Mr. Zacharski had spied for Poland obtained classified plans of American aircraft and systems, including the F-15 fighter jet, the Patriot missile sys

Mr. Zacharski had spied for Poland obtained classified plans of American aircraft and systems, including the F-15 fighter jet, the Patriot missile system and the Stealth aircraft
Marian Zacharski, a Polish intelligence officer was operating under commercial cover, posing as a salesman for a Polish export firm.
The FBI arrested him in 1981. He was tried, convicted, and sentenced to life imprisonment.
Four years later, he was exchanged for 25 Western agents held in Soviet and East European prisons in one of the Cold War’s periodic spy swaps.
Zacharski was dubbed the "Silicon Valley spy" by the US media because of his success in stealing US defense secrets and technology.
Zacharski paid or arranged payment of $110,000 to William Holden Bell, a senior radar engineer at Hughes Aircraft Company in Los Angeles, California.
The information Bell provided on the F-15 Look Down-Shoot Down Radar, TOW anti-tank missile, Phoenix air-to-air missile, and quiet radar saved the Soviets approximately $185 million in technological research and advanced their technology by about 5 years by permitting them to implement proven design concepts.
The neo-Communist press in Poland hailed him as the "biggest star of Polish intelligence in the Communist era."
On 15 August, 1994 the Polish Government announced Zacharski’s appointment as head of civilian intelligence in the Office of State Protection.
On the August 17, 1994 the US Embassy delivered a démarche to the Polish Government. It noted that Zacharski was still under a life sentence in the United States and requested that Warsaw reconsider his appointment.
Zacharski withdrew his name the next day
To a casual observer, William Holden Bell appeared to be the very model of a hardworking, leisure-loving Los Angeles suburbanite. A U.C.L.A.-trained radar engineer, Bell, 61, had put in 29 years with Hughes Aircraft Co., a major defense contractor once owned by the late Howard Hughes. Together with his pretty second wife Rita, a Belgian-born Pan American airlines cabin attendant, and her nine-year-old son from an earlier marriage, Bell lived in a fairly ordinary-looking condominium complex in Playa del Rey. It had the usual Southern California accouterments—tennis courts, pools, saunas and Jacuzzis. One of his neighbors there was Polish-born Marian Zacharski, 29, an affable, fast-climbing executive of the Chicago-based Polish-American Machinery Corp. Since both men enjoyed tennis and watching their children play in the pool, there seemed to be nothing extraordinary about the friendship between them. Nothing, that is, until both were arrested last week by the FBI.
What a casual observer would not have noticed about Bell and Zacharski —and their neighbors certainly missed —was a tale out of John le Carré: international espionage, replete with secret passwords, a document-copying camera, clandestine meetings with foreign agents, and payoffs made in gold. Zacharski, the FBI alleged last week after six years of not-so-casually observing him, was an undercover operative for the Polish intelligence service. According to a court affidavit filed by the bureau, he had paid Bell about $110,000 over the past three years to photograph highly classified documents detailing Hughes Aircraft radar and weapons systems. The film was passed to Polish agents and ultimately, it is believed, to the Soviet Union.
The FBI got wind of Bell's intrigues about a year ago and obtained his confession and cooperation in the investigation shortly before his arrest. Bell's motive, said Agent John Hoos, was "definitely monetary." Despite a $50,000 salary, Bell said he had been having "financial problems" when he first met his neighbor about three years ago. Zacharski offered to help him out. Equipped by his new friend with a movie camera capable of taking single-frame exposures, the Hughes engineer began photographing unclassified company documents in exchange for cash and gold coins.
Gradually, Bell later confessed, his position became more compromised, and he was required to record more highly classified plans of advanced radar and weapons systems. Bell's involvement grew deeper still in late 1979, when Zacharski told him he would have to start delivering the film directly to Polish agents overseas. During the next year and a half, Bell made three trips to Austria and Switzerland, where Polish agents would identify themselves to him with the code phrase, "Aren't you a friend of Marian?"
The case of Marian and his friend is just the latest example of what the FBI calls "technology transfer"—the continuing effort by foreign countries, particularly the Soviet Union, to grab American technical know-how in whatever way they can. The methods, says FBI Spokesman Roger Young, "range from the legal and overt to the covert and illegal. Sometimes they are crude to the point of a car pulling up to a technological trade show and just loading up with free literature."
