The Enemy Spies
In the shadows: The insurgents' most powerful weapon may be their vast network of infiltrators and spies—forces strengthened by talk of American exit plans. A secret CIA study frets about a whole new generation of master terrorists.

By Scott Johnson and Melinda Liu
Newsweek

June 27 issue - No one challenged the bomber as he approached his target. Iraqi sentries waved him through the gate, into a high-security compound that protects some of the most vital government offices in Baghdad. His uniform and badge identified him as a member of the Wolf Brigade, the elite police unit he had joined three months before. His shirt looked strangely baggy—"billowy," an investigator would say later. It covered a vest packed with explosives. The bomber walked unhindered through the gate and past the Interior Ministry. He passed
Story continues below ↓ advertisement

through another checkpoint at the entrance to Wolf Brigade headquarters, 15 minutes by foot from the compound's gate. In the courtyard, members of the brigade were assembling for their 8:30 a.m. roll call. The young recruit had been AWOL for weeks, but no one asked him where he had been. Then he detonated himself. The only identifiable trace that remained of the bomber was his severed head and feet, according to Iraq's Interior minister, Bayan Jabr.

The explosion on June 11 killed three brigade members, wounded roughly a dozen others and worsened an already deep sense of gloom among U.S. military advisers in Iraq. The Wolf Brigade is supposed to be the cream of Iraq's counterinsurgency forces. The attack showed once again how vulnerable those forces remain. Since the newly elected Shiite-led administration under Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari took office on April 28, nearly 1,100 people, mostly Iraqis, have lost their lives in suicide bombings, shootings, abductions and beheadings. The problem goes far beyond the seemingly limitless pool of suicide bombers. In the long run, the insurgents' most powerful weapon may be one that is practically silent: a vast network of infiltrators, spies and recruiters.

According to intelligence officials in Baghdad, whose clearances bar them from speaking publicly, Iraq's security services have hundreds of "ghost soldiers"—members who vanish, sometimes for months on end, but continue to draw their pay. The fear is that they are working for the insurgency while keeping up their ties in uniform. Early on, when training procedures were still being defined, U.S. forces tried to institute a program to screen Iraqi recruits. According to officials who worked on the program but were not cleared to talk publicly about it, the process began with a preliminary interview with the enlistee. If he passed, vetting agents went on to do a background check on the individual as well as on key family members. But with pressure on to find an exit strategy for Iraq—and to build significant Iraqi forces fast—a lot of doubtful characters seem to have slipped through the cracks. Gaps in the process were quickly exploited in a strategic campaign of infiltration by the insurgency.

Over dinner last week in a fashionable Baghdad neighborhood, Iraqi officials were shaking their heads over news that 176 Iraqi police officers were found to have terrorist connections in the past two weeks. " [Some of] their fingerprints were found on bomb debris examined by specialists," said one official, requesting anonymity because he wasn't cleared to talk to media. "The Americans [have been] taking fingerprints from bomb cars and matching them with police records." But Iraq's Security minister, Abdul Karim al-Inizi, says the ones who got caught are only a fraction of the total number of infiltrators. "A number way bigger than that is still active and still in service," al-Inizi told NEWSWEEK. He's especially concerned about moles from Saddam Hussein's elite intelligence corps, the Mukhabarat. "They penetrated easily because [the former Iraqi] government brought them back without asking enough questions." Inizi criticizes the Americans, too, for failing to cultivate reliable Iraqi sources and ignoring repeated warnings about the loyalty of the Iraqis they had recruited. "Yes, they needed to have sources with the former regime," Inizi says. "But they needed other sources of information as well."

China's spies come out from the cold
By Tim Luard

Modern spies are not thought to be the shadowy figures of the past
More than a decade after the end of the Cold War, spies are back in the news.

But instead of hardened KGB agents lurking on street corners in dark glasses, the spy stories appearing in the Western press recently have been about fresh-faced Chinese students.

Some are said to be engaged in research at respected foreign establishments, while others are enrolled as bright young business trainees in major Western companies.

Their mission - or so the reports allege - is to use fair means or foul to gather technological and commercial intelligence that will help speed China on its way to becoming the next global superpower.

Britain's Sunday Telegraph reported recently that a leading Chinese agent had "defected" in Belgium and blown the whistle on hundreds of Chinese spies working at various levels of European industry.

Like rape victims, companies that have been infiltrated are reluctant to talk about it
John Fialka,
Author of War by Other Means

The Belgian-based economic espionage network used a group called The Chinese Students' and Scholars' Association of Leuven as a front organisation, according to the French newspaper Le Monde.

These allegations follow the case of a 22-year-old Chinese woman who was detained in France after being accused of "illegal database intrusion" by the car-parts maker Valeo, which had employed her as an intern. She has since been released.

Police in Sweden also suspect Chinese guest researchers of stealing unpublished and unpatented research from an institute there, according to the Swedish radio Ekot's website.

Gaining experience

Chen Yonglin, a Chinese diplomat who recently defected in Australia, claimed Beijing had as many as 1,000 spies in Australia alone.

But Mr Chen, a former first secretary at the Chinese consulate-general in Sydney, told the BBC News website that his lawyers had told him to say no more, for fear of jeopardising his chances of receiving political asylum.

The cool response to Mr Chen's and other defectors' requests says much about current Western attitudes towards China.

Whether in government, business or academic circles, there is a general reluctance to do or say anything that might unduly upset Beijing and threaten access to its markets - not to mention its vast pool of high-paying and often highly gifted students.

Chinese student Li-Li Whuang was accused of "database intrusion" in France
China has sent 600,000 students overseas in the past 25 years as part of a conscious policy of developing its science, technology and business skills.

While some belong to well-off families who simply want their children to get a good education, most are funded by the government and are expected to return to help their country afterwards.

"It is very easy for Chinese companies or intelligence agencies to approach these students - who are often quite nationalistic - and get them to collect information that might be of either commercial or military interest," said Christian le Miere, Asia Editor of Jane's Country Risk.

The recent defections suggest there are so many such contacts that what they produce could amount to a valuable pool of intelligence, he said.

In one case that came to light in the US, Chinese agents are said to have put pressure on a recruit by telling him that his family in China was at risk if he failed to do what they wanted.

But few such cases come to court, since they are hard to prove and involve people trained not to be caught, said John Fialka, author of a book on espionage, War by Other Means.

"And like rape victims, companies that have been infiltrated are reluctant to talk about it. They don't want people to know they've been hoodwinked by their own staff," he added.

Military connections

There is often a fine line between what is legal and what is not.

Asian societies tend to have a less legalistic view of intellectual property than some other nations, Mr Fialka said.

