Studies in Intelligence

Journal of the American Intelligence Professional

Unclassified extracts from Studies in Intelligence Volume 52, Number 1

(March 2008)

West -Arbeit (Western Operations)

Stasi Operations in the Netherlands, 1979–89

Turning a Cold War Scheme into Reality

Engineering the Berlin Tunnel

The Movie Breach: A Personal Perspective

Brian J. Kelley

The Intelligence Officer’s Bookshelf

Compiled and Reviewed by Hayden B. Peake

On the Web at cia.gov

Five Months in Petrograd 1918:

Robert W. Imbrie and the US Search
for Information in Russia
David A. Langbart

Center for the Study of Intelligence

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EDITORIAL POLICY Contributors iii

Articles for Studies in Intelligence may
be written on any historical, opera- Studies in Intelligence Awards, 2007 v
tional, doctrinal, or theoretical aspect
of intelligence.
The final responsibility for accepting
HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES
or rejecting an article rests with the
Editorial Board. West -Arbeit (Western Operations)
The criterion for publication is Stasi Operations in the Netherlands, 1979–89 1
whether, in the opinion of the Board, Beatrice de Graaf
the article makes a contribution to the
literature of intelligence.
Turning a Cold War Scheme into Reality
Engineering the Berlin Tunnel 17
EDITORIAL BOARD
G...
Carmen A. Medina, Chairperson
Frans Bax On the Web at cia.gov 1
A. Denis Clift
Nicholas Dujmovic Five Months in Petrograd 1918:
Eric N. Heller Robert W. Imbrie and the US Search
Robert A. Kandra for Information in Russia Web only
William C. Liles David A. Langbart
Jason U. Manosevitz
William Nolte
Maj. Gen. Richard J. O’Lear,
USAF (Ret.)
INTELLIGENCE IN THE PUBLIC MEDIA
Dwight Pinkley
Michael P. Richter The Movie Breach: A Personal Perspective 25
Barry G. Royden Brian J. Kelley
Noah D. Rozman
Jon A. Wiant
Ursula Wilder The Intelligence Officer’s Bookshelf 31
Compiled and Reviewed by Hayden B. Peake
Members of the Board are drawn from the
Central Intelligence Agency and other
Intelligence Community components.

EDITORIAL STAFF
Andres Vaart, Editor
Carey Dueweke, Graphics/Web

1 https://cia..gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/index.htm l

Studies in Intelligence Vol 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) i

 Contributors

Beatrice de Graaf (PhD) studied modern history and German literature and culture at Utrecht
University and in Bonn, Germany. She was an assistant professor at Utrecht’s History Institute
before becoming assistant professor and researcher at Leiden University’s Center for Terrorism
and Counterterrorism at The Hague Campus.

G served in the Directorate of Operations.

Brian J. Kelley served as a case officer for both the US Air Force and CIA, specializing in
counterintelligence for more than 40 years before his retirement in 2007. He currently teaches
officers in CIA and the Department of Defense about the art of counterintelligence.

David A. Langbart is an archivist at the National Archives and Records Administration. He is

responsible for the appraisal of records of the Department of State and agencies of the Intelli-
gence Community, including CIA.

Hayden Peake is the curator of the CIA Historical Intelligence Collection. He served in the Di-
rectorate of Science and Technology and the Directorate of Operations.

Studies in Intelligence Vol 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) iii

 Studies in Intelligence
Awards, 2007

Studies in Intelligence 2007 Annual Awards were presented to authors in

December 2007 by the Associate Deputy Director of the Central Intelli-
gence Agency Michael Morell. The following were honored for unclassified
articles:

Dr. Mark E. Benbow was recognized for “‘All the Brains I Can Borrow:’
Woodrow Wilson and Intelligence Gathering in Mexico: 1913–1915,” Vol-
ume 51, Number 4. Mr. Benbow worked as an analyst in the Directorate
of Intelligence and then as a support officer in CIA for 15 years before
becoming the staff historian at the Woodrow Wilson House Museum in
Washington DC. He now teaches history at Marymount University in
Virginia.

Mr. Ricky Dale Calhoun received the Walter Pforzheimer award for his
essay “Strategic Deception During the Suez Crisis of 1956,” in Volume 51,
Number 2. The Pforzheimer award is reserved for the year’s outstanding
essay by a student. Mr. Calhoun is a PhD candidate at Kansas State Uni-
versity, where he is studying history and international security.

Andrew Finlayson received an award for “The Tay Ninh Provincial Recon-
naissance Unit and Its Role in the Phoenix Program, 1969–70” in Volume
51, Number 2. Colonel Finlayson, USMC (Ret.) served a two tours in Viet-
nam during the Vietnam War. During one of those tours, he served in the
Agency’s Phoenix Program.

David Robarge was recognized for the outstanding book review published
in 2007—”A Review of Fair Play: The Moral Dilemmas of Spying Volume
51, Number 1. Dr. Robarge is the CIA’s chief historian, and he has won
several Studies in Intelligence awards for his contributions.

❖❖❖

Studies in Intelligence Vol 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) v

West -Arbeit (Western Operations)

Stasi Operations in the Netherlands, 1979–89

Beatrice de Graaf

In the year 2000, the case of Germans may have been spies.
former Chancellor Helmut Official BStU estimates are
Kohl, who had sued the Ger- much lower, perhaps 3,500–
man Office of the Commis- 6,000 over a period of 40 years.
sioner for the Records of the In 1989, 1,500 of them were

“
State Security Service of the still operational. These agents
German Democratic Republic spied on thousands of West
With the scope of West- (BStU) for releasing files con- German companies, organiza-
cerning his political activities tions, and citizens, including
Arbeit so broadly before 1989, invoked new inter- Helmut Kohl. They also worked
defined, the boundaries est in a special category of vic- against East Germans who
between foreign tims and collaborators of the were in contact with the West. b2
intelligence and Stasi, East Germany’s Minis-
domestic policing could try for State Security (Ministe- For the Stasi, West-Arbeit
not be discerned clearly rium für Staatssicherheit— activities im und nach dem
in Stasi activites. MfS). This category involved Operationsgebiet (in and
West Germans and other West directed to the target region)

”
Europeans who were the sub- were organized not only in geo-
ject of the Stasi’s West-Arbeit graphic terms but in political,
(Western operations). a 1 organizational, and structural
terms. With the scope of West-
Several studies of the West- Arbeit so broadly defined, the
Arbeit have been published. boundaries between foreign
Some historians, for example, intelligence and domestic polic-
Hubertus Knabe, mentioned ing could not be discerned
the possibility that 20,000 West clearly in Stasi activites.

Although most of the records

a The BStU (Die Beaufträgte für die Unter- of the Stasi’s Main Directorate
lagen des Staatssicherheitsdienstes der
for Intelligence (the Hauptver-
ehemaligen Deutschen Demokratischen
Republik) is responsible for preserving the waltung Aufklärung—HVA)
records of the Stasi, which had responsibil-
ity for both external and internal security.
The files on Kohl suggested he had taken b Knabe’s 1999 study was reviewed by CIA

bribes from major firms on behalf of his historian Ben Fischer in Studies in Intelli-
party, the Christian Democratic Union. gence 46, no. 2 (2002). It offers a useful
The BStU’s functions are described on its overview in English of East German intel-
Web site, www.bstu.bund.de. ligence.

All statements of fact, opinion, or analysis expressed in this article are those of the
author. Nothing in the article should be construed as asserting or implying US gov-
ernment endorsement of an article’s factual statements and interpretations.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 1

A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

Hatred of the enemy was the Stasi’s all encompassing idea.

of espionage) has written that
“enemy images” are the back-
bone of intelligence services,
have been destroyed, traces of Brandt (1969–74). Brandt’s out- but that these images can have
the West-Arbeit can be found in reach brought the GDR consid- negative effects on their
“domestic” departments of the erable gains: diplomatic efficiency. 3 With respect to
MfS. Research into this branch recognition (and thus embas- Stasi operations against the
of activities is all the more sies) in the West, economic Dutch, I will argue that the
revealing because the files of treaties, technological imports image of the enemy, conceived
the West German intelligence (microelectronics, computers), through a Marxist-Leninist per-
and security services remain and loans. spective, drove Stasi actions
closed. with apparent success at a tac-
The gains also brought new tical level. Strategically, how-
The West-Arbeit had a direct dangers: East Germany’s pol- ever, the Stasi actions failed to
relationship to the domestic icy of Abgrenzung (the ideologi- prevent the fall of the regime it
duties of the Stasi, because the cal, political and geographical was charged with protecting.
enemy against whom the opera- sealing off of the GDR from the
tions were directed could be West, in particular from the In this article, I will investi-
located abroad, among foreign- FRG) began to erode because of gate what the MfS was after in
ers, or within the GDR popula- the many contacts with the and against the Netherlands and
tion itself. As can be deduced West established during this to what extent these operations
from the training manual of the period. The increased percola- were affected by its thinking
Stasi, Haß auf den Feind tion through the Wall of West- about the enemy. Information
(hatred of the enemy) was the ern influences was mirrored by about these operations is avail-
organization’s all encompass- the growth of the Stasi. The able in the archives of the Stasi’s
ing idea. “shield and sword of the party” HVA (foreign intelligence and
had to make up for the new counterespionage) as well as its
Established as the counter- openness with a major expan- Directorate XX (internal opposi-
part and junior partner of the sion of its personnel, informal tion) (Hauptabteilung XX—HA
KGB and staffed with commu- agents (inoffizielle mitarbeiter), XX), and HA I (military intelli-
nist veterans like Erich Mielke, and duties. At the same time, gence), which are maintained by
Ernst Wollweber, and Wilhelm the Stasi made good use of con- the BStU.
Zaisser, the Stasi was a repres- tacts fostered by Brandt’s Ost-
sive institution from its begin- politik and began new
nings. Because communism was offensives against the West. Intelligence Requirements
considered the logical and inev- These were directed mainly Regarding the Netherlands
itable outcome of history, short- against West Germany, but
comings and conflicts within other West European coun-
tries, including the Nether- According to MfS guideline
the system could only be caused
lands, also were targetted. No. 1/79, the Stasi was to con-
by external factors, for exam-
centrate on the following goals:
ple, saboteurs inspired by the
great class enemy in the West.
The Stasi’s Image of the • neutralizing and combating
This definition of the enemy Enemy, as seen through the “political-ideological diver-
evolved over time, but it was Netherlands sion”;
still in place during the neue
Ostpolitik of 1970–72 of West- Eva Horn (professor of Ger- • gathering military intelli-
German Chancellor Willy man literature and the theory gence;

2 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

Humint was the Stasi’s main source for West-Arbeit in the Neth-
• gathering economic intelli- erlands.
gence;

• counterintelligence. 4
groups, and terrorist lection. OSINT was easy to
Under these guidelines, at incidents.5 come by: The Stasi collected
least five MfS directorates— newspaper clippings, official
HVA, HA XX, HA I, HA II HA I (military intelligence) (government) publications, and
(counterespionage), and HA collected material on: “grey” reports on GDR- or secu-
XVIII (economic intelligence rity-related issues. The MfS
and security)—ran operations • military exercises of the also made good use of articles
against the Netherlands. Dutch armed forces; on Dutch military and security
Research into BStU holdings issues published by Dutch left-
reveals a broad range of topics • The Rotterdam harbour; wing pacifist organizations and
and targets between 1979 and parties. The Pacifist Political
HA II and HA XVIII were
1989. Party, the PSP, for example,
interested in:
exposed details of the structure
HVA (foreign intelligence) and activities of the Dutch
• “operational games” by the
files contain intelligence on: security service (the Binnen-
Dutch security services
against the GDR embassy, landse Veiligheidsdienst—
• NATO-deployment prepara- BVD). These were immediately
consulate, and personnel;
tions, the AFCENT-headquar- analyzed and sent to Berlin. 7
ters in Brunssum and the • security issues surrounding
Dutch position in the INF- the embassy compound. 6 With respect to technical col-
negotiations; lection, little is known from the
HA XX (internal opposition) existing files. There is some evi-
• preparations for East Ger- files contain most of the more dence that the MfS made use of
man communist leader Erich elaborate analyses found in Dutch radio and telecommuni-
Honecker’s visit to the Neth- these files. These mainly regard cations, including those of
erlands in June 1987; the: Dutch military radio and satel-
lite installations in Westerbork
• activities of the “hostile-nega- • Dutch peace movement; and Eibergen. 8
tive forces”in the Dutch peace
movement; • contacts between Dutch and
Humint was the Stasi’s main
East German churches, peace
• reliability of the employees of source for West-Arbeit in the
groups, and individuals;
the GDR consulate and Netherlands. Before the Dutch
embassy in the Netherlands; officially recognized the GDR in
• political positions of the
January 1973, the HVA made
Dutch government concern-
• the microelectronics program use of the handful of salesmen
ing detente and the East-West
of the Philips Corporation; conflict. and church officials who had
established contacts in the
• the Dutch civil and military Netherlands. Because of the
security service (telephone Intelligence Assets proximity of the two countries,
numbers, organization charts, these so-called headquarters
pictures); East German intelligence in operations were relatively easy
the Netherlands involved the to set up. According to a former
• security-related issues, such use of open sources (OSINT) Dutch intelligence officer, most
as activities of right wing and technical and human col- of the West-Arbeit against the

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 3

A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

On at least three occasions the MfS did run successful opera-

tions over a longer period of time. ber of Dutch citizens who were
showing up at the embassy to
offer themselves to the
Netherlands was conducted Netherlands (through head- service. 12
through headquarters opera- quarters operations or by legal
On the whole, informal agents
tions. residents):
like these volunteers were of
The agents participating in limited utility as sources. The
• Three informal agents in the
those operations could be East members of the Friendship
Dutch-East German Friend-
Germans, but sometimes they Association (the informal
ship Association (a subdivi-
had Dutch backgrounds. agents “Aorta,” “Arthur,” and
sion of the official Liga für
According to the same Dutch “Ozon,” for example) or mem-
Völkerfreundschaft)
intelligence officer, most East bers of other GDR-affiliated
German headquarters opera- organizations were either too
• One informal agent and one
tions used Dutch citizens who “prospective agent” from the old, unemployed, or too suspect
eventually were doubled by the Horizontal Platform, a Marx- to get anywhere near interest-
BVD. 9 New Stasi files suggest ist-Leninist offshoot of the ing military or political infor-
this is not the case. Dutch Communist Party. mation. The resident came to
the same conclusion: Their
From 1973 on, political and • Several “contact persons” (not assets were too “leftist” and
economic relations also pro- quite “informal agents” but attempts to “broaden the con-
vided up-to-date information. something less committed) tact scope did not produce many
However, the MfS was espe- inside the Stop-the-Neutron- results,” he lamented in 1988. 13
cially interested in non-govern- Bomb campaign and other left
mental relations between wing peace groups. Stasi “Success” Stories
protestant church congrega-
tions and peace groups in both • At least two informal agents However, on at least three
countries. Around 1978, some not affiliated with left wing occasions the MfS did run suc-
100 parish contacts had been organizations, but recruited cessful operations over longer
established, and by 1984 the because they sought adven- periods of time: on military
number had grown to more ture or had financial needs. intelligence, on the Dutch peace
than 150. By then, 9,000 to movement, and against a group
12,000 Dutch protestants and The MfS was not allowed to of Dutch draft resisters with
peace activists were participat- recruit members of the official East German contacts.
ing in exchange programs. 10 Dutch Communist Party (they
could only be used as contact Military Reconnaissance—
Diplomatic recognition also persons, not as informal “Abruf”
enabled the MfS to place at agents). Most informal agents The MfS was first of all inter-
least three “legal” intelligence and other sources were never- ested in political and military
officers at its residentura in the theless drawn into its service intelligence on the North Atlan-
embassy. Although the BVD through their sympathy for tic Treaty Organization, the
kept the GDR embassy under communist ideals or through main enemy of the Warsaw
strict surveillance, the MfS res- their “progressive political con- Pact. Within pact collection
identura was able to run sev- victions,” as Stasi chief Erich arrangements, the GDR was
eral informal-agent operations Mielke phrased it. As late in responsible for collecting intelli-
from the embassy. 11 The the Cold War as September gence concerning the areas
records reveal that the follow- 1988, the resident was com- associated with NATO Army
ing assets were recruited in the plaining about the large num- Group North and Army Group

4 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

The BVD, however, was a formidable adversary for the HVA.

