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Was the Soviet James Bond Vladimir Putin's role model? 10 May 2017 While generations of Westerners were growing up on the films of James Bond, Soviet citizens had their own favourite spy, a wartime agent who went under the name of Max Otto von Stierlitz. And it could easily have been Stierlitz who prompted Vladimir Putin to join the KGB, writes Dina Newman.The USSR's answer to James Bond was a very different kind of spy. He had no time for women or gadgets. His life was devoted entirely to his work in Berlin in World War Two, where, under cover, he infiltrated the German high command.Stierlitz was the hero of a 12-part series, Seventeen Moments of Spring, screened on Soviet TV every year around 9 May - the date the USSR marked as the end of World War Two.The first broadcast, in 1973, was watched by an estimated 50 to 80 million people.Continued: http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-39862225