LUCY Ring

LUCY Ring, the name given by the head of the Rote Drei, a GRU (Soviet Military Intelligence) espionage network, to the espionage network run by a German communist, Rudolf Rössler, from Switzerland.

According to the most reliable publication on the subject (Rote Kapelle: the CIA's History of Soviet Intelligence and Espionage Networks in Western Europe, 1936–45, Washington, DC, 1979), Rössler, who ran a map publishing firm in Lucerne, had four principal German sources: Werther—the most important—Teddy, Olga, and Anna. Between them they provided almost half the messages transmitted by the Rote Drei to Moscow. They may have given their intelligence to Rössler direct; more probably, it went to the Swiss General Staff who passed on to Rössler, via Swiss intelligence, what they wanted Moscow to know.

Before he died Rössler told a confidant who these sources were (though there is no means of knowing if he was telling the truth). Three of them were prominent conspirators against Hitler (see Schwarze Kapelle): Hans Gisevius, an Abwehr agent stationed in Switzerland; Carl Goerdeler, a former mayor of Leipzig; and a German ‘major’ who, from what Rössler told his confidant, was probably Maj-Gen Hans Oster, the Abwehr's second-in-command. The fourth, a ‘ General Boelitz’, has never been identified. Oster was the most likely candidate for Werther.

Contrary to what some publications state, Rössler's intelligence did not include the date of the German invasion of the USSR in June 1941 (see BARBAROSSA) as he was not in contact with the Rote Drei until September 1942, or thereabouts. But according to some sources he was provided with high-level intelligence on the intentions of the German High Command (OKW) which included not always accurate information about the German preparations for the Kursk battle in July 1943.

In June 1944 Rössler was arrested by the Swiss police, but was released three months later. After the war, he continued to pass high-level intelligence on the western Allies to the Czech authorities until he was caught by the Swiss in 1953 and jailed. See also spies.