Oleg Penkovsky
Oleg Penkovsky was born on April 23, 1919. See ranking, bio blurb, and everyone else born that day.
About Oleg Penkovsky
Oleg Vladimirovich Penkovsky (Russian: Оле́г Влади́мирович Пенько́вский; 23 April 1919 – 16 May 1963), codenamed Hero (by the CIA) and Yoga (by MI6) was a Soviet military intelligence (GRU) colonel during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Penkovsky informed the United States and the United Kingdom about Soviet military secrets, including the appearance and footprint of Soviet intermediate-range ballistic missile installations and the weakness of the Soviet intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) program. This information was decisive in allowing the US to recognize that the Soviets were placing missiles in Cuba before most of them were operational. It also gave US President John F. Kennedy, during the Cuban Missile Crisis that followed, valuable information about Soviet weaknesses that allowed him to face down Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev and resolve the crisis without a nuclear war. Penkovsky was the highest-ranking Soviet official to provide intelligence for the West up until that time, and he is one of several individuals credited with altering the course of the Cold War. He was arrested by the Soviet state in October 1962, and he was tried and executed the following year.