Global agenda at the University of Delaware spies lies and sneaky guys. I'm Ralph BEG lighter you these journalist in residence. This global agenda Series is supported by the World Affairs Council of Wilmington end by the University of Delaware Center for International Studies. The Department of Political Science and International Relations and the Department of Communication the website and graphics for this year's series are being created by the students and faculty of the visual communication group of the UD art department and we're very grateful to them for that. We've learned a great deal this spring from practitioners in the craft >> Intelligence and espionage among the things we've learned is that the field is full of surprises. And that's been corroborated by some real-world events. Very recently. Certainly many were surprised by the attacks of September 11th 2001. Many were surprised to learn of CIA agents operating on the ground. After that in Afghanistan and less prominently in Iraq within the past few weeks. Many were surprised by the inability of US intelligence to track down Osama Bin Laden. Either in 1998 as we learned from our speaker on SPY photography last time >> Or after 911 and we've been surprised by the several inconclusive attempts to locate Saddam Hussein. Not that we were looking for him. But I'll just leave it at that. We've also been surprised in recent years to discover through news media reports that the United States actually encourage the transfer of secret weapons shipments from Iran to Muslim fighters in Central Europe Europe encouraged by the United States. And we've been shocked to read that a CIA director misused highly classified intelligence documents on his laptop computer >> Cia Director everything surprised by allegations of Chinese espionage at the Los Alamos weapons lab. Many of these surprises would have gone either unnoticed or at least long deferred if it weren't for journalists who spend their lives chasing after the secrets of the intelligence community that the government doesn't want you to know. Tonight will experience a bit of that phenomenon as a journalist myself I hope you'll forgive me for believing that this watchdog function plays as important a role in the world of spies lies and sneaky guys as it does in the world of open government business the environment and other arenas. Many of you met our speaker already this evening. Jim rising was out in the lobby signing his new book. And I want to announce at this time that his book The main enemy will be also available after his talk this evening. And if you if you get out and inside the by1 after his talk he will rush out there as soon as he possibly can to sign it for you so don't leave in a hurry. If you don't want to if you'd like to get his signature in your copy of the book. Please he's glad to do that. To introduce tonight's speaker I'm delighted to present a new colleague of mine Dr. Jason my cough It was one of two domestic institutions scholars in the Political Science department. Professor my cough is teaching a legislative politics course right now. And one of the University of Delaware is media and politics courses focusing especially on domestic political campaigns and policy. His research and other classes cover Congress polling data analysis political parties interest groups campaign war chests and fundraising voting behavior and elections. Professor Microphone earned his Masters and PhD at Ohio State University and spent some time in Washington as an undergraduate professor My perfectly >> Good evening I am j's Mike off and it is my great pleasure. This evening to introduce our speaker tonight. New York Times correspondent James rising. Myths arise that is a critically acclaimed journalist who covers national security and the intelligence community. His recent work for The Times has covered a wide variety of intelligence community issues. To give you a taste of some of his work. He's recently written on the use of US intelligence capabilities in recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He's recently written about the Bush administration's plan to expand the powers of the central times the agency in terms of providing domestic records data wiretaps. He's also written about a botched counterintelligence. Operation made against China where an intelligence community leak may have contributed to the failure of a an attempt to bug of Chinese version of Air Force One. And finally he's written about an increase pressure on CIA analysts to find a link between Iraq and I'll Haida throughout his career Mr. horizon has and a number of important stories international media. He was the first to write about security breaches. With such cases as one who we and John Deutsch. He also broke the story that the Clinton administration okayed the shipment of arms from Iran to Bosnia. One of the milestones in his career was winning a Pulitzer Prize in 2002. This prize was one with a team of New York Times journalist. Who wrote a series of articles entitled a nation challenged. And this is published in the months following the September 11th attacks. Mr. rises particular contribution to this series of articles. Was an article that focused on a link between the Pakistani nuclear arms Program and Al-Qaeda the story. I'll also focused on the threats with this length may provide to the United States US efforts to encourage full cooperation from the Pakistani government and the investigation. In addition to his injury but he's journalistic. Endeavors. Mr. rising is an accomplished author. His most recent book which Ralph discussed earlier >> Main enemy is hot off the presses and in fact this was first delivered here to New York today. Main enemy is coauthored by former CIA intelligence officer. Milk bearded and provides an insider's perspective to the competition between US and Soviet intelligence. Organizations in the final years of the Soviet Union is the first detailed account of this time period in terms of intelligence activities. Leading up to that collapse of the Soviet Union. In addition the book focuses on problems with the US intelligence community. Exploring some high profile examples such as the aims and Hanson espionage cases >> Given this extensive experience in covering national security uncovering intelligence issues. And his extraordinary access to intelligence operatives. Mr. Isaac is without question. In a position to further enlighten us about spies lies as Nicky guys. So without further ado I give you New York Times journalist author and Pulitzer Prize winner. James rising. Thanks very much appreciate your time and thanks for having me here. I wanted to I thought I would start off by >> Talking about how a reporter ends up dealing with trying to cover a secret world a world in which no one really wants to hear from a reporter world in which you can go to jail for talking to a reporter and a world in which there are no press conferences. Or there's no press room at the CIA. You can't get a press pass to go into the CI. And you can't even go there with that. You get a physically get into the building without going through extensive security clearance security process. I mean have I don't know if any of you have ever been to Langley but they have a security gate about a mile away from the building so you can't even get near the building without going through security. And so it was it's an area where very few reporters really have an interest in trying to cover it full-time. And for good reason because it's difficult to get stories out of it. And so I thought I'd tell you a little bit about how I ended up doing this because it's certainly not how I how I thought of myself as a reporter before it's not something I ever thought about covering before I got into it. In fact I was I was a business reporter. For most of my career I covered the auto industry in Detroit. And then I came to Washington about 12 years ago. And I started covering economic policy and I covered the recession in the early nineties and then the recovery in the mid nineties and I started getting kind of bored with economics. And I started asking my editors want you know once you let me do something else And they kept dragging their feet as editors or want to do or is any kind of manager has wanted to do. And it took a long time to get them. And I finally just said hey you know let me do some mouse. What do you got and S1 editor came to me and said Well we got this job or you could cover State Department half