The Great Illegals, Part One: The Whistler | NKVD

True Spies: Espionage | Investigation | Crime | Murder | Detective | Politics

SPYSCAPE

True Crime, Society & Culture, Documentary, History

4.6 • 2.9K Ratings

🗓️ 12 August 2025

⏱️ 58 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this two-part True Spies story, author and journalist Shaun Walker unmasks the greatest generation of Russian spies - the Great Illegals. In Part One, Shaun tells the story of Nikolai Khokhlov - the music-hall 'whistler' turned deep-cover spy in Nazi-occupied Belarus. From SPYSCAPE, the home of secrets. A Cup And Nuzzle production. Series producer: Joe Foley. Produced by Frank Palmer. Shaun Walker is the Central and Eastern Europe correspondent for The Guardian newspaper. He is the author of The Illegals: Russia's Most Audacious Spies and Their Century-Long Mission to Infiltrate the West. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:57.4	This is True Spies.
1:00.9	The podcast that takes you deep inside the greatest secret missions of all time.
1:06.8	Week by week, you'll hear the true stories behind the operations that have shaped the world we live in.
1:13.6	You'll meet the people who live life undercover.
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	...

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