New York Times, found himself in 1973-74 being regularly criticized by ordinary Soviet citizens who fumed at the alleged American perfidy against the Soviet Union during the Dulles-Wolff talks. However, there is a kernel of truth to the version of the Dulles-Wolff talks offered in Seventeen Moments of Spring in that the Soviets were not informed of Operation Sunrise at first, and expressed much suspicion of Operation Sunrise when they did learn of the talks, believing that Dulles was engaged in something underhanded against them. As aspect of both the novel and TV versions of Seventeen Moments of Spring that has greatly annoyed Westerners who are more accustomed to seeing spy stories via the prism of the fast-paced Bond stories is the way that Stierlitz spends much time interacting with ordinary Germans who he meets during his long walks on the streets and parks of Berlin despite the fact these interactions do nothing to advance the plot as these scenes are utterly superfluous to the story. However, the point of these scenes are to show that Stierlitz is still a moral human being, who remains sociable and kind to all people, including the citizens of the state that his country is at war with despite the way that state has killed millions of his own people. Unlike Bond, Stierlitz is devoted to his wife who he deeply loves and despite spending at least ten years as a spy in Germany and having countless chances to sleep with attractive German women remains faithful towards her. The brooding, thoughtful and quiet Stierlitiz who remains devoted to his wife who he has not seen for years reflects a certain Russian ideal of a romantic hero. In an entirely unrealistic scene, Stierlitz's beloved wife is smuggled into Berlin to be allowed to see him from a café in Berlin opposite another café on the other side of the street which he is in; for six minutes Stierlitz and his wife stare longingly at each other before departing without saying a word. Through Stierlitz is a spy for the NKVD as the Soviet secret police was known from 1934 to 1946, it is stated quite explicitly in Semnadtsat' mgnoveniy vesny (which is set in 1945) that he left the Soviet Union to go undercover in Nazi Germany "more than ten years ago", which means that Stierlitz was not involved in any way in the Yezhovshchina.