But China differs from many other countries because of the way its economic entities are still intertwined with the government and military, he added.

China has about 3,000 "front" companies in the US that exist mainly to obtain technology and military secrets, according to US officials.

Chen Yonglin claims Beijing has as many as 1,000 spies in Australia
Right-wing groups in the US, and opposition parties in Australia, Canada and elsewhere, are warning that Western countries may one day regret allowing China to take advantage of their openness and tolerance.

The dramatic growth in China's economic and political power will soon be matched in the military sphere, they claim.

But China has indignantly denied the spying allegations as fabrications stemming from narrow-minded fears of legitimate commercial and industrial competition.

Louis Turner, chief executive of the London-based Asia Pacific Technology Network, says it is a natural part of the "catch-up" process to place people as close as possible to where the best research is being done and get them to send back information.

"Just as Japan used to effectively steal a few tricks when it was learning from the West, I would be enormously surprised if China wasn't involved in some sort of technical espionage... and no doubt some of this is backed by the Chinese military," he said.

But he said China was genuinely keen on two-way collaboration - and said the main factors behind its rapid progress in science and technology were its sheer size, economic dynamism and willingness to learn.

Some of China's own universities are now producing world-class researchers, and some of its science parks are comparable with Silicon Valley in the 1960s, he added - "but with much more cohesiveness ... and on a much bigger scale".

The undoing of al-Qaida's 'James Bond'
Muslim spy behind CIA's biggest victory in war on terror

Everyone remembers the picture: Khalid Sheik Mohammed, mastermind of Sept. 11, looking not like the “James Bond of al-Qaida ” but more like someone shaken out of bed in the middle of the night, hair disheveled, his T-shirt stained, forlorn and knowing his fate. In short, a nervous wreck.

But just what happened that night that led to the famous picture?

Current and former U.S. intelligence officials tell NBC News that the March 1, 2003, capture of Khalid Sheik Mohammed, or KSM as he is known in the spy world, was one of the CIA’s biggest coups in the past decade, one that relied not on satellite photos or electronic eavesdropping but on the cultivation of a spy, a Muslim who wanted to help because of his anger over Sept. 11.

Driven by religious duty

It is a tale that includes a lucky break, clandestine signals in the night, tossed food trays, a meandering ride through the streets of an old Silk Road trading post and a secret meeting presided over by the director of the CIA.

The CIA had recruited the spy as an "asset" and used him increasingly after 9/11. A Pakistani Muslim, he had one overriding reason to risk his life.

“He told us [the CIA] he hated the 9/11 hijackers because he believed they had killed innocents in violation of the Quran. It was his religious duty,” said a former senior U.S. intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

And he hated no one more than Osama bin Laden and his top operations man, Khalid Sheik Mohammed.

Revered symbol, killer of Daniel Pearl

In the months after 9/11, KSM had become a revered symbol in the world of Islamic fundamentalists. It was KSM who conceived the attacks on New York City and Washington, D.C., with their use of suicide pilots and heavily loaded aircraft. It was KSM as well who had beheaded Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in May 2002, and then just before the first anniversary of the videotaped killing sat for an interview in silhouette with al-Jazeera to brag about what he had done. Some admirers in fact did refer to KSM as “al-Qaida’s James Bond,” adoring him as a mythic, untouchable figure. His exploits won him praise on Islamic Web sites as well as on street corners and desert firesides.

His assistant and 9/11 cell organizer in Hamburg, Germany, Ramzi Bin al Shibh, had been grabbed on Sept. 11, 2002, exactly a year after the 9/11 attacks, following a firefight at an apartment building in Karachi, Pakistan. U.S. officials believed KSM was at the same location, but later conceded he had either escaped or was never there to begin with.

A 'meeting with bad guys'

By Spring 2003, there were reports that KSM was in the Islamabad-Rawalpindi area. It was an odd place to hide. Islamabad is the 50-year-old capital of Pakistan, while Rawalpindi, the Silk Road trading post nearby, is where Pakistan’s army headquarters is located. Most of bin Laden’s top associates had fled to Pakistan, but Islamabad and Rawalpindi were crawling with Pakistani and U.S. intelligence officials. Indeed, the CIA station in Islamabad is among the world’s largest.

The Muslim spy was not on the hunt for KSM when events suddenly put his life on a different track. A second former U.S. intelligence official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, said the spy had been able to ingratiate himself with al-Qaida supporters in Pakistan and was "meeting with bad guys" in Rawalpindi when he was told he would find himself in the company of a high-ranking al-Qaida official. The official turned out to be Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.

The moment they had waited for

That night, the spy was one of four al-Qaida members, including TSM, in a car winding its way through the streets of Rawalpindi. He knew that if his identity were blown, he would be beheaded on the spot in the same way as Pearl. The driver dropped off KSM at a house in one of the city's affluent neighborhoods — one where retired Pakistani generals lived in seclusion — and then the spy quickly went to work.

“Once he was free, he had a prearranged signal to alert his handlers that he had left KSM,” said one of the former intelligence officials. "He used it.” None of the officials NBC News spoke with would reveal the signal.

Once he gave the signal, all hell broke loose back at the building where CIA officers had gathered for a late dinner. “Food trays literally started flying around the room,” said the other former intelligence official. “People began scrambling, knowing that this was the moment they had waited for.”

But there was a problem.

A raid almost gone bad
The spy was unfamiliar with the neighborhood where KSM had been dropped off and it was dark. Over the next few hours, he and his CIA handlers frantically cruised the city, trying to find the house, backtracking from familiar reference points he had tried to make mental notes of earlier in the evening.

“They drove around for hours, ultimately finding the house where he believed KSM was sleeping,” said one of the former officials.

“By now, it was early morning. It was time to call in the Pakistanis.”

The house turned out to be that of Ahmed Abdul Qudoos, who was believed to be an al-Qaida supporter. At around 4 a.m., a large contingent of Pakistani security forces raided the home. And although portrayed at the time as uneventful, the officials say the raid almost went badly. The United States desperately wanted KSM alive, but he had been awakened by the raid and grabbed his gun, ready for a gunfight that could have easily led to his death. As a Pakistani security officer barged into his bedroom, the gun went off, wounding the officer in the foot. KSM was quickly subdued, photographed for posterity and then whisked away, first to a Pakistani interrogation center and later to an undisclosed U.S. interrogation center somewhere overseas, where he sits today.

The raid’s success did not end there. Also grabbed that night was a man who was traveling with KSM, one whose importance was not known for hours. He turned out to be Mustapha Ahmed, the paymaster of the 9/11 attacks and, as it turned out, someone who regularly traveled with KSM. It was — and is — the CIA’s biggest victory in the war on terrorism.