Because of loosely enforced Commerce and State Department regulations, says Young, "only rarely can we catch anyone as calculating as Bell." According to Kenneth Kaiser, an agency counterintelligence supervisor in Chicago, Poland is particularly active in the pirating of corporate data. Says Kaiser: "While the Soviet KGB gets all the press, Polish intelligence is perhaps superior. They, however, could care less about military intelligence; they want economic and scientific secrets. Their objective is to short-circuit development costs and undersell us." And, as the Zacharski case suggests, they are good at finding friends in the right places
Marian Zacharski (born in Gdynia, Poland in 1951, raised in nearby Sopot), was a Polish Intelligence officer arrested in 1981 and convicted of espionage against the United States. After four years in prison, he was exchanged for American agents on Berlin's famous Glienicke Bridge. Arguably, he was one of the most famous agents of the Polish intelligence service. Back in 1996, prosecutors in Warsaw charged him with flagrant mismanagement at the Pewex company, and Gorzów Wielkopolski police want to question him about illegal car trading.

Espionage
Zacharski was president of the Polish American Machinery Company (POLAMCO) and lived in the United States from about 1977 till 1981. Acting as the commercial representative, he was at the same time an officer of the Polish intelligence service. In June of 1981 William Holden Bell, project manager of the Radar Systems Group at Hughes Aircraft in El Segundo, California, and Zacharski, were arraigned on espionage charges. For the apprehension of Marian Zacharski credit belongs to a Polish diplomat Jerzy Koryciński at UN who blew the whistle, while asking for political asylum in the US.
Under disguise of business activities, and over the period of several months, Zacharski developed a relationship with Bell. According to a court affidavit filed by the bureau, he had paid Bell about $110,000 in cash and $60,000 in gold coins, to photograph highly classified documents detailing Hughes Aircraft radar and weapons systems. Furthermore, Zacharski won access to material on the then-new Patriot and Phoenix missiles, the enhanced version of the Hawk air-to-air missile, radar instrumentation for the F-15 fighter, F-16, "stealth radar" for the B-1 and Stealth bomber, an experimental radar system being tested by the U.S. Navy, submarine sonar and tank M1 Abrams.
According to Kenneth Kaiser, an agency counterintelligence supervisor in Chicago, Poland was particularly active in industrial espionage. While the Soviet KGB got all the press, Polish intelligence was perhaps superior. They, however, could not care less about military intelligence; they wanted economic and scientific secrets. Their objective was to short-circuit development costs and undersell us And, as the Zacharski case suggests, they were good at finding friends in the right places.
Zacharski disclosed the activities of a Russian spy in Poland who under code name "Olin" (known as affair of Olin - Polish Security Services and Oleksy Case Olingate cooperated with one of the best connected KGB agents and the most powerful Russian spies Vladimir Alganov and another Russian diplomat, Georgiy Yakimishin. This consequently resulted in fall of Polish government under Prime Minister Jozef Oleksy. *Afery Prawne(Polish).
In June of 1996 Marian Zacharski left Poland for Switzerland, and the tracks of his whereabouts vanished. Currently Wojciech Bockenheim from Polish TV station TVN produced six TV movies entitled Szpieg (eng. for Spy) "in search of Marian Zacharski", which is dedicated to disclose some of activities of Zacharski
The Spy Who Went Into Retailing 1991Marian Zacharski has a finely tuned sense of irony, and he ought to. A decade ago, he was sentenced by an American court to life in prison, a Polish agent who paid a high penalty for stealing military secrets. Today, six years after his release in a spy exchange, he is a leading businessman in Poland, director of this country's most profitable retailer."Each day, all that is becoming more distant," Mr. Zacharski said of his years as a foot soldier in the cold war in the guise of a sales representative for a Polish machine-tools company. "History has moved forward. I owe a lot to America. If I've become a seasoned businessman, it was because of the years I spent in America. It was my university of life."With his perfectly coiffed gray hair, starched white shirt and lightly accented colloquial English, Mr. Zacharski epitomizes Poland's new breed of Westward-looking entrepreneurs. While competitors struggle to cope with the new principles of free-market economics, he has a sure grasp of his marketing strategy. He wants to emulate J. C. Penney, not K