time covering Latin America and the CIA half time. And at the time I was then at the Los Angeles Times this the paper did not have anybody covering the CI full time. And I said to myself I'll take that that sounds you know I had no intention really of covering mexico. Despite what they wanted >> The Los Angeles Times has a long history of at least at that time they had a long history of talking about Mexico but never really writing any stories about it. And so I I knew that they really weren't all that interested in Mexico. So I figured this is a way to do something new. And I decided that I would take this job and then kind of created into something that that I wanted to do which was right about intelligence. And I found out very quickly how difficult it was to get anybody to talk at the time >> C i is actually slightly better now at press relations and they were then. But they had people who at the time in the mid nineties the late nineties the CIA's press officers were mostly intelligence officers case officers who were rotating into that job briefly for a year to or then and then rotating at and they had no no real interest whatsoever in telling you anything or even talking to you and but this just at about the same time that I started covering the CA a strange thing was happening which I didn't realize at the time. The Cold War had just ended a few years earlier and about two years before about a year and a half before I started covering it although James had been arrested for spying for the Soviet Union he had been a longtime mole inside the CIA. And I've realized pretty soon after I started doing this that a lot of people were Leave him the CIA deeply embittered by what by the budget cuts by the the retribution that was the feuding that was going on inside the CI over the finger-pointing over the aims case they ended the Cold War was changing their whole approach to intelligence. All the people who had fought the cold war were leaving the CIA. And many of them were very bitter about the way they were being shown the door. And some of them I think for the very first time in their lives wanted to find someone who would tell their story. And it was a very interesting experience for me because I had never covered. I'd never been over. I'd never served as a foreign correspondent. And as I said I had spent most of my time as a business reporter and I'd never really covered intelligence before. But I think in many ways that was what I was kinda the person some of these people were looking for they the reporters who covered the aims case The major newspapers had in the previous year or two before I started covering this. They had written about many of these people. And they by nature had to write some nasty things about him because they had made mistakes. And so these people who were leaving the CI didn't want to talk to the reporters who had just written nasty things about him. They were looking for somebody new. And now they were all retired sitting in their homes in Lang in McLain or in Vienna or in Alexandria in Bethesda and stewing but their heads were all filled with secrets. And I began to try and meet them. And I found that once you got past a little bit of the bitterness and a little bit of the anger at the way they had been treated and some fascinating stories to tell about that had never really no one had ever heard. And so I began to put some of that in the newspaper and then I realized it might actually make a good book. And so that's kind of the genesis of this book that I've written about the end of the Cold War in the CIA's role in the last six years of the Cold War. And at the same time I think this a parallel something very similar was happening in Moscow at the the coup in Moscow in August of 91 as you know led to the collapse of the Soviet Union by December 91. And very shortly thereafter thousands of KGB officers were also fired and shown the door. The KGB was broken up into separate organizations. The Russian Federation which succeeded the Soviet Union created what's known and in place of the KGB they created an organization called the SPR which is their foreign intelligence agency. And the FSB which is the Domestic Security Agency. Those were really although they had new names are essentially the KGB with with they were in the same buildings. Actually the FS VR is still in the old. Yes ANOVA headquarters of the first Directorate of the KGB which was the foreign intelligence on. And the FSB is still head still headquartered in division ski square which was the old main headquarters of the KGB. But but they worship greatly greatly reduced in size. And many of the senior KGB officers were sitting in their house in their apartments. They didn't have nice houses in McLain are Alexandria like the CIA officers did and they were mainly unemployed and they were looking for some kind of job to do. And they were also ready to talk. And many of them in fact were more willing to talk than the ex CIA officers Because they were just as they were just as embittered at their employer but they add another layer of bitterness and that was it the way the Soviet Union had ended. And the way in which they were being felt that they were being held responsible for many of the tragedies of the Soviet Union. And many of them felt that they were being treated unfairly for that. And so if you got beyond their bitterness and their anger at the system they had many interesting stories to tell about intelligence operations. And so this idea formed my head to try and talk to both sides about CIA KGB operations and how those really done unheard of in the last few years of the Cold War. And as we as I put this together I found that a number of things that one area in particular had never really been documented. And that was what were the CIA KGB doing from the time of the Berlin Wall fell until the collapse of the Soviet Union. Now there have been plenty of books written about the Alder James case or the Robert Hansen case or the john blocker case from an earlier period. But no one had ever tried to put all the all the put it all together into one narrative of how intelligence together in this period and no one had ever done a really gotten into the the secret operations that were going on while we were all watching CNN and they are Germans celebrating. And then in August of 91 when the when the Boris Yeltsin stood on the tank in front of the White House and and stood stood up to the coup plotters. So that's what I've tried to focus on. And I found a number of really fascinating things. And that was to me the most startling fact was that the KGB and CIA worked together much more than anyone ever knew during the Cold War they had closer relationships than on a professional basis. Then that just really stunned me. It turned out that there was a secret hotline between KGB headquarters and CIA headquarters. That began first in 1983. It was called the gorilla OFF channel. The KGB nicknamed it after a Russian poet from the 19th century Russian would have ever heard of. And whenever there was a crisis whenever there was a major defector case or a or a major scandal going on. That the two sides needed to talk about in the CIA or the KGB would pick up the telephone. And they would say I need to talk to give runoff. And that was the code name to hold a meeting between the CIA and the KGB. And they would hold meetings in places like Vienna or Helsinki. Just one or two intelligence officers from each side. Getting together to talk about the nasty business that they were in. No almost no one outside no one even within the CIA KGB almost no one knew that this existed. It was never very few CIA officers ever had any idea that there were these kind of secret meetings going on And what I found was that in the middle of the coup in August 1991 this channel became critical to the CIA is an understanding of how what that was happening to Mikhail Gorbachev. He was as you remember may remember he was stuck in his summer dacha on the Black Sea on vacation when the coup plotters arranged for him to be held under house arrest. Well a small cabal of reactionaries from within his government people that who we had. And he knew that they were opposed to many of his policies but they had been reluctant to purge them from his government because he felt he needed them politically. They took over well and declared a new emergency committed. The first day that this happened the CIA was done. They had no idea that occurs about to take place. Many