Leon Grossvogel (born 27 November 1904 in Łódź; likely died 1944-1945) was a Polish-French Jewish businessman, Comintern official, resistance fighter, communist agitator and one of the organizers of a Soviet intelligence network in Belgium and France, that was later called the Red Orchestra ("Rote Kapelle") by the Abwehr.
In the autumn of 1938, Grossvogel became associated with Leopold Trepper, a Soviet intelligence agent who would later run a large espionage network in Europe.
[1] Grossvogel ran a small Brussels business called Le Roi du Caoutchouc or The Raincoat King on behalf of its owners.
[6] Although Grossvogel was related to one of the owners by marriage and who recognised him as a good worker, he had become unpopular with his employees due to his communist sympathies and his errant behaviour during a strike at their Brussels plant in 1938.
[9] Trepper financed Grossvogel to the sum of $8,000 to create the new business,[10] that was given an unidiomatic name of Foreign Excellent Raincoat Company.
As a representative of the company, he made trips to Norway, Switzerland, Denmark, and Finland, in the spring and summer of 1939, i.e. the places Trepper planned to establish bases for operations against the United Kingdom.
[11] After the start of World War II, Trepper abandoned the idea of trying to expand the raincoat company overseas, stopping intelligence activities against Britain.
[1] On the 30 November 1942, Grossvogel was arrested, while waiting for a rendezvous with the forger and criminal, Abraham Rajchmann, at the Café de la Paix in Paris,[1] He was betrayed by Trepper.