On 28-29 November 2019, the international scientific conference 'Need to Know IX: Intelligence and major political change' was held in Tallinn (Estonia). The conference was opened by the Deputy President of the Institute of National Remembrance Jan Baster, Ivo Jurvee from the International Center for Defense and Security in Estonia, Erik Kulavig from the University of Southern Denmark, the Danish Ambassador to Estonia Kristina Miskowiak Beckvard and the Polish Ambassador to Estonia Grzegorz Kozłowski.
The event is organized jointly by the Institute of National Remembrance and the Center for Cold War Studies of the University of Southern Denmark. This year, it was also organized by the International Center for Defense and Security (Estonia), the Norwegian Aviation Museum and the King's College of London (United Kingdom).
The very idea of organizing this type of conference stems directly from our common European and global experience, namely, the 20th century. In short, from the era of criminal totalitarianism, Nazi and communist, but also the ubiquitous and omniscient special services, including intelligence – the services of the German Third Reich and the Soviet Union, as well as those guarding the values of the free world.
The key issue was the global circulation of materials related to secret services from the IPN Archive and from similar collections stored by our partner institutions in countries such
as Germany, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. As far as the IPN is concerned, this task, and maybe even an obligation, results directly from the provisions of the Act on the Institute of National Remembrance adopted
in 1998 by the Sejm of the Republic of Poland.
The Need to Know annual conference on intelligence and counterintelligence enables researchers from countries that once constituted the "free world" of the West and from countries that were once enslaved or directly occupied by the Third German Reich and the Soviet Union to meet. From the very beginning, the second goal was also to create a group of colleagues and friends, intelligence researchers from around the world - to create the possibility of "networking.
Processes of political change and intelligence services are often interrelated. In popular culture, conspiracy theory of the hidden hand of secret services thrives, but what is the reality? The ninth Need to Know focuses on intelligence services ability to predict or even promote political change at home or abroad.
Conference-language is English.
The conference is organized by the the International Centre for Defense and Security, Institute of National Remembrance - Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation, the Center for Cold War Studies of the University of Southern Denmark, the King’s College London, and the Norwegian Aviation Museum.
Program
Need to Know IX: Intelligence and Major Political Change
Tallinn, Estonia, 28-29 November 2019
28 November 2019
Venue:
Majandus-ja Kommunikatsiooniministeerium (Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications) - Suur-Ameerika 1, 10122, Tallinn
9:00 – 9:30 Introduction: Ivo Juurvee (International Centre for Defense and Security)
Opening Speeches:
Jüri Luik, Estonian Minister of Defence
Kristina Miskowiak Beckvard – Danish Ambassador to Estonia
Grzegorz Kozłowski - Polish Ambassador to Estonia
Erik Kulavig (University of Southern Denmark)
Jan Baster (Deputy President of Institute of National Remembrance)
Commentators:
Erik Kulavig (University of Southern Denmark)
Jacek Tebinka (University of Gdansk)
I. Intelligence and Major Political Change
Chair: Michael Goodman (King’s College London)
9:30-9:45 Lavly Perling (Prosecutor General of Estonia): On Estonian recent experience in countering foreign espionage
9:45-10:00 Michael Herman (Oxford University): Intelligence Lessons of the Cold War
10:00- 10:15 Mark Kramer (Harvard University): The Soviet Intelligence Services and the Impact of the 1989 Upheavals in East Central Europe
10:15-10:30 Władysław Bułhak (Institute of National Remembrance): Transformation of intelligence services after the end of the Cold War and the Birth of the European School of Intelligence Studies
10:30-11:00 Discussion
11:00-11:15 Coffee break
II. 1924: Soviet Hybrid Warfare?
Chair: Michael Fredholm (The Swedish Law and Informatics Research Institute)
11:15-11:30 Ivo Juurvee (ICDS): Planning and Execution of the Coup d'état Attempt in Estonia
11:30-11:45 Tomasz Gajownik (University of Warmia and Mazury in Olsztyn): The Communist Coup in Estonia in 1924 in a Papers of the Polish Military Attache in Rewel. The Case Study of Soviet`s Foreign Politics in the 1920s
11:45-12:00 Igor Cașu (State University of Moldova): Tatarbunar Rebellion in Romanian Bessarabia (1924): an Operation of Soviet Secret Services or a Modern Jacquerie?