people in hindsight I see that as a major intelligence failure by the CIA and I think that's a valid criticism. Ci had had some small indications that something was going on. But nothing that would have led them to believe that Major who was in the worms in a few months before I guess the best intelligence they had came from a source in Germany Soviet military officer and working at the Soviet mission. In West Germany who said that they Soviet High Command had called for volunteers from within the soviet officer corps who would be willing to go back to Moscow for special operations they were never told exactly what those special operations would be that the CIA got very worried by that report. And then about a month before the crew. The Mayor of Moscow met with the US ambassador in Moscow and said I think there might be a COO in the works. And James Baker Secretary of State took this seriously enough that he mentioned it to the Soviet foreign minister who pass it on to go to try. And Gorbachev dismiss the warning. Knowing that this was something that could never possibly happen. So on the morning of the coup actually the Qu began on a Sunday. And on Monday morning the CIA station chief in Moscow to work at seven in the morning wasn't listening to the radio hadn't heard any of the Lose overnight had gone to better early that he walked into the US embassy in Moscow and somebody walked up to him and he didn't he didn't even see any tanks on the road that morning because it because of the router takes took from somebody walked up to him and said I think something's going on. And that was how the CI found out about the coup and most Again. It's not they're not a pretty picture for the CIA. But very shortly thereafter that same CIA station chief got on the telephone called the KGB And said Is give roll off there and give roll off was the codename as I said for this secret communications channel between the KGB NCI and the real person there was a person who kinda personified gorilla for the KGB was a man named Remy Chris Selma cough who was chief of the American section of the second Chief Directorate of the KGB which is a long way of saying he's the main and follow the CIA officers in Moscow and kept track of what they were doing. And REM persona cough was an unreconstructed communist his firstname ran as an acronym. His father had been an NKVD officers which was the precursor to the KGB. He was born in 1927. And at a time when the revolutionary ardor is very strong and in Russia. And Rahm was an acronym for revolute ski mirror world revolution. And eventually went into the KGB any married a woman whose name was Neil which was Lenin spelled backwards. So he was a man who believed he was a true believer and so Dove Real off. So actually the CIA station chief called him got on the phone and give roll off. For some Lakoff told him let's meet this afternoon. May met in a Volga car which is was a Soviet limousine a black Volga in near Chinese restaurant in downtown Moscow just as the tanks were closing in on Boris Yeltsin. That Monday morning CI and KGB met to talk about it. And Priscilla cough give roll-off told the CIA station chief is a man named David Rolf. He said You don't understand. We have to do this. And for raw off it was a signal that maybe the KGB really was behind this because that was one of the questions that the CIA and the American government had how strong does the support within the security apparatus for the coup and Moscow what Christina Lakoff told Roth sent chills down Ross back at first he said if Boris Yeltsin wants a confrontation will give him one. And at first it seemed very much that the KGB was behind this could in fact Khrushchev who was the chief of the KGB was one of the key coup plotters. And so Ralf took this news back to CIA headquarters that the KGB was saying if Boris Yeltsin lenses confrontation and we'll give him one. But within that day by the end of that day it was still it was beginning to become clear to the CIA that something was wrong with this cute. Despite the bravado of croissant path. And despite the tanks swinging the White House where Boris Yeltsin by then was holed up It was clear that when Roth decided to send some of his officers from the CIA station out throughout the city to find out what was really going on he sent an officer to the airport. I found that he could get to the airport and you get back. And there were no tanks blocking the roads. They found that they can make telephone calls all over Moscow out. No one had controlled the telephone system. We found that there were tv shows that still didn't seem to be controlled by the coup plotters. And the news seem very confused as if the coup plotters had not yet gained complete control over all of the journalists in Moscow. And so he then by the end of the day after his first meeting with give roll-off began to send back memos saying I don't think this is really working out the way these plotters say it is. And so the CIA very quickly and before the rest of the US government began to get a sense that the plot might fail. And so while it's true that the CIA was caught completely by surprise by the two. It's also true I think in hindsight that they responded fairly well on the ground in Moscow what was going on and I just think that that the fact that they were able to meet the fact that the CIA KGB had a secret channel in which they could have conversations back channel conversations about in which they could get kinda these atmospherics of what was happening made a crucial difference had a key point in history. The fascinating thing was two days later they activated that give roll off channel again and the last day and occur on Wednesday in August. And by that time to roll off a changed his tune completely and got into the car again >> The Volga in the parked along the chain outside the Chinese restaurant. And give roll-off persona cuff was completely to shoveled. It looked as if he hadn't slept in three days Roth who had met Kristallnacht off several times to give real OFF channel was stoned. He was a man of impacted or bearing silver hair >> And just a real kind of intimidating force and a personal meeting. And he looked like a beaten man. He'd never seen anything like it. Kusama cough then began to say perhaps I didn't understand what was happening. Perhaps we were not informed properly by our superiors. Perhaps this coup was not the right thing to do. And he said you know maybe Mr. Yeltsin is right. When he says that this is illegal and the persona coughed and said to give rise to Roth this is you have to understand I was misinformed That was a clear signal to the CIA that the KGB was no longer behind the key that the KGB wanted enough and wanted to distance itself even though it's own chief was one of the key coup plotters. And so that signal went back to Washington and began to inform the Bush administration that this coup was beginning to fall apart. And so I think that may that moment those moments provides some may help and may help you understand why I find this area so fascinating to cover and to write about because I think what you begin to realize is that through the CIA through intelligence officers through the KGB officers you're getting kind of a sideways glance at a stage Shane that's being put on on television. When we see colon pal go to a foreign country or Donald Rumsfeld go to a foreign country and Luke with a liter of President Bush have an Oval Office meeting. What we're seeing on television or in the newspapers or getting the kind of the official agenda of what's happening. But through the intelligence officers if you begin to talk to them you realize they're the guys on the side or they're the guys backed by the curtains are in the back row. Listening in to these meetings and beginning to to hear what's really happening and then they're reading the reports from their agents. And they're the ones who go into the White House and say I'm sorry Mr. President. The leader of Syria just lied to you about what's really happening. Or it goes to the Secretary of State and say I'm sorry that country's policy is completely different from what you have been told it is. And here's the evidence. And so what you're getting I think is I like to think of it as kind of a like standing on the backstage at a plane and you're seeing people walk on and off stage and you're hearing the actors moderate to themselves as lame as they leave and you're getting a little bit to the side by play from from