 2010 census, down from 5,125 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Running Springs is located at ....
, killed by a gunshot to the head. In his room was an unfinished typewritten paper (which he was preparing for Senator Strom Thurmond
Strom Thurmond
James Strom Thurmond was an American politician who served as a United States Senator. He also ran for the Presidency of the United States in 1948 as the segregationist States Rights Democratic Party candidate, receiving 2.4% of the popular vote and 39 electoral votes...
in regards to receiving permanent residency in the US), a champagne bottle, and the gun borrowed from the family's father.
Due to the circumstances, Sergei Kourdakov was initially announced to have died by suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
. Many, notably Underground Evangelism founder and then-president L. Joe Bass, repudiated this claim. After a more thorough investigation, Kourdakov's death was ruled an accident on March 1, 1973, stating that while Sergei was playing with his revolver, he probably accidentally shot himself. But due to Kourdakov's status as a former high-rank KGB agent who defected to North America and publicly opposed Communism, some believe that he was assassinated] by another KGB member in order to silence him. Sergei himself had considered the possibility of an assassination attempt, hence the revolver, stating that he "was in the Soviet Intelligence. They do not warn twice." and that if anything were ever to happen to him, "it would have all the appearances of an accident." L. Joe Bass was quoted on an Underground Evangelism newsletter saying that "What better than midnight on New Year's Eve, and what better place than that small, tourist-packed resort area for Sergei Kourdakov to have an 'accident'?"
After his death, his body was sent to Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
on January 10, 1973 where an English funeral service by Reverend Richard Halverson
Richard C. Halverson
The Reverend Richard Christian Halverson, D.D., , was born in Pingree, North Dakota. He attended Valley City State Teacher College in Valley City, North Dakota, before earning a Bachelor of Science degree from Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois, in 1939, participating in the Wheaton College Men's...
, a Presbyterian pastor, and a Russian service at a Russian Orthodox
Russian Orthodox Church
The Russian Orthodox Church or, alternatively, the Moscow Patriarchate The ROC is often said to be the largest of the Eastern Orthodox churches in the world; including all the autocephalous churches under its umbrella, its adherents number over 150 million worldwide—about half of the 300 million...
church were held. Sergei Kourdakov was buried in a Russian section of Rock Creek Cemetery
Rock Creek Cemetery
Rock Creek Cemetery — also Rock Creek Church Yard and Cemetery — is an cemetery with a natural rolling landscape located at Rock Creek Church Road, NW, and Webster Street, NW, off Hawaii Avenue, NE in Washington, D.C.'s Michigan Park neighborhood, near Washington's Petworth neighborhood...
in Washington, D.C., USA on January 11, 1973.
Subsequent controversy
Kourdakov's death stirred up much controversy among Christian anti-communist organizations and elsewhere. Jesus to the Communist World general director Richard WurmbrandRichard Wurmbrand
Richard Wurmbrand was a Romanian Christian minister of Jewish descent. He was a youth during a time of anti-Semitic activity in Romania, but it was later, after becoming a believer in Jesus Christ as Messiah, and daring to publicly say that Communism and Christianity were not compatible, that he...
, himself a defector from Soviet controlled Romania, accused Underground Evangelism of exploiting the young defector. On January 4, he wrote an open letter
Open letter
An open letter is a letter that is intended to be read by a wide audience, or a letter intended for an individual, but that is nonetheless widely distributed intentionally....
to the organization stating that Sergei Kourdakov "should not have been brought on the stage [into publicity] with its perils before having been a member of a church growing in grace and knowledge." Andrew Semenchuk, the west coast
West Coast of the United States
West Coast or Pacific Coast are terms for the westernmost coastal states of the United States. The term most often refers to the states of California, Oregon, and Washington. Although not part of the contiguous United States, Alaska and Hawaii do border the Pacific Ocean but can't be included in...
representative of the Slavic Gospel Association stated that he and other Russian Baptist church members who heard Sergei speak at a Santa Ana
Santa Ana, California
Santa Ana is the county seat and second most populous city in Orange County, California, and with a population of 324,528 at the 2010 census, Santa Ana is the 57th-most populous city in the United States....
felt that he "should not have been thrust into such a situation—speaking on subjects 'completely beyond him.'"
Some of the criticism towards Underground Evangelism was its alleged exploitation of Kourdakov for profit. According to the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
, by 1973, the young Christian "had become the feature of the organization's literature." In addition to placing Kourdakov on a tour of over twenty speaking engagements during his short time in the organization, Underground Evangelism sold taped versions of his story priced at four dollars. Myrus Knutson, board chairman of Jesus to the Communist World, made a statement saying that "it may be unfair to say it, but they [Underground Evangelism] smelled money."
There has also been some conflicting claims regarding Kourdakov's actual religion. While Sergei Kourdakov identified himself as an Evangelical Christian during his time living in North America to the point of his death, Father Sergius Shukin, an Orthodox priest, claimed that during an interview Kourdakov revealed to him that he was an Orthodox Christian. This claim was first made public in The Orthodox Word nearly two years after Kourdakov's death.
See also
- Persecution of Christians in the Soviet UnionPersecution of Christians in the Soviet UnionThe history of Christianity in the Soviet Union was not limited to repression and secularization. Soviet policy toward religion was based on the ideology of Marxism-Leninism, which made atheism the official doctrine of the Soviet Union...
- List of KGB defectors
- List of Soviet and Eastern Bloc defectors