In 1928, Joseph Stalin's personal secretary escaped through a daring trek across Iran
In a high-stakes escape that sounds like a spy thriller, Joseph Stalin's personal secretary became the only member of the inner circle to successfully defect by trekking across the Iranian border.
In 1928, Boris Bazhanov achieved the impossible by defecting from the Soviet Union while serving as Joseph Stalin's personal secretary. Carrying intimate knowledge of the Kremlin's inner workings, he fled through the mountains of Iran to seek asylum in France. He remains the only member of Stalin's secretariat to ever successfully escape the regime.
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