Intelligence quickly learned that al-Qaida immediately suspected the one man in the car they did not know that well, and the CIA quickly moved to get their spy out of Pakistan. The next week, Tenet went to the region and met personally with the man to honor him and the CIA agents who had participated in the operation — and to reward the Muslim financially.

A new suit and a secret meeting

The man had just bought his first suit with the help of CIA officers for his meeting with the CIA director. According to the former U.S. officials, Tenet asked him the obvious question: Why did you do this? Why did you risk your life?

The officials recounted their conversation like this:

“My religion doesn’t support this killing,” the man told Tenet, adding that he wanted these people “brought to justice.”

He asked Tenet, "Do you think the president [Bush] knows what I did?" Tenet smiled and responded: "He knows because I told him."

Today, the spy has been relocated — officials will not even say to which continent — and a financial reward in the millions has been paid out. The irony, said one of the U.S. officials, is that the purported James Bond of al-Qaida had been undone by “a real James Bond.”

Cubans' spying convictions overturned

ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- Citing the influence of Miami's large Cuban community, Atlanta's 11th Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the spying convictions Tuesday of five men found guilty of spying for the Cuban government.

The court agreed with motions filed by defense attorneys that Miami's large Cuban community influenced the trial proceedings. None of the jurors were Cuban.

Alicia Valle, a spokeswoman for the U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Florida, said prosecutors were reviewing the court's 93-page decision and had no further comment.

In 2001 a Miami jury convicted Ruben Campa (also known as Fernando Gonzalez), Rene Gonzalez, Gerardo Hernandez, Luis Medina (also known as Ramon Labanino) and Antonio Guerrero, members of the so-called Wasp Network -- on charges they had spied on prominent Cuban-American exile leaders and U.S. military bases.

Group leader Gerardo Hernandez was also convicted of conspiracy to commit murder for engineering the shootdown of two Brothers to the Rescue planes in 1996.

Cuban fighter jets downed the unarmed Cessnas as they flew toward the island, where they had previously dropped anti-government leaflets. Four men died.

During the trial, the defendants claimed they had spied as a way to defend Cuba from hard-line anti-Castro groups in Miami they feared would attack the island.

Hernandez's attorney, Paul McKenna, said he expects his client will be released from prison soon and may face retrial.

The case has been widely followed in Cuba, where the men were regarded as heroes and whose communist leader, Fidel Castro, regularly advocated their release.

McKenna said he expects the Cuban government to be "elated" by the court's ruling.

Manny Vasquez, a spokesman for the Cuban American National Foundation, a prominent exile group, said he was surprised by the ruling and that his organization will demand they be retried.

"It is a very unfortunate decision. They got a fair trial," Vasquez said.

"Granny-Spy"

Motivated by "indignation" and "desperation" at the police's alleged failure to combat the criminals, Brazil woman, 80, turns detective against drugs

She used up 22 video cassettes, or 33 hours of tape, as she recorded the drugs gang's activities from her apartment window overlooking a hillside shantytown near Copacabana beach.

The hunt is on for seven police officers implicated in the recordings, Mr Itagiba said.

Rio de Janeiro police have complained they are outgunned by the drugs gangs, who are blamed for a plague of killings and kidnappings in the city.

And it took Granny to show them how to fight the enemy. :armywink:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4184144.stm

I got this one from someone.


=============

Revealed: MI6 plan to infiltrate extremists

Read the letter from the head of the intelligence arm of the Foreign Office here (pdf)

Read the memo from the FCO's Islamic issues adviser here (pdf)

Martin Bright, home affairs editor
Sunday September 4, 2005
The Observer

British intelligence officers planned a 'black propaganda' campaign against Islamic extremists, infiltrating their groups through the internet, documents leaked to The Observer reveal.

Details of the proposals, contained in a letter from the head of the intelligence arm of the Foreign Office, will cause widespread alarm within government.

The letter reveals that the FCO planned to spread anti-Western propaganda as a way of gaining the trust of Islamic extremists and then arguing that violence was not the way forward.

Last week, in a separate leak, The Observer revealed that the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office has directly blamed the war in Iraq for a growth of extremism in Britain.

The confidential letter from the Foreign Office's top intelligence official, William Ehrman, to the government's security and intelligence co-ordinator, Sir David Omand, dated 23 April 2004, proposed that spies should infiltrate extremist websites posing as radicals and dissuade extremists from taking up arms. His only concerns were that similar operations during the Cold War 'had a mixed record' and that he might not have the linguists and Islamic experts necessary for the job.

The letter reveals that Britain's foreign intelligence service, MI6, was already working to 'export' propaganda techniques used by its counterparts in Saudi Arabia and Egypt.

Ehrman's high-risk strategy distinguishes between overt diplomacy and covert propaganda. On the one hand, he suggests that diplomats should continue to promote 'messages that will bolster modern Western-orientated currents of thought in Islam'. But behind the scenes he proposed developing 'messages aimed at more radicalised constituencies who are potential recruits to terrorism'.

These radicals would not listen to the traditional calls 'for the Middle East to become a zone of peace and prosperity', said the intelligence officer. 'They might, however, listen to religious arguments about the nature of jihad, that, while anti-Western, eschew terrorism.'

Officials within the Foreign Office are known to be unhappy about the growing 'Islamisation' of the department and many feel uncomfortable with moves across Whitehall to open up a dialogue with radical Islamists. However, ministers believe it makes sense to engage with the more moderate fringes of political Islam.

The policy of engagement with radicals was tested by the bombings of 7 July, but the Home Office and Foreign Office have pressed on with their plans, sources have told The Observer. This includes talking to the likes of Tariq Ramadan, the Geneva-based scholar appointed to a Home Office task force on extremism last week. Ramadan has been refused entry to the US and France in the past because of his alleged extremist views and contacts, but has condemned terrorist attacks on Western targets.

The 7 July bombings were a direct challenge to the policy of engagement and have led some critics to suggest it should be abandoned. One former minister said last night: 'The strategic error is to think you can fight hot fire with cooler fire. These people still want to see sharia law extended and find it difficult to handle secularism or gay rights. You need more, genuine political engagement rather than searching for the acceptable face of Islam.'

A second document seen by The Observer will further fuel concerns of increasing 'Islamist' influence in the Foreign Office. The memo from Mockbul Ali, the FCO's Islamic issues adviser, recommends allowing the radical Qatari-based cleric Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi into Britain. Qaradawi has consistently supported suicide bombers in Palestine and armed resistance to coalition forces in Iraq. The Observer reported last weekend that the scholar had said that martyrdom was a 'duty' of Muslims in Iraq and Palestine.

The memo of 14 July, a week after the London suicide bombings, reveals that the director-general (political) of the Foreign Office, John Sawers, agreed the line to support a visa application from al-Qaradawi.

