Vladimir Vetrov

Who was Vladimir Vetrov?

Vladimir Ippolitovich Vetrov was a high-ranking KGB spy during the Cold War, who decided to covertly release valuable information to France and NATO on the Soviet Union's clandestine program aimed at stealing technology from the West.

Vetrov was assigned the code-name Farewell by the French intelligence service DST, which recruited him. He was known by that name throughout NATO's intelligence services. The code-name was chosen as an English word so that the KGB would assume he worked for the CIA if it learned his codename.

His history inspired the book Bonjour Farewell: La Vérité sur la Taupe Française du KGB by Sergei Kostin. It was loosely adapted for the French film L'affaire Farewell, starring Emir Kusturica, Guillaume Canet and Alexandra Maria Lara.

Authors Sergei Kostin and Eric Raynaud have published a more complete and updated account of the Farewell dossier under the title Adieu Farewell. This title is now available in English for the first time, thirty years after the events.