THE ORGANS OF SOVIET COUNTERINTELLIGENCE AT THE BEGINNING OF THE GREAT PATRIOTIC WAR. FEATURES OF FRONTLINE ACTIVITY

Anisimov Dmitry Sergeevich

The study of the history of Soviet counterintelligence was banned for a long time. Interest in the Great Patriotic War remains in scientific circles to this day. Therefore, it is important to reveal the aspect of the "secret war" - the struggle of the special secret services of the USSR and the Third Reich in order to fully study the history of the war. To begin with, it is necessary to find out the state of the Soviet special services at the initial stage of hostilities. To do this, the office materials were analyzed, starting from June 1941, ending in April 1943. The main direction of counterintelligence work has been revealed: frontline activity, that is, not only countering enemy agents in units of the active army, but also maintaining a high level of morale of units. A comparative analysis of these documents with the regulatory framework of SMERSH has been carried out. The aspect of frontline work was studied not only through the prism of clerical sources, but also sources of personal origin. Comparative studies and historical-comparative analysis are the basis of the methodology of the entire study. The peculiarity of the work is the allocation of the key, in the author's opinion, the direction of the work of military counterintelligence. The description of the main activities of special forces in the frontline zone is given.

Keywords:SMERSH, counterintelligence, operational search activities, counterintelligence activities, aspects of counterintelligence work