Within a year of arriving in the United States in 1941, GPU agent Jack Soble was running a Stalinist spy ring inside the Trotskyist movement. It consisted of at least 10 members. Soble’s principal agent was Mark Zborowski. The others included:
Sylvia Franklin, who was planted in the Socialist Workers Party as James Cannon’s secretary in the New York headquarters.
Floyd Cleveland Miller, who had tapped Cannon’s home telephone for 12 months and then became a Stalinist agent inside the SWP under the name of Michael Cort.
Lucy Booker, whose Manhattan apartment was paid for by the GPU and who collated and typed up material from the Trotskyists before giving it to Soble.
There were two other women, Esther Rand and Sylvia Getzoff, whose exact role in the spy ring remains obscure.
Although Soble testified to a network of 10 agents inside the Trotskyist movement, only these six names ever came out. Like Floyd Miller, Miss Booker was indicted as a co-conspirator in 1961 in the trial of Soble’s brother, Dr. Robert Soblen, but she was not named as a defendant.
The International Committee of the Fourth International has pieced together the structure of Soble’s anti-Trotskyist spy ring from testimony which he gave during spy trials in the 1950s and 1960s. It must be stated right away that the court trials never fully probed the GPU activities in the Trotskyist movement. Indeed, whenever the testimony got within reach of exploring this facet of Soble’s spy career, the judge and the government attorney gingerly diverted the cross examination in other directions.
Nevertheless, the Soble testimony established beyond doubt that the Stalinists orchestrated an elaborate and expensive campaign against the Trotskyist movement in the United States after Trotsky’s death. Trotsky’s murder on August 20, 1940, did not ease Stalinist infiltration and disruption. If anything, it was intensified. Soble recalls what happened when his GPU controller Chaliapin told him to go back to work inside the Trotskyist movement. “I just had a good laugh at the time,” he said. He asked his controller: “What do you want from the Trotskyite movement? Trotsky is a dead man.” Chaliapin was not amused. “They said this is an assignment,” Soble said, “and I will give you even the exact words ... ‘this is a prescription of the doctor,’ he said. By the doctor’s prescription was meant the prescription from Moscow. This is an order and you have to do it.” Next day Soble met Zborowski. As he was inducted into the GPU network in the United States, Soble was introduced to all the agents previously handled by members of the GPU, who were on the embassy staff under diplomatic cover. Gradually he took over the field work from embassy officials like Zubilin and Chaliapin.
Soble told the jury during the trial of his brother, Dr. Robert Soblen, that he was the “boss” of agents working in “the Trotskyite movement and among Russian Mensheviks—I was their boss.”
Judge Herlands: And without going into the details at this time as to what they did, can you tell the jury approximately how many people were working under you, just in round numbers?
Soble: I don’t know. Maybe around 10 people or so.
Judge Herlands: That would be an approximation?
Soble: Yes, sir.
Q: These 10 people who worked for you and with you, was it in connection with the Trotskyites—
Soble: Still have difficulty in pronunciation?
Q: Yes, I have.
Judge Herlands: Proceed!
Soble: I sympathize with you.
Judge Herlands: Complete your question, Mr. Brill. Have you completed it?
Q: Yes, your honor.
Judge Herlands: Mr. Brill wants to know whether these people who worked with you and under you were active only in connection with the Trotskyite matters.
Soble: Trotskyite matters, matters with Russian Mensheviks.
Q: Will you tell the court and jury exactly what the duties of these 10 people under you and yourself were in regard to the Trotskyite matters?
Soble: In regard to the Trotskyite matters?
Q: Yes, first.
Soble: In regard to the Trotskyite matters, I have said it last week to you, and therefore I am a little tired from the same question, and I think that you must be tired a little too—
Q: No, no.
Soble: I am not tired, either, don’t worry about that, in general—
Judge Herlands: Mr. Soble—
Soble: Excuse me.
Judge Herlands: Eliminate preambles.
Soble: All right.
Judge Herlands: Do you know what I mean? You are an intelligent person. Just eliminate the preambles and just answer the question. Now, what did they do in connection with Trotskyite matters? Now start off without any introductions.
Soble: There were people—there was a secretary to Cannon, who was a secretary of the Trotskyite organization at that time here in the States who had one of the secretaries worked for the GPU. I never recruited her; I never introduced her. The GPU introduced her to me.
Judge Herlands: What is her name?
Soble: I knew her under the name of Sophie or Sylvia.
The court never attempted to uncover Sylvia Franklin’s role; but it is certain she was one of Soble’s prize performers. He had regular meetings with her in New York to transmit information direct from the SWP headquarters to the Russian Embassy to be relayed to the Kremlin.
“I went farther in the Trotskyite field,” Soble said, “and worked with the secretary to Cannon, Sylvia, whom I knew only under the name Sylvia or Sophie, also introduced to me by the same Russians who worked for them already before.”
Q: What did she do?
Soble: She gathered material at the secretariat of Cannon and gave it to me.
Q: The same Trotsky material?
