Edward Snowden Risks Sharing Fate of Kim Philby, Guy Burgess & More
What kind of future does the NSA leaker face if he gets asylum in Russia or another country? If the experience of past defectors—alcoholism, suicide attempts, mental illness—is any guide, it looks grim.
by Malcolm Jones
Jul 2, 2013 4:45 AM EDT
... By the time the public learned of the details that prompted Philby’s defection to the Soviet Union, he’d been ensconced in Moscow for almost five years, where he lived until his death in 1988. He claimed to be unrepentant, saying he missed only some friends, Colman’s mustard, and Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce. In fact, he was kept under virtual house arrest, as the Russians were afraid he might try to return to England. He also drank heavily and attempted suicide at least once. He had gone to Moscow with the assumption that he would be named a colonel in the KGB, a promise that, if indeed made, was never kept.
At least Philby wanted to defect. Evidence suggests that Guy Burgess believed he was only helping Donald Maclean escape when they disappeared in 1951, but the KGB had no intention of ever letting Burgess fall back into English hands. Upon surfacing in the Soviet Union in 1956, he spent the rest of his short life—he died in 1963 at 52—descending ever deeper into alcoholism.
But Burgess’s story looks almost serene compared to the saga of Victor Norris Hamilton, another National Security Agency analyst who defected to Moscow in 1962. Thirty years later, he turned up outside the capital in a psychiatric prison hospital, where he’d been institutionalized for more than 20 years after being diagnosed with paranoia and other mental illnesses ...
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/07/02/edward-snowden-risks-sharing-fate-of-kim-philby-guy-burgess-more.html
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