Central. The HVA, with 4,000
members, and the military
intelligence service of the East According to the MfS residen- staunch supporter of commu-
German Army, with 2,000 tura in The Hague, the BVD nism. Hilmar played into this
members, were responsible for conducted so many unfriendly zeal and general disaffection
carrying out these operations. acts of surveillance and recruit- with the capitalist environ-
West Germany, Great Britain, ing activities against the ment and had no difficulty
France, the Benelux and Den- embassy, against East German recruiting the young man. 16
mark were defined as principal citizens in the Netherlands, and
objectives. against “friendly” organiza- As his codename implied,
tions, such as the Friendship Abruf was used as a freelance
Association GDR-Netherlands agent. He received instructions
Fulfilling this aim in the
(Vriendschapsvereniging Neder- to photograph Rotterdam Har-
Netherlands meant gathering
land-DDR), that they threat- bor, the Schiphol and Zestien-
early warning about NATO
ened to “obstruct the positive hoven airports, industrial
preparations and securing
effect of the socialist detente plants in the region, and mili-
information about the order of
politics concerning disarma- tary compounds. He also col-
battle and military disposi-
ment questions.” That is, the lected material on NATO
tions. In addition to the targets Stasi blamed the BVD for dete- Exercise REFORGER in 1985.
listed above, HVA was also riorating East-West relations After 1985, he was told to move
interested in Dutch military and troubled disarmament to Woensdrecht, a site then
compounds and in the Schiphol talks. 15 being prepared to receive new
and Zestienhoven airports. 14
NATO missiles.
However, at least one Dutch
The BVD, however, proved a informal agent of the 1980s, Abruf received payments of
formidable adversary for the whose codename was Abruf (“on 100 Dutch guilders for every
HVA. Intensive Dutch surveil- call”) was not discovered. Abruf task he carried out. Contact
lance turned the residentura in was run by a case officer code- with his case officer was made
The Hague into little more than named Hilmar, who was a through dead drops and in
a shelter for underemployed member of the legal residen- short meetings (after long, fran-
case officers. HVA security tura of the military intelligence tic diversions and smoke
reports from 1984 on regularly department of the East Ger- screens) in crowded places,
record Stasi suspicions that the man Army and worked in close such as the Jungerhans depart-
BVD was using its connections cooperation with the MfS staff ment store in Rotterdam. To
in the Dutch media to publicize at the East German embassy. some of these rendezvous he
acts of espionage conducted by Hilmar had recruited Abruf in brought his girlfriend. 17
the socialist states. Ironically, November 1983 at a meeting of
these complaints (partially jus- the Communist Party of the Abruf’s employment ended
tified, as we shall see) were Netherlands (CPN) that he, as after three years, in 1986, after
triggered by concern in Dutch a comrade and embassy offi- an assignment in 1985 raised
conservative circles that War- cial, could legally attend. suspicions. In that year, he was
saw Pact countries were trying ordered to Coevorden, Ter Apel,
to infiltrate and manipulate the Hilmar described Abruf as and Vriezenveen, where he was
country’s peace movement. Poli- young, unemployed, unhappy told to locate military depots,
ticians asked questions in Par- with the perceived rightist poli- and to Woensdrecht, where he
liament, and the Home Office cies of the Dutch government, was to photograph the deploy-
felt compelled to increase secu- frustrated by the NATO-mod- ment site. On 25 February
rity measures. ernization decision, and a 1986, the BVD paid him a visit

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 5

A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

Interest in the Dutch peace movement and its church grew out of
opposition to the planned modernization and expansion of Party (Sozialistische Ein-
NATO’s intermediate range ballistic and cruise missiles. heitspartei Deutschlands—
SED) and the peace council
were responsible, among other
and asked about the trip to The Stasi and the Dutch Peace things, for financial and logis-
Vriezenveen and about his con- Movement tic support of the “Stop the
tacts with the GDR embassy. Files unearthed in the BStU Neutron Bomb” campaign—a
The BVD had stumbled across archives also provide insight Dutch communist front organi-
Abruf while they were follow- into another type of intelli- zation that cost East Berlin
ing Hilmar. At the time, Dutch gence activity, covert influence around 120,000 Dutch guilders
security did not seem to know operations. The Stasi focused in (110,000 West German DM). 20
much about Abruf’s history and the late 1970s and 1980s on the
actual activities as an agent. Dutch peace movement and In addition, the Stasi influ-
Hilmar had already been churches and invested heavily enced the foundation Generals
in them and selected leaders. for Peace—a well known and
replaced by an MfS case officer
Ironically, the East Germans respected anti-nuclear peace
codenamed Haupt. The BVD
would find their efforts turned organization of former West
visit alarmed both Abruf and
against them as circumstances European generals, with Dutch
the residentura, and the rela- in Europe and the Soviet Union
tionship was mutually termi- General Michiel von Meyen-
changed with the introduction feldt (former chief of the Dutch
nated two days after the of perestroika and other Royal Military Academy) as
inquiry. reforms in the region. secretary. To support its per-
spectives, the Stasi gave it
Informal agent Abruf had pro- East German interest in the 100,000 West German DM
vided the Stasi with useful Dutch peace movement and its annually. 21
reconnaissance material on church grew out of West Euro-
Dutch military and economic pean and Dutch opposition to Even more potentially useful,
capabilities centering around the planned modernization and it seemed to the Kremlin and
the Rotterdam region. His cover expansion of NATO’s intermedi- East Berlin, was the expansion
was never really blown, and the ate range ballistic and cruise of the support base of the peace
BVD did not uncover his real missiles in Western Europe in movement in the Netherlands
activities. After 1989, he left 1977. By the early 1980s, hun- to include churches and the
the Netherlands and disap- dreds of thousands of Dutch Dutch Interchurch Peace Coun-
peared. people would demonstrate to cil (Interkerkelijk Vredesber-
attempt to force the govern- aad—IKV), which had started a
ment to postpone or cancel the campaign for unilateral atomic
What Abruf provided was typ- deployments. disarmament in the Nether-
ical of the many reports on
lands. All influential Dutch
Dutch military matters, some- The opposition spawned new churches participated in the
times via open sources, some- opportunities for Soviet and IKV, and the organization suc-
times of obscure origin, found in Warsaw Pact leaders, and the ceeded in mobilizing large parts
Stasi files. One of the show- official communist World Peace of Dutch society. 22 East Ger-
pieces is a detailed description Council and its suborganiza- man leader Erich Honecker
of the organizational struc- tions were used to wage open believed that the Dutch “reli-
ture—telephone numbers and covert campaigns to capi- gious powers” were the main
included—of the intelligence talize on the protests. 19 cause of turning the anti-
department of the Dutch land Between 1977 and 1979, the nuclear campaign into a mass
forces. 18 ruling East German Socialist movement, 22 and invitations

6 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

A four-part campaign against the IKV was begun.

would follow to a variety of
church officials to visit like-
minded groups in East Ger- demanded that all member umbrella of church exchanges—
many. countries start dismantling and eventually announced the
nuclear missiles on their own formation of a joint Peace Plat-
territories rather than pointing form with East German dissi-
However, Stasi sympathy for
fingers at other nations. In dents in the summer of 1982.
the Dutch peace movement
effect, this meant the end of a
started to turn sour after 1981.
purely anti-NATO campaign. 23 The Stasi read about the
After Polish government
repression of the independent development in a Dutch news-
To make matters worse for paper and went on red alert.
trade union Solidarity in the communists, the IKV
Poland and after exchanges Honecker himself ordered the
extended its contacts with dissi- official state Secretariat for
with members of the Czechoslo- dents throughout Eastern
vak dissident group Charter 77, Religious Matters (Staatssekre-
Europe and declared that tariat für Kirchenfragen) to
the IKV radically altered its repression in the East was a
positions and began to target exert all means of influence to
major political cause of the eliminate these “divisive forces”
not only NATO missiles but arms race and not the other
those of the Warsaw Pact and (Spalterkräfte). 25
way around. The IKV planned
to organize a peace A four-part campaign against
movement “from the IKV was begun. First, the
below” to confront Stasi activated its church
both superpowers at agents to force the abandon-
grassroot levels. 24 ment of the platform. 26 Second,
it started a smear campaign
With its change of
against the IKV. IKV Secretary
position, extant
Mient Jan Faber and other offi-
church contacts
cials of his group were regis-
within the GDR
tered as persons of criminal
became especially
intent. 27 Party and state offi-
interesting for the
cials, newspapers and front
IKV—and trouble-
organizations were instructed
some to the MfS.
to depict the IKV as a divisive
Most inviting was
force within the West Euro-
an independent
pean peace movement and
peace movement
Faber as an arrogant bully. 28
that appeared in
Third, Faber himself was
East German protes-
barred from entering the
tant churches in
GDR. 29 And finally , the exist-
1978 called Swords
ing contacts between Dutch
Into Plowshares
reformed parishes and East
(Schwerter zu Pflug-
German congregations were
scharen). The IKV
threatened. The Dutch working
followed up and sent
group within the East German
emissaries to vari-
churches was told that the
A leaflet of the IKV illustrating the cooperation ous peace groups in
obstructions were caused by the
between it and East German and Hungarian organi- the GDR—as tour-
zations. state’s misgivings about the
ists, or under the
IKV. Several visits of Dutch

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 7

A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

The Stasi was appalled by the tolerance of Soviet communists to-

ward Dutch peace activists and did not adapt itself to the new lib- In the end, however, the
eralism. efforts bore fruit. East-German
churches detached themselves
from their IKV contacts and
delegations to East Germany in the Netherlands and a board froze most exchange activities.
and vice versa were cancelled. 30 member of the IKV—and lower- In the Netherlands, many
ranking IKV members. 32 IKV Dutch church leaders and local
These measures were officials, Dutch church groups groups were convinced that
informed by the strategy of “dif- and journalists were led to Faber was a threat to stability
ferentiation” (Differenzierung), believe that the IKV’s secre- and East-West relations. 35
which was a very subtle method tary was no longer in favour in Faber was threatened with dis-
of alienating “divisive” and neg- East Europe or with the protes- missal. Local IKV groups and
ative elements from their own tant churches in the GDR. 33 parishes sent angry letters to
base. 31 The Stasi sorted out IKV headquarters and
which IKV and church mem- In line with this strategy, the demanded that Faber stop med-
bers disliked Faber and invited Stasi also tried to recruit dling in internal East German
them to East Berlin. It suc- agents in the Netherlands. IKV affairs, let alone lead a cam-
ceeded in manipulating the Secretary Janneke Houdijk, paign for human rights. 36 The
president of the IKV and IKV’s coordinator for East Ger- envisaged Peace Platform never
reformed church official Jan many, was approached —in came into being, frustrated in
van Putten, General von Mey- vain. She did not recognise the advance by the Stasi, which
enfeldt—he was also an advi- attempts for what they were was helped, knowingly or
sor to the Reformed Churches and remained loyal to Faber. 34 unknowingly, by Dutch and
East German church leaders.

Ironically, after Mikhail Gor-

bachev came to power in the
Soviet Union, Marxist-Leninist
enmity towards a democratiza-
tion approach faded away. The
new leadership in the Kremlin
even developed sympathy for it,
and, in 1988, Faber and British
peace activist Mary Kaldor
were invited to Moscow to
observe the dismantling of SS-
20 rockets. The same year, an
IKV delegation visited Moscow,
invited by the Kremlin itself. 37
The GDR, however, stuck to its
rigid policy. The Stasi was
appalled by the tolerance of
Soviet communists toward
Dutch peace activists and did
not adapt itself to the new lib-
eralism. Indeed, it continued
A page from the file of Mient Jan Faber. the struggle against the IKV
and even started a new action

8 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

Such activity fit perfectly in the communist vision of class ene-

against it in 1988. Operations mies conspiring to create domestic unrest.
were only aborted after the Ber-
lin Wall came down in Novem-
ber 1989. discussed world politics and tions against the idea of “social
disarmament initiatives. 38 peace service” as an alternative
Operation “Bicycle Tour” to military service since at least
Groups other than the IKV In 1985, IKV Secretary Faber 1981. 40 (Vicar Eppleman, in
tried to establish exchange pro- and East German Vicar Rainer fact, had been a leader in the
grams with East German peace Eppelmann (a prominent fig- “social peace service” effort.)
activists, and in doing so gener- ure in the East German opposi-
ated a Stasi response that illus- tion scene) concluded a HA XX, the department
trates the entanglement of personal contract to work charged with dealing with the
foreign and domestic intelli- together for peace. Many partic- churches and opposition cir-
gence activity in East Germany. ipants in the Groningen-GDR cles, learned that Dutch partici-
In 1981, a group of draft resist- exchange decided to do the pants planned to publish stories
ers from the northern Dutch city same and committed them- about their bicycle tours and
of Groningen founded an organi- selves to not using violence experiences in the GDR in
zation called the Peace Shop against each other in case of a Dutch church and peace maga-
(Vredeswinkel). The entity func- war. According to the signato- zines, and, in 1984, Peace Shop
tioned as a communication cen- ries, in doing this, they contrib- members initiated a letter cam-
tre for peace activists from the uted to “detente from below.” 39 paign on behalf of Amnesty
region. Through existing church International for the release of
Although their activities were
contacts and the War Resisters arrested East German
relatively low-profile and not
International, the leaders soon dissidents. 41
aimed at threatening the GDR
contacted a construction branch
system, the cycle tours
of the East German army
were betrayed by their
known as the Bausoldaten, that
own success as the Stasi
had since 1964 been offering the
got wind of them. Large
possibility of completing obliga-
international groups
tory military service not with
peddling, for example,
arms but with the spade. This
from Karl Marx City
alternative had been provided at
(Chemnitz) to Stral-
the urging of East German prot-
sund, could not stay
estant churches, which repre-
unnoticed, especially
sented about 45 percent of the
after their frequency
GDR’s population.
increased to three or
four times a year.
As a grass roots organization,
the Peace Shop organized bicy- Veterans of the Bauso-
cle tours through East Ger- ldaten were suspect to
many as a joint venture of begin with in the eyes of
Dutch, East German, and, the MfS, especially
when possible, Czechoslovak when they organized
and Polish conscientious objec- meetings with other
tors. The Dutch entered the Bausoldaten and West-
GDR as private visitors, gath- ern draft resisters. A member of the Peace Shop in Groningen
ered at prearranged addresses, Indeed, the Stasi had and an East German dissident exchange per-
and, with East Germans, cycled been carrying out opera-
sonal peace treaties.
to rural parts of the GDR and

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 9

A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

The bicycle tours fit perfectly in the communist vision of class en- recruit him in 1983 to report on
emies conspiring to create domestic unrest. his East German contacts.
Although Noppers stated in his
letter that he refused, the HA
Such activity fit perfectly in ground Forces (Politische Unter- immediately listed him as a
the communist vision of class grundtätigkeit—PUT), which the probable foreign intelligence
enemies conspiring from out- East German authorities saw as agent. It then attempted to col-
side the system to create a threat to communist rule, lect evidence to indict Noppers
domestic unrest, and the bicy- increased international pressure for hostile agitation against the
cle tours thus became objects of on the GDR, and a perceived East German state and for dis-
intensive surveillance. In 1983, potential for embarrassment seminating information to for-
the Stasi started several Opera- during Erich Honecker’s planned eign intelligence agencies or
tive Vorgange (intelligence June 1987 visit to the Nether- other foreign organizations to
operations aimed at arresting lands, the MfS tried to obstruct discredit the GDR. If convicted,
dissidents) against former Bau- and manipulate cross-border he faced two to 12 years of
soldaten who had participated exchanges. HA XX began an imprisonment. 44
in the tours. HA XX recruited Operativer Vorgang against the
several East Germans as infor- Dutch organizer of the bicycle Nothwithstanding such
mal agents “mit Feindkontakt” tours, Bert Noppers, who was threats, the Peace Shop orga-
(in contact with the enemy), described as the inspirator and nized a protest against East
who reported on all the meet- organisator of the PUT tours. German border controls in
ings and preparations. 42 1987, building a model Berlin
As part of its attack on Nop- Wall of cardboard boxes
Although bicycle tour partici- pers, HA XX used a letter from through Groningen and draw-
pants kept their distance from Noppers to an East German ing media attention to the con-
IKV officials, HA XX and the friend in which he wrote that dition of their dissident friends
HVA nevertheless increasingly Dutch intelligence had tried to in the GDR. Although the peace
suspected them of being part-
ners of the IKV and executors
of the IKV’s grand strategy of
developing a “pseudopacifist,
bloc–transcending peace move-
ment.” By way of confirmation
of this, one Stasi report quotes
a Dutch activist as saying
“When there are no soldiers on
both sides, there will be no
weapons used.” 43

In the belief that the Peace

Shop was helping dissidents,
the Stasi was not mistaken.
The activists had indeed given
their East German contacts a
typewriter and helped finance
Bausoldaten activities with
2,000 Dutch guilders.

