(1963) Colonel Klebb is a high ranking member of the feared Russian counter-intelligence agency SMERSH, where she serves as the supervisor of Department II (operations and executions)... Klebb attempts to kick Bond with the poison-tipped shoe, but Bond blocks the attack with a chair. (more)
(1975) It wasn’t just Soviet bloc spies who used such techniques, though. In a 1975 US Senate hearing, CIA Director William Colby handed the committee’s chairman a gun developed by his researchers. Equipped with a telescopic sight, it could accurately fire a tiny dart – tipped with shellfish toxin or cobra venom – up to 250 feet. Colby claimed that this and other weapons had never been used, but couldn’t entirely rule out the possibility. (more) (video) BTW, the "dart" is believed to be an icicle. No 'pop gun' jokes, please.
(1978) The assassination of Georgi Markov in London in 1978 by a man with a poison-tipped umbrella was one of the most infamous incidents of the Cold War. The story reads like it is straight out of a super-spy novel. The forensic autopsy findings and results are as sensational as today's TV crime dramas. There is motive,a possible weapon, the known cause of death, and shadow government workings involved. Still there is no killer, and offically there may well never be. (more)