Soble: The same Trotsky—
Q: Trotsky material?
Soble: Yes, it had pure Trotsky material. It had nothing to do with Mensheviks.
He then moved on to describe his association with Lucy Booker, another key individual in the network. “I was taken by Zubilin and his wife and brought directly to her apartment to—I don’t recall exactly the address, you know, but I was directly taken down town. It was in front of an apartment. I came with Mr. Zubilin and Helen Zubilin and a woman was standing outside there waiting for them. And then they introduced me to her saying that she is an old, devoted contact of them and I should—she will—I mean, she is not working for them directly, but in her apartment they use as quarters in which the Trotskyite material is being typed and being done, and I should pay her the monthly rent for her apartment, in total, $100.”
Q: And how were you introduced, sir? Under what name were you introduced to Lucy Booker?
Soble: I was introduced as Peter.
Under cross examination, Soble said more about Lucy Booker’s role in the spy ring.
Q: Now you mentioned Lucy Booker and you said that her apartment was used for the meeting.
Soble: Lucy Booker was introduced to me by Zubilin and his wife Helen.
Q: Now when did you meet Lucy Booker?
Soble: Before, shortly before Zubilin left.
Q: And give the jury to the best of your memory the time when you met Lucy Booker?
Soble: Around the fall of 1944.
Q: Now did you have any activities with Lucy Booker other than the fact that her apartment was used for meetings?
Soble: No, she didn’t do any other work for them.
Q: She just let her apartment be used?
Soble: She let us use the apartment, she was present even when the material was typed there. She had no other functions—
Q: That is the same Trotskyite material?
Soble: Yes.
Q: And I think you said her rent was paid?
Soble: Yes.
Q: Who paid the rent?
Soble: I had to give her. This said Zubilin in the presence of Lucy Booker.
Q: How much did you pay?
Soble: That I should give her $100 a month and if she needs sometimes a little more I should give her $120, $150.
Q: And where did you get the money from?
Soble: I used to get the money from the Russians.
Q: When you say the Russians, you mean whom? Zubilin?
Soble: I used to get—not Zubilin, because Zubilin left by that.
Q: Whom did you get it from?
Soble: I used to get it from Chaliapin, from Choudenko, and very often, I remember, I used to give it from my own money on a promise that they will return it to me.
Judge Herlands: Just continue with what you were saying.
Soble: These people worked in the Trotskyite movement—not all 10. I said I was a boss of 10 people, but these people whom I quoted before worked in the Trotsky movement and among Mensheviks and Lucy Booker did not work at all. She just gave her apartment, and the rent was paid for this apartment, and I didn’t introduce Lucy Booker to the Russian GPU either. She knew them, as I said Friday and last week, and she was a very devoted friend of Helen and Zubilin, and she admitted it during confrontations. So this woman, at her home it was produced or typed, produced lots of material which were brought from the Trotsky movement and Russian Mensheviks.
Q: Produced material in connection with the Trotsky movement. Is that the point, sir?
Soble: Yes.
Q: In other words, you were ferreting out sympathizers of Trotsky, is that the point?
Soble: I am sorry?
Judge Herlands: He didn’t get the words “Ferreting out.” Do you know what that means?
Q: Do you understand?
Soble: Yes?
Judge Herlands: Is that so or isn’t that so?
Soble: We were ferreting out, you mean, sympathizers of Trotsky? This was considered for us not only spying but as party work.
Judge Herlands: The answer is yes.
Soble: Yes.
Q: In other words, you were getting hold of the Russians in the United States who were sympathetic to the Trotsky movement, is that the point, and reporting it to Russia? Is that what you were doing?
Soble: You don’t understand anything. Excuse me. I overestimated your intelligence—
Judge Herlands: No, no. Let us leave out the personal remarks. I will take your question in the interest of saving time. Is that all right with you?
Q: Yes, your honor.
Judge Herlands: Mr. Soble, these Trotskyite sympathizers who were being ferreted out, did you report these names to the Russians?
Soble: Yes, but they had nothing to do with Russians close to the Trotsky movement—I don’t understand this—they were American Trotskyites.
Q: You mean the American Trotskyites?
Soble: The American Trotskyite organization, yes. There are Trotskyite organizations all over the world.
Judge Herlands: Mr. Brill is trying to find out whether the names of the American Trotskyite sympathizers were reported.
Soble: Yes, they were.
Q: To the Russians, to the Soviets?
Soble: They were, yes.
During another stage of the trial, Soble’s network in the Trotskyist movement was again raised.
Q: Mr. Soble, getting back to these 10 people that worked for you, you are able to name every one of them, are you not, sir?
Soble: Yes.
Q: And can you explain to the court and jury precisely what orders you gave them in connection with your activities in the Trotskyite movement? Can you do that?
Soble: In the Trotskyite movement? I didn’t give them any instructions. They just brought the material what they found—what they could have found and what they could have gotten where they worked.
Q: Precisely where was this Trotskyite material found? Was it found in libraries, magazines, newspapers?