With growing Dutch contacts Demonstrators by a cardboard “Berlin Wall” built through Groningen in 1987.
in the so-called Political Under-

10 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

activists also criticized the

West European and Dutch con-
tribution to the armaments
race, these acts had no impact
on the activities of HA XX. 45

Stepped-up HA XX activities
included the recruitment as
informal agents of three GDR
participants in the Peace Shop
exchanges. Codenamed Karl-
heinz, Betty, and Romeo, they
reported all of their activities to
HA XX. Romeo was sent abroad
to visit the Peace Shop in
Groningen in July 1988. How-
ever, the department could not
find enough evidence to prose-
cute the East German partici-
pants or arrest the Dutch
organizer.
The Peace Shop, on the corner, in Groningen.

Even by the standards of the

East German Penal Code, the continuation of the operations 15 days after the fall of the Ber-
activists were just not subver- against Noppers, inspired by the lin Wall, the Stasi finally closed
sive enough. The Dutch activists same suspicions against the its files on Noppers. 49
did not advocate open criticism Dutch activist. 47 Although the
or revolution. As Noppers put it MfS knew that Moscow had
shifted policies and now aimed
In Sum: Tactical Gains,
during an interview in 2006, “If
at cooperation with the IKV and Strategic Loss
the East Germans wanted to
topple the regime, they had to do other West European peace
it by themselves. We came from organisations, HA XX was still During the last decade of its
abroad and did not want to tell plotting in April 1989 to use existence, the MfS was success-
them what to do. And although intercepted inquiries by the ful in tactical terms. It suc-
we were no friends of commu- Peace Shop to members of the ceeded in running one operation
nism, we had enough criticism to East German network to recruit to collect military intelligence,
pass on capitalism and material- more informal agents. 48 managed to infiltrate and
ism at home.” 46 Moreover, the manipulate most IKV contacts in
East German government did Only in October 1989 were the the GDR, penetrated the Peace
not want the MfS to make ran- Operativer Vorgange against the Shop, and started an Operativ
dom arrests, since that would East German Bausoldaten and Vorgang against the Dutch coor-
cause too much damage to the against Noppers called off. They dinator of East European peace
economic and political relations ended partly because of a lack of tours. Moreover, there is reason
the GDR had established by evidence and partly because the to believe that the MfS employed
then. Stasi had already begun clean- more Dutch informal agents in
ing up its files in the face of the 1980s than are discussed
Nevertheless, MfS surveil- growing unrest and pending rev- here but whose records remain
lance continued. HA XX ordered olution. On 24 November 1989, undiscovered.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 11

A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

During its last decade, the MfS had tactical success. Strategically,
however, it failed to preserve the security of the GDR

In the overall, strategic setting, blinded to useful insights and

however, the Ministry of State could not see that the Dutch
Security failed in its mission to movements gave the Soviet bloc
preserve the security of the GDR. opportunities to exploit genuine
divisions in NATO.
• First, by entangling its foreign
intelligence operations with • Finally, when the Stasi got it
domestic security interests, the right, it could not persuade its
Stasi focused on the foreign leadership. In May 1987, the
inspiration of domestic opposi- HVA issued an study of Dutch
tion at the expense of under- foreign and military politicies
standing that dissent in the GDR before Honecker’s state visit to
drew on the system’s own eco- the Netherlands. The analysis
nomic, social, military, and polit- precisely listed the deviations of
ical weaknesses and the
Dutch politics from the US and
government’s abuses of its popu-
NATO lines. (The Dutch
lation.
denounced SDI, favoured a
nuclear test ban and prolonga-
• Second, the MfS itself became
tion of the ABM treaty.)
part of the problem instead of
Honecker, however, made no
part of the solution, as the
effort to play into these differ-
expansion of the security appara-
tus from the 1970s on acted as a ences and only uttered the usual
driver for even more protests. clichès about peace-loving social-
ist countries. To him, the Nether-
• Third, activities of the IKV and lands remained part and parcel
other Dutch peace initiatives like of the imperialist block. 50 Pain-
the Peace Shop were blown up out fully collected and sound intelli-
of proportion, and those in the gence was made useless by
GDR who were in touch with incapable and ideologically
them were deemed to be guilty of deformed party leaders.
high treason. In this intellectual
strait-jacket, the Stasi was ❖❖❖

Endnotes

1. “Gauck-Behörde iritiert über Aufgeregtheit im Westen um Stasi-Akten,” in

Magdeburger Volksstimme, 28 April 2000.

2. Hubertus Knabe, Die unterwanderte Republik. Stasi im Westen (Berlin,

1999); Helmut Müller-Enbergs, Inoffizielle Mitarbeiter des Ministeriums für
Staatssicherheit. Teil 2: Anleitungen für Arbeiten mit Agenten, Kundschaftern
und Spionen in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland (Berlin, 1998); Müller-

12 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

Enbergs, “Die Erforschung der West-Arbeit des MfS,” in Suckut und Weber
(eds.), Stasi-Akten, 240–69; Joachim Lampe, Juristische Aufarbeitung der
Westspionage des MfS. Eine vorläufige Bilanz. BF informiert Nr. 24 (BStU,
Berlin, 1999).
3. Eva Horn, “Das wissen vom Feind. Erkenntnis und Blindheid von Geheim-
diensten,” in Wolbert K. Schmidt, et al., Geheimhaltung und Transparanez.
Demokratische Kontrolle der Geheimdienste im internationalen Vergleich
(Berlin, 2007), 257–77. Here: 259.
4. Jens Gieseke, “Annäherungen und Fragen an die Meldungen aus der
Republik,” in idem (ed.), Staatssicherheit und Gesellschaft. Studien zum Herr-
schaftsalltag in der DDR (Göttingen 2007), 79–98, here: 89–90.
5. Vgl. Query in the SIRA database 14, Druckauftrag Nr. 12839, AR 7/SG03,
Nr. AU 2585/05 Z.
6. HA XVIII, “Pläne und Massnahmen feindlicher Geheimdienste gegen Aus-
landsvertretungen und langfriestige Delegierungskader der DDR im nichtso-
zialistischen Ausland im Jahre 1985.” BStU MfS HA XVIII, 32–33.
7. “Vorgangsanalyse zum Vorgang Aorta,” 15 July 1986; “Aufgabenstellung
AA 1986. Fortschreibung der Sicherheigsanalyse ‘Haupt,’” 1 March 1986;
“Information über die ndl. Sicherheitsdienste. Auswertung der Broschüre “De
BVD en de Inlichtingendiensten, Hrsg. by PSP, Amsterdam 1983,” 1984.
BStU MfS HA I 1682, 25–28; 90–94; 127–29.
8. For example “Jahresabschlussbericht 1981 über die Ergebnisse der Funka-
bwehrtätigkeit,” 16 November 1981, in which West German, British and
Dutch radiocommunications are mapped. BStU MfS HA II 25043, 1–39.
9. Frits Hoekstra, In dienst van de BVD. Spionage en contraspionage in Ned-
erland (Amsterdam, 2004). See also Dick Engelen, Frontdient. De BVD in de
Koude Oorlog (Amsterdam, 2007).
10. Beatrice de Graaf, Over de Muur. De DDR, de Nederlandse kerken en de
vredesbeweging (Amsterdam, 2004), or De Graaf, Über die Mauer. Die DDR,
die niederländischen Kirchen und die Friedensbewegung (Münster, 2007)
11. RoD Den Haag, “Fortschreibung der Sicherheitanalyze zur RoD im Ausbil-
dungsjahr 1987/1988,” 11 November 1988. BStU HA I, 1682: 7–10.
12. HA I 1682, S. 11.
13. RoD Den Haag, “Fortschreibung der Sicherheitanalyze zur RoD im Aus-
bildungsjahr 1987/1988,” 11 November 1988. BStU HA I, 1682: 7–10.
14. “Information über die Streitkräfte der Niederlande,” nr. 46/88, 27 Janu-
ary 1988. BStU MfS HA XVIII 91: 202–15; “Information über den mil-
itärischen Beitrag der Niederlande zu den Streitkräften der NATO,” 29 May
1987. BStU MfS HVA 47: 60–79.
15. Telegrams and reports to MfS headquarters from The Hague: 21 March
1984, 18 January 1989, 31 March 1989, security report “Fortschreibung der
Sicherheitsanalyse zur Rod im Ausbildungsjahr 1987/1988” of 18 November
1988. BStU, MfS HA I 1682: 1–11.
16. Several reports on IM “Abruf” by “Haupt” and other MfS-personnel. BStU
MfS HA I 1682: 29–163.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 13

A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

17. Hilmar, “Zum Einsatz in den NL,” 1985; “Sicherheitsanalyse zum Vorgang
AM-V ‘Abruf’,” 31 January 1986. BStU MfS HA I 1682: 58–63, 81–84.

18. “Angaben zum Nachrichtendienst der Streitkräfte der NL, insbesondere

der Landstreitkräfte,” 4 June 1985, Den Haag. BStU MfS HA I 1682: 39–52.

19. Peter Volten, Brezhnev’s ‘Peace Program.’ Success or Failure? Soviet

Domestic Political Process and Power. Academisch Proefschrift (Emmen,
1981).

20. Letter, Hans van der Velde (secretary of the National Committee “Initi-
atief Internationale Stafette”) to the East German Peace Council, Amsterdam,
12 July 1979; Letter Kurt Hölker (deputy secretary-general of the Peace
Council) to Hans van der Velde, Berlin, 7 August 1979. Both at Bundesarchiv
Stiftung Arbeiterparteien und Massenorganisationen der ehemaligen DDR
(thereafter BArch SAPMO), DZ 9 463.2411; Carel Horstmeier, “Stop de Neu-
tronenbom! The last mass-action of the CPN and the Moscow-Berlin-Amster-
dam triangle,” in Carel Horstmeier etal (eds.), Around Peter the Great: Three
Centuries of Russian-Dutch Relations (Groningen 1997), 65–77.

21. De Graaf, Over de Muur, 113; Jochen Staadt, “Die SED und die Generale
für den Frieden,” in Jürgen Maruhn and Manfred Wilke (eds.), Die verführte
Friedensbewegung, 123–140.

22. East German Peace Council, “Information,” 22 March 1978, 1, 6, 11, BArch SAPMO
DZ 9 463.2411; Neue Zeit, 2 July 1979. East German Peace Council, “Maßnah-
meplan,” February 1981, 2, BArch SAPMO DZ 9 450.2354.

23. Jan Willem Honig, Defense Policy in the North Atlantic Alliance. The Case
of the Netherlands (London: Westport, 1993), 211–12; Ronald Jeurissen, Peace
and Religion: An Empirical-Theological Study of the Motivational Effects of
Religious Peace Attitudes on Peace Action (Kampen, 1993), 47; Philip Everts,
Public Opinion, the Churches and Foreign Policy: Studies of Domestic Factors
in the Making of Dutch Foreign Policy (Leiden, 1983); Jürgen Maruhn and
Manfred Wilke, eds., Die verführte Friedensbewegung: Der Einfluß des Ostens
auf die Nachrüstungsdebatte (München: 2002); Udo Baron, Kalter Krieg und
heisser Frieden. Der Einfluss der SED und ihrer westdeutschen Verbündeten
auf die Partei ‘Die Grünen’ (Münster 2003).

24. Mient Jan Faber, “Brief van het IKV-secretariaat aan alle IKV-kernen
over Polen kort na 13 december 1981,” in: Faber et al. (eds.), Zes jaar IKV-
campagne (Den Haag, 1983), 133–34; “Open letter of Charter 77 to the Inter-
church Peace Council,” 17 August 1982. BArch SAPMO DZ 9 585.2879.

25. Report of Hauptabteilung XX (HA XX) for the Stellvertreter des Minis-
ters, Genossen Generalleutnant Mittig, “Negative Aktivitäten von Personen
des ‘Interkirchlichen Friedensrates’ (IKV) der Niederlande,” 9 August 1982,
BStU MfS HA XX ZMA 1993/5, 34–37, 56–57.

26. Report of the HA XX/4 (Stasidepartment for church and opposition mat-
ters), “Subversive Aktivitäten kirchlicher Personen der Niederlande,” 15 June
1982, BStU MfS HA XX ZMA 1993/5, 21–22; Letter, Christoph Demke (Office
of the East German Church Organisation) to Staatssekretär für Kirchen-
fragen, Klaus Gysi, 9 August 1982, Berlin, “Sekretariat 3827-1632/82,” Rep.
B3 Nr. 711, Archive KPS Magdeburg.

14 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

27. BStU MfS HA XX AKG-VSH. ZAIG 5. SLK 10964. ZPDB 2082010579.

Erfassungsnr. 40438/1590/1993; HA XX AKG-VSH. ZAIG 5 1009. SLK 10994.
ZPDB 2082010587. ZMA 3420/1993–1580. VSH-Karteikarten are register
cards, not a file. In June 1982 Stasi started an Operativ Vorgang (file) on
Mient Jan Faber and Wolfgang Müller.

28. Report of the HA XX/4, “Interkirchlicher Friedensrat der Niederlande,”

October/November 1982, BStU MfS HA XX/4 1917, 1–5; In the mid-1980s,
IKV was mentioned in a list of approximately 1,000 “Zielobjekte” (targets) of
the Stasi’s Reconnaissance Service, the Hauptverwaltung Aufklärung.
“Zielobjekte der HVA - alphabetische Liste,” BStU ASt Gera BV Gera/Abt. XV
0187, 21–39, in Knabe, West-Arbeit des MfS, 518–54. See 537.

29. “Vertreter holländischer Friedensbewegung dürfte nicht in die DDR,”

ADN-Information, 29 July 1982, BStU MfS HA XX ZMA 1993/4, 13.

30. Office of the East German Churches (BEK-Sekretariat), “Arbeitsbeziehu-

ngen zwischen dem Bund der Ev. Kirchen in der DDR und dem Raad van
Kerken in den Niederlanden und einzelnen Gliedkirchen und Gemeinden,”
November 1982, LDC NHK ROS 735.

31. Clemens Vollnhals, Die kirchenpolitische Abteilung des Ministeriums für

Staatssicherheit. BF informiert 16/1997 (Berlin 1997). Concerning the strat-
egy of differentiation, the following orders were relevant: Richtlinien zur
Bearbeitungs Operativer Vorgänge (RL 1/76), Operative Personenkontrollen
(RL 1/81), Direktive zur IM-Führung (RL 1/79).

32. East German Peace Council, “Maßnahmeplan,” Berlin, April 1981, 4,

BArch SAPMO DZ 9 K295.1578; East German Peace Council, “Aktivitäten der
Rüstungsgegner im Monat November 1981,” “Niederlande,” 23, BArch
SAPMO DZ 9 450.2354.

33. E.g., Ton Crijnen, “Waarom Mient Jan Faber niet welkom is in de DDR,”
De Tijd, 31 December 1982.

34. BStU MfS Abteilung Rostock, OV “Integration” 3/92.

35. “Verslag van uitspraken van bisschop W. Krusche op de bijeenkomst met

de Raad van Kerken te Amersfoort d.d. 7-9-82,” Series 3, Nr. 32, Utrecht
County Archive, Reformed Churches in the Netherland, General Diaconal
Council (Het Utrechts Archief, Gereformeerde Kerken in Nederland, Alge-
meen Diakonaal Beraad); Letter, Prof. Berkhof to Vorsitzender des Bundes
der Evangelischen Kirchen in der DDR (Krusche), 26 Juy 1982, Amersfoort,
Rep. B3 Nr. 711, Archive KPS Magdeburg; Letter, Prof. Berkhof to Faber,
2 July 1982, Amersfoort, LDC NHK ROS/IKV Box 15.

36. All letters at the (Dutch) International Institute for Social History (IISH)
in Amsterdam, Box IKV 455; “Verslag Oost-Europadiscussie op de Campag-
neraad van 26 februari,” in Kernblad 3, March 1983, IISH Box IKV 453.

37. Interview with Mient Jan Faber, 10 September 2001, The Hague.

38. Interview with Bert Noppers (former participant in these contacts and
supporter of the Peace Shop), 20 March 2006, Utrecht.