The memo contains the warning that refusing Qaradawi entry could lead to further terrorist attacks.

'Exclusion ... could turn Muslim opinion further against the UK and encourage some to move to violence against British targets.'

According to the official, although controversial, Qaradawi's views are mainstream in the Muslim world: 'We certainly do not agree with Qaradawi's views on Israel and Iraq, but we have to recognise that they are not unusual amongst Muslims.

'Refusing entry on these grounds would also open a Pandora's box in relation to entry clearance for others in the Muslim world.'

· Read the letter from the head of the intelligence arm of the Foreign Office here (pdf)

· Read the memo from the FCO's Islamic issues adviser here (pdf)



PDF file;

http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Obse...onfidential.pdf


Webpage LINK:

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/print/0,385...-102279,00.html

US holds four China spy suspects
FBI agents in Los Angeles have arrested four people for allegedly trying to smuggle US military secrets to China.

n FBI affidavit said they were charged with theft of government property, conspiracy and transportation of stolen goods, Reuters news agency reported.

The affidavit said one suspect worked for a California defence contractor.

Those arrested - two married couples - are all ethnic Chinese. Two of them are naturalised US citizens, while the other two are legal US residents.

Navy secrets

Chi Mak and his wife Rebecca Laiwah Chiu along with Mr Chi's brother, Tai Wang Mak and his wife Fuk Heung Li, were held last week at Los Angeles airport as they prepared to board a flight to China.

The FBI affidavit unsealed earlier this week showed that all four were later charged in a US district court.

It said Mr Chi was a lead engineer on a research project that involves Quiet Electric Drive technology for US Navy ships.

Along with the three others, he is suspected of trying to smuggle sensitive information about the project.

"Based on my experience and training, I believe the targets are foreign intelligence operatives," FBI Special Agent James Gaylord wrote in the affidavit, according to Reuters news agency.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4409216.stm

Cold warrior, spymaster
SKETCHES By Ana Marie Pamintuan
The Philippine Star 12/09/2005

Last Oct. 26, the US director of national intelligence released "The National Intelligence Strategy of the United States of America."

The strategy details "mission objectives," which refer to "efforts to predict, penetrate and preempt threats" to US national security.

Among the mission objectives: to "defeat terrorists at home and abroad by disarming their operational capabilities, and seizing the initiative from them by promoting the growth of freedom and democracy."

During the brief visit in Manila this week of US Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte, I asked him if he was concerned about the dysfunction in Philippine democracy and its potential to compromise the war on terror.

Negroponte, who was ambassador here from 1993 to 1996, deftly avoided commenting on local politics.

He would only say that the US viewed the Philippines "as a partner in the pursuit of democratic objectives" in East Asia.

He "absolutely" did not see the Philippines turning into a failed state, he said. And while saying that democracy and good governance require free elections, competent and honest public officials and strong national institutions, he would not be drawn into commenting even indirectly on vote-rigging or corruption scandals in the Philippines.

Filipinos have grown used to Uncle Sam stepping in during periods of deep political turmoil in this country.

This time, even if the war on terror could suffer from political warfare, Washington is keeping its hands off the turbulence in Manila, refusing to take sides.

Negroponte did meet with former President Fidel Ramos at noon last Wednesday at the US Embassy residence in Forbes Park, but not to back any coup that Ramos is suspected to be plotting. Negroponte, who waited half an hour for the perennially late ex-president, told me the meeting was merely to renew acquaintances, because he was ambassador here during the Ramos administration.
* * *
In his latest public role, however, Negroponte could find himself increasingly drawn into some form of interference in the affairs of sovereign states. If this happens, he will be no stranger to intervention.

Two decades ago John Dimitri Negroponte was a cold warrior, accused of ignoring systematic human rights abuses of the Honduran government because it was helping Washington fight the communist Sandinistas in neighboring Nicaragua.

Battalion 3-16, the Honduran military’s special intelligence unit that came to be known as a death squad, was trained by the US Central Intelligence Agency and the Argentine military.

Negroponte has consistently denied knowledge of the rights abuses when he was US ambassador to Honduras from 1981 to 1985.

Now he is at the forefront of a different kind of war, and his government is once again under fire for disregarding human rights in waging a war without borders, where the enemy does not abide by international rules.
* * *
Negroponte will not discuss the details of how this new war is being waged. He will only say that his office is strengthening intelligence cooperation with allies in the war on terror, and increasing human intelligence capability by as much as 50 percent in the coming years.

His role in the war on terror is so new he’s still defining it.

America’s director of national intelligence oversees the collection and processing of intelligence within the United States and from around the globe.

When his appointment was announced in February by US President George W. Bush, Negroponte had vowed to provide "timely and objective national intelligence" to the commander-in-chief.

Negroponte, 65, has a tough mandate: to prevent a repeat of the failure of intelligence that led to 9/11, and the faulty intelligence on Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction.

As US ambassador to the United Nations, Negroponte had helped sell the war on Iraq to a skeptical international community. That was his job; the massaged intelligence on WMD was not his responsibility. And he got the job done.

It was the same in Honduras, where he did what he thought was best for US interests in preventing the spread of communism in Latin America. The human rights complaints hounded his confirmation hearings for the UN post. But in the end American lawmakers acknowledged the work of the cold warrior and gave him their nod.

They had such faith in him that they sent him to Iraq as the first post-war US ambassador. And they apparently liked his work in Baghdad as well. When he was handpicked by Bush to whip into shape the intelligence services, Negroponte got bipartisan support in Congress.
* * *
His position is so new many people are still confused about his functions, and the parameters he is setting for his role. I still see him as a diplomat. Standing at the foyer of the sprawling Forbes Park house where he lived for three years, he recalled that it was his wife Diana who had renovated the residence.

Still the diplomat, he commented only on positive changes in his former host country. He took note of the new flyovers and said there is less traffic in Manila, considering it’s the Christmas season.

Negroponte oversees 15 spy agencies, including the CIA and the Federal Bureau of Investigation — agencies with chronic turf problems that have been partly blamed for the failure of intelligence that led to 9/11.

The "watchword" of his intelligence strategy, Negroponte said, is "integration" of the efforts of all the spy agencies.

"I am creating a new agency so there are many challenges connected with establishing a new department and carrying out intelligence reform," he told me.

As far as democracy and good governance are concerned, he wants the intel community to be able to understand "political dynamics" in other countries so difficulties or crises can be anticipated and US policy-makers can be alerted for proper action.

How will the intel be gathered? Political assessments are relatively easy; intel gathering on terrorism is something else. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is currently confronting the outcry of allies over secret CIA prisons in Europe, and the Bush administration has long been under fire for the use of torture in interrogating suspected terrorists.

