JUDr. Alexander Bory

* 1949

  • "We had a workplace in Slovakia, close to the Austrian border, which was could monitor the communications traffic of embassies, consulates and everything. And among other things, we managed to pick up information from the Iraqi consulate or embassy in Budapest. And there, in fact, Iraq received information that there had been a meeting between the CIA director in Kuwait and someone else, and a complete record of the meeting, including the phone number of the CIA head [William H.] Webster, so I could have called him at the time, it was his direct number. And because in the GDR I learned the procedure, I knew I couldn't take the original of the report and take it somewhere. Because I knew that those stupid people, sorry for the word, they had come back from Mars, the people of 1968, they would just blab it out and actually break down the source principle, that it was from the radio intelligence. So I had the whole message recorded in writing. As it was, without anything, I picked it up and went straight, without respecting subordination, because the man who was supposed to be my boss had a couch brought to his office, he suffered from backache, and he was still lying there and he was ill somehow. So I went and took it to General Procházka. And then the rumour was spread about me that I would have been capable of giving this message to the Russians. So they started slandering me and Procházka knew, he invited analysts, he knew what I had given him. It was really an incredible bomb at the time. It was about a murder, they murdered him, the emir, the whole case is described there. The meeting of the head of the CIA and the prince in Kuwait, what the Americans agreed on and so on. At the time, it pointed at something huge, consider it was 1990. And I ended up being forced to leave the service because I wasn't pro-Russian. "

  • "I went to Ciklamini saying, 'Look, Lorenc has ordered to have everything shredded, that the services have [to stop everything?].' I didn't stop it, on my own responsibility, I kind of delegated myself to the chief position. Because I had the highest rank in that radio intelligence, I was the head of analytics, and no one else was there. I thought, we can´t get disposed of this, so I went to the [Ministry of the] Interior, everywhere, and got to Ciklamini. I showed him some documents, and he said, 'You're kidding me!' Because he was reading the faxes of [German] Foreign Minister [Hans-Dietrich] Genscher. And how come this can be obtained? Those people had no idea at all, they had been off the mark since 1968. I'll tell you this way - there hadn´t been such situation at all that it would possibly turn around. They still, the majority of people, they hoped the communists would stay here. And to the intelligence service and bezond that, the former expelled communists came back everywhere, no one else got there. And they began to plot those positions among themselves, under the illusion that it would keep on working that way. And then General Procházka came, he was independent, and he started cleaning it. But it wasn't ... there were terrible Stables of Augeas. And I was in touch with him at the time, I have the documents here as I was obliged to report on the radio intelligence service where I had worked. That is, the characterization of the people and why it should be maintained. "

  • "I made up such an action with General Procházka that we could build a workplace pointed against Russia in Košice. Because it was clear that in Užhorod, there was the retransmission tower, where the things were. But it was necessary to go to the place and find out which way the aerials were directed, what kind of, and so on. So we came up with an espionage operation, me and a colleague. Everything was planned, legalized, we were going there, [we knew] that there was Staropramen, we had such a big Žiguli car, I was driving. Just a funny detail, I got the driver's license at forty-two, I hadn't driven any car until then. " " And Užhorod, are we talking about, say, 1996? "-" No, that was in 1991. Which was insane. Because I said: we have the technology, we can do it, we could eavesdrop on Russian telecommunications in Košice or even closer to the border, it was ok. So the whole action was prepared in detail, I had with me the equipment, a camera, everything. And my colleague and I crossed the border, we entered the city, we were approaching the tower somehow, and some sixth sense told me it was wrong. You feel it somewhere here. And I say, 'Look, we're being watched, someone is tailing us, it's messed up, the action.' So I couldn't even pull out a camera. And I say, 'Hey, look, we have to get away, because if they catch us here it´s the end.' I was driving, and to see if I was really being watched, I was driving - imagine the situation, you're driving down the main road, it was a straight road - and suddenly a helicopter appeared above us. I said, 'The Russians have already deployed a helicopter, so it's blown!' So I deliberately drove into a kind of a quarry. And they, they didn't realize, so they showed up right behind me. That´s how we found out they had been watching me. So we left, we returned home across the border. I drove through Hungary all night, we stopped at my relative in Papa, before Austria, because I had passports, everything. And I came home, we wrote a report, it was in May, and I was put off duty. "

  • "Firstly, it was taught or lectured how the information was obtained. You have one and the other aerial, there is a bundle of information between them. And then it was searched, it had side lobes, it was radiating something and the signal could be picked up somewhere, it could be found by radio. That's why the GDR was here, because it radiated here from Germany and we were able to make recordings of it. Even at that time, the Germans were able to wiretap on every radio telephone in Germany and record it when we knew the number. So they recorded, for example, it was a huge affair with those wiretaps of Strauss, and it all was made at us. They recorded the driver's calls and then leaked it through journalists, saying it was happening in Germany, but it was made here. And the analyst monitors how, for example, German intelligence works, and they already had a voice database of BND [Bundesnachrichtendienst] employees. So when someone called, they knew that this and that colonel was talking then. So they had a filing room, and when I came to the filing room, I was completely horrified. I say, all this has already come out about those people. And then the revolution came, and I have these fragments of information that the first what the Americans did was that they wanted to get all the information from the GDR. And they were supposed to look for me here and someone deliberately kept secret where the Americans would find me. So I kind of dropped out of the game and I know who did it. He worked with the Russians. I was generally known, because everyone got a bit dirty, because everyone was in Russia for training and had to sign something, and I have never signed such a commitment anywhere in my life, although I was in the service. "

  • Full recordings
  • 1

    Praha, 14.08.2020

    (audio)
    duration: 02:00:26
    media recorded in project Stories of 20th Century
  • 2

    Hradec Králové, 11.09.2020

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    duration: 01:52:00
    media recorded in project Stories of 20th Century
  • 3

    Hradec Králové, 03.12.2020

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    duration: 01:52:10
    media recorded in project Stories of 20th Century
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Turn the aerials eastwards

Alexander Bory, historical photo
Alexander Bory, historical photo
photo: witness´ archive

Alexander Bory was born on July 25, 1949 in the Vinohrady hospital in Prague. His parents, father Alexander and mother Margita, were post-war Hungarian exiles from southern Slovakia and they met while working at the railway construction near Havlíčkův Brod. They were both manual workers and so young Alexander could study at grammar school. After A level exams, he considered studying theology, but eventually he applied for admission at the Faculty of Arts. He was not admitted, so he had to start the military service, he served with signalmen who checked the radio traffic. He wanted to keep doing similar work, so he signed up for the Public Security. After coming back from the military service in the autumn of 1971, he put on the uniform of a Public Security, becoming a member of the Prague - Žižkov department. In the spring of 1973, he got to the Administration VI of the National Security Corps (NSC), where, working on shifts, he participated in the monitoring of radio broadcasting. In 1986 he graduated from the University of the NSC and went over to radio engineering secret service (NSC Administration XIII) as an analyst. At the end of 1988, he completed an internship at the East German secret service Stasi, which belonged to the elite in the field of wiretapping in the Eastern bloc and also cooperated with Czechoslovak State Security. After the November Revolution, the witness became the highest-ranking member of the radio intelligence service and tried to adapt this secret service to new circumstances. For example, he played a key role in picking up the information that saved the Americans from political disgrace in the Middle East. He tried to reorientate the potential of the radio intelligence service to the disintegrating Soviet Union. The action aimed to monitor the retransmission tower near Užhorod, Ukraine, and to start eavesdropping on signals there failed. Alexander Bory was made to leave the intelligence service. He then changed several jobs and run businesses, in 2020 he was engaged in housing construction.