SMERSH
The wartime Soviet military counterintelligence organization known as Death to Spies
Overview
Formed in April 1943 under Viktor Abakumov, SMERSH, an acronym of the Russian phrase for Death to Spies, hunted German agents, deserters and suspected traitors in and behind the Red Army. It ran radio deception games with captured German agents, screened returning Soviet prisoners of war, many of whom were sent to camps, and secured the Fuhrerbunker after the fall of Berlin, recovering remains attributed to Hitler. Ian Fleming made it the villainous organization of his early James Bond novels. It was dissolved in 1946 and its functions merged into the Ministry of State Security.
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