CIA Director Porter Goss said recently that what they do "does not come close to torture."

The US national intelligence strategy aims to build an integrated intel capability that is "consistent with US laws and the protection of privacy and civil liberties."

For now America’s spymaster is focused on integrating intelligence services, and intensifying intel sharing with allies.

"This is something that cannot be done alone," he told me. "One needs friends around the world in an international struggle such as this."

http://www.philstar.com/philstar/NEWS200512092604.htm

Sinn Fein official exposed as spy shot dead
Murder likely to throw a wrench into fragile Northern Ireland peace process

DUBLIN, Ireland - A former Sinn Fein official recently exposed as a British spy was found fatally shot Tuesday after apparently being tortured, police said — a slaying certain to send shock waves through Northern Ireland’s peace process.

Denis Donaldson was Sinn Fein’s former legislative chief in the failed power-sharing government of Northern Ireland. He admitted in December he had been on the payroll of the British secret service and the province’s anti-terrorist police for two decades. He went into hiding because the traditional Irish Republican Army punishment for informing is death.

But the IRA denied responsibility in a one-line statement. “The IRA had no involvement whatsoever in the death of Denis Donaldson,” the outlawed group said.

Irish Justice Minister Michael McDowell said the 55-year-old Donaldson had been tortured before being killed — apparently with one or two shotgun blasts to his head — inside his isolated home near Glenties, County Donegal, in northwest Ireland. He was last seen alive Monday while walking in the village, McDowell said.

Mutilation
“His right forearm is almost severed,” McDowell said. “He was shot in the head and mutilation was done to his body. It’s a murder we’re dealing with.”

Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern and British Prime Minister Tony Blair both condemned the murder.

The killing comes at a pivotal moment in Northern Ireland’s 13-year-old peace process.

On Thursday, Blair and Ahern are to travel to Northern Ireland to reveal a new blueprint for reviving a Protestant-Catholic administration, the intended cornerstone of the province’s 1998 peace accord.

The plan — 3½ years of diplomacy in the making — would call for Northern Ireland’s legislature to reconvene in mid-May and face a Nov. 24 deadline to elect an administration.

The killing appeared certain to harden Protestant opinion against cooperating with Sinn Fein, the IRA-linked party that represents most Catholics in Northern Ireland. But officials in both governments said Thursday’s announcement would go ahead anyway.

Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams — who in December initially defended Donaldson as an innocent man, then outed him as a British spy — said he did not know who killed him. But he suggested it might have been the work of IRA dissidents opposed to Sinn Fein’s peacemaking efforts.

“It is likely that his death at this time is intended to undermine current efforts to make political progress,” Adams said. “Those who carried out this murder are clearly opposed to the peace process.”

But Ian Paisley, whose Democratic Unionist Party represents most of Northern Ireland’s British Protestant majority, said someone within IRA ranks was the most likely culprit. “There is a finger-pointing tonight at IRA-Sinn Fein,” he said.

Spy scandal helped bring down administration
A Catholic-Protestant administration for Northern Ireland fell apart in October 2002 because of an IRA spying scandal involving Donaldson.

Donaldson and two others were charged with pilfering documents that identified the personal details of thousands of potential IRA targets. Protestants accused the IRA of plotting a potential resumption of its violent campaign to oust Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom.

But British prosecutors mysteriously dropped all charges in early December. A week later, Adams announced that Donaldson had confessed to being a paid British spy. Within hours, Donaldson admitted the same in a television interview.

During its 27-year campaign, the IRA’s internal security unit tortured scores of IRA members suspected of passing information to British intelligence. Typical IRA methods included drowning the interrogation victim in a bathtub, applying electric shocks, and administering cigarette burns.

Those who admitted informing had their confessions audiotaped before being shot in the head; their bodies were usually dumped — naked and with hands tied behind their backs — on rural roadsides.

The IRA last year declared it was renouncing violence for political purposes and backed the pledge by handing over its weapons stockpiles — moves supposed to spur a revival of power-sharing involving Sinn Fein.

But Paisley has refused to cooperate with Sinn Fein, citing the IRA’s refusal to disband and its alleged involvement in criminal activities.

Power-sharing rules require the Democratic Unionists and Sinn Fein to lead the next administration. It would receive substantial powers from the British government in London, which began governing Northern Ireland in 1972 during the bloodiest year of the province’s conflict.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12152854/

Talk about deep penetration.

Drives Outline Military Tactics
Computer devices sold at an Afghan bazaar appear to hold data showing how insurgents use Pakistan as a base for cross-border strikes.

By Paul Watson, Times Staff Writer
April 14, 2006

BAGRAM, Afghanistan — Maps, charts and intelligence reports on computer drives smuggled out of a U.S. base and sold at a bazaar here appear to detail how Taliban and Al Qaeda leaders have been using southwestern Pakistan as a key planning and training base for attacks in Afghanistan.

The documents, marked "secret," appear to be raw intelligence reports based on conversations with Afghan informants and official briefings given to high-level U.S. military officers. Together, they outline how the U.S. military came to focus its search for members of Taliban, Al Qaeda and other militant groups on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistani border.

In one report contained in a flash memory drive, a U.S. handler also indicates that the United States discussed with two Afghan spies the possibility of capturing or killing Taliban commanders in Pakistani territory.

Pakistan has long denied harboring Taliban leaders or training bases and has engaged in several well-publicized battles with insurgents in its tribal territories bordering Afghanistan.

But the documents contained on memory drives sold at a bazaar in front of the main gate of the Bagram air base suggest that although Pakistani forces are working to root out foreign Al Qaeda fighters from the northwestern tribal regions, the Taliban has been using Quetta, the provincial capital of Baluchistan in the southwest, as its rear guard for training and coordinating attacks, some by foreign Arab fighters, in Afghanistan.

The theft of the drives became the subject of a full-scale criminal investigation Wednesday, two days after the Los Angeles Times revealed the black-market operation.

The contents of the flash drives appear to be authentic documents, but the accuracy of the information could not be independently verified.

Military officials, however, acknowledged Thursday that the sale of the stolen drives posed a security risk.

"Obviously you have uncovered something that is not good for U.S. forces here in Afghanistan," said Col. Tom Collins, speaking from the public affairs office at the Bagram base. "We're obviously concerned that certain sources or assets have been compromised."

In Washington, Lawrence Di Rita, a top aide to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, said it was "too early to say" whether any commander in Afghanistan would be held responsible for failing to secure the drives.

The drives appear to contain the identities of Afghan sources spying for U.S. Special Forces that operate out of the Bagram base, which is the center of U.S. efforts to fight Taliban and Al Qaeda insurgents and includes a secretive detention and interrogation center for terrorism suspects flown in from around the world.

