Operation Trust

Operation Trust (операция "Трест") was a counterintelligence operation of the State Political Directorate (GPU) of the Soviet Union. The operation, which ran from 1921 to 1926, set up a fake anti-Bolshevik resistance organization, "Monarchist Union of Central Russia", MUCR (Монархическое объединение Центральной России, МОЦР), in order to help the OGPU identify real monarchists and anti-Bolsheviks.

The cover story used for discussion was to call the organization the Moscow Municipal Credit Association.

The head of the MUCR was Alexander Yakushev (Александр Александрович Якушев), a former bureaucrat of the Ministry of Communications of Imperial Russia, who after the Russian Revolution joined the Narkomat of External Trade (Наркомат внешней торговли), when the Soviets began to allow the former specialists (called "spetsy", Russian: спецы) to resume the positions of their expertise. This position allowed him to travel abroad and contact Russian emigrants.

MUCR kept the monarchist general Alexander Kutepov (Александр Кутепов) from active actions, as he was convinced to wait for the development of internal anti-Bolshevik forces. Kutepov had previously believed in militant action as a solution to the Soviet occupation, and had formed the "combat organization", a militant splinter from the Russian All-Military Union (Russian: Русский Обще-Воинский Союз, Russkiy ObshcheVoinskiy Soyuz) led by General Baron Pyotr Nikolayevich Wrangel.

Kutepov also created the Inner Line as a counter-intelligence organization to prevent Bolshevik penetrations. It caused the Cheka some problems but was not overly successful.

...
Wikipedia