Mart, and hopes to build relationships with customers eager to buy previously scarce consumer goods.The state-owned company he heads, Pewex, was the nationwide chain of stores that sold imported items for dollars, German marks, or other hard currency. It is being privatized and today, with the border open to imports, Pewex accepts payment in Polish zlotys.Sitting in his office on the 12th floor of the Marriott Hotel in downtown Warsaw, Mr. Zacharski speaks confidently of prospects for doubling gross sales this year, to $2 billion. One advertising gambit he plans has a distinctly Western flavor: Pewex is playing host to a tour this spring by the American figure skating troupe the Ice Capades. Mr. Zacharski says the company must diversify to maintain market share.American intelligence officials remember Mr. Zacharski for skills other than his marketing acumen. To them, he was the ultimate professional. His prowess in recruiting a disgruntled engineer at Hughes Aircraft as his American agent is still studied at the F.B.I. academy as a textbook example of how a resourceful spy plies his trade. 'Very Talented'"I knew he was very talented, and I was convinced he was a very talented spy," said Robert Brewer, a private lawyer in San Diego who prosecuted Mr. Zacharski in 1981. "I'm not a bit surprised that whatever venture he got involved in, he would succeed."Indeed, Mr. Zacharski is a rarity among intelligence operatives East or West in his ability to prosper in a subsequent career. The attributes of a capable spy -- grace under pressure, personal charm, daring -- would seem to be ideal for business executives. But the United States has had enormous difficulty helping defectors from Soviet and Eastern bloc intelligence services find work in the West. And today, intelligence agents dismissed by the new democracies in eastern Germany, Czechoslovakia and Poland are also said to be struggling to find an employer who can make use of their abilities.From 1977 until his arrest in 1981, Mr. Zacharski worked as what is known in espionage jargon as an "illegal." It is considered the riskiest job in the spy business. Some Face PrisonMost intelligence officers enter foreign countries as diplomats who enjoy immunity from arrest. They are closely watched by counterespionage agents and if caught are simply deported. To avoid surveillance, some spies pose as students, tourists or business executives. Their handlers work particularly hard at inventing credible cover stories because these illegals face imprisonment if detected.In Mr. Zacharski's case, his cover as a sales representative for a Polish company was as much a vocation as spycraft. He recalled with evident pride his success in selling machine tools to American companies.He was more circumspect about details of his espionage career, declining to say when and how he was enlisted. But it was still easy to see why he was both a successful spy and a formidable salesman. He fixes a visitor with his light blue eyes, and he has a knack for creating a warm, congenial atmosphere even in a short conversation. 'Like a Game'What was it like to be a spy?"It's something in which you have to turn your emotions off," he recalled. "It's a job, and the same time, it's something like a game between certain types of agencies."Mr. Zacharski grew up in the northern Polish city of Sopot, and attended college in Warsaw, studying business. At some point, he was enlisted in the Polish intelligence service, which was working closely with Soviet intelligence to steal Western technology."I consider myself a great patriot," Mr. Zacharski said of his decision to become a spy. "To me it makes no difference whether Poland is Socialistic, Communist or a feudal country. To me, it's that it was Poland. My country is Poland and I do everything possible for it."Mr. Zacharski came to the United States in 1975, accompanied by his wife and daughter.For several years, he worked as president of the Polish American Machinery Corporation, with headquarters in Elk Grove Village, Ill. The Personal TouchListen to how Mr. Zacharski describes the attributes of a great salesman: "Business is not done between companies. It's done between people. Before you sell your product, you have to sell yourself."Mr. Zacharski was doing both in the United States. In 1978, he met William Holden Bell, an aerospace engineer at Hughes Aircraft in El Segundo, Calif., who was embittered and having financial problems. Mr. Zacharski moved into the condominium complex in which Mr. Bell lived, befriended him, played tennis with him and slowly eased him into espionage."This was a classic case in which an intelligence officer correctly assessed his target. Mr. Bell needed a friend and Zacharski just recruited him beautifully," said Kenneth Degraffenreid, former head