The memory drives also apparently include the identities of U.S. military personnel working in Afghanistan, assessments of targets, descriptions of American bases and their defenses, and maneuvers by the U.S. to remove or marginalize Afghan government officials it considers a problem.

Pakistani officials rejected the reputed intelligence Thursday. Maj. Gen. Shaukat Sultan, spokesman for Pakistan's armed forces, said the military promptly checks out information on insurgent activities that it receives from the U.S.-led coalition and that the intelligence sometimes proves incorrect.

"To make a sweeping statement like this, that people are taken to Pakistan to training camps and then brought back [to Afghanistan], is absolutely absurd, and I reject this information," Sultan said from Islamabad, the Pakistani capital.

U.S. intelligence and counter-terrorism officials have long been concerned about liaisons between Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence agents and the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

The counter-terrorism officials have compiled intelligence alleging that ISI officials were looking the other way, or possibly aiding, as Al Qaeda and Taliban members plotted militant activity in the tribal territories of Pakistan.

The concerns were disclosed publicly in a report to Congress last year by its independent research arm, the Congressional Research Service, which questioned whether Pakistan "is fully committed to fighting the war against terrorism."

"Among the most serious sources of concern is the well-documented past involvement of some members of the Army's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) organization with Al Qaeda and the Taliban, and the possibility that some officers retain sympathies with both groups," the report said.

On the drives from the bazaar, reports from Afghan informants, marked "secret," outline efforts by U.S. Special Forces in the fall of 2005 to locate and target Taliban insurgents inside Pakistani territory. The focus fell on top Taliban leaders who informants said had been residing in Quetta and facilitating kidnapping and bombing missions around the southern Afghan city of Kandahar.

An October 2005 cable to U.S. commanders at Bagram, also marked "secret," said an intelligence source had reported that Taliban leaders met in a council of elders, or shura, in Quetta, on Sept. 25, just days before Afghanistan's parliamentary elections. In the meeting, the leaders apparently decided not to launch attacks on election day but to target government buildings and elected officials afterward, according to the documents on the drives.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/wo...headlines-world

East Asia biggest suspect in US military technology theft

Agence France-Presse
Last updated 10:40am (Mla time) 01/04/2007

WASHINGTON -- East Asian nations are the biggest suspected thieves of American military technology, according to an annual Pentagon study showing foreign spies using sex and computer hacking to steal defense secrets.

There will be no let up in technology theft in East Asia, which includes rising military power China, as the economically booming region modernizes its defense systems, said the "2006 Technology Collection Trends in the US Defense Industry" report.

Most of the 971 so called "suspicious contact reports" from US defense contractors and security and counterintelligence staff in 2005 were linked to the East Asian region, said the study, a copy of which was obtained by Agence France-Presse.

Prepared by the Defense Security Service Counterintelligence Office, the unclassified document said "the majority of reported targeting originated from East Asia and the Pacific, which accounted for 31 percent of all reporting.

"The apparent across-the-board surge in activity from East Asia and Pacific countries will continue in the short term as gaps in technological capability become apparent in their weapons development processes," it said.

A total of 106 countries were linked in the report to "suspicious activities" pertaining to secret military technology in 2005, up from 90 countries a year earlier, the report said.

The Middle East emerged second after East Asia with 23.1 percent of the cases, followed by Eurasia with 19.3 percent and South Asia with 13.2 percent.

In one case, a foreign" woman "seduced" an American male translator to give her his password in order to log on to his unclassified network, the report said, without giving particulars.

"Upon discovery of this security breach, a computer audit revealed foreign intelligence service viruses throughout the system, it said. The study did not identify countries.

"Identifying particular countries will make it a classified document," a spokeswoman for the Defense Security Service told Agence France-Presse.

The report said however that lasers and optics technology and aeronautics appeared to be "priority technology targets" for the East Asian region.

South Asia was keener on obtaining secrets pertaining to signature control technology.

After terrorism, the greatest threat to US national security at home is espionage, officials say.

Many American state agencies have cited China as the top counterintelligence threat, with as many as 3,500 Chinese "front companies" reportedly gathering intelligence, especially highly-prized information technology.

Just last month, a Chinese national was charged in California with stealing military trade secrets and using them in demonstration and sales proposals to Beijing as well as the air forces of Malaysia and Thailand.

Xiaodong Sheldon Meng, 42, allegedly stole military combat and commercial simulation software and other materials from his ex-employer Quantum3D, a San Jose-based company.

Meng, a resident of Cupertino in California and facing 36 "economic espionage" charges, was said to have stolen trade secrets from Quantum3D "with the intent that they would be used to benefit the foreign governments of China, Thailand, and Malaysia."

"The alleged economic espionage and theft and export of trade secrets such as these -- visual simulation training software that has military application, no less -- has real consequences that could jeopardize our country's military advantages in the world," said US attorney Kevin Ryan.

The US Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive in an annual report to Congress in August last year underlined the challenge of protecting sensitive US technologies from foreign theft, citing globalization and the openness of the US economy to both trade and labor flows.

While the FBI had expanded its counterintelligence cooperation with key defense contractors, that may not be enough, said Peter Brookes, a former senior Pentagon official.

"We've clearly got to do more to prevent foreign spies from nicking sensitive American information for ill-gotten commercial, military -- or worse yet -- terrorist gain," he said.

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/...rticle_id=41551

Do we have counter-intelligence unit in the National Bureau of Investigation?

I think they are called "jaguars"...hehehe joke laang

Back to topic, doesn't ISAFP handles intelligence and counter-intelligence operation.
Does NICA still exist?

ISAPF is not a law enforcement agency. Doesn't have arresting powers. I remember when CIA Ames was suspected to be involved, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the US law enforcement agency, took over the surveillance, investigation, and arrest. It's good we clarify these matters. It is also important that we weigh heavily on these matters. A Chinese spy in the Department of National Defense or a civilian Chinese spy Defense secretary would be tantamount to killling three fourths of AFP. That's the damage assessment.

Wow...this is quite interesting and disturbing to read, especially if one notes that the Japanese officer in question had a Chinese wife! The article doesn't specify if his wife was a PRC/Mainland Chinese citizen or was just ethnically Chinese and living in Japan.

:wow:

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2007/12/ap_japanaegis_071213/

Job security, messing with someone's woman or jealousy. Which one was the result of the downfall.

Very disturbing. :wow:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...8033101573.html

Pentagon staffer guilty of handing secrets to China agent

Mon Mar 31, 6:11 PM ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) - A Pentagon official pleaded guilty Monday to passing US military secrets to an agent working for China after being showered with gifts and gambling money, the Department of Justice said.