39. “Network News,” in: Peace Magazin, 1 (December 1985): 1, 30.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 15

A Cold War Intelligence Battleground

40. Uwe Koch, Das Ministerium für Staatssicherheit, die Wehrdienstverweig-

erer der DDR und die Bausoldaten der Nationalen Volksarmee. Eine übersicht
über den Forschungsstand. Die Landesbeauftragte für die Unterlagen des
Staatssicherheitsdienstes der ehemaligen DDR in Sachsen-Anhalt und Meck-
lenburg-Vorpommern, Sachbeiträge 6 (Magdeburg 1999); Robert-Havemann-
Archiv (ed.), Zivilcourage und Kompromiss, Bausoldaten in der DDR 1964 –
1990, Bausoldatenkongress Potsdam, 3.-5. September 2004 (Berlin 2005).
41. Vredeswinkel Groningen, “Schrijf een brief!!!!!’[write a letter!!!!!], around
January 1984. Matthias Domaschk Archive Berlin, Box “Erik de Graaf.”
42. OV “Schwaben.” BStU MfS BV Frankfurt (Oder) AOP 1430/89; Abteilung
XX/4, “Information über feindlich-negative Aktivitäten zur Organisierung und
Inspirierung politischer Untergrundtätigkeit,” Frankfurt (Oder), 22 March
1985. BStU MfS OV “Radtour,” 1091/87, Anlage I, 84–86.
43. OV “Schwaben.” BStU MfS BV Frankfurt (Oder) AOP 1430/89; Abteilung
XX/4, “Information über feindlich-negative Aktivitäten zur Organisierung und
Inspirierung politischer Untergrundtätigkeit,” Frankfurt (Oder), 22 March
1985. BStU MfS OV “Radtour,” 1091/87, Anlage I, 85.
44. Abteilung XX/4, “Eröffnungsbericht zum OV ‘Radtour’,” Frankfurt (Oder)
3 September 1987. BStU MfS OV “Radtour,” 1091/87, Anlage I, 7–12.
45. Abteilung IX/2, “Strafrechtliche Einschätzung zum operativen Ausgangs-
material ‘Radtour’ der Abteilung XX,” Frankfurt (Oder) 10 September 1987.
BStU MfS OV ‘Radtour’ 1091/87, Anlage I, 22–23.
46. Interview with Bert Noppers, 20 March 2006, Utrecht.
47. Abteilung XX/4, “Sachstandbericht zum OV ‘Radtour,’ 1091/87,” Frank-
furt (Oder), 22 July 1988. BStU MfS OV “Radtour,” 1091/87, Anlage II, 47–51.
48. Abteilung XX/4, “Dienstreisebericht,” Frankfurt (Oder), 20 June 1988;
Abteilung XX, “Information zur ‘Ost-West-Gruppe’ Groningen (Niederlande),”
Frankfurt (Oder), 5 April 1989. BStU MfS OV “Radtour” 1091/87, Anlage II,
18–21 and 131–133.
49. Abteilung XX/4, “Abschlussbericht zum operativ-Vorgang ‘Radtour,’
Reg.nr. V/1091/87,” Frankfurt (Oder), 24 November 1989. BStU MfS OV “Rad-
tour,” 1091/87, Anlage II, 189–192.
50. “Information über aktuelle Aspekte der Außen- und Innenpolitik der Nied-
erlande im Zusammenhang mit dem offiziellen Besuch des Genossen
Honecker vom 3.-5.6.1987,” 21 May 1987. BStU MfS HVA 47, 85–91.
❖❖❖

16 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

Turning a Cold War Scheme into Reality

Engineering the Berlin Tunnel

G...
Fifty years ago, the CIA cubic yards of grout were con-
embarked on a project to inter- sumed. This was not a small
cept Soviet and East German operation!
messages transmitted via
underground cable. Intelli- Debate has swirled around the
gence was collected to net intelligence value of the
determine the best place to hit operation. 2 But the completion
the target, and then concrete of this demanding project—
planning for a new collection accomplished in secret and

“
The tunnel was
1,476 feet in length and
consumed 125 tons of
site was begun.

Early in 1951 when I was work-

ing in the Engineering Division
of the Office of Communica-
under exacting conditions—is a
tribute to the resourcefulness
and expertise of an outstand-
ing team of professionals.

steel liner plate and tions, I received a message from

some people in the office of the Learning as We Went
1,000 cubic yards of
Deputy Director of Plans—spe-
grout . . . This was not Prior to this project, my tunnel
cifically the chief of Foreign
a small operation! Intelligence/Staff D (FI/D), and experience was limited to sev-
a member of his team—request- eral night-shift visits to the

” ing a meeting. 1 The meeting

was short. The only question
they asked was whether a tun-
nel could be dug in secret. My
reply was that one could dig a
Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel as a
student civil engineer. Con-
structed in 1948 and somewhat
unique, the tunnel extended
from Battery Park in lower
tunnel anywhere, but to build Manhattan to South Brooklyn.
one in secret would depend on It was designed for two 18-foot
its size, take more time, and bores, which were mostly
cost more money. After the blasted and drilled in solid
meeting, I was transferred to rock. The East River crossing
FI/D. Thus began planning for presented a problem, however.
the construction of the Berlin
Tunnel. 2 Accounts of the tunnel project covering its
conception and execution, its compromise by
British spy George Blake, and Moscow’s delay in
We started building the tunnel
closing it down include: David C. Martin,
The author of this article served in in August 1954 and completed Wilderness of Mirrors (New York: Harper & Row,
the CIA Directorate of Operations. it in February 1955. It was 1980); Peter Grose, Gentleman Spy: The Life of
The article, originally classified, 1,476 feet in length; 3,100 tons Allen Dulles (New York: Houghton Mifflin
Company, 1994); David E. Murphy, Sergei A.
appeared in Studies 48, 2 (2004). It of soil were removed; 125 tons
Kondrashev, and George Bailey, Battleground
was reviewed and portions redacted of steel liner plate and 1,000 Berlin: CIA vs. KGB in the Cold War (New
for declassification by the Historical Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997); and
Collections Division of the David Stafford, Spies Beneath Berlin
Information Management Staff. 1 Staff D was a SIGINT component. (Woodstock, NY: The Overlook Press, 2003).

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 17

Berlin Tunnel

“
Soil from the tunnel
would fill more than
20 living rooms in an
At the confluence of the East cal analysis of the tunnel
River and the Hudson River, average American structure.
there was a deep submarine home!
canyon, a leftover from the

”
In the spring of 1953, I flew to
extensive land erosion caused Frankfurt, Germany, to meet
by the violent runoff of melt with a senior case officer at the
waters from the retreating Con-
CIA station. The officer told me
tinental Glacier. The canyon showed that the amount of soil that the tunnel site had not yet
was filled with the muck and expected to be brought out from been selected. He also advised
detritus of eons of erosion. This the tunnel and vertical shaft me that Lt. Col. Leslie M. Gross
fact required that a pressur- would fill to the brim more than had been selected as the tun-
ized shield, solely for the 20 living rooms in an average nel’s resident engineer. He
prevention of blowouts on the American home! Security and expressed regret that I had not
East River crossing, had to be silence dictated that not one been selected. I told him not to
moved the entire length of the cubic foot of soil be removed worry. 3
tunnel. The concept of such a from the site. A warehouse,
shield surfaced in design dis- with a basement for the stor-
cussions for the Berlin Tunnel age of the excavated soil and a The next subject we discussed
project. The Brooklyn-Battery first floor reserved for record- was a meeting with the British
Tunnel demonstrated the mag- ers and signal equipment, was in London. We would attend
nitude of the job of marshaling the solution. this meeting with Bill Harvey,
the experienced personnel, chief of our Berlin base. At the
materials, and equipment for My task began with an inspec- beginning of the meeting, I
the huge task of constructing a tion of existing tunnels in the started to discuss some notes I
tunnel and disposing of the Washington, DC, area, which had on the unfinished mathe-
excavated soil. Work on the 18- included utility bores, pedes- matical analysis of the tunnel
foot bore tunnel could not have trian walkways, storm drains, structure. Clearly the attend-
been done in silence. These and railroad maintenance tun- ees were not interested in
matters were a warning, nels. From this research, I mathematics. The discussion
because silence would be a top concluded that our tunnel turned to the matter of the form
priority in constructing the Ber- should be 6 feet in diameter of the tunnel design. The Brit-
lin Tunnel in secret. with a structure of steel-flanged ish proposed using heavy
corrugated liner plates—the 6- concrete blocks, which were
foot diameter would provide a common in the London Under-
Design Decisions comfortable working room at ground. I countered with the
the tunnel face. Next came idea of using steel liner plates,
Once the Berlin project received research at the Library of Con- which would be lighter and eas-
a green light, design specifica- gress to check the available ier to use in the tunnel and at
tions had to be determined; literature dealing with earth the tunnel face. This proposal
men and materials assembled; pressures on tunnels. I already was accepted.
and questions of site selection, had two textbooks and found
training, and transportation three relevant papers pub-
3 Time magazine of 7 May 1956 reported
answered. The big question lished by the American Society
that some Army people saw “friends whom
that loomed was how to dispose of Civil Engineers. Together, they knew to be engineers appearing in
of the tons of soil that would be these provided the procedures I Berlin wearing the insignia of the Signal
excavated! Rough calculations needed to start the mathemati- Corps.”

18 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Berlin Tunnel

“
The ‘circuit method’ of
computing earth
The next subject was a ques- pressures on tunnels of computing earth pressures
tion of using a shield. I did not required solving six on tunnels. It was a sort of cir-
offer an opinion because it was simultaneous cumferential calculus. The
a topic that I felt should be dis- equations. downside was that the circuit
cussed with Les Gross. Bill method of calculation required

”
Harvey got the impression that solving six simultaneous equa-
I did not know the difference tions! Perhaps this
between a shield and a coat-of- sophisticated method was a bit
advantage of keeping the align-
arms. When we returned to of overkill; however, the design
ment of the tunnel on course.
Frankfurt, it was suggested assumptions called for precise
We selected a prime contractor
that I make a drawing of a planning. The tunnel not only
for the liner plates and shield,
shield. Normally, a shield— needed to be able to withstand
negotiated a classified con-
such as the one used on the a dead load of 10 or more feet of
tract, and work commenced.
Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel—
soil overburden, but also had to
would not be used in a tunnel
bear a potential surcharge
as small as 6 feet. Other meth-
Assembling Men and load—to wit, Soviet or East
ods, such as poling, would be
Materials German 60-ton tanks riding
used to prevent a collapse of the
down Schoenefelder Chausee or
tunnel roof. However, I drew an
Working out of an office in one maneuvering around the open
engineering plan for a 6-foot
shield, and Bill Harvey later of the World War II temporary field above the tunnel.
used the drawing in his request buildings along the Reflecting
for final approval of the Pool near the Lincoln Memo- While Les narrowed the search
tunnel. 4 rial, Les started the process of for a site to test the installa-
recruiting his team. He selected tion of the shield and liner
Corps of Engineers officers and plates to New Mexico, I flew
I had my first meeting with
non-commissioned officers. He back to London for a meeting
headquarters. A short confer- also began to look into a site
ence resulted in an agreement with Bill Harvey. We traveled
out West where the liner plates with one of Bill’s British col-
that a shield should be used. A and shield could be assembled
shield would have the added leagues to a location to view the
for training for the up-coming
operation of the vertical shield
real thing.
needed to gain access to the
4 A shield is made of a steel tube slightly
Soviet communications cables.
larger than the tunnel bore. Hydraulic Les left the structural analysis
jacks are fitted inside the outer rim oppo- The vertical shield was demon-
to me. Ordinarily, earth pres-
site the cutting edge. The shield, support- strated by the British sappers
ed by an external framework, is assembled sure on a tunnel is figured at
four points: the overhead, both who would operate it at the
in a shaft at the beginning of a tunnel. The
shield then makes its first shove forward, sides, and the invert. This tech- site. This was a process that
and the face is dug out until 12 or more nique did not seem adequate. I required extreme patience and
inches of soil have been removed. The skill. During the motor trip, I
jacks are retracted and liner plates are in- spent nearly a week at the
stalled in the space uncovered when the Library of Congress searching suggested that as a cover for
soil is removed. The flanges of the liner for a better way of analyzing the tunnel site, we should build
plates are bolted to a reinforced concrete earth pressures. I found two one or two communications sta-
wall and then bolted to each other, com-
pleting the first ring of the structure of the technical papers that offered a tions that would exchange false
tunnel. The shield is then moved forward better approach. The papers traffic. This idea was met by icy
for construction of the second ring. discussed the “circuit method” stares.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 19

Berlin Tunnel

Site Preparation quantity of water—but this was

not considered a problem.
Drawing on the clandestine
sources of the Berlin base, Bill We also used a newly devel-
Harvey decided to locate the oped electronic distance
operation in a rural area of the measuring system (EDMS). An
American Sector southwest of agent faked a flat tire on the
Berlin known as Altglienecke. side of the road by the aiming
The target cables—two esti- point. While working on the
mated to be in good shape, and tire, he placed a small device on
a third, in poor shape—ran in a the hood of the car. The device
ditch on the west side of Schoe- received and transmitted data
nefelder Chausee in the Soviet in the EDMS system. Thus, air
Sector. The aiming point for the photogrammetry and electronic
tunnel was about 300 yards measurement fixed the coordi-
north of a graveyard. nates of the target cables.

Tunnels are usually kept on Next, under the supervision of

line and grade by surveys con- a Berlin-based Corps of Engi-
ducted in the tunnel and on the beams ultimately would not be
neers unit, the requisite
ground above it by transits and necessary. The civilian engi-
“warehouse” was constructed on
calibrated steel tapes. A sur- neer who quit was not the only
the site, using mostly local con-
face survey, however, was one to raise an eyebrow. The
tractors and available
obviously inappropriate for a Army Chief of Engineers finally
materials. Keeping the plans
secret tunnel. Having no lasers, resolved the design contro-
secret was a constant chal-
we had to use other methods. versy. Calling it an
lenge. Time magazine reported
“experiment,” he ordered the
that a civilian engineer had
Drawing on the best technical warehouse built as planned,
quit the construction project in
resources of the time, several with a basement and no col-
disgust because the blueprints
photographic over-flights were umns and beams.
seemed crazy. “Why build a cel-
ordered. One flight used glass lar big enough to drive through
plates for maximum accuracy. with a dump truck?” he asked. 5
The glass plates were sent to From Training to Action
Good point. Warehouses were
the Agency’s fledgling air pho- usually built on reinforced con-
toanalysis unit. They conducted The two British sappers who
crete slabs poured on well- would play a key role in the
air-photogrammetry studies to drained, compacted sub-bases.
determine distance and eleva- tunnel construction were
A warehouse with a basement invited to the New Mexico test
tion. The engineering and normally would require col-
geologic analysis of the other site to observe the operation of
umns and beams, which were the shield in conjunction with
photographs showed the site to not incorporated into our plans.
be underlain by well-drained the liner plates. The time had
Our intention was to use the come to demobilize the test site
deposits of sandy loam. There basement for the storage of the
was a possibility of encounter- and ship all of the equipment to
excavated soil, so columns and Berlin. The last step was to
ing some “perched water
tables”—where a layer of pack up all of the unit’s files—
impervious clay traps a small 5 Time, 7 May 1956. consisting of requisitions,

20 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Berlin Tunnel

receipts, and disbursements—

for shipment to CIA headquar-
“
Two British sappers,
who would play a key started with a sequence of
push, dig, retract, assemble
ters, where they were locked in role in the tunnel liner-plate ring, and repeat. An
a safe. construction, were unanticipated messy problem
invited to the New developed about 10 feet beyond
All along, Les had planned to Mexico test site. the tunnel portal when the
send the equipment to a US shield passed under the leach

”
Army Quartermaster Corps field of the compound’s sani-
boxing facility near Richmond, tary system. The drainage
Virginia, for final packing for problem was quickly solved
most secret cargo was trans-
shipment to Berlin. Now he dis- with a pump. History does not
ported to West Berlin on an
covered that the boxing plant record what was used to allevi-
ordinary goods train—no armed
was due for closure and he ate the odor!
guards or security arrange-
quickly had to negotiate a 30-
ments of any kind. The cargo
day hold. At Richmond, the The dig proceeded. A wooden-
arrived in West Berlin without
metal parts were sprayed with rail track was built to keep the
incident.
a rubberized compound to elim- forklift on course. About one-
inate clanking as they were eighth of the spoil never left the
taken into the tunnel and The dig began in August 1954. tunnel. Sandbags were filled
assembled. We wanted to avoid A 10-foot-diameter vertical and stacked halfway up the
any kind of cowbell chorus deep shaft, 10 feet deep, was exca- sides of the finished tunnel.
in the tunnel. The shield, liner vated 15 feet inside the They were secured with steel
plates, conveyor belts, and a warehouse foundation. The cables and gave the tunnel
small, battery-powered forklift shield was assembled in this cross section a T-square look.
were shipped to Hamburg, Ger- shaft below the basement floor. The benches formed by the
many. From Hamburg, this The excavation of the tunnel sandbags were used to support
and store air-conditioning ducts
and power and message cables
running back and forth between
the equipment-room amplifiers
and the Ampex recorders,
which packed the first floor of
the warehouse.

