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Kim Philby (January 1, 1912 – May 11, 1988) was a high ranking member of British intelligence who led a lifelong career as a spy for the Soviet Union.

Philby was revealed as a possible member of the spy ring known as the Cambridge Five, along with Donald Maclean, Guy Burgess, Anthony Blunt and John Cairncross (although Cairncross's involvement has never conclusively been established, he and several others, including Sir Roger Hollis, former head of MI5, have been suspected at one time or another to be the "fifth man" of the ring).

Born in Ambala, India, Philby was the son of St. John Philby, the British diplomat, explorer, author, and Arabist who converted to Islam and served as an adviser to King Ibn Sa'ud of Saudi Arabia. He was nicknamed after the protagonist in Rudyard Kipling's novel , about a young Indian boy who spies for the British in occupied India in the 19th century.

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After leaving Westminster School in 1928 at the age of 16, Philby went on to Trinity College, Cambridge, where he was introduced to and became an admirer of the ideals of Communism.

Philby was not recruited into espionage; rather, he volunteered. He asked one of his tutors, Maurice Dobb, how he could serve the Communist movement. Perhaps ignorant of the possible consequences, Dobb referred him to a Communist front organisation, which passed Philby in turn to the Comintern underground in Vienna. The front organisation was the World Federation for the Relief of the Victims of German Fascism in Paris, France. The World Federation was one of the innumerable front organisations operated by the German Communist Willi Münzenberg, who was one of the leading Soviet agents in the West. The Soviet intelligence service itself (at that time known as the OGPU) recruited him on the strength of his work for the Comintern. Anatoli Gromov, the London Resident, was his case officer.

After working as a journalist in Austria and Spain, the latter during the Spanish Civil War, Philby was recruited by Valentine "Vee Vee" Vivian of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) in 1940, later becoming part of the Special Operations Executive, and coming into contact with Office of Strategic Services agents. Immediately after World War II Philby was assigned to Istanbul.

In January 1949, the British Government was informed that VENONA intercepts showed atomic secrets were passed to the Soviet Union from the British Embassy in Washington in 1944 and 1945 by an agent code-named HOMER, later identified as Second Secretary Donald MacLean.

In October 1949 Philby arrived in Washington as British intelligence liaison to the newly created U.S. intelligence agencies under the National Security Act of 1947. Philby received VENONA material which the U.S. was sharing with the U.K. In defiance of all known intelligence principles, he shared a house in Washington, at 4100 Nebraska Avenue, N.W, with his personal friend from the Cambridge days, fellow British diplomat, intelligence officer and Soviet penetration agent, Guy Burgess.

When MacLean was identified in April 1951, surveillance commenced to obtain evidence independent of VENONA, as the U.S. and U.K. did not want to reveal the existence of the Venona. MacLean defected to Moscow with Guy Burgess a month later in May 1951. Philby came under instant suspicion as the third man who tipped them off.

That year, Philby resigned under a cloud and was denied his pension until an internal investigation failed to come up with definitive proof of his treachery. A few years later, against all expectations, he was 'cleared' by the Prime Minister in an ill-timed statement made in the House of Commons.

Thus, in 1956 Philby was again in the employ of SIS as an "informant on retainer". He was supposedly given the position of second-in-command to the point man for Operation Musketeer, the British, French, and Israeli plan to attack Egypt and depose Gamal Abdel Nasser. However, given Philby's sympathies, it can only be supposed, if this truly occurred, that his role was less one of support, than of subversion.

Better attested is his role as Middle East correspondent for the British magazine "the Economist" which however, led to his exposure. Sometime in late 1962, a British Jewish woman, Flora Solomon, was attending a cocktail party in Tel Aviv and made a comment about how Philby, the journalist in Beirut, displayed sympathy for Arabs in his articles. She said that his masters were the Soviets and that she knew that he had always worked for them. The comment was overheard by someone at the party and was relayed to the offices of the MI5 in London, which sent Victor Rothschild to interview her. Mrs. Solomon declared that she would never testify against Philby, though she later admitted that he had told her he was a spy and that he had tried to recruit her to the Communist cause.

Although MI5 and MI6 could not immediately agree on how to deal with Philby, it was eventually agreed that a personal friend of Philby from his MI6 days, Nicolas Elliott, would be sent to confront him in Beirut. There seemed to be a constant leak of information and it is alleged that there was a high level mole in MI5 those days. Although it is unclear whether Philby was aware of the developments against him vis a vis Flora Solomon or whether he knew about the defection of Anatoly Golitsyn (which led to the arrest, escape, and defection to Moscow of fellow MI6 officer and Soviet agent George Blake), there is evidence that in the last few months of 1962 Philby began to drink heavily and his behaviour became increasingly erratic. Philby may have also been warned by Yuri Modin, a top Soviet handler who had served in the Soviet embassy in London who travelled to Beirut in December 1962.

It is reported that the first thing that Philby said upon meeting with Elliott was that he was "half expecting" to see him. When told that there was fresh evidence against him, Philby immediately confessed without asking what this evidence was. Although a further interrogation was scheduled in the last week of January 1963, Philby disappeared on January 23. Soviet records later revealed that a Soviet freighter was called to port in Beirut on this date.