what's really happening in the world. And I think it's it's a completely different perspective on foreign policy than you can or you can get from any other direction. So that was kind of what led me into this. And I thought I'd tell you a little bit about some of the other news in our book. One of the as I said found out about the secret channel between the KGB and CIA. But as we also move forward through the various spy cases as I was actually working on this book when Robert Hanson who is arrested. And I realized immediately that that would force a complete revision of what I thought I knew about espionage cases just as it did to the CIA and the FBI for sender revise everything they thought they knew. And began to look back at all of the major spy cases of the 990s in 990s You begin to kind of piece together. You'll now we're now at a point where we can begin begin to piece together a realm narrative of what happened and we have unfortunately in the past we've tended to look at these spy cases the Alder James case the John Walker case the Robert Hansen case. We've tended to look at them in isolation and not really tried to piece together. What is it they really gave to the Russians what does it they really betrayed and if you go back and try and piece them all together you begin to realize that and that there are still things that were betrayed that these people can't be held accountable for. And I realized that if you go back to what is known in the intelligence world as the year of the spy 1985. When a whole series of spies were betrayed we tend to believe now that older chains and Robert Hanson and Edward Lee Howard who was fired CIA officer were the ones who betrayed all of the American spies working for the Soviet Union in the mid 19 eighties who were executed by the Soviets. There were about ten or 12. Soviet agents between between 198587 were shot in the back of the head. In one of the shooting prisons of the Soviet Union and the FBI and CIA tended to believe for many years. That first Edward Lee Howard who was a CIA officer who was fired and then decided he was so angry that he would spy for the Russians. And then older change. We're responsible for all of those losses than with Robert Hansen's arrest. They realized oh no it had to be some had to be handsome. But now I find as I talk to people in the government and as you do try and do a careful reconstruction that there was someone else that they have not yet identified. And as you talked to more and more people inside the government you realize that they're they think there is a fourth man. Just as in the if you remember in Britain there was a spiraling from Cambridge they were all students in the thirties from Cambridge and they call them. The five the Cambridge Five. I think now there is another. A fourth spy who they still have not yet identified. And I've been told that there is an active investigation looking to try and sort it out. And that's because there are several of the spies American agents who were shot in Russia who were betrayed at times and in ways that aims Hanson inevitably Howard cannot be cannot be blamed for. It just doesn't work. Doesn't work all the time and doesn't work. And as we went through this and as I tried to sort this out it was like a revelation and then I started going to people in the government and saying Is this right And they would kind of be surprised and stunned and a little bit chagrined that we'd figured this out and they said yes. But we don't know who it is. And we're not sure what to do about it. And so that to me was one of the really stunning things to come out of this is that we can go for 20 years and think we know but the truth is on the spy cases and then constantly be surprised because something else always turns up. Hansen was a major surprise aims was a supplier's equity. Howard was a surprise at first the CIA in 1985. If you go back if you remember back to the middle of the Cold War in 1985. You remember that there were a series of spies who suddenly started dying in Russia and there were a series of Americans who began to get arrested for spying for the Soviets. And the Press nicknamed it the euro of spot. What we didn't know at that time even as John Walker who was with the Navy was arrested for turning over Navy codes to the Soviets. And as Vitale your Chienco who was a KGB defector came to the United States and then defected again. And as Edward Lee Howard was arrested. What we didn't know is that the middle of all that Alder James and volunteered to spy. And you wouldn't be caught for another nine years. And Robert Hanson had volunteered to spy and wouldn't be caught for another 15 or 16 years. So there are always layers upon layers of the spy cases. And it's extremely difficult to sort out the truth in any any one of them. Because in many of these cases one there are more than one person who betray the same thing. For instance I think one of the most interesting spy cases of the Cold War involved a man named Adolf TO catch off. He was a Soviet scientist who was a designer within the Soviet aviation design bureau responsible for all of their designs of Soviet fighter and bomber aircraft. He was a secret dissidents. In the 19 seventies he come to hate the Soviet system. But he knew because of his clearances and because of his job that he would never be able in any way to go public with his opposition to the government even though there were dissident groups popping up in Moscow at the time he knew that as soon as he whatever approach of dissonant group he would be arrested. Because of who he was and what he did. And so he decided the only way for him to oppose the Soviet regime was to actually spy for the United States. And to give the sequence what he did he had a volume or seek military sequence. So we approached the CIA station chief in Moscow dropped a note in his car. Let's see I ignored him and figuring it was a provocation. And he did this four times Before the sudden before the CIA took seriously the last time he did it he left a phone number part of his own phone number. And he left a note saying if you want left out the final two digits at his phone number. He said if you want to get my full phone number come to a certain square and noun downtown Moscow at a certain time. And I'll be standing there holding something that has two numbers on it. And then you'll get the rest of my phone number. And so the CI sent an officer there they found and they saw him holding something with two numbers on it. And they got the final digits of his funds were able to contact them. He became probably the best spy in the history of the CIA. He delivered thousands and thousands and thousands of pictures photographs of secret Soviet aviation designs that the Air Force took and declared in a in a report later that there were worth at least $5 billion to the US government. He had he allowed the US Air Force in the late 19 seventies and early 19 eighties to design every American aircraft in such a way that it could defeat any Soviet aircraft not yet. So it was there it was the origin is an American air supremacy. 990s in 990s. Tokyo chaff spied from about 1979 to about 1985. In 1983 a young CIA officer named Edward Lee Howard who had previously worked for the Peace Corps in South America but he had a drug problem was assigned to Moscow and he was going to be toolkit shafts case officer. And just before he was assigned to just before he was about to leave from Moscow. He had to take another polygraph test just because he was going into such a sensitive program. In this polygraph he had trouble with questions about his drug use and about petty thievery he'd been on an airplane travelling the year before. And sf for some strange reason he decided to steal the person the woman in front of him. And he got away with it at the time and he he had he had a very emotional problems. Psychological problem is wrapped up in this idea this ego idea of being a secret stealer. And this all came out on his polygraph including the fact that he was still doing drugs. And we had an alcohol problem. So the CI fired and they fired him after who knew all about aid off topic shaft the most in sport and important spy in the history of the CIA. And all they did was let him go back through album to New Mexico to drink and think about it. And a year later he approach the Soviets and offered to tell them everything they knew. And six months after that it off topic shaft is arrested and shot. It was maybe one of the biggest