The operation of the shield

resulted in an overcut of 2 1/ 2
inches. This provided space for
the liner plates, but left a 1/2-
inch void between the tunnel
and the undisturbed earth
above. This void had to be filled
in order to prevent subsidence
of the earth above the tunnel.
About every fourth liner-plate
ring had “grout plugs,”
threaded cores that filled holes
Tunnel interior with wooden rails for forklift and sandbag “benches” for utility lines
and ventilation ducts. used for pumping grout into the
void. The plugs were screwed

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 21

Berlin Tunnel

out, grout under high pressure removed; then that slot was The electronic equipment room,
was pumped in, and then the closed and the next one opened. located under the roadway, was
plugs were replaced. The grout This sequence was repeated jammed with amplifiers, trans-
selected was called “Vollclay,” a until the target cables were formers, and tuners. All of
molecular composite of clay, reached, a process that required these devices used vacuum
minerals, and other ingredi- extreme patience and skill. tubes—“valves,” under British
ents. Once, a full boxcar of nomenclature—that were high
Vollclay disappeared between The tap of the first cable was heat generators. The maximum
Chicago and Baltimore! It took completed in May 1955. A team expected heat load of these gen-
five days for the Office of Logis- of British specialists started the erators had been used to
tics to find the shipment, but work of transferring the cable calculate the required level of
the grout reached Berlin with- voice and signal circuits to the air-conditioning. Something
out delaying the progress on recording equipment. The full was wrong, however, because
the tunnel. tapes were collected and sent to the temperature in the equip-
London and Washington. ment room was rising.
The British team of sappers
started—and completed in the This problem had to be solved
spring of 1955—the construc- Unexpected Development before winter set in. Some cold
tion of the vertical shaft needed morning, a frost-free black
to gain access to the Soviet On two occasions, I was invited mark might appear on the road-
communications cables. This to visit the tunnel site. I way over the equipment room,
was the most delicate and declined, suggesting that, with- perhaps extending into the field
tedious job in the entire pro- out a good reason for such a between the road and the ware-
cess. The vertical shaft was visit, we might be turning the house, calling attention to
carved out using a “window tunnel site into a tourist attrac- something strange occurring
blind” shield: A slot was opened tion. Then, a good reason below the surface. Emergency
and about an inch of soil was surfaced. action was needed.

22 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Berlin Tunnel

A chilled-water air-condition-
ing system was the only
“
The completion of this
demanding project is a
tribute to the
over the equipment room were
dropping, almost certainly due
solution because there was no to the supplemental cooling
room for extra ducts on the
resourcefulness and system.
sandbag benches. Such a sys- expertise of an
tem, including about 1500 feet outstanding team of Further monitoring of ground
of newly developed 3/4-inch professionals. temperatures became irrelevant
plastic irrigation tubing, was when the tunnel was discovered
shipped to the site. The tubing
fitted nicely alongside the exist-
ing air ducts.

We still needed a way to moni-

” in late April 1956. A team of
East German telephone work-
men unearthed the tunnel while
inspecting the cable system.
That spring had been unusually
used: one in the tap chamber,
tor the temperature in and four in the equipment room, wet and we had overheard
above the tunnel. With assis- three in the tunnel, and three numerous conversations about
tance from the Office of at the tunnel portal. The tun- flooded cable vaults and the
Logistics, we checked out a nel portal sensors served as need to fix the problems and
company in New Jersey named controls for comparative analy- restore communications.
Wallace and Tiernan Products, sis. When the sensors were in
Inc. Primarily a manufacturer place and the plugs restored
of altimeters and surveying and sealed, the connecting Reflection
equipment, the company also cables were run back to the
made a remote temperature entrance shaft.
recording system consisting of Over the years, the Berlin Tun-
sensors, a data-recording sta- nel project has been heatedly
The next step involved getting
tion, and connecting cables. We debated. Opinions have ranged
the cables up through the base-
purchased the system and widely—some favorable, some
ment floor of the warehouse
shipped it to Berlin. resentful of its success, some
and connected to the recording
political, and many just plain
station. This required pound-
As the Washington “expert,” I wrong. Most of the controversy
ing a hole through 16 inches of
followed with an engineering has centered on differing inter-
reinforced concrete with a star
drawing of the planned loca- pretations of net intelligence
drill and hammer! It took three
tions and elevations of the value of this costly, time-con-
days before the cables were con-
sensors that were to go into the suming, and technically
nected and operating.
earth above the tunnel. The challenging project. The simple
first job was to install the sen- The first readings showed that truth, however, is that Leslie
sors, since the plan called for the temperatures in the ground M. Gross and his Army Crops of
statistical analysis to deter- above the tunnel were in gen- Engineers staff, along with the
mine if observed differences in eral agreement with the British sappers, built the tun-
temperatures were random or readings from the sensors at nel and tap chamber in
significant. The grout plugs the tunnel portal; however, SECRET!!
now had a second purpose. A temperatures in the ground
number were removed and over the equipment room were Hand salute, gentlemen, hand
holes were drilled in each to indeed elevated. Later, data salute.
accommodate a sensor and its sent to CIA headquarters
cable. Eleven sensors were showed that the temperatures ❖❖❖

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 23

Intelligence in the Public Media

The Movie Breach: A Personal Perspective

Brian J. Kelley

FBI Supervisory Special Agent Robert Philip Hanssen was a rep-

rehensible traitor. Off and on for more than 20 years, he spied for
the GRU (Soviet military intelligence), the KGB (Soviet state intel-
ligence service), and the SVR (Russian intelligence service). Hans-
sen’s espionage career came to an abrupt end when he was arrested
on 18 February 2001, just after he had placed a tightly wrapped
package containing highly classified intelligence documents into a

debated as
“
Nothing has been

vigorously as the
dead drop under a footbridge in Foxstone Park in Vienna, Virginia.

Hanssen was certainly one of the most complex and disturbing

spies of our time. An enigmatic loner, Hanssen spent most of his 25
years in the Bureau specializing in Soviet intelligence matters on
question of why assignments in New York and in Washington DC—at FBI head-
Hanssen was able to quarters and as the FBI’s representative to the State Department.
elude detection for A senior agent once said of Hanssen, “I can’t think of a single
two decades. employee who was as disliked as Hanssen.” 1 One of the FBI’s fore-
most authorities on technical intelligence, Hanssen understood how

” technical applications could be brought to bear on the Bureau’s

most challenging operational initiatives. Moreover, Hanssen knew
how to navigate the bureaucratic labyrinths of the FBI, and, as a
certified public accountant, he understood especially well how work
on the Bureau’s most sensitive and high-profile cases were funded.

Arguably the most damaging spy in US history, Hanssen repeat-

edly volunteered his services to Moscow’s intelligence services,
cloaking his activities in a fictitious persona (Ramon Garcia) and
adamantly refusing to reveal to his handlers the identity of his gen-
uine employer. By all accounts, Hanssen was arrogantly confident
in his ability to “play the spy game” according to the rules he cre-
ated and employed. He gambled that he could deceive the FBI and
the Russians and avoid being compromised by any US agent that
might have penetrated Moscow’s services.

1I. C. Smith. Inside: A Top G-Man Exposes Spies, Lies, and Bureaucratic Bungling Inside
the FBI. Nashville, TN: Nelson Current, 2004, 301.

All statements of fact, opinion, or analysis expressed in this article are those of the
author. Nothing in the article should be construed as asserting or implying US gov-
ernment endorsement of an article’s factual statements and interpretations.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 25

In Watching the Movie Breach

Many vexing questions exist about Hanssen’s of an extraordinarily invasive counterespionage

rationale for acting as he did for as long as he did. investigation over the previous five years, was
But nothing has been debated as vigorously as innocent. Despite the absence of evidence, the
the reasons why he was able to elude detection FBI had convinced CIA officials that it had good
for two decades. Attempts to confer on Hanssen reason to believe that one of CIA’s officers had
the mythological status of a “master spy” (e.g., been responsible for compromising more than 50
CBS’s made-for-television movie Masterspy: The compartmented FBI operations against the Soviet
Robert Hanssen Story) are not supported by the and Russian intelligence services operating in the
facts of the case, and the key question remains: United States during the period 1985–2000. 3
Why did it take so long for the FBI to catch a
mole that had operated with impunity within its During those five years, the FBI invested a
ranks for such a long period of time? staggering amount of technical and human
resources to try to obtain evidence to corroborate
Breach, a fast-paced movie directed by Billy its suspicions against that officer. He was placed
Ray, attempts to answer some of these perplex- under 24-hour surveillance, his home and work
ing questions. The movie covers only the last six spaces were covertly searched, and computers
weeks of Hanssen’s two-decade-long espionage and telephones in both his home and office were
career, opening in the late fall of 2000, when put under technical surveillance. Even an elabo-
Hanssen first came under the investigative rate “false flag” operation was run against him—
microscope. According to David Wise, author of it proved no guilt; the officer dutifully reported
one of the best of several accounts of Hanssen’s the unsolicited contact. On top of that, the officer
life and perfidy, a successful joint CIA-FBI initia- was subjected to a ruse polygraph administered
tive obtained a package containing a portion of an by a senior FBI polygrapher.
operational file pertaining to a mole deeply
embedded in the US counterintelligence commu- The results of all these efforts revealed nothing
nity. 2 In addition to the file, the package con- pointing to the officer’s guilt. Moreover, the
tained three other exceptional pieces of evidence: senior FBI agent who administered the poly-
an audio tape containing two brief telephone con- graph was adamant that the examination deter-
versations between the mole and a KGB interloc- mined without a doubt that the alleged CIA spy
utor in 1986, copies of letters written by the mole registered a “no deception indicated” response.
during 1985–88, and two partial fingerprints With nothing to substantiate contentions that the
lifted from a plastic garbage bag the mole had CIA officer was a “master spy” who somehow
used to wrap a delivery to Moscow. Wise wrote managed numerous acts of treason without leav-
that the purchase price of the package was ing behind any clues and who always stayed a
$7 million. step ahead of their efforts, frustrated FBI counte-
respionage investigators took to calling the officer
the “Evil Genius.”
It did not take the FBI long to piece together the
shards of evidence and come to a stunning conclu- The information contained in the acquired pack-
sion: The mole was one of their own special age, while damning to Hanssen, was only enough
agents. Equally shocking to the FBI was the real- to support charging Hanssen with relatively
ization that the person its investigators had minor offenses, and the FBI wanted to build an
firmly believed to be the mole, a senior CIA coun-
terintelligence specialist who had been the object
3 Many of the details of this case were published in the unclassi-

fied US Department of Justice, Office of the Inspector General

2 David Wise. SPY: The Inside Story of How the FBI's Robert report, A Review of the FBI’s Performance in Deterring, Detecting,
Hanssen Betrayed America. New York: Random House, 2003. and Investigating the Espionage Activities of Robert Philip Hans-
Reviewed in Hayden Peake, “The Intelligence Officer’s Book- sen, August 2003. Fuller accounts were published in Secret and
shelf,” Studies in Intelligence 48, no. 3 (2003) Top Secret versions.

26 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 In Watching the Movie Breach

ironclad case that would lead to the death pen- a long history in the historically caste conscious
alty. To do this, Hanssen had to be caught in fla- FBI.
grante in an operational activity involving his
Russian intelligence handlers. Time was of the Although initially disdainful of the young sup-
essence, as Hanssen was facing mandatory retire- port assistant, Hanssen soon begins to reach out
ment in less than six months. to O’Neill because of their common interests in
technology, computers, and Catholicism. Taking
To buy time, the FBI concocted a plan to lure O’Neill under his wing, Hanssen squires the
Hanssen back to FBI headquarters from his posi- young officer on a tour of some of the FBI’s work-
tion at the State Department. Knowing Hans- ing areas. They pass a vault with a sign reading
sen’s frustration with and professional disdain for “Restricted Access Area: Special Compartmented
the FBI’s antiquated computer systems, the FBI Information Facility” (SCIF) and as they move
created a bureaucratic entity called the “Informa- down the corridor have the following conversa-
tion Assurance Division,” complete with a well- tion:
appointed office, and offered him a promotion to
the senior executive service. The FBI also offered Hanssen: You know what is going on behind
to waive Hanssen’s mandatory retirement if he those doors?
agreed to take the apparently prestigious posi-
tion. Hanssen agreed to the challenge and was O’Neill: No, sir.
told that the FBI had already selected a young
FBI surveillance specialist, Eric O’Neill, to be his Hanssen: There are analysts looking for a spy
first employee. What Hanssen did not know was inside the Intelligence Community. Highest
that O’Neill had been assigned to report on Hans- clearances but there are no CIA officers in there.
sen’s activities inside their office. You know why?

O’Neill: No, sir.

Breach compellingly portrays much of the
above. As the movie opens, O’Neill, played by
Hanssen: Because it is a CIA officer we’re try-
Ryan Phillippe, is summoned to FBI Headquar-
ing to build a case against. Now, could the mole
ters and informed that he is being reassigned be someone from the Bureau and not CIA? Of
from surveillance duty to an office job in the course. But are we actively pursuing that possi-
Hoover Building. Senior FBI officials inform bility? Of course not. Because we are the Bureau
O’Neill that he will work for a Special Agent and the Bureau knows all.
named Robert Hanssen to monitor his question-
able sexually “deviant” behavior, which O’Neill is As the innocent CIA officer alluded to in that
told “could be a huge embarrassment to the dialogue, I felt chills through my body when I saw
Bureau.” 4 that scene, and it triggered immediate flash-
backs to that two-year period in my life, when the
On his first day of duty, O’Neill greets a scowl- FBI intimated to me, my family, and friends that
ing Hanssen, portrayed exceptionally by Chris I would be arrested and charged with a capital
Cooper, who immediately establishes his author- crime I had not committed.
ity by telling O’Neill that he can call him either
“sir” or “boss.” Hanssen dismissively refers to The scene and the dialogue in Breach were fic-
O’Neill as a “clerk,” a derisive label that has had tional, but official retrospectives on the Hanssen
case suggest that the scene was a completely apt
4 In the commentary on the film that accompanies its CD release,
characterization of the perspective of the FBI
O’Neill says that in reality he was told that Hanssen was the sub- team investigating the case. (See passage from
ject of a counterintelligence investigation, but he was not told of the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector
the acquisition of evidence against him. General report on the next page.)