Philby later surfaced in Moscow, and was given a make-work sinecure within the KGB which he held until shortly before his death. Aside from a role as a propagandist for the KGB he was given no significant responsibilities and his alcoholism became progressively deeper. He had married the estranged wife of fellow defector Donald Maclean shortly after his arrival in Moscow but upon her return to the West he married a Russian woman 20 years his junior, with whom he lived until his death in 1988 at age 76. Only after his death did he receive the praise and appreciation which had escaped him in life, being awarded a hero's funeral and numerous posthumous medals by a belatedly grateful USSR.

Philby was a close friend of the novelist Graham Greene, who reportedly left MI6 rather than become involved in exposing Philby. It has been suggested that Greene never really left the intelligence service, but continued to run Philby as a British triple agent in the KGB. However, the hypothesis that Philby was working in the interests of Britain all along is considered extremely improbable, if not fantastic, given that (a) Philby had for a time singlehandedly nullified Western intelligence efforts against the Soviet Union; (b) his exposure had seriously damaged the relationship between the American CIA and Britain's MI5; and (c), what is now known about Philby's life in Moscow.

1931 Joined the Cambridge University Socialist Society CUSS. Labour government of Ramsay MacDonald defeated 27th October. Philby became a more ardent socialist. After obtaining only a third in his history exams he transferred to economics.1933 Left Cambridge a convinced Communist with a degree in economics, then went to Vienna where Chancellor Dr Engelbert Dollfuss was preparing the first 'putsch' in February 1934. Philby became a Soviet agent.1934 Clash between the Austrian government and socialists in Vienna. On Feb 24 Philby married Litzi Friedman; then in May, after the collapse of the socialist movement in Vienna, he returned with his wife to England. He began work as a sub-editor of a Liberal monthly review, and joined Burgess as a member of the Anglo-German Fellowship. (Philby edited the fellowship's pro-Hitler magazine, supported by Nazi funds). To cover up his communist background he also made repeated visits to Berlin for talks with the German Propaganda Ministry and with von Ribbentrop's Foreign Office.1937 In February Philby arrived in Spain to report on the Spanish Civil War from Franco's side. 20 May 1937 he became correspondent of 1940 In June, after the evacuation of British Forces from the European mainland, he returned to Britain. Recruited by the British Secret Service and attached to the SIS under Guy Burgess in Section D. Assigned to school for under-cover work, but later transferred to the teaching staff of a new school for general training in techniques of sabotage and subversion at Beaulieu, Hampshire.1941 Transferred to SIS, Section V (Five). Philby took charge of the Iberian sub-section, responsible for British Intelligence in Spain and Portugal. Trained James Jesus Angelton in the arts and crafts of counterespionage.1942 Married his second wife Aileen Furse. OSS group under Norman Pearson arrived in London for liaison with British Secret Service. Philby's area of responsibility grew to include North African and Italian espionage under newly formed counter-intelligence units.1945 In September Soviet intelligence officer Konstantin Volkov based at the Soviet embassy in Ankara seriously threatened Philby's position by offering to defect and provide the names of two agents working in the Foreign Office and one in SIS (probably Philby). The offer was sent to Philby as head of the Section IX, Soviet counterintelligence. Soon afterwards, Volkov was kidnapped by Soviet agents and taken to the Lubyanka in Moscow for interrogation and execution.1946 Took a field appointment - officially as First Secretary with the British embassy in Turkey, actually as head of the Turkish SIS station.1949 Became SIS representative in Washington, as senior British Secret Service officer working in liaison with the FBI and the newly created CIA. He occasionally visited Arlington Hall for discussions about VENONA; furthermore, he regularly received copies of summaries of VENONA translations as part of his official duties. He sat in on a Special Policy Committee directing the ill-fated Anglo-US attempt to infiltrate anti-communist agents into Albania to topple the Enver Hoxha régime.1950 Guy Burgess arrived in Washington on assignment as Second Secretary of the British Embassy, and Philby invited him to stay at his house.1951 Philby learnt of the tightening net of suspicion surrounding Foreign Office diplomat and Soviet agent Donald Maclean, whose British embassy position at the end of the war had placed him on the Combined Policy Committee on Atomic Energy as its British joint secretary. Burgess's alcoholism caused Ambassador Franks to remove him and he returned to England. On May 25, Burgess and Maclean disappeared from Britain, with help from Philby, having escaped via the Baltic to the Soviet Union. Philby summoned to London for interrogation and asked to resign from the Foreign Service.1952 In the summer a secret trial took place in which Philby underwent questioning about his activities.1955 The British Government published a 'White Paper' (report) on the Burgess-Maclean affair. On October 25, questions tabled in parliament asking about the 'third man', Philby. Prime Minister Harold Macmillan, stated that no evidence existed of Philby having betrayed the interests of Britain. Nevertheless, the Foreign Service dismissed him because of his association with Burgess.1963 January 23, Philby disappeared in Beirut. The Soviet Union announced that it has granted Philby political asylum in Moscow. On March 3, Mrs. Philby received a telegram from Philby postmarked Cairo, Egypt. On June 3 located Philby with the Imam of Yemen. On July 1, the British Government admitted that Philby had worked as a Soviet agent before 1946 and identified him as the 'third man'. is partly based on unexplained aspects of Philby's life story, providing a supernatural context for his behavior ("tradecraft meets Lovecraft")., features an elderly Philby advising a Soviet leader on a plot to influence a British election in 1987. Implausibly, the book suggests that Philby was, in fact, a triple agent who was secretly working for Britain all along. is alleged to be a truthful account of Philby's love affair, and marriage, to Eleanor Brewer, during his time in Beirut, and his eventual defection to the Soviet Union, in late January of 1963. The names of all characters, including the lead characters, have been changed.