12:00-12:30 Discussion
12:30-14:00 Lunch
III. West German Intelligence Services’ Transformation
Chair: Aleksandra Gasztold (Warsaw University)
14:00-14:15 Thomas Wegener Friis (University of Southern Denmark): Dealing with the devil. Nordic relations with the BND
14:15-14:30 Bodo Hechelhammer (BND): "Dieser Dilettanten-Verein" - public criticism of intelligence
14:30-14:45 Agilolf Kesselring (Finnish National Defense University): From Cold Peace to Total War – How the Federal German Intelligence Service would have mobilized
14:45-15:00 Helmut Müller-Enbergs (University of Southern Denmark): West Germany and the dissolution of the GDR
15:00-15:30 Discussion
15:30-16:00 Coffee break
IV. New Archival Releases and Interpretations from East and West
Chair: Karl Kleve (Norwegian Aviation Museum)
16:00-16:15 Joe Maiolo (King’s College London): The US intelligence failure in Pearl Harbor?
16:15-16:30 Michael Goodman (King’s College London): The new opening from the British archives
16:30-16:45 Polly Corrigan (King’s College London): The background of the opening of the Ukrainian intelligence archives
16:45-17:00 Rafał Leśkiewicz (Institute of National Remembrance): The background of the opening of the Polish intelligence archives.
17:00-17:30 Discussion
29 November 2019
Commentators:
Paul Maddrell (Loughborough University)
Witold Bagieński (Institute of National Remembrance)
V. Transformation of Europe and Rise of Communism
Chair: Bernd Schaefer (George Washington University)
9:00-9:15 Kevin Riehle (National Intelligence University): Escaping Two Dictators: Czechoslovakian Intelligence Defectors from the New Communist Regime, 1948-1949
9:15-9:30 Dieter Bacher (Ludwig Boltzmann Institut für Kriegsfolgenforschung): Social unrest or “attempted red revolution”? The Austrian general strikes 1950 and the role of Soviet secret services and occupation as seen by British intelligence in Austria
9:30-9:45 Cees Wiebes (Netherlands): Nests of Communist Spies? The Polish Legation in the Hague and the Dutch Embassy in Budapest
9:45-10:00 Przemysław Gasztold (Institute of National Remembrance): Spies and Diplomats: Polish-Dutch Intelligence Rivalry
10:00-10:30 Discussion
10:30-10:45 Coffee break
VI. Dictatorships in Crises
Chair: Anna Piekarska (Museum of Polish History)
10:45-11:00 Sofia Tzamarelou (Brunel University London): Post-dictatorship intelligence reform in Southern Europe
11:00-11:15 Mirosław Sikora (Institute of National Remembrance): Line "G". Reaction of OECD countries to economic transformations in Poland through the lens of civil intelligence service in the 80s.
11:15-11:30 Marek Hańderek (Institute of National Remembrance): Between threat and inspiration. Polish intelligence station in Beijing reports on Chinese authorities and pro-democracy demonstrators attitudes towards the “Solidarity” Movement in the late 1980s
11:30-12:00 Discussion
12:00-13:30 Lunch
VII. 1989: the Major Political Change
Chair: Robin Libert (Belgian Intelligence Studies Centre, RUSRA-KUIAD)
13:30-13:45 Nadia Boyadjieva (Bulgarian Academy of Sciences): Bulgarian Intelligence services and Political Changes in the Eastern Bloc in 1989
13:45-14:00 Daniel Běloušek (Ministry of Defence of the Czech Republic): The Response of the State Security apparatus in November 1989 - an attempt of self-preservation
14:00-14:15 Kristina Burinskaitė (The Genocide and Resistance Research of Lithuania): Why KGB missed soviet regime collapse in Lithuania?
14:15-14:45 Discussion
14:45-15:15 Coffee break
VIII. Beyond the Cold War
Chair: Phil Gurski (Borealis Threat and Risk Consult)
15:15-15:30 Danny Pronk (Netherlands Institute of International Relations): Witness to Change. The Domestic Security Service and the Global 1980s
15:30-15:45 Tomasz Kozłowski (Institute of National Remembrance): Why can’t we be friends? Establishing a relationship between Polish and American intelligence agencies in the context of political transformation
15:45-16:00 Constant Hijzen (Leiden University): Terrorism during the Holiday from History: how Western Security Services Dealt with Terrorism between 1989 and 2001
16:00-16:30 Discussion
16:30-16:45 Meeting with Joseph Gilling – the editor on the Digital Resources team at Routledge, Taylor & Francis