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 27

In Watching the Movie Breach

The FBI should have seriously questioned its conclu-

sion that the CIA suspect was a KGB spy and
In this brief seg- CIA, when he was
considered opening different lines of investigation.
ment, director Billy The squad responsible for the case, however, was so negotiating the place-
Ray perfectly cap- committed to the belief that the CIA suspect was a ment on my staff of
tured the arrogant, one of his senior ana-
mole that it lost a measure of objectivity and failed to
snarling Hanssen lysts. I was told he
give adequate consideration to other possibilities. In
flaunting his “I’ve got addition, while FBI management pressed for the was shocked to learn
a secret” attitude that investigation to be completed, it did not question the
that the FBI believed I
he inflicted on those factual premises underlying it. Similarly, the CIA'swas a master spy.
he felt were below his SIU did not serve as an effective counterbalance to Ironically, he down-
intellectual station in the FBI, because it was not an equal partner in the loaded relevant inves-
life. As I was later to molehunt. tigative reports on me
learn from many who from the ACS and
—DOJ IG Report, 2003.
worked with him, included them as part
Hanssen’s frequent of his initial communi-
sarcastic comments cation with the SVR
were often laced with veiled references showing when he alerted them that “Ramon Garcia” was
utter disdain for what he believed to be the FBI’s back in the game. 6 For more than a year and a
hopeless ineptitude in the field of counterintelli- half, Hanssen passed copies of the FBI’s investi-
gence. gative reports on me to the SVR via his custom-
ary dead drops. (He would later claim that he was
What the scene also revealed was that even trying to “save” me.)
though he was assigned to a backwater position
in 1995, Hanssen knew details of the highly com- People who have lived events that are about to be
partmented hunt for the alleged CIA mole. The portrayed in films have every reason to worry
FBI later determined that, starting in the spring about what the films will contain. I was no differ-
of 1999, Hanssen had made thousands of unau- ent. Some months before the film was finished, a
thorized probes into the FBI’s investigative contact in Hollywood sent me a copy of the origi-
records system called the Automated Case Sup- nal screen play. I felt it was appallingly poorly
port System (ACS) and was preparing to reenter written, and in my mind, the movie had the mak-
the spy world he had abruptly left in December ings of a disaster as bad as the much ballyhooed
1991, after the collapse of the Soviet Union. 5 To The Good Shepherd, which promised much but
ensure that the FBI was not tracking him, he had delivered little. 7 With some trepidation, I attended
taken to querying the databases for his name and a pre-launch showing of Breach as the guest of a
home address. In one of his forays into the ACS media acquaintance. I fully expected the movie to
he stumbled onto what should have been highly sacrifice reality to a skewed Tinsel Town vision of
compartmented reporting detailing the FBI’s real life. To my great surprise, 20 minutes into the
intensive investigation of me. His later inquiries movie, I realized I was very wrong.
at FBI headquarters yielded my name as the sub-
ject of the investigation. After the showing, I was introduced to Director
Ray, who was interested in my opinion of his pro-
I first met Hanssen in the early 1980s, when we duction. He was pleased to hear my positive
worked together on some sensitive counterintelli- response. After I remarked on the SCIF scene, he
gence matters of common interest to the FBI and told me he knew the basic outline of my story but
CIA. We once lived on the same street and took could write no more about me than was con-
official trips together. He once visited my office at

5 US Department of Justice, Commission for Review of FBI Secu- 6USDOJ, IG Report, 15.
rity Programs (Webster Commission), A Review of FBI Security 7See David Robarge et al., “Intelligence in Recent Public Media,
Programs, 31 Mar 2002. The Good Shepherd,” Studies in Intelligence 51, no. 1 (2007).

28 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 In Watching the Movie Breach

tained in the scene: “I could only make a passing I can live with that part, but the idea that my
reference to your case due to time and story line entire career had been a waste of time is the part I
restrictions. What happened to you was so power- hate. Everything I’ve done since I got to this office,
ful that it would have overwhelmed the story if I everything we were paid to do, he was undoing it.
tried to bring your case into the film any more We all could have just stayed home.
than I did.” I told Ray that I fully understood and
completely agreed. That commentary sums up the feelings of intel-
ligence officials who must come to grips with the
He asked me if there were any noticeable mis- knowledge that someone very close to them has
takes in the movie. I laughed and told him the become a traitor. Colleagues who worked with
first mistake I saw was when the movie opened traitors such as Rick Ames, Jim Nicholson, Earl
with a clip of the press conference at which Attor- Pitts, and Ana Montes all had the same sick feel-
ney General John Ashcroft announced Hanssen’s ing upon learning that someone they trusted had
arrest. I pointed out that the crawler used to breached their trust.
show the date of the press conference was off by a
day. Ray looked crestfallen and told me he real- In a closing scene, Hanssen has a discussion
ized the mistake just hours before final produc- with a senior FBI official as he is being trans-
tion and said it had been too late to make a ported to jail after his arrest:
correction. He said he would ensure the correct
date was used on the DVD version—and he did. Can you imagine sitting in a room with a bunch
of your colleagues, everyone trying to guess the
I also mentioned scenes in the movie involving identity of a mole and all the while it is you
Hanssen’s sexual behavior. The movie suggested they’re after. It must be very satisfying, don’t
that some of his activities were discovered before you think?
his arrest, but in reality investigators did not
learn of them until after Hanssen’s arrest. These The scene was fiction, but it, too, was very
included Hanssen’s bizarre one-year relationship believable and haunting. No one should feel sorry
with an “exotic dancer,” his clandestine filming of for the likes of Hanssen, who caused the deaths of
his love-making with his unsuspecting wife, and, several Soviet intelligence officers. We must be
finally, his posting on the Internet of soft porn reminded of two comments in Hanssen’s sentenc-
stories in his true name. Ray acknowledged that ing memorandum:
the information came after Hanssen’s arrest, but
in this case he claimed literary license to make Even though Aldrich Ames compromised each of
sure he captured this aspect of the man. them [executed Soviet Intelligence officers], and
thus shares responsibility for their executions,
Later, Ray and I were to have several discus- this in no way mitigates or diminishes the magni-
sions and E-mail exchanges about scenes that tude of Hanssen’s crimes. Their blood is on his
struck me as particularly compelling. One such hands.…That we did not lose the Cold War ought
scene involved dialogue in which O’Neill’s super- blind no one to the fact that Robert Philip Hans-
visor unburdened herself to him, saying: sen, for his own selfish and corrupt reasons,
placed every American citizen in harm’s way.8
A task force was formed to find out who was
giving them [KGB officers who had been Breach is not a perfect movie but it hammers
recruited by the FBI] up. We had our best ana- home how precious our freedoms are and how
lysts pouring over data for years trying to find vulnerable we are to potential traitors within.
the mole but we could never quite identify him.
Guess who we put in charge of the task force?
He was smarter than all of us. 8 www.fas.org/irp/ops/ci/hanssen_senmemo.pdf, 10 May 2002.

❖❖❖

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 29

Intelligence in Recent Public Literature

The Intelligence Officer’s Bookshelf

Compiled and Reviewed by Hayden B. Peake

Current

Countering Terrorism: Blurred Focus, Halting Steps, Richard A. Posner

Democratic Control of Intelligence Services: Containing Rogue Elephants, Hans Born and Marina Caparini
(eds.)
Intelligence Analysis: A Target-Centric Approach, 2nd edition revised, Robert M. Clark
The Quest for Absolute Security: The Failed Relations Among U.S. Intelligence Agencies, Athan Theoharis
Reforming Intelligence: Obstacles to Democratic Control and Effectiveness, Thomas C. Bruneau and Steven C.
Boraz (eds.)
Spying Blind: The CIA, the FBI, and the Origins of 9/11, Amy B. Zegart,

General Intelligence

Detecting Deception: A Bibliography of Counterdeception Across Time, Cultures, and Disciplines—Supple-

ment to the Second Edition, Barton Whaley
Intelligence and National Security: A Reference Handbook, J. Ransom Clark
Intelligence and National Security: The Secret World of Spies—An Anthology, Second Edition, Loch K.
Johnson and James J. Wirtz

Historical

Comrade J: The Untold Story of Russia’s Master Spy in America After the End of the Cold War, Pete Earley
The FBI: A History, Rhodri Jeffreys-Jones
Intelligence, Statecraft and International Power, Eunan O’Halpin, Robert Armstrong and Jane Ohlmeyer (eds.)
Living With the Enigma Secret: Marian Rejewski 1905-1980, Jan Stanislaw Ciechanowski (eds.)
Nazi War Crimes, US Intelligence and Selective Prosecution at Nuremburg: Controversies Regarding the Role
of the Office of Strategic Services, Michael Salter

Intelligence Services Abroad

Inside IB and RAW: The Rolling Stone that Gathered Moss, K. Sankaran Nair
Intelligence: Past, Present and Future, B. Raman
The Kaoboys of R&AW: Down Memory Lane, B. Raman
The Volunteer: The Incredible True Story of an Israeli Spy on the Trail of International Terrorists, Michael Ross
with Jonathan Kay

Correction: The review of Enemies: How America’s Foes Steal our Vital Secrets (Bill Gertz) in the “Intelli-
gence Officer’s Bookshelf” of Studies Vol. 51, No. 2 (2007) may have led readers to infer that Gertz lifted
material about Ana Montes from Scott Carmichael’s biography of the Cuban agent, True Believer. Car-
michael’s book, also reviewed in the issue, appeared after Enemies, and the review meant only to point out
that Enemies included unattributed material on Montes that True Believer would confirm.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 31

 Bookshelf—March 2008

Current
Richard A. Posner, Countering Terrorism: Blurred Focus, Halting Steps
(New York: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2007).

Journalists and academics with no direct experience in the intelligence

profession often do not let their lack of knowledge of the subject stand in
the way of making critical analyses of the profession’s performance. Rich-
ard Posner acknowledges that though criticism of the intelligence busi-
ness by a federal judge might seem presumptuous, but “an outsider’s
perspective can be valuable.” He is right, of course, and in Countering Ter-
rorism, his third book addressing intelligence reform, he argues provoca-
tively that “Kulturkampf [culture conflict]…is the biggest impediment to
improving domestic intelligence, dominated by the FBI despite the bu-
reau’s permeation by a culture of criminal investigations that is incompat-
ible with the effective conduct of national security intelligence.” (xii) In
short, he recommends that a separate MI5-like organization be formed to
meet “the growing danger of homegrown terrorism.” The FBI is not suited
to the task, he suggests: “Criminal law enforcement…has shown that it
has only a limited value against terrorism.” The role of the FBI, with its
arrest powers, should be similar to that of the British Special Branch.(xii)

Posner questions the view that because we are at war “we simply don’t
have time to establish a new national security agency.”(12) Precedent, he
argues, suggests otherwise. The creation of OSS, NSA, the National Coun-
terterrorist Center, Department of Homeland Security, and the Office of
the Director of National Intelligence during periods of conflict makes his
point.

The balance of the book discusses the organizational, managerial and

leadership problems that would have to be overcome to achieve his goal.
He presents a series of benchmarks in the form of questions that have to
be answered before a decision is made; e.g., is the proposed change an im-
provement over what currently exists? His answer is yes because “we are
overinvested in criminal law as a weapon against terrorism. Excessive le-
galism in the form of what I call warrant fetishism is also preventing us
from dealing imaginatively with privacy and civil liberties concerns that
domestic electronic surveillance arouses.” Judge Posner concludes by pro-
viding answers to his benchmark questions. His judgment is that the FBI
and DHS do not “understand that intelligence is an alternative, as well as
an adjunct, to law enforcement and military force” and that “congressional
oversight of the reorganized system” is not adequate. In sum, Posner is
convinced that creating a new MI5-like organization with only a security

All statements of fact, opinion, or analysis expressed are those of the author. Nothing in the article
should be construed as asserting or implying US government endorsement of its factual statements
and interpretations.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 33

Bookshelf—March 2008

and counterintelligence mission is necessary to achieve effective domestic

counterterrorism efforts. One aspect not considered is the level of personal
and organizational disruption that creating another new intelligence orga-
nization would entail and the time required for it to become proficient.

Countering Terrorism is a thoughtful and very detailed explication of

Judge Posner’s position; it is worth very serious consideration.

Hans Born and Marina Caparini (eds.), Democratic Control of Intelligence

Services: Containing Rogue Elephants (Burlington, VT: Ashgate Publishing
Company, 2007), 303 pp., footnotes, bibliography, index.

Cicero, the Roman lawyer and orator, wrote “In time of war, the laws fall
silent.” 1 Editors Born and Caparini have recast this view in modern terms,
asking: “whether protecting the security of the state should trump all oth-
er objectives and values in society…and preclude any constraints on it?”
(4) Nine of the 15 articles in the Democratic Control of Intelligence Services
examine the issue from the viewpoints of four Western countries (the
United States, the United Kingdom, France, and Norway) and five from
the former Soviet bloc (Romania, Poland, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic,
and Hungary). 2 Six articles discuss the fundamental principles of over-
sight—the law, accountability, freedom of information, data protection—
and the need for intelligence. With regard to oversight, which is defined
broadly as “management,” they stress the importance of internal controls
by inspectors general, as well as those applied by the executive and con-
gressional or parliamentary committees.

The chapters on the former Soviet bloc countries are particularly interest-
ing. They discuss the degrees of progress made since independence, em-
phasizing the extent to which the principles above have been achieved in
each nation and what remains to be done on domestic security and foreign
intelligence reforms. The chapters on the Western countries review the
procedures and institutions in place to assure democratic control of intel-
ligence and the problems that led to their creation. With the exception of
France, each country formed parliamentary oversight committees after
questionable conduct by one of its intelligence agencies. In France, while
the need for such oversight is recognized, the National Assembly has not
endorsed the formation of an oversight commission.

1 Quoted in James M. Olson, Fair Play: The Moral Dilemmas of Spying (Washington, DC: Potomac Books,
2006), 18.
2 For analysis of the oversight problem in Canada, South Africa, South Korea, and Iraq, see Hans Born, Loch

K. Johnson, and Ian Leigh (eds.), Who’s Watching the Spies?: Establishing Intelligence Service Accountability
(Washington, DC: Potomac Books, 2005).

34 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Bookshelf—March 2008

The final chapter reviews the common problems of implementing effective

democratic and parliamentary oversight of intelligence, the need for inter-
national cooperation, and the lessons learned from the accounts present-
ed. It concludes with proposals for strengthening oversight while
maintaining a balance between secrecy and transparency.

While the Democratic Control of Intelligence Services looks closely at what

has been and what needs to be done, it does not address the practical prob-
lem of the qualifications of those doing the oversight. Nevertheless, it is a
valuable book that demonstrates the difficulty of acquiring needed intelli-
gence while protecting basic human rights.

Robert M. Clark, Intelligence Analysis: A Target-Centric Approach, 2nd

edition revised (Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2007), 321 pp., end of chapter
notes, appendix, charts, index.

Joseph Stalin rejected intelligence analysis: “Don’t tell me what you think,
give me the facts and the source!” 3 CIA analyst Sherman Kent countered:
“There is no substitute for the intellectually competent human…, who
through firsthand knowledge and study” recommends what facts should
be presented to the decisionmaker. 4 Kent went on to say his criterion ap-
plied to collectors and analysts. Dr. Robert Clark, a former CIA analyst,
takes the next step with his target-centric approach—a collaborative ana-
lytical network for successful analysis involving contributions from all
“stakeholders” associated with the target issue. His approach begins with
an explanation of a model that describes what is known and not known
about the target’s functions or behavior. The concept of a model is illus-
trated using a WW II operation made famous in Ewen Montagu’s The Man
Who Never Was. 5 In that case. the Germans, convinced of the veracity of
inaccurate data deceptively supplied by British intelligence about the in-
vasion of Sicily, altered their troop dispositions. For the operation to have
worked, MI5 planners had to model how the Germans thought and oper-
ated and the most likely conditions that would lead to the desired German
responses. (5).

The second part of the book discusses methods for creating a model—some
quite complex, though well illustrated. It also examines sources of data,
the techniques of data evaluation, the risks of deception, and the impor-
tance of validation. The third part includes six chapters on predictive anal-
ysis and cover techniques, organizational issues, and technological
aspects. The final chapter deals with the qualities that analysts and cus-
tomers must have to increase the likelihood of understanding, if not agree-

3 Alexander Orlov, Handbook of Intelligence and Guerrilla Warfare (Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan
Press, 1963), 10.
4 Sherman Kent, Strategic Intelligence For American World Policy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University

Press, 1966), xxi.

5 Ewen Montagu, The Man Who Never Was (Staplehurst, Kent, UK: Spellmount Limited, 2003).

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 35

Bookshelf—March 2008

ment. This is a matter of speaking truth to power when the superiors with
whom analysts must work think of themselves as analysts of at least equal
ability. The two appendices illustrate the importance of differences in an-
alytical approach in two National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs): one from
1990 on the future of Yugoslavia, the other from October 2002 on WMD in
Iraq that was based on inadequate treatment of multidisciplinary factors
and poorly validated evidence.

Intelligence Analysis is a fine treatment of contemporary analytic trade-

craft that makes clear why the analyst has one of the toughest jobs in the
profession.

Athan Theoharis, The Quest for Absolute Security: The Failed Relations
Among U.S. Intelligence Agencies (Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 2007), 320 pp.,
index.

Marquette history professor Athan Theoharis introduces his new book by

agreeing with the 9/11 Commission that CIA and FBI failures to cooper-
ate, share information, and analyze intelligence properly were among the
factors that contributed to the disaster. But he strongly opposes the cor-
rective action recommended—“a more centralized bureaucracy, headed by
a DNI.”(4, 267) Theoharis views such an approach as part of the “quest for
absolute security,” a phrase never used by the committee, that would place
undesirable limits on human rights.(4) History, he suggests, does not sup-
port the commission’s conclusion on centralization. On the contrary, he
claims, increased centralization will only lead to more abuses by the intel-
ligence agencies. The balance of the book attempts to make the point. It
fails.