blunders in the history of the CIA. But one of the things that confuse the CIA after that Was that Alder James who had volunteered to the Soviets about a year after Edward Lee heritage or maybe six months after also told the Soviets about Adolph Topeka. He also told them about a number of other operations that Edward Lee Howard It also told the Soviets about. And so by late 1985 actually in August 1985 a man named Vitale your Chienco KGB senior KGB Turner decided to defect to the United States. And he walked into the US embassy in Rome. The CIA officer you have a mole inside the CIA is name. Is code name that we use is Mr. Robert. And he was just fired by the CIA. Immediately the CI figured that had to be utterly heroin. He was the only person who had been fired who was bound from ascap. And so then the CIA after your Chienco killing CSR we've solved our problem. Our problem was Ed Lillehammer. But they didn't know was that they had another problem. An even bigger problem because right as right as they were investigated >> Edward heroin Alder James was meeting with the KGB in Washington and was turning over documents about every single spy the US had in Soviet Union. And the CIA and the KGB was stunned by the level of penetration of them had no idea how many agents or over a dozen American spies inside the KGB at one time. And said they began to to shoot them. They began to execute them. Kate CIA began to see this began to see these what they call them nominees. They would hear they would sometimes it wasn't obvious exactly what had happened. They would send a CIA officer out in LA scout for a meeting and no one would show up. And then later they would hear well you know he had an accident or has been transferred or his his mother Brazil or he got called to China or something. And then they would have here these things where a guy would call his wife and say I'm OK.. And so they weren't quite sure what was happening. But it kept happening. And by 1986 they had lost all of their Never in Russia. It was all gone and they began to call it within the Ci the 1985 problem. And they didn't know what it was. But what they did after that was maybe the most egregious mistake to see I ever did and that was after it stopped happening because they'd lost all their ages. They began to ignore the problem. And they acted as if everything is okay again. Because they had whoever was doing it whatever it happened it had stopped. And it stopped for two reasons but they didn't know what those reasons are First reason was Alder James had been transferred to Rome. Cia station in Rome. No longer had the same level of access to information that he had in his job in Washington when he was at the time he betrayed the CIA he was chief of counter intelligence for the Soviet division of the CA which gave him access to everything about Soviet operations. In Rome he had much less access. As soon as he left the losses and for the time being the CIA didn't know that. And they just assumed that whatever had happened it had been fixed. So they didn't do any major investigation until the early 990s. And it was only the CI has long said that they finally through analysis through hard work. They were able to figure this out. What we found out is that they actually got a Russian spy to tell them who is who and who and I then who had been there mole. And they've never admitted that before. They've not rounded to say that in part because they're trying to protect the spy one of the things I think after that after the aims case was just as with Edward Lee Howard they believe they can now close the books. That aims was aims solved all the cases aims was guy. It's kind of like a police department when there's a serial killer out there there's a whole series of murders. And we've got one guy who a restaurant guy and you want to blame him for all the murders. Is that saw that closes the books it's the same thing at the CIA. They were able to say this is the guy who did it all. We're all done. We fixed the problem was that the FBI the FBI was willing to say the same thing. The FBI said I resolved and Ricardo was the CIA's problem not our problem. But as in throughout the nineties they began to get indications from Russian sources that there was still another problem. And they didn't really want to admit that. Finally in the mid nineties the CIA counterintelligence Center and the FBI were forced to admit that they still had a problem because they had never been able to solve one case in particular. And that was the case of Felix Bloch who in 1989 had been investigated for espionage at the State Department. And he was right as he was coming under investigation by the FBI. He was warned by the KGB that he was under investigation by the FBI. It was a case that people in the FBI and CIA were convinced that someone had leaked the information. They were convinced that there was a problem somewhere but they were reassured themselves by the fact. And I find this somewhat amusing that they had told the French Intelligence Service abandoned. And they figured it had to be the French. And so for years they went on without investigating what had happened to the Block case. But eventually that was no longer possible to ignore it. They begin to realize Aldrich Ames did not know about Felix Bloch. Edward Lee Howard certainly couldn't live by that time he had defected and was living drinking himself to death in Moscow But the CIA had known about the Block case. Maybe Alder James didn't know about it but the CIA did know about it. It wasn't purely an FBI operation. By that time after aims his arrest the FBI was ascendant and the CIA was in serious decline. The FBI had taken over Canada intelligence from the CIA. And FBI official has said it had to be at the CIA had to be at the CI. There was no possible no way an FBI agent would have done that. And so they began a mole hunt again at the CIA after ends is arrested. And by the late nineties they'd focused on one CIA officer named Brian Kelly who had all of the mark in all of the circumstances for this case fit him perfectly he was one of the key operatives involved in figuring out how to get the block case work. He had he had identified a KGB a legal officer. In Vienna who who would he thought might know about the source of the State Department. So we had played a key role in the in the block investigation. He also lived in Vienna Virginia and tended to job in a park caught not Away Park in Vienna. And he shopped at certain stores and all of that fit a pattern because the CI CI and the FBI were told that whoever was doing this sometimes left dead drops in Norway part. And sometimes went to certain stores were KGB officers work. And sometimes went was n was apparently a devout Catholic. Turned out that Robert Hanson lived about two blocks away from Brian Kelly. He did at dead drops and not Away Park. But he didn't job there. Went to the same catholic church as Brian Kelly. But he worked with the FBI and the CIA and the FBI was running the investigation. And they didn't want to hear about somebody at the FBI. And so finally the CI in order to finish this investigation had Brian Kelly. They broke into his house they gotta FISA warrant which is a secret court order allowing you to break into someone's house. And they found a map of not of a park with x's all over and times on it. They said it had to be a spine that they then confronted Brian Kelly. And this top secret document that they entertained and confrontative with him. And he looked at him and said what did you get my job back and eventually they had to give up on Kelo but only after another russian mole. Another Russian see KGB officer approached the CIA and said I've got the file on this mole. And when the see it when they see INFP I looked at it they were shocked animism FBI agent and not a CIA officer. Now they now know that even Hansen and Edward Lee Howard and aims can't account for everything But they don't know who is still out there. But there's always I think one thing you can learn from this world is is it's spying is is they like to say maybe the second oldest profession and I think it's still going on. And it's really fascinating world there will always be with us. So I thought I'd be happy to open with any questions. