Foreign scouting information in the activities of VIAM and TSAGI in the pre-war years

The article examines the contribution of Soviet intelligence to the provision of research activities of the leading aviation research institutes of the USSR - VIAM and TsAGI in the pre–war period. In these scientific centers, a number of breakthrough aviation materials and technologies were obtained for that time, but the role of scouting in these successes was practically not covered until recently. In the study, for the first time, on the basis of archival materials not previously introduced into scientific circulation, some specific examples of the positive use of secret foreign information in the scientific research of VIAM and TsAGI are analyzed. This practice allowed us to make significant progress in the development of aviation and strengthen the country's defense potential on the eve of the Great Patriotic War.