The Quest for Absolute Security begins with a summary of the national se-
curity background that led to the creation of the FBI. Succeeding chapters
review well-known espionage cases, civil rights policies, congressional in-
vestigations, and bureaucratic rivalries associated with the coming of
WW II, the Cold War, the post–Cold War period, and 9/11. Professor Theo-
haris discusses each era’s many failures, violations or abuses attributed to
the Bureau and, to a lesser extent, OSS and CIA. But he presents nothing
to demonstrate that either the successes or mistakes cited actually oc-
curred in the search for “absolute security,” an objective even the author
admits is unrealistic. Moreover, he offers nothing to suggest that the many
difficulties he recounts resulted from centralized control and are thus like-
ly to be repeated under a DNI. Poor management, political interference,
frequent mission modifications, fluctuating budgets, and long learning
curves are equally likely explanations for the problems he cites though
none are mentioned. To avoid the problems he foresees under the new cen-
tralization, Professor Theoharis offers a solution: “stricter congressional
oversight.” He will probably see that happen, but not for the reasons he
suggests.

36 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Bookshelf—March 2008

Thomas C. Bruneau and Steven C. Boraz (eds.), Reforming Intelligence:

Obstacles to Democratic Control and Effectiveness (Austin: University of
Texas Press, 2007), 385 pp., end of chapter notes, bibliography, index.

The need for intelligence reform in democratic nations is an unchallenged

assumption of Reforming Intelligence. The editors point out that there are
no studies or benchmark models for determining when the reformers have
got it right. They propose applying a modified version of the familiar “civil-
military relations (CMR)” model to civil-intelligence relations as a frame-
work for analysis and judgment.(2) The need for modification follows be-
cause only two of the three basic elements of CMR—civilian control,
effectiveness and efficiency—can be applied; efficiency cannot be assessed
because of “the essential, fundamental requirement for secrecy” (1, 5) ap-
plied to budgets and related potential performance measures. The 13
chapters of the book are written by a mix of academics and intelligence of-
ficers. They include a review of the processes by which information be-
comes intelligence in democratic societies, followed by studies that discuss
democratic control and effectiveness in three Western nations—the Unit-
ed States, the United Kingdom, and France—and seven “new democra-
cies”—Brazil, Taiwan, Argentina, Romania, South Africa, Russia, and the
Philippines. Three chapters are devoted to the United States. They discuss
oversight—internal, congressional and judicial—and obstacles to reform.
The final chapter compares the “development of controls” and the effec-
tiveness achieved among the various countries dealing with reform.

The problems discussed are different for each nation as indicated by the
following examples. Oversight in France, as Professor Douglas Porch
points out, is restricted by the persistence of traditional military influence
over its intelligence agencies. Romania, according to Cristiana Matei, has
yet to break free of “the cultural legacy of prior regimes.”(235) Civilian con-
trol in Russia, as described by Mikhail Tsypkin, is complicated by terror-
ism and “a KGB/FSB/SVR mindset.”(295) In each case, the general
solution suggested is an informed populace, better oversight, and account-
ability. For comparison, former CIA general counsel Elizabeth Rindskopf
Parker and Bryan Pate provide a detailed historical review of oversight in
America that suggests the possible need for permanent judicial review
commissions that “might enhance public confidence.” (68)

Reforming Intelligence does not demonstrate that the CMR model is any
help in solving intelligence reform issues. And its claims that assessing
performance is greatly limited by secrecy are not supported. To its credit,
the book leaves no doubt about the complexity of oversight issues. It is well
documented, well written, and should serve as a foundation for studying
this persistent problem.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 37

Bookshelf—March 2008

Amy B. Zegart, Spying Blind: The CIA, the FBI, and the Origins of 9/11
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2007), 352 pp., endnotes, index.

In her first book, Flawed By Design, UCLA professor Amy Zegart argued
that the CIA “was never supposed to engage in spying,”(163) that “the
agency was given no authority to engage in covert activities of any sort be
it collecting intelligence or conducting subversive political activities
abroad,” (187) and that “CIA failures were an inevitable consequence of
the way [it was] structured” at the outset.(231) 6 Citing statutory evidence,
historians promptly noted that the first two propositions were flawed by
inaccuracy. 7 But the idea that organizational structure was the principal
determinant of CIA failures could not be disproved and had daunting im-
plications as a harbinger of failures to come.

Professor Zegart returns to this topic in Spying Blind. She begins by de-
fining organization as having three components, “cultures, incentives, and
structures…that critically influence what government agencies do and
how well they do it.”(1) Zegart then develops a model for making compar-
isons with three performance factors: “the nature of organizations, ratio-
nal self interest, and the fragmented federal government.”(Chapter 2) She
then loosely applies the model to the CIA and FBI before 9/11, allowing for
influences by contributing factors such as their failure to adapt to change,
congressional interference, budget cuts, staff reductions, and mission re-
alignment. In the case of the CIA, Zegart finds that “the agency did not
miss some of the eleven opportunities it had to potentially disrupt the Sep-
tember 11 attacks. They [sic] missed them all.”(119) She treats the FBI
similarly but more gently. It had “twelve known chances to follow leads
that hinted at impending disaster. In each case, FBI officials missed the
lucky break.”(168) How did this happen? Zegart’s answer for both cases is
“organizational weakness” or “organizational factors.” But she does not of-
fer convincing evidence, e.g., bureaucratic fragmentation or frequent man-
agerial change, to prove these assertions or to make them more convincing
than explanations rooted in poor decision making by analysts and manag-
ers.

The final chapter summarizes her views on the unsettled Intelligence

Community. In the process she introduces topics not dealt with in depth
previously. For example, she calls for “fundamental changes in analysis,”
though she offers no specifics. As to human intelligence capabilities, which
she does discuss briefly in chapter 4, she claims that there has been “little
progress since 9/11…because the agency’s approach to improving human
intelligence has focused primarily on increasing the number of spies rath-
er than on improving quality or dramatically increasing nontraditional re-
cruitment models to penetrate terrorist groups.” Here too she offers little

6 Amy Zegart, Flawed By Design: The Evolution of the CIA, JCS, and NSC (Stanford, CA: Stanford Univer-
sity Press, 1999).
7 Michael Warner review of Flawed by Design, in Studies in Intelligence 44, no. 2 (2000): 101–103.

38 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Bookshelf—March 2008

evidence. In short, while she has enumerated some problems facing the In-
telligence Community, their causes and her recommended solutions to
them remain problematical. Few will challenge her basic conclusion that
“organization matters.”(196) That was a given from the outset. But the
“why and how” it matters more than or as much as other competing pa-
rameters is not proved.

At no time does Professor Zegart question the need for intelligence agen-
cies. Her conclusion is that “The United States’ ability to protect itself
hinges on whether U.S. intelligence agencies built for a different enemy at
a different time can adapt.”(197) Spying Blind is a thought-provoking, de-
tailed analysis of current problems that takes historical precedent and the
judgments of many distinguished thinkers into account. Whether it is a
correct assessment of cause and effect and the solutions it recommends is
a question that remains unanswered.

General Intelligence

Barton Whaley, Detecting Deception: A Bibliography of Counterdeception

Across Time, Cultures, and Disciplines—Supplement to the Second Edi-
tion (Washington, DC: Foreign Denial and Deception Committee, National
Intelligence Council, 2007), 182 pp., appendix, CD, no index.

This supplement to the 2,444 entries in the second edition of Whaley’s De-
tecting Deception: A Bibliography of Counterdeception adds 253 new items
and revises 49 others. Several of the new entries in the supplement are
themselves bibliographies, and they contain 4,000 more titles on various
topics, for example, counterfeit coins and paper currency, mimicry, true
names of authors of anonymously written works, and myth and fraud in
archeology. Several entries discuss instances in which previous claims
about fakes and forgeries were incorrect. Whaley notes in the introduction
that while many titles are seemingly redundant, his annotations identify
the “more accurate and detailed pieces that contribute fresh data, new
methods, or original theories.” He adds that the noticeable variance in for-
mats of the entries is intentional in order to avoid the loss of data that
might occur if a standard format were introduced. Other entry features in-
clude a five-star rating system and keywords that indicate the “styles of
logical detection” in the item. For example, the word medicine indicates an
analogy with medical practice; the word fiction indicates an entry in which
a fictional story is used to make a point. A searchable CD of the Supple-
ment is included at the back. This is another valuable contribution from
the pre-eminent bibliographer in the field.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 39

Bookshelf—March 2008

J. Ransom Clark, Intelligence and National Security: A Reference Hand-

book (Westport, CT: Praeger Security International, 2007), 192 pp., end of
chapter notes, bibliography, appendices, glossary, chronology, index.

Former CIA officer Ransom Clark has written a book with the intention of
providing “those who are interested in watching or even participating in
the intelligence business enough background and context to assist in mak-
ing reasoned evaluations of on-going and future activities.”(vii) Intelli-
gence and National Security does just that. It is a primer that discusses
the definition of intelligence; its historical evolution since the Revolution-
ary War; how it is collected, analyzed, and disseminated; the security and
counterintelligence aspects of the process; and the role of covert action. Ex-
amples and brief case studies are included on each topic. The final chapter,
“Where Do We Go From Here,” addresses accountability, the role of Con-
gress, and the impact of recent reforms. Clark concludes by noting that
“structural and substantive changes are two different matters. New boxes
on organizational charts do not generate new intelligence or change mind-
sets in evaluating data. New layers of bureaucracy do not speed up the
flow of information.” Improvements in these areas require good people.
Clark has provided a sound basis for assessing the controversies sur-
rounding intelligence today. It is a valuable contribution that should be
very helpful to those studying or anticipating a future in the profession.

Loch K. Johnson and James J. Wirtz (eds.), Intelligence and National Secu-
rity: The Secret World of Spies—An Anthology, Second Edition (New York:
Oxford University Press, 2008), 553 pp., end of chapter notes, bibliography,
index.

Second editions can result from demand pressures, changes in subject

matter detail, and/or the availability of new material. This anthology re-
sponds in part to the latter two criteria. It has changed its name; 8 added
two articles, increasing the number to 38; and deleted some earlier contri-
butions while adding new ones on satellite surveillance, warrantless wire-
taps, and events since 9/11. The other nine parts address definitions—still
no consensus here—the functions described in the so-called intelligence
cycle as applied by selected intelligence community organizations, plus po-
liticization, counterintelligence, accountability, oversight, and covert ac-
tion. The new article on “warrantless wiretaps” deserves attention
although it has little to do with wiretapping, and everything to do with
electronic intercepts. But it does present a variety of viewpoints, including
those of Alan Dershowitz.

Two areas were neglected in the new edition. The first is the index, which
does not include the additions. The second is articles in need of updating.
For example, the article on open source intelligence makes no mention of

8The previous edition was Strategic Intelligence: Windows into a Secret World (Los Angeles, CA: Roxbury
Publishing Co., 2004)

40 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Bookshelf—March 2008

the new Open Source Center created under the DNI, but it does state that
the DNI “has chosen to remain focused on secrets for the president,” what-
ever that means. More generally, this article does not reflect a grasp of the
current or past approach to open source information. Another example is
the article on counterintelligence, which still has a correctable definitional
problem. Executive Order 12333 has defined counterintelligence and secu-
rity as distinct functions, but the description given in this volume subor-
dinates security to CI.

This anthology is not a collection of the “right” answers to persistent and

often controversial intelligence issues. But it does lay the foundation for
sensible discussion, and that argues strongly for reading it closely.

Historical

Pete Earley, Comrade J: The Untold Story of Russia’s Master Spy in Amer-
ica After the End of the Cold War (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2008), 340
pp.

Sergei Turanov, Comrade Jean, and Comrade J were among the code-
names used by Sergei Tretyakov, a KGB and SVR intelligence officer until
he defected to the United States in October 2000 with his wife and daugh-
ter. KGB defections were not uncommon during the Cold War, although
they dropped sharply as their utility diminished after the collapse of the
Soviet Union. The new Russian government abolished the KGB and estab-
lished a separate foreign intelligence service now designated the SVR. Ser-
gei Tretyakov is the first member of this service to defect to the United
States. He sought out Pete Earley to tell his story because Earley had writ-
ten two fine books about American traitors, John Walker who was a KGB
agent, and Aldrich Ames, who spied for the KGB and the SVR.

In Comrade J, we learn that Tretyakov’s childhood goal was to be a KGB

officer like his father. To this end, he learned French and English, gradu-
ated from the Moscow Institute of Foreign Languages, where he was spot-
ted by the KGB. Formally recruited after graduation, he joined the CPSU
and attended the Red Banner Institute, where he learned the tradecraft of
his chosen profession. After a boring assignment in Moscow, where hard
work and additional duties for the party earned him good marks, he was
sent to Canada. Inspired by the Gorbachev reforms, he succeeded in re-
cruiting several important agents and gained the attention of the right
people at KGB headquarters. After the coup of 1991, his dissatisfaction in-
creased and in Canada he and his wife considered not returning to Russia,
an option they at first rejected because of the impact the move would have
on family members at home. After a year back in Moscow during which he
watched as several of his colleagues were arrested and executed as CIA
agents (thanks to Ames), Tretyakov was assigned to the New York Resi-
dency in April 1995. He never returned to Russia.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 41

Bookshelf—March 2008

For the traditional reasons of security, the details of his defection are not
revealed in Comrade J. Earley does describe some of Tretyakov’s opera-
tions in Canada and America with emphasis on sources developed and
agents recruited, some of whom he names. In the category of “special un-
official contact,” he mentions former US deputy secretary of state Strobe
Talbot, stressing that Talbot was not an agent and implying that the SVR
did not realize that their contacts with him were routine, not secret com-
munications. Tretyakov also reported on the SVR penetrations of the Unit-
ed Nations and the operations and personnel of the SVR residencies to
which he was assigned. Tretyakov’s descriptions of bureaucratic infight-
ing and his functions as deputy resident and later as acting resident sug-
gest that in some respects the profession has changed little from KGB
days.

Of particular interest from the US point of view, the book reveals that for
three years before his defection in October 2000 Tretyakov worked for the
FBI, providing details of residency operations and personnel. Ten months
before his defection, the FBI encouraged him to leave but could not tell
him the reason: it was hunting a mole who might learn about him. When
Tretyakov’s defection became public on 30 January 2001 and Robert Hans-
sen was arrested on 18 February 2001, the press presumed Tretyakov was
the one who gave him up. The FBI assured Earley that this was not the
case.

Finally, as with all unsourced defector memoirs, one must deal with the
question of accuracy. In this case, the narrative contains two technical er-
rors worth noting: (1) reference to Tretyakov as a double agent is incorrect,
and (2) the statement that the CIA calls its employees “agents” is
wrong.(48) Recognizing that independent assessment of Tretyakov’s story
is desirable, Earley includes a chapter with comments from “a high-rank-
ing US intelligence official” that addresses the kinds of material Tretyak-
ov provided and affirms that it included names and “saved American
lives.” Further detail is attributed to other “intelligence sources,” as, for
example, the fact that the bug planted in the State Department conference
room in the late 1990s had a “miniature battery…recharged with a laser
beam.”(323) If correct, someone would have had to have line-of-sight ac-
cess to the battery, but no comment is made on this point.

In the end, although Earley has provided another well told espionage case
study, he leaves the curious hoping for a second volume containing more
details of Tretyakov’s work for US intelligence.

Rhodri Jeffreys-Jones, The FBI: A History (New Haven, CT: Yale University
Press, 2007), 317 pp., endnotes, bibliography, index.

Herodotus, Cicero’s pater historiae, is said by modern historians to have

been generally “fair-minded and balanced…if not always entirely accu-
rate,” even though there is not a source note in Herodotus’s book, The His-

42 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Bookshelf—March 2008

tories. 9 The FBI: A History has source notes and still meets these criteria,
with one significant revisionist exception. Rhodri Jeffreys-Jones, a profes-
sor of American history at Edinburgh University, begins by noting the
“richness as a source” of the FBI case files and then writes, “I have tried
to produce a work from the standpoint that is liberated from the bureau’s
filing system…in the context of broader historical currents.” The currents
he chooses are racism and civil liberties.(vii) And to show that both have
long been driving factors in Bureau history, Professor Jeffreys-Jones
changes the date the FBI was formed as the Bureau of Investigation, from
1908 to 1871!(3) This liberty is justified, he tells readers, because the Bu-
reau “has long been…an unjust organization,” where “prejudice ran deep-
er than the nation at large.” The first two chapters of the book use this
historical sleight of hand to discuss “Bureau history” over a period of near-
ly 38 years before it was formed.