Gregg William Bergersen, 51, faces up to 10 years in jail after admitting to one count of conspiracy to disclose national defense information to persons not entitled to receive it the department said in a statement.

It said Bergersen started handing secret information in March 2007 to Tai Shen Kuo, 58, a Taiwan-born US citizen with business interests in New Orleans.

Bergersen worked as a weapons systems policy analyst at the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, which implements the Pentagon's foreign military sales program.

Unbeknown to Bergersen, Kuo was passing the information to an unnamed Chinese government official. But the DoJ statement said the US official knew the documents, many of which were about US weapons sales to Taiwan, were classified and should not be shared with outsiders.

"During the course of the conspiracy, Kuo cultivated a friendship with Bergersen, bestowing on him gifts, cash payments, dinners, and money for gambling during trips to Las Vegas," it said.

Bergersen will be sentenced on June 20 and faces up to 10 years behind bars, the statement said. Both Kuo and an alleged conspirator, Chinese citizen Yu Xin Kang, remain held without bond pending espionage charges.

Patrick Rowan, acting assistant attorney general for national security, said Bergersen had "betrayed his oath to serve and protect our nation."

"This case serves as a reminder that espionage networks are relentless in their efforts to steal our secrets and continue to pose a serious threat to our national security," he said.

China's foreign secret service is among the "most aggressive" in trying to steal sensitive US military technology and information,US Director of National Intelligence Michael McConnell charged last September.

A week ago, Chinese-born US engineer Chi Mak was jailed for 24 years after being convicted of conspiring to smuggle sensitive technology about US Navy submarines to China.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080331/wl_as...GPJ1VuXFT9H2ocA

May 28, 2008: American intelligence officials have confirmed what has long been suspected, that the new Chinese J-10 fighter was built using Israeli technology. Russian engineers also admitted that the J-10 had such technology. The J10 looks something like the American F-16, and weighs about the same (19 tons). Like the F-16 the J10 has only one engine. It's no accident that the J10 resembles the F-16, because Israel apparently sold them technology for their Lavi jet fighter. Israel had abandoned the Lavi project, because of the high cost and availability of cheaper alternatives (buying F-16s and F-15s from the United States.) But the Lavi was meant to be a super F-16, and incorporated a lot of design ideas from the F-16 (which the Israelis were very familiar with, as they used them, and had developed new components for them.) The Chinese denied any Israeli contribution, but Russian engineers say that China had one of the Lavi prototypes. . Pakistan is believed to have provided the Chinese with one of their F-16s for examination. There does appear to be a lot of F-16 technology in the J-10.

In the end, the J10 did not perform all that well in air combat, so the Chinese have been reconfiguring some of them as a fighter-bomber (the J-10C). This version can carry over four tons of bombs and missiles and has been equipped with a fire control system for delivering missiles and smart bombs. The Chinese designed targeting pod is similar to the Israeli Litening, and they were showing it off as early as 1998. American warplanes use a later version of the Litening. The J10C will have a weapons officer to concentrate on hitting things on the ground. China already has over 90 J10s in service, and Pakistan has some on order.

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htintel/a...s/20080528.aspx

hehe a buck is a buck di ba? just ask our jewish friends :).

----------

I have read a similar topic a long time ago...

This is why US embargoed Pakistan's F-16s.

Although, there was unconfirmed participation of Israel in the J-10 project, the US cannot easily give up its relations with Israel since it is the balancing force in the Middle East.

The US have learned a very valuable lesson here.

That's why they are very careful about their arms sales / donations nowadays.

----------

Only that some people don't understand this situation.

They think that it is still so easy to acquire US weapons nowadays.

Many dream about having the AH-64 Apache and other US weapon systems/platforms for the AFP... however, it's not that easy to acquire those from the US nowadays (eventhough some of it are 30 year-old technology).

These things are always tied up to political, economic, security, etc... and especially STRATEGIC reasons.

----------

peace out!

----------

Dude, as far as i remember the US embargo on Pakistan is due to its nuclear weapons program.
also by now, its pretty much common knowledge that Israel (a country that benefits/depends on billions of dollars in hand-outs/assistance from USA) sold the lavi tech to China.
as for America learn a thing or two here.. i dont know. hehe im not america.

your other rant..well im clueless. :lollol:

----------

Nuclear program...

Yeah right, a perfect event as a cover story for that...

Politics and media work together...

...and the poor civilians and foot soldiers will never have a clue...

whew... :headbang:

----------

out!

----------

um not going to force you to believe it.. but im not going to twist history for my own belief system.

have a nice day!

As Ferrari racing fans are very aware these days, industrial espionage that goes far beyond the bounds of ethical competitive intelligence is alive and kicking. This is even more true in the aerospace industry, whose national security implications often feature national intelligence organizations undertaking industrial espionage – in some cases, even against allied countries. China is most frequently mentioned in this context, with good reason, but Russia and France have also built reputations in this area.

A recent case in Europe shines a brief light on some of these goings on – and on some classic techniques used in the field. Deutsche Welle reports that former Eurocopter executive “Werner G.” allegedly met with a Russian SVR intelligence agent several times between 2004 and 2006 in Germany, Austria and Croatia, handing over unclassified technical manuals, files and CD-ROMs in exchange for EUR 13,000 (about $20,500). In a modern twist, classic techniques like dead drops and visual signals were bypassed in favor of anonymous webmail accounts to arrange meetings.

Remember this acronym: MICE. Money. Ideology. Compromise. Ego. Werner G. was reportedly in debt, and hoped his contact would help him gain business for his engineering consultancy. He clearly falls into the “money” category, as opposed to the Ferrari scandal which was primarily an “ego” example. His activities may also seem to come very cheap, but this too is normal when dealing with intelligence professionals. As is the fact that none of the requested documents were classified. This is often how it starts, with deliberately low-grade requests and pay. This achieves 2 things: (1) It fails to relieve the need for money, ensuring that the fish remains hooked; and (2) it establishes a firm hold, since later requests for secret documents can be backed up by the threat of exposure for clearly illegal activities that have already been committed.

http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com/cat/ge...l-focus/russia/

in future the j10 problems will be solved

British spy points to Russia in Litvinenko death

LONDON, England (AP) -- A British security services agent says the Russian government may have been involved in the 2006 murder of former security agent and Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko in London, according to the BBC's Newsnight program aired Monday night.
Former president Vladimir Putin has rejected any claims of a Russian plot to kill Litvinenko.

Former president Vladimir Putin has rejected any claims of a Russian plot to kill Litvinenko.