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah sure. I got. I got every hour >> Yeah mapping the questionnaire questionnaires says in all the cases that have been mentioned tonight in earlier and this is one of them. One name hasn't come up at all. That's the name of Jonathan Pollard who was accused of spying for Israel in the United States maybe you can comment on that before you do let me just remind you that Jim has also written about intelligence in Iraq. He's extensively covered the Chinese espionage cases and so on. So don't limit yourself just sit in your questionnaire >> Arena that that Jenna just spoken about it has remarked. Does concussion I have written about Pogge for The New York Times. In fact broke a story a couple of years ago about how George Tenet threatened to resign. If Bill Clinton pardoned Jonathan problem upon which Clinton was seriously thinking about doing. Because the Israelis wanted him to and because the Israelis was part of a peace negotiations over that Clinton and Brock are involved with Apollo cases a fascinating case. And it has been written about to some degree. I've written about old but it was Pollard was a very at a very troubled person. He actually has has insisted since he was arrested that he did this. Because Israel needed support from within the US intelligence community and that the CIA and the government were keeping information that Israel needed away from Israel. If you talk to people in the US government they dismiss those claims saying that pilot actually spied for other countries to he tried to give information to a whole series of countries for money and that he was really just interested in the money not in supporting Israel. But he has gained a lot of defenders >> Which I think partly because people don't completely understand the the magnitude in this case. I've got a question from a student or a student with a question. Community member yes sir. Ok. This is a question about the alleged spy for China and this is low. In Awesome I'm sorry. This is long in in Los Angeles who is the girlfriend of an FBI agent yeah actually I've been writing >> Story lately it's a fascinating case. If could bring everyone else up to date it's MS.. Katrina lung was a Chinese American businesswoman in Los Angeles who was arrested a few weeks ago on charges stemming she wasn't actually charged with espionage. She's facing lesser charges xi and an FBI agent who she had had a long-term affair where he was also arrested and she is charged with being a Chinese double agent. She had been an informer to the FBI since the early 19 eighties. Supposedly providing the FBI with intelligence about China. The FBI now says In fact she was a double agent taking information from the FBI and giving that to the Chinese her defenses that she's doing just what the FBI wanted her to do which was meet with the Chinese. It's a very kinda it's one of those cases of the wilderness of mirrors you know who was spying on who and it's it's really interesting. It's clear though at at the very least that the FBI completely mishandled her as a source. They allowed this one FBI agent who's been identified as James Smith to handle her for 20 years. And they had a long-term sexual relationship. That was apparently pretty common knowledge within the FBI field office in Los Angeles. She also had an affair with a second FBI agent in the San Francisco field office. And both of them just happened to be in charge of China's counter intelligence operations. Jim maybe you could talk for just a bit about the broader picture of Chinese alleged Chinese espionage against the United States. Yeah. Well I mean this goes up against this comes in the context I guess of Chinese and charges and Chinese espionage going back to went holy. And some of the earlier cases there's some evidence. The US government believes that in this case this woman may have known or these FBI agents may have told her about some of the other espionage investigations underway. Clearly they've already said that they believe she compromised a case against them in and Peter Lee who is a defense contract China's American defense contract worker who was investigated in the mid 990s for passive radar secrets to the Chinese. She clearly got some information about that case. It's not yet clear whether she knew about the when her lay investigation. But she did clearly know about a number of other cases through these AI agents who were deeply involved in all of the major Chinese intelligence operations by the FBI. And so it's led the a number of people in the intelligence community to think that since these guys these two FBI agents she is sleeping with new so much that she must buy now must. They must assume that she knows about it One of the funniest part of this whole story is that when the FBI finally confronted her in December she had in our possession classified FBI documents. She claims that she got them from the briefcase of her lover. While I was basically in bed with her he would leave his briefcase open. And she would take documents out of his briefcase and copy them and put them back without him knowing about it. But this is a relationship that they both admit went for 20 years. So it's kind of hard to believe that he didn't know what was going on >> Student with a question. Okay now go. Oh wait yes there is I'm sorry. The question is Do terrorist cells have the capability of spying against the United States or do they only or do they just use open sources like as who does such as his artifacts OK. Slightly loaded. The eye as far as I know they don't have an intelligence operatives yet able to penetrate the US government >> I think it's quite likely that al-Qaeda and other terrorist groups have received a lot of cooperation over the years from many Arab governments. Because partly because Islamic There are a number of Islamic fundamentalists in many of these Arab governments. And I think at the very least they avoided some of the security services of some of these governments especially before September 11th. Would if they did not pass on information do Al-Qaeda they would at least not investigate Al-Qaida very thoroughly. And I think it was really more of a case having Islamic fundamentalist sympathizers within those governments rather than actually moles or intelligence operatives I think it was just the fact that ideologically and theologically they thought alike. And so in countries like Yemen or Saudi Arabia or Pakistan or Afghanistan certainly they were able to get support and some kind of information I think out of those governments I think after September 11th that became much harder for them to do. Because the US began to crack down on all of those governance. Sir. Whatever happened to the whatever happened to the American corporations or in the case of the american corporations who are alleged to have supplied guidance systems and other technologies to the Chinese. Yeah I think that that's a good question that refers I guess to the morale cuz scandal which my colleague Jeff girth wrote in the New York Times reporter with me in Washington. It was a just it's a very complicated story just for those of you not familiar with it It was essentially the argument was that these two major US defense contractors who are working to provide build commercial satellites for China were looking the other way when the Chinese wanted to steal technology from there these commercial jobs in order to use it for the Chinese military satellite program and rocketry program. I don't know exactly where that stands today. I'm Jeff could probably tell you exactly. It kind of there was a long investigation by the State Department by the customs and the Commerce Department I think there were sanctions against those companies. But it really kind of ended in. And maybe you know more that I haven't tracked that lightly. But there was a long investigations and the US government about that whole problem. They changed the regulations are as I recall about the way in which technology transfers were allowed but I'm not sure house how effective those new regulations evolve. Yeah. Sir. Layer. Ok the question is asking about the when Holy case of alleged Chinese espionage at Los Alamos and the question and notes that he thought when ** Lee had been cleared of the Allegheny of mishandling classified information. He was in prison for about six to ten months in pretrial detention he was then enter a plea agreement when he pled guilty to that one felony counts there were 58 other accounts dismissed against him and the jobs and the case actually apologized to him because he felt that he had been mistreated by the US government. The there's been a lot of back and forth and debate about how that case