Gunman Had Plan to Kill Gorbachev

The man who tried to shoot at Soviet leaders during last week’s Revolution Day parade had been planning to kill President Mikhail S. Gorbachev for more than two years, Soviet news reports said today.

Alexander A. Shmonov, a 38-year-old unemployed man from Leningrad, was charged with attempted terrorism in the Nov. 7 shooting on Red Square.

Shmonov managed to fire two shots but was prevented by police from aiming at Gorbachev and other Soviet leaders, who were observing the traditional military parade from atop Lenin’s Mausoleum. No one was hurt.

Col. Pyotr Sokolov, a top KGB investigator, told the newspaper Glasnost that a body search of Shmonov turned up a note confirming that Gorbachev was his intended victim.

“The note was prepared in advance in case of his death during the assassination attempt,” Sokolov said in an interview. “In the note, Shmonov explicitly set out his criminal intentions in regard to the Soviet president.”

According to Glasnost, the shooting took place just 46 yards from the mausoleum. Police said an officer had noticed Shmonov pulling out a hunting rifle and aiming at the Soviet leaders on the mausoleum.

The officer forced the gun barrel skyward before Shmonov fired the two shots. He was then grabbed by more security men.

“Shmonov said he had been preparing this assassination attempt for more than two years,” Sokolov told the newspaper. “During that time, he acquired an imported double-barreled hunting rifle and practiced rapid firing.”

Another newspaper, Rabochaya Trybuna, said Shmonov had a hunting license and bought the weapon legally for $1,600.

“He went to a public library to read about the correct way to prepare a cartridge and asked some questions of hunters who were in the store,” the newspaper said.

“To carry the gun into Red Square, he sawed off the butt and fixed a kind of pocket made of rubbery material inside his jacket,” the report said, quoting an official in the state prosecutor’s office.

Sgt. Andrei Mylnikov, the police officer who subdued Shmonov during the shooting, said in an interview with Moscow News on Wednesday that the gunman told investigators: “I wanted to kill Gorbachev.”