of intelligence programs at the White House.Over the next three years, prosecutors said, Mr. Bell was paid more than $110,000 for secrets on military radar systems, including the technology for the radar-evading Stealth aircraft then under development. In 1981, he was caught by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, confessed, and agreed to wear a hidden microphone to entrap Mr. Zacharski. The plan succeeded, and the handsome Polish emigre was arrested on June 28, 1981. A Life SentenceMr. Bell was sentenced to eight years. Mr. Zacharski went before a Federal judge for his punishment on Dec. 14, 1981, a particularly inauspicious moment. The day before, Poland's Communist Government had imposed martial law. Mr. Zacharski said the life sentence was not a surprise.Though he would not have been eligible for parole until June 2011, he said he never gave up hope. He asserts that his biggest worry was whether he could get a job when he returned to Poland. In 1985, he and three other agents were traded for 25 spies being held in Eastern bloc countries. Months later, the Government named him to a post in Pewex and he soon went to work as head of the consumer electronics division. He became general director last year.It is not yet clear whether he will head Pewex when the company is sold into private hands. Mr. Zacharski says he has the qualifications, pointing to a 74 percent increase in sales last year. Political ConcernsOf late, Mr. Zacharski's prominence has attracted some unwanted political attention. Lech Walesa, the new President of Poland, ran on a platform of sweeping the Communist elite, or "nomenklatura," from posts in business and industry. Though Mr. Zacharski was appointed to Pewex by the Communist Government, he was chosen director in a competition last year.He was recently the subject of an unflattering article in Tygodnik Solidarnosc, the weekly paper with close ties to the Walesa camp. The article recounted published reports linking Mr. Zacharski's operations in the United States to the Soviet intelligence service, the K.G.B."They are trying to create an atmosphere that I am a foreign object in this country, and this is complete nonsense," he said.These days, Mr. Zacharski seems to have little nostalgia for his years in the back alleysNo, I don't miss it," he said. "At a certain point in your life you do certain things. At that point in my life, I was young and brave. Now, I am old and settled," said the 39-year old Mr. Zacharski, with only the hint of a twinkle in his eye.
Marian Zacharski - najsłynniejszy agent polskiego wywiadu. W czasach zimnej wojny wykradł Amerykanom dokumentację supernowoczesnej broni, wartej ponad 2 miliardy dolarów. Losy superszpiega PRL-u i oficera wywiadu III RP prześledził dziennikarz TVN i TVN24 Bogdan Rymanowski. Reżyserem filmu jest Wojciech Bockenheim, autor „Wielkich ucieczek”. Tak powstał serial "Szpieg", który od maja będzie można zobaczyć w TVN.
Zacharski przybył do USA w 1976 roku, jako przedstawiciel Polish-American Machinery Company (POLAMCO). Formalnie zajmował się sprzedażą obrabiarek kalifornijskim przedsiębiorstwom przemysłu lotniczego. Zaprzyjaźnił się z pracownikiem jednej z firm, Williamem Bellem. Wykorzystując fakt, że Bell tonął w długach, zaproponował, że kupi od niego tajne materiały.
Za niespełna 200 tysięcy dolarów zdobył m.in. dokumentację rakiet przeciwlotniczych, obrony przeciwlotniczej, bombowca strategicznego, czołgu i myśliwca. Materiały te centrala w Warszawie przekazała Moskwie.Skazany na dożywocieFBI aresztowała Zacharskiego w 1981 roku. Został skazany na dożywocie, w amerykańskim więzieniu przesiedział ponad cztery lata. W czerwcu 1985 roku Zacharskiego oraz trzech innych szpiegów wschodnioeuropejskich wymieniono na moście między Berlinem Wschodnim a Zachodnim na 25 zachodnich agentów, schwytanych w krajach bloku wschodniego.
Po zmianie systemu superszpieg PRL-u został zatrudniony w Urzędzie Ochrony Państwa. Przez kilka dni był nawet szefem wywiadu III RP.W 1995 roku Zacharski zdobył informacje o działalności rosyjskiego szpiega o kryptonimie "Olin". Wybuchł skandal, gdy ówczesny szef MSW Andrzej Milczanowski oskarżył z trybuny sejmowej urzędującego premiera Józefa Oleksego o współpracę z rezydentami rosyjskiego wywiadu w Polsce: Ałganowem i Jakimiszynem. Oleksy podał się do dymisji, a śledztwo w największej aferze szpiegowskiej zostało umorzone.Oficerowie, którzy zajmowali się tzw. sprawą "Olina" zostali usunięci ze służb specjalnych. W czerwcu 1996 roku Marian Zacharski opuścił Polskę i zapadł się pod ziemię.Premiera 8 majaKim naprawdę jest Zacharski? Gdzie teraz przebywa? Jakie tajemnice zabrał ze sobą? Odpowiedzi na te pytania w Stanach Zjednoczonych, Meksyku, Rosji, Niemczech, Austrii i w Szwajcarii szukał ponad rok Bogdan Rymanowski.