was handled overhears. I think it's fair to say that the US government overcharged him began claimed he was a spy when they lack enough evidence to prove that the investigation began to fall apart. But he did it was held. It was actually it was interesting. He was actually arrested in December 1999 after the government had already acknowledged that they weren't showed he was a spy. Whole espionage investigation had fallen apart. And so one of the distinctions that should be made in that case was that he was not arrested. Based on the Espionage investigation he was arrested because he had downloaded massive amounts of data from the Los Alamos computer system into his personal computers. So he was charged with mishandle and classified information. The US government made a major mistake when they took that and tried to turn that into an espionage case against him. And that was I think the key mistake was Rather than letting him plead to a lesser charge on that that continue to try and turn that into trunk that into a major espionage case. Yeah I mean that's one of the debates you hear from people at Los Alamos about how significant rise what he was doing versus others. I mean there's that's goes back and forth. The actually the head of Los Alamos said that it was it was unique. It wasn't no one else was doing that. Other scientists have disagreed with that. Question from a student. Anyway. Okay. Right throughout the series of speakers we've heard a lot about the the relative value of human intelligence during the Cold War. Would you please comment on the on the value of human intelligence Yeah I think one of the things I've learned is that intelligence I don't believe ever really changes history. The US didn't win the Cold War because of the CIA. These large trends in world history happened because I think our system was better than the Soviet system their economy was falling apart their military was falling apart. So I'm not sure you can't really say can't point to any one human spy and say well this guy he's won the Cold War floors. But what I think what you can say is that they do make a difference in certain specific ways. You can when the Soviet Union for instance was had a massive defense buildup in the 19 seventies. And the US was beginning to get legitimately concerned about its ability to maintain a military superiority over this over the Soviets. A man like right off talk a trough came provided the secrets to the Soviet air force and allowed the US to maintain air supremacy for the next 20 years. Until in fact we are still benefiting from that today because many Iraq for instance we're dealing with old Soviet airplanes and old Soviet equipment. So I think in certain ways on the margins they make a difference but you can never point to a spy. I mean people like to say a spy and save the world or something like that it it's not quite it's never that way but it does I think they do make a difference in certain ways. They can help international security that certain time. Clearly I think in the war on terrorism. Human intelligence has probably become more important than ever before. In the Soviet Union when we were spying on the Soviets you could have a spy satellite look at the Soviet Union and see Mrs. silos and tanks. But you need you can't do that so much with Al-Qaida you need somebody close to Al-Qa'ida who tells you what they want and what they're planning to do the next in their next operation. So I think if anything human intelligence has become more important And also Harvard again because getting a spy inside a terrorist organization is much harder than getting a spy inside the Soviet. You. Can you can you comment on whether the CIA is handling that take that demand at this point is human intelligence able to influence for infiltrate terrorist organization. I think the simple answer is no. But but I'd have to caveat that slightly. I think prior to 9-11 the CIA had very little human intelligence about Al-Qaeda. It really didn't know very much about it. It was unable to get anybody inside organization in Afghanistan who was close enough to make a difference. If you talk to CIA officers now they will say well we add people on the margins of our pie to the outer rings of the security around Bin Ladin. Maybe two or three levels would move from leadership. But there was clearly never any source inside the group who could tell them about the plans and intentions of our planet I think the key difference now is the military victory in Afghanistan and the ongoing war against terrorism and then has turned turned up Al-Qaida. You've ended up arresting a lot of people. You've got them in detention around the world. And they've overtime and forced to say things that they didn't want to say. And they've been able to identify other people through those people who were still at large. And so they have a much better sense now of what Al Qaeda's plans and intentions are. I think that has made a major difference. I still don't think it's possible to get an American CIA case officer into the Al-Qaeda leadership. You may be able to get an error knows somebody inside Al-Qaida. But these people they are so hermetically sealed that if they don't trust anything out signs yes I got to the back next time. Or else. Okay. Question is about John Deutsch the CIA director accused of mishandling classified information on its personal computer. What did he do that was different from the mishandling that you just mentioned about going Holy. While they it's a good question and it was a question that was raised at the time. After I broke the window league case I broke the John Deutsch case and it actually felt the one reason I found out about the Doidge case because because people said inside the CA Hey we're prosecuting the scientist and yet we're letting the CIA director get off with Deutsche had. He's one of those guys who has an arrogance of power and that arrogance created enemies within the CIA who came to me to talk about it. They felt that he he was acting as if he was above the law. Now one of the things one of the little known facts about that case is that people think he got off Well in fact he was he lost all his security clearances. And then he was afterwards or stories came out. The Justice Department began a criminal investigation. And he was in the process just as when linked had done even when only a kind of plea bargain much more public and painful plea bargain than John Deutsch been plea-bargaining. Nonetheless. On the last weekend of the Clinton administration and the Friday before Bill Clinton left office. John Deutsch who is in the middle of plea negotiations with the Justice Department he was going to play two of felony. And then Bill Clinton pardoned him on the last day in office >> It was one of the partners that almost nobody noticed. And so it ended the criminal investigation. For the back sir. Is there a student Okay the question is what countries are most active in spying against the United States economically and militarily the questioners focusing on nato I'd like to add to the question. Is there are there any indications that the United States is engaging in economic espionage against European allies >> Well there's an easy answer to that. It's France. France has long spot on the United States especially on economic matters and they have been quite vigorous throughout the 19 eighties and 19 nineties but they're not alone. Israel spies on the United States. The I don't think the Germans do too much because I'm not very good at it. But I think we certainly spire on all of those countries in fact and then mid 990s. The CIA got caught spying on the French. It was really in response. Having talked to a lot of CIA officers about it they were kinda mad at the French for spying on them. So they figured they should spy on and they got caught. And got five CIA officers were expelled after they tried to get information from a source. I mean it didn't seem even like it was worth it. It was something about Gat of the ISI negotiation. Ok. Yes sir >> I also ok the question is asking he's making the assumption that book will be public domain and will be published in Russia and what kind of impact will it have there it's interesting actually Random House made a decision early on not to sell the Russian lights. Because we didn't want the Russians to see the manuscript before it was published. We sold the rights in Western Europe and in Japan but not in >> In Russia and Eastern Europe I don't know what their