The remaining chapters of The FBI present a balanced review of the FBI’s
organization and functions from its creation in 1908 to the present. Its scope
is broader than that of Raymond Batvinis’s The Origins of FBI Counterin-
telligence, which focused on counterintelligence until mid–WW II. 10 But it is
topically similar to Athan Theoharis’s The Quest for Absolute Security (see
above): bureaucratic battles, espionage, security, political surveillance, com-
munist threat, Cold War, post–Cold War change, and possible 9/11 reforms.
One exceptional topic is race relations, which Jeffreys-Jones mentions from
time to time, although not nearly as often as his introductory remarks sug-
gest. For example, both Theoharis and Jeffreys-Jones discuss adjustments
in the FBI counterintelligence mission that President Roosevelt approved in
1939. Theorharis sees the consequences in terms of actions against subver-
sives. Jeffreys-Jones, on the other hand, suggests that “historians must try
and gauge the significance of the 1939 reform, not just for the FBI, but for
the history of race relations.”(98) In the realm of civil liberties, Jeffreys-
Jones is overly concerned about the impact of a “Gestapo Factor”—fear of
knocks on doors at night and unlawful surveillance—that some in the Unit-
ed States expressed after WW II.

Jeffreys-Jones devotes considerable attention to investigations from the

Church Committee to the 9/11 Commission and how Hoover’s successors
tried to implement reforms, a task complicated, he suggests, by frequent
unplanned high-level personnel changes in the Intelligence Community.
To be fair, The FBI: A History, also mentions the FBI’s achievements, the
role of Robert Lamphere in the VENONA case being a good example. But
some of the book’s claims are factually incorrect: the FBI did not initiate
the investigation that uncovered Aldrich Ames; it joined in after the CIA
had done so.(223) With respect to the Robert Hanssen case, Hanssen was
not arrested at “a dead-drop site in Tysons Corner”; Vienna, Virginia, de-

9Robert B. Strassler (ed.), The Landmark Herodotus: The Histories (New York: Pantheon Books, 2007), 728.
10Raymond Batvinis, Origins of FBI Counterintelligence, (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 2007. Re-
viewed in “Intelligence Officer’s Bookshelf,” Studies in Intelligence 51, No. 3 (2007).

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 43

Bookshelf—March 2008

serves that honor. Likewise, Hanssen did not ask, “What took you so
long?” when captured.(226) Finally, the Wen Ho Lee case was not a prod-
uct of racial bias.(224)

Jeffreys-Jones is not optimistic about the FBI’s future. The organization,

he asserts, has “always been a showcase for human frailties and bitter con-
troversies, and no reformer could reasonably expect to change that.”(253)
What he does not seem to recognize, however, is that operational success
is at least as dependent on professional competency, which even he admits
is high. In short, the Bureau’s track record does not support the professor’s
assessment.

Eunan O’Halpin, Robert Armstrong and Jane Ohlmeyer (eds.), Intelligence,

Statecraft and International Power—Irish Conference of History (Dublin:
Irish Academic Press, 2006), 246 pp., end of chapter notes, Index.

In 2005, the Irish Committee of Historical Sciences sponsored a conference

at Trinity College in Dublin on intelligence from ancient to contemporary
times. This volume contains 15 of the papers presented. Three of the au-
thors are from the United States, one is from Scotland, and the balance
from Ireland. All are academics with solid credentials. Seven articles dis-
cuss the history of Irish intelligence over four centuries, a fascinating topic
little reported in literature. One on Anglo-Scottish relations in medieval
times considers the familiar question: Did intelligence matter? Another
describes intelligence during the last Chinese dynasty, which ended in
1911. Others include intelligence in India at the turn of the 20th century,
in Rome during the reign of Emperor Trajan (A.D. 98–117), Stalin’s use of
intelligence in WW II, British covert action against Egypt after the Suez
crisis of 1956, and the role ambassadors played in intelligence in Renais-
sance Italy. The final contribution deals with intelligence during the cur-
rent conflict in Iraq.

It should come as no surprise that espionage in ancient times has many

similarities to today’s enterprise, although the penalties for an agent’s
failure are less drastic now. Likewise, as Christopher Andrew notes in his
foreword, speaking truth to power, whether in Soviet times under Stalin,
in Saddam’s Iraq, or during the war on terror, has always been a challenge
for those in intelligence work. The broad historical perspective of this vol-
ume on what works and what does not in intelligence will be of value to
students of the profession as they search for answers to today’s intelli-
gence problems.

44 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Bookshelf—March 2008

Jan Stanislaw Ciechanowski (eds.), Living With the Enigma Secret: Marian
Rejewski 1905-1980 (Bydgoszcz, Poland: Bydgoszcz City Council, 2005), foot-
notes, photos, chronology, no index. Preface by Prof. Zbigniew Brzezinski.

With the publication of The Ultra Secret in 1974, the world learned that
British codebreakers had broken the secret traffic produced by the Ger-
man Enigma machine. 11 This achievement aided the British victory in the
Battle of the Atlantic, allowed the allies to monitor German military move-
ments, and made possible the successful Double Cross operation that iden-
tified all German agents in Britain and allowed MI5 to turn many into
double agents. What was not reported then and not formally and officially
recognized until 2005, was that three Polish cryptographers had broken
the code in 1933 and given their results to the British just before WW II.
One of the cryptographers was lost in France before he could get to Brit-
ain. The other two worked with the British throughout the war. One
stayed in Britain after the war, where his contributions went unacknowl-
edged. The third, Marian Rejewski, returned to his family in Poland where
he hoped to finish his PhD, but the communist government prevented him
from achieving this goal. He died in 1980.

Living With the Enigma Secret is a collection of reminiscences in Rejews-

ki’s honor. A contribution by Rejewski’s daughter gives biographic details
and reveals that her father wrote and published an article in 1967 about
his breaking the Enigma: no notice was taken. Then, in 1973, French cryp-
tographer Gustave Bertrand published a book telling of Rejewski’s role. It
too went unnoticed in the West. Other articles in this book describe the
role of the Polish security services prior to WW II, provide details of just
how the Poles contacted the British and made available the Enigma se-
cret, and reveal Rejewski’s treatment by the Polish communist security
services. French historian, Colonel Frederic Guelton, adds a short piece on
the French participation in the Polish “cracking the Enigma.”(265) The fi-
nal article, by David Kahn, explains the value of Enigma in the Battle of
the Atlantic. The book concludes with a detailed chronology of Rejewski’s
life.

Living With the Enigma Secret is an important, long overdue contribution

to the history of cryptology and sets straight the record of Marian Rejew-
ski’s role. 12

Michael Salter, Nazi War Crimes, US Intelligence and Selective Prosecu-

tion at Nuremburg: Controversies Regarding the Role of the Office of

11F.W. Winterbotham, The Ultra Secret (New York: Harper&Row, 1974).

12For a more detailed discussion of the cooperation between Britain and Poland during WW II see: Tessa
Stirling, Daria Natecz, and Tadeusz Dubicki, Intelligence Co-Operation Between Poland and Great Britain
During World War II: The Report of the Anglo-Polish Historical Committee (London: Vallentine Mitchell,
2005). Reviewed in “Intelligence Officer’s Bookshelf,” Studies in Intelligence 50, No. 1.

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 45

Bookshelf—March 2008

Strategic Services (New York: Routledge-Cavendish, 2007), 458 pp., footnotes,

bibliography, appendix, index.

At first glance the idea that OSS played a role in the Nuremburg war
crimes trials seems an impossibility since the organization was abolished
before the trials began. But in a sense it is accurate. During the war, OSS
established a war crimes staff that grew to 130 analysts and assembled
data on individuals that might be tried after the war. This staff remained
in Nuremburg after the war as part of the Strategic Services Unit (SSU)
that replaced OSS. Most of this very detailed book dwells on its contribu-
tion and the participants involved. One of its major themes is the contro-
versy surrounding the granting of immunity to suspected war criminals
who might have been of help to the Allies in the post-war world in which
the Soviet Union was viewed as the next threat. One example looked at in
detail is the case of SS General Karl Wolff, who cooperated with Allen
Dulles in Operation Sunrise, an operation that was intended to bring the
war in Italy to a close before a German surrender. For his efforts, Wolff es-
caped trial at Nuremberg, and this book examines “the trenchant moral
judgments regarding Wolff’s alleged immunity from prosecution”(5) in
terms of evidence found since the decision was made.

The book details the involvement in Nuremberg of OSS Director William

Donovan, who during the war planned on an OSS role in any war crimes
trial. After his dismissal in 1945, Donovan was assigned to the Nuremburg
trials as deputy to Robert Jackson, the principal trial judge. Donovan had
definite views on the trials’ handling, and they conflicted sharply with
Jackson’s. For example, Donovan argued that the basis for prosecution of
military war criminals should be documents and direct testimony, an ap-
proach Jackson rejected for the use, inter alia, of films of the concentration
camps. The book mentions that former OSS officer Franz Neumann
helped Donovan in these matters, although Salter does not point out that
Neumann was a Soviet agent.

According to Salter, before the differences with Jackson led to Donovan’s

dismissal, he conducted a series of one-on-one negotiations with Herman
Goering. Salter alleges that Donovan urged Goering to accept responsibil-
ity for all the Nazi war crimes in order to expedite Goering’s sentencing
and execution. The top leaders would be tried at Nuremberg while most
former Nazis would be tried under German law by German courts. The
idea is said to have been unacceptable to Jackson. Unfortunately this sto-
ry, while interesting, is not well documented. 13

13 The source Salter uses for this story is Richard Dunlop, DONOVAN: America’s Master Spy (Chicago: Rand

McNally, 1982). Unfortunately Dunlop does not document this point. Neither Slater nor Dunlop explains
how Donovan, who did not speak German, could have had “one-on-one” conversations with Goering, who did
not speak English.

46 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1

 Bookshelf—March 2008

Nazi War Crimes is an unexpected and important contribution to OSS his-

tory. It is comprehensive and with the exception noted, thoroughly docu-
mented with primary sources. And it adds a new chapter to the life of the
legendary “Wild Bill” Donovan.

Intelligence Services Abroad

B. Raman, The Kaoboys of R&AW: Down Memory Lane (New Delhi: Lancer
Publishers, 2007), 294 pp., index.

———, Intelligence: Past, Present and Future (New Delhi: Lancer Publish-
ers, 2002), 416 pp., bibliography, index.

K. Sankaran Nair, Inside IB and RAW: The Rolling Stone that Gathered
Moss (New Delhi, Manus Publications, 2008), index.

History has always been important to retired Indian intelligence officer B.

Raman. In Kaoboys of R&AW, citing the CIA “historical division” prece-
dent, (27) he reveals that in 1983 Rameshwar Nath Kao, the first chief of
India’s foreign intelligence service—the Research & Analysis Wing—es-
tablished a historical section. Unfortunately, it was abolished in 1984
when Kao left office. Raman was not surprised; he knew that in India or-
ganizational change often followed new leadership. Raman had joined the
Indian Police Service in 1961 and was transferred in 1967 to the External
Division of the Intelligence Bureau (IB), then India’s foreign intelligence
element. He became a Kaoboy when R&AW was established as an indepen-
dent entity in 1968. After assignments in Paris and Geneva, he headed the
Counter-Terrorism Division from 1988 to 1994 and then retired to accept
a cabinet secretariat position, where he served on various antiterrorism
commissions and testified twice before the US Congress. After his perma-
nent retirement, citing the precedents set by retired CIA officers, he decid-
ed to write these memoirs.

Kaoboys of R&AW tells about India’s struggle to develop a full range of in-
telligence service capabilities while at war with Pakistan and China and
while managing conflicts among religious factions and dealing with tribal
disputes on its borders. Raman also examines charges of CIA disinforma-
tion campaigns and covert action operations against India, R&AW efforts
to counter domestic and foreign terrorist acts, and the constant turf bat-
tles with the Indian domestic intelligence service, the IB.

The book has two central themes. The first is the relationship of R&AW to
the prime ministers under which it served, and the problems created when
two of them were assassinated. Those unfamiliar with India get a sense of
its political history. The second theme is the pervasive threat to national
security from Pakistan and separatist groups as well as the actions taken
to deal with provocations and incidents. Raman does not provide opera-

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Bookshelf—March 2008

tional detail in terms of tradecraft or case studies. There is a chapter on

R&AW relations with foreign intelligence agencies that concentrates on
high-level contacts with the CIA and French services. An example of the
latter is a visit to the CIA by Kao where he is received positively by DCI
George Bush. He views the relationship with the CIA as a mix of coopera-
tion when interests coincide and the reality of the operational imperative.
As an example of the latter, he mentions instances in which the CIA re-
cruited two R&AW officers. He does not mention the reverse possibility.

Kaoboys of R&AW gives a good high-level overview of the formation, evo-

lution, and current status of the Indian intelligence services.

In his earlier book, Intelligence, Raman presents a survey of Indian intel-

ligence from colonial times, when the IB was created (he calls it the
“world’s second oldest internal security agency”—the French being the
first) (1)—to the present eight intelligence agencies that form India’s in-
telligence community. His approach is topical, covering all elements of
modern intelligence—military, political, technical, collection, analysis, co-
vert action, counterintelligence, oversight, and management of the intelli-
gence process. For comparison, he often refers to the experience of US
intelligence agencies and the commissions formed to investigate them. For
example, as a basis for establishing India’s military intelligence element,
he cites in great detail the precedents of DIA’s formation and its evolution.
(31–36) Similarly, the NSA, NRO, NGA and related agencies provide the
rationale for counterparts in India. When discussing the requirement for
good counterintelligence, examples from the UK are cited and the Aldrich
Ames case is analyzed as an exemplar of what should and should not be
done.

In short, Raman’s Intelligence is a text book by an experienced intelligence

officer who certainly understands the fundamental elements of the profes-
sion and provides a framework for successful operations, not only in India,
but in any democratic society.

K. Sankaran Nair’s Inside IB & RAW does not deserve the professional at-
tention Raman’s books have received. Although the dust jacket claims
Nair served as a head of R&AW, in fact, he held the post for less than 3
months in the 1970s.(174) He spent more time in the IB, and the book has
some interesting stories about his attempts in the 1960s to advise recently
formed African nations about security services. Overall, though, he pro-
vides little beyond anecdotal “scribblings”(95) focusing on personal epi-
sodes and dealings with his superiors that are of no great intelligence
value. It is a memoir covering his entire life, and while it no doubt recounts
some impressive political accomplishments, it is primarily of local interest
and a minor contribution to the intelligence literature.

48 Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008)

 Bookshelf—March 2008

Michael Ross with Jonathan Kay, The Volunteer: The Incredible True Story
of an Israeli Spy on the Trail of International Terrorists (New York: Sky-
horse Publishing, 2007), 294 pp., no index.

When in 1992, Victor Ostrovsky attempted to publish By Way of Deception,

a book that revealed his adventures as a Mossad officer, the Israeli gov-
ernment obtained an injunction against the Canadian publisher. The pro-
cess was repeated for an American edition. Ostrovsky fought back, and
both editions were eventually published. The publicity made them best
sellers and confirmed his former status. Now, Michael Ross, claiming the
same credentials, has followed a similar path, but with no comment from
Israel.

Volunteer is the story of Canadian Michael Ross, who went to Europe to

see some of the world after completing military service. On impulse he
went to Israel. There he worked on a kibbutz, learned Hebrew, converted
to Judaism, married an Israeli, and was recruited by the Mossad in 1988
where he served until 2001. Ross tells in considerable detail of his training
before describing missions in Africa, Europe, South East Asia, and the
United States. There also were missions in the Middle East against terror-
ist groups “to foil attempts by Syria, Libya, and Iran to acquire advanced
weapons technology.”(vii) He describes assignments at Mossad headquar-
ters and as liaison with the FBI and CIA, in which he has unflattering re-
marks to make about the late CIA officer Stan Moskowitz that suggest
Ross did not know him at all.

Life in the field was too much for Ross’s marriage, and he divorced, became
estranged from his children, and suffered “depression, anger, compulsive
behaviors, posttraumatic syndrome, and general alienation.”(viii) But, he
tells the reader, he still admires the Mossad and all it stands for. Ross says
at the outset that much of his book is “nominally secret,” adding, with a
touch of arrogance, that his former colleagues need not worry, as he has
left out anything that in his “judgment” might “compromise” them.(viii)

Volunteers has been published in the United States and in Canada, but the
latter version lacks a chapter titled, Failure To Launch, that tells of Ross’s
work against Hamas with FBI-CIA contacts. No explanation is given. Both
editions lack documentation. We are left with a well written story book
that asks the reader to “trust me,” but provides little reason to do so.

❖❖❖

Studies in Intelligence Vol. 52, No. 1 (Extracts-March 2008) 49