Soble: No, but I told you this before—we are coming again slightly in the repetition of your questions—
Judge Herlands: All right, tell him anyway.
Soble:—this was the secretary of Cannon who worked as Cannon’s secretary, and Cannon was at that time the secretary of the Trotsky organization in America, according to my knowledge.
Judge Herlands: Is that Cannon, C-a-n-n-o-n?
Soble: C-a-n-n-o-n. I think James Cannon, but I’m not sure.
Q: In other words, you and your men infiltrated into James Cannon’s office in order to obtain this Trotskyite material. Am I correct on that?
Soble: No, you are not correct.
Q: How did you obtain it, sir?
Soble: I did not infiltrate them. I was introduced to the agents of the Russians who worked for them already before me.
Soble also spotlighted his work with Floyd Cleveland Miller, the American Stalinist who infiltrated the Socialist Workers Party under the pseudonym “Michael Cort,” and became editor of the journal of the Seafarers’ International union. He revealed that he identified Miller on May 21, 1957, during a confrontation session at FBI headquarters in New York. He admitted knowing him in 1945 when, for a brief period of months, he was Miller’s controller. They were introduced by Chaliapin, the same agent who introduced Soble to Zborowski. Asked where the introduction took place, Soble said: “In front of the Radio City,” a New York landmark.
Q: And do you recall under what name you were introduced to Miller?**
Soble: I was introduced as Sam.
Q: Sam?
Soble: Yes.
He did not make an immediate identification because, as he explained, he had not seen him for 12 years. Only when Miller signed his undercover name “Hal,” the signature he used when receiving payments from the GPU, did Soble recognize him. During the espionage trial of his brother, Robert, Soble talked about his association with Miller.
Q: Mr. Soble, how long had you known Mr. Miller prior to May 21, 1957?
Soble: Miller? For a few months in 1945 I met him.
Q: How many months?
Soble: For a few months.
Q: How many times had you seen him in those months?
Soble: Very rarely. I met him maybe several times, that is all, on the street.
Q: And you gave him money?
Soble: I gave him $40. Whatever the GPU told me to do, I did. I will not deny my guilt. Don’t worry about that; and you are wasting your time.
Q: Mr. Soble, are you relaxed?
Judge Herlands: Put the question.
Soble: I am as relaxed as I can be in a court against a brother.
Soble said that at the confrontation session, Miller walked in saying, “I know you. How are you, Sam? You gave me money.” In some doubt as to Miller’s identity, Soble replied, “Show me, you sign your signature,” because he didn’t recognize the name Miller. “I knew him under Hal,” he explained. After Miller signed his name, Soble was certain it was the agent Miller who carried out undercover work inside the Trotskyists for the GPU.
The Getzoff connection was never fully revealed, thanks to diplomatic intervention by the judge and the government attorney. But enough came out to show that she too was a Russian agent involved in anti-Trotskyist work.
Judge Herlands: You mentioned other names.
Soble: Yes, excuse me. There was another woman, Getzoff. I never knew her. I was again introduced to her by the Russians.
Judge Herlands: When you say Russians, who do you mean?
Soble: The Russians—I mean the superiors of the GPU.
Judge Herlands: What about Getzoff, what did she do?
Soble: She also got some material, Trotskyite material, and so on.
Judge Herlands: Have you told us substantially what she did?
Soble: I don’t recall, even, because I didn’t pay much attention to Getzoff’s work. I worked with her very shortly.
Judge Herlands: When you say Trotskyite material, will you tell the jury what you mean by Trotskyite material? What does that mean realistically?
Soble: Trotsky material means all the fights and all the splits. Whoever is acquainted with it knows that was going on in the Trotsky movement, particularly after Trotsky’s death. Splits, everybody wanted to be orthodox, the orthodox Marxist who understands and interprets Trotsky better than the other one. They had many wings and many factions in their own small movement.
Jack Soble testified that he transferred all his agents in the Trotskyist movement to his brother, Robert Soblen, in 1945-1946.
Q: Specifically, did you transfer the man you knew as Miller to your brother, Robert?
Soble: Yes, I did.
Q: Now tell us whether or not you personally introduced him to Robert?
Soble: I personally introduced Miller to Robert in front, also, of Radio City.
Q: Do you recall whether or not you personally introduced Lucy Booker to Robert?
Soble: I personally introduced Lucy Booker to Robert in front of a restaurant at 169th Street and Broadway.
Q: Now, can you recall whether or not any of the other people who were assigned to you or part of your group—do you recall whether or not you introduced any of them personally to your brother Robert?
Soble: I introduced Esther Rand to Robert.
One of the attorneys was still puzzled about what happened to the Stalinist agents under Soble’s control. “What happened to the 10 men?” he asked. “Did you fire them?” “I did not hire them and I did not fire them,” Soble said. “This is a method of the GPU. You just stop meeting, that’s all. When you have no other prescription from the doctor, you just forget them, even if they are ill and without money or without anything.”