reaction will be to it. I think it has a lot of information that they don't know and but things have changed so much down Russia. It's hard to figure out. I mean they kind of sort of our friends. But yeah I think so I think yeah I think so I mean it certainly has a lot in there about KGB operations that have never come out about the way the KGB operating at the time of the coup and in Afghanistan. And in the mid 19 eighties against the CI. And it's rem Priscilla cough whom I mentioned when I was talking who's give roll off he just died about a month ago in Moscow. And he had written a little monograph in Russia about his life. And it was only printed in Russian and I had it translated for my own use for the research. And it was filled with ideological very very loaded communists language tracking down these traders and finding these American american agents. It is real skewed view of of this whole time period. And I think that still is prevalent among some of it some parts of Russia. It is kind of a skewed view of what the Soviet Union really did beck. Yeah why why would you why would why would the publisher not want the Russians to see the manuscript while we were somewhat well or trying to be cautious about frankly I think it was more had to do more with the fact that they don't trust Russian publishers to protect your manuscript and not just put it out and publish it or that copyrights things like that. But I also think it had something to do with the fact that we want this information to come out in the United States first. I'm sure it will make its way out. Yeah I shot myself. Is there a student with a question yes please. The question is do you I believe there was substantial evidence intelligence evidence or information to support the war with Iraq. That's a good question I. I wrote in the New York Times several stories saying that they were analysts at the CIA did not believe there was enough evidence. They specifically did not think that there was enough evidence to support the idea that Al-Qa'ida and was tied in with the Saddam Hussein regime. And that they question some aspects not all but some aspects of the case on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Probes. I think There are a number of people in the intelligence community who believe strongly that the Bush administration I shouldn't say made up things but I should I think what they would say is that they overemphasized certain possible pieces of intelligence and ignore the others to suit to make a case that Iraq and Al Qaeda were linked. And that Iraq had a nuclear weapons program and things like that. And I think it's an open question now what the verdict will be on I just ask you to follow up on that. If you had that information and you wrote about it were you able to get that information prominently published in the newspaper I think often the answer to that. My stories did not make it onto page one of the New York Times. And I think that's partly because at the time in the run-up to the war there was a strong feeling of Washington that against dissent the government and the media. And I think there was I can't it's very hard in these circumstances to put your finger on why something happens. And I still don't know exactly why those things happen. I think it's fair to say that the Bush Administration did an excellent job of getting their message out. I believe with that. Okay see let's say. Okay question is asking about what we know about North Korea in terms of its presumably you mean its nuclear program and so on. Well that is it a real troubling situation because I think once again it's fairly clear that the CIA and the US intelligence community does not have good sources of information. And that we have been repeatedly surprised by the accelerated state of the North Korean nuclear program. In then you may remember in 1984 the Clinton administration he struck a deal with the North Korean government to free supposedly phrase their their effort. What I remember writing in three or four years ago story I now look back on and think I should have made it bigger deal out of it than I did because I didn't wasn't very big story was the fact that the it turned out that the agreement that they had struck with North Korea only apply to the young beyond Uranium enrichment facility reprocessing facility freezing operations there it didn't apply to freezing anything else than North Koreans wanted to do anywhere else. And the Clinton administration never said that publicly and the North Koreans and never said that publicly. And now it's clear that what happened was the North Koreans froze operations a young beyond but then continued operations elsewhere. And that I think caught everyone by surprise. Now now it's unclear. And I think the problem is they don't have any good sources inside North Korea. Let's take two more questions before we call it quits. Yes sir. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah okay. Okay make this brief one the questioners asking he was surprised to hear that the US had a CIA station in Moscow and presumes there was Soviet Station in Washington. Of course we had a speaker here during this series who worked for the Soviet Station in Washington. Yeah what was the rationale for having stations yada the stations are essentially inside the embassies of the different countries. If they assign see intelligence officers undercover as diplomats to the embassy and then they worked on a secret part of the embassy called a station. The KGB has one hadn't won in their embassy in Washington. The KGB calls them resident chose UCI calls them stations but they're essentially the same thing. A small group of people under diplomatic cover working in the station and they are the ones who go out and conduct operations in the enemy territory. Yes sir way in the back. Okay please comment on the difficulties you have as a journalist gathering information for your newspaper articles and for your book. Well it's constant struggle to try and get information out of the intelligence community because almost everything is classified. And to me the hardest thing is to meet people who have the information because they you know you can't just walk around CIA headquarters as an outside. So you have to try and meet them in ways that are kind of unconventional. And then you have to convince them that it's okay to tell you something that they could get fired from their job for telling you. So it's not that easy and it can it comes it comes and goes. Sometimes you go months without getting it is you feel like you should just quit. And then suddenly you'll get something that makes it seem great. And so there's a lot of highs and lows involved. Before we say thanks to what Jim Rice and let me just let me know that for those of you who might run review what occurred at previous Global Agenda sessions as well as this one >> There is video now on the internet for all the previous speakers and Jim's talk will also be on the internet probably by next week. You can find a little image of the TV set on the website and click on it to get to those videos two weeks from tonight. The last speaker in our series on May 21st will close out global agenda for this year by hearing from US Army Captain tablet capture a military intelligence specialist. Captain chakra has trained us forces and intelligence issues for use in peacekeeping operations. In the Balkans I deliberately scheduled her at the end of this series so should be able to shed some light on the intelligence use in the Iraq war the spring she'll be joining us from the US Military Academy at West where xi is an aide to US Army General Barry McCaffrey. I don't have any hints for you yet about next year's Global Agenda series except to say that we'll have won. We're also putting up some interesting events for October and November here at the University of Delaware which will want you to know about I want to thank you all for coming. I'm proud to announce By the way that some of our students in the class that goes with global agenda will be walking around the CIA. Next week we're going to get a chance to get down there to the intelligence agency as well as visiting the International Spy Museum. And now let's please say thank you to Jim Rice and four. And phase >> It's going to rush right out to the lobby there right now and sign books. If you'd like to pick one
Global Agenda_5-7-03_James Risen .mp4
From Robert Diiorio January 06, 2020
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