Borvendég Zsuzsanna: Fabulous Spy Games. How international trade networks with the West developed after 1945 - A Magyarságkutató Intézet Kiadványai 24. (Budapest, 2021)
ATTACK ON THE OMFB - Ties running deep
FABULOUS SPY GAMES documents related to investments and containing technical specifications.483 Unfortunately, this document was not included in the investigation dossier, so all we can establish is that Sebestyén and his associates were preoccupied by Vályi ’s trip to the USA, and the potential ramifications thereof. 483 ÁBTL 3.1.9 V-160121/2, p. 26 Report on the case of Endre Simon, 10 August 1973 Péter Vályi’s role and his relationship with the individual members of the lobby highlight yet another connection that merits further consideration regarding the enmity between the financial interest group and those committed to economic reform, and paints a more nuanced picture of the reasons for the failure of the new mechanism. Ties running deep In the summer of 1973, Endre Simon was arrested. He was interrogated, his cell was bugged and a detention intelligence agent was assigned to him in order to gather evidence against Sebestyén and his circles. In the beginning, Simon tried to protect his boss and said little. Before long, however, he realised nobody was going to help him, so he began to make more and more detailed confessions to save himself and implicate his superiors instead. During his interrogation, he confirmed the conclusions drawn by state security during the secret investigation: “As shown by later practice, Sebestyén and the persons mentioned [i.e. Robert Geist, István Dévai and Sándor Udvardi] paved the way through their relationships built during their stay in Frankfurt for various West German firms to later enter the Hungarian market, and to further strengthen their position later on. Until 1962, when the OMFB was established, there were few opportunities for this, but more and more avenues started to appear with the OMFB around. [...] Given that the so-called club members, the West German firms and their representatives with whom they had relations since Frankfurt, were inquiring continuously, efforts to favour the bids by these firms 174