The unnamed security officer told Newsnight there were strong indications the government of former Russian President Vladimir Putin was involved in Litvinenko's murder, according to the report. Putin is now Russia's prime minister.

In the Newsnight report, the agent's voice is heard speaking but no face is seen.

"We very strongly believe the Litvinenko case to have had some state involvement," the officer is heard saying during the half-hour program featuring news analysis on several subjects.

Separately, a British security official told The Associated Press it is thought possible that there was some Russian state involvement in Litvinenko's killing. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the intelligence being discussed.

Officials at the Kremlin were not immediately available to comment on the report.

Litvinenko, a renegade officer of Russia's Federal Security Service, or FSB -- the successor agency to the KGB -- had been living in asylum in Britain when he died in a London hospital after ingesting radioactive polonium-210. In a deathbed statement, he accused Putin of being behind his killing -- charges the Kremlin has fiercely denied.

The BBC's Newsnight program also said that officials from MI5, the British security service, had said they believed they had stopped Russian security services from killing another Kremlin critic, Boris Berezovsky, in London last year.

The BBC program said a Russian citizen was arrested and deported in June 2007 in connection with the alleged incident. Berezovsky told Newsnight that British authorities had not put the man on trial because they did not want to reveal their sources, according to the report.

The British security official who spoke with The AP declined to comment on Berezovsky's claim.

Berezovsky, a former Kremlin insider, has been an outspoken critic of Putin and is wanted in Russia on embezzlement and other charges -- all of which he denies.

Litvinenko's murder has strained diplomatic relations between Russia and Britain. Jonathan Evans, head of Britain's security service MI5 said recently he believes Russian spies are operating in Britain under diplomatic cover.

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/0...ref=mpstoryview

Feds: Ex-CIA spy, son renewed Russian contact

By DEVLIN BARRETT, Associated Press Writer Devlin Barrett, Associated Press Writer – 2 hrs 53 mins ago
Featured Topics:


WASHINGTON – An imprisoned ex-CIA spy and his son have been charged with renewing contact with the father's former Russian handlers to get more money — and perhaps a "pension" — for his espionage.

Harold Nicholson and his 24-year-old son, Nathaniel, have been indicted in Oregon, where the elder Nicholson is still serving time in a federal prison for past espionage charges.

The pair face charges of conspiring to act as agents of a foreign government and money laundering. The duo's plans were undone by an imprisoned bank robber who told authorities six years ago that Nicholson was trying to establish contact with his former spymasters, according to court papers.

The indictment says Harold Nicholson, who pleaded guilty in 1997 after being paid $300,000 to pass secrets to the Russians, wanted to receive additional payments for his work, and used his son as a go-between.

Officials charged that Nathaniel Nicholson collected another $35,593 in a series of recent trips to meet Russians in San Francisco, Mexico City, Lima, and even a T.G.I. Friday's restaurant in Cyprus in December.

On each return trip to the United States, the messenger son would declare less than $10,000 in cash to avoid federal law requiring him to disclose the source of the money, authorities said.

Nathaniel Nicholson, who lives in Eugene, Ore., had been under surveillance for more than a year, according to court records. He was arrested Thursday morning in Oregon and he and his father were scheduled to appear in court later in the day, officials said.

Harold Nicholson is currently serving a 23-year prison term in Sheridan, Ore., after pleading guilty to conspiring to commit espionage. As a trainer of CIA personnel, authorities say he gave the Russians the identities of the young CIA recruits he was training, and the identities of other high-level CIA officers.

According to the new indictment, the Russians still thought Harold Nicholson might be able to give them valuable information — specifically, how he had been discovered and how much the investigators had learned about Russian spying.

The father told his son he was due a "pension" for his past work for the Russians, and even dropped hints that he would like to live in Russia when he was freed. To that end, investigators say, he once relayed his age, height, weight, and other relevant personal data that would be required for a Russian visa.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090130/ap_on_.../imprisoned_spy

Legendary Soviet spy mistress dies aged 97: official
AFP
AFP - Tuesday, September 22


MOSCOW (AFP) - – Elizaveta Mukasei, a Soviet spy who formed half of one of the most famous husband-and-wife duos in the history of espionage, has died aged 97, Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service said Monday.

Mukasei worked in tandem with her husband Mikhail on a string of undercover operations abroad in a career that spanned the 1940s under Joseph Stalin to the late 1970s.

The pair operated under the codenames "Zephyr" (Mikhail) and "Elza" (Elizaveta) and such was the sensitivity of their work that the modern successor to the KGB has yet to disclose full details of their operations.

Elizaveta Mukasei's death in Moscow was announced by Sergei Ivanov, the spokesman for the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) in a statement published by Russian news agencies.

Her death came soon after that of her husband, who died in August 2008 at the age of 101. Ivanov said she had died on Saturday.

"Under these seemingly naive codenames (of Zephyr and Elza) they served their Russia for more than 50 years, loyally and inconspicuously, and sometimes at the risk of their own lives," said Ivanov.

"May their memory glow and their descendants thank them eternally!" he added.

The deeds of Soviet spies in the Cold War remain a subject of great respect and celebration in Russia under its strongman prime minister and ex-KGB agent Vladimir Putin.

Elizaveta Mukasei spent most of her working life as "nelegal", a Russian term for spies who worked abroad undercover in the West in the Cold War and sent intelligence back to Moscow Centre.

The details of her career remain sketchy and largely limited to the information made public by the SVR.

She was born in 1912 in the southern Russian city of Ufa in a "poor working family" which later moved to Tashkent to escape poverty, and studied at Leningrad University.

Between 1939 and 1943 -- including years when the Soviet Union was the ally of the United States in World War II -- she worked "on mission" in Los Angeles where her husband was operating under the cover of deputy Soviet consul.

She took courses in German, Polish and coding in Moscow in the late 1940s and also found time to be secretary of the artistic council for the Moscow Art Theatre (MKhAT).

In 1955 she set off on her biggest mission, described as "espionage work in special circumstances abroad" in a still unidentified Western European country.

"Elza", who had received a full training in telecommunications, managed to maintain a two-way radio link with Moscow Centre throughout her stay abroad.

The couple also travelled on missions throughout Europe in that period, uncovering information that received the "highest estimation" back in Moscow, according to the SVR biography.

The couple only returned to Moscow in 1977, after which they devoted their energies to instructing a new generation of young Soviet spies at Moscow Centre in the art of espionage.

Like her husband, she also wrote a string of "textbooks" for the KGB's spy school and was decorated with top honours by the state.

The best known husband-and-wife spy tandem in the West is Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, US communists who passed on classified military information to the Soviet Union and were executed in 1953 after their conspiracy was revealed.

http://asia.news.yahoo.com/afp/20090922/tt...py-509a08e.html