5 ms·

Double life as a KGB agent

286 points by whitenoice 10y ago

CalChris 10y ago
In the end, it all seems so mundane. Secretive to be sure, but a talented life accomplishing nothing. Well, maybe an improvement on East Germany in the 80s but that's it.
- oxide 10y ago
  The guy looks happy now, though. His kids tracked each other down, he spends his time dead-dropping cookies for later. I wonder what might have become of him had he become a chemist. Nothing remarkable, maybe. Might have been even more mundane than the reality of spycraft.
- RealityVoid 10y ago
  I remember reading a book about Gunther Guillaume, an east-german spy in Germany. The same feeling resonated throughout the book, the job is, as you said, secretive, but mundane. Interestingly, I would expect people that choose to go into this line of work to know this, since most all realistic books and media leave show how utterly lonely and boring it is. On the other hand, I guess there are spy handlers ane their life might be more... exciting?
  - meowface 10y ago
    Being a spymaster sounds far more fun and interesting than being a spy.
    - mathattack 10y ago
      It seems worse to me. Just sorting through all these memos trying to figure out which people are and aren't important, and which data may be relevant. id the business is mundane, middle management isn't exciting.
      - meowface 10y ago
        I don't know, I'd find that kind of analysis a lot more fun than living a mundane line for decades just for a chance of learning some interest info.
- frozenport 10y ago
  Article says he wrote software for a living becoming director of IT. Although nothing in React Native.
- galfarragem 10y ago
  > but a talented life accomplishing nothing'. For what it's worth, he managed to accomplish several 'lifes' in just one lifetime.
Pyxl101 10y ago
A fair number of sleeper agents like this have been outed over the years. Another example that comes to mind is the KGB agent couple on which the TV show "The Americans" was based: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/07/discovered-our-parents-were-russian-spies-tim-alex-foley https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/07/discovered-our... FBI Operation Ghost Stories arrested 11 people back in 2010. https://vault.fbi.gov/ghost-stories-russian-foreign-intelligence-service-illegals/images https://vault.fbi.gov/ghost-stories-russian-foreign-intellig... What I'm wondering is: how many other agents are out there and haven't been caught yet? Or were here and left without being caught? I wonder if this type of agent is still in active use, in the sense of seeding more of them. Given the arrests just 7 years ago, I'd guess so. But perhaps not, since hacking and electronic surveillance can be so effective. You don't necessarily need an agent within a country's borders to penetrate a lot of their networks, email, and other communications. But you never know ... what lengths would Russia go to to get an agent TS/SCI clearance and access to a SCIF?
- ethbro 10y ago
  One of the inefficiencies of embedding agents like this seems to be that they're subject to the same vagaries of chance as all of us. What are the chances of an agent being hired and then promoted to have access to an SCI file you're interested in? It seems a pretty poor bet compared to turning individuals already in relevant positions.
  - ocdtrekkie 10y ago
    Bear in mind that was also part of his job. Profiling people they could potentially turn.
  - privong 10y ago
    > What are the chances of an agent being hired and then promoted to have access to an SCI file you're interested in? I think the chances are higher if you expand the realm of interest to industrial espionage.
    - 10y ago
akoster 10y ago
60 minutes produced a segment about him. Here is the transcript: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/former-kgb-spy-jack-barsky-steve-kroft-60-minutes/ http://www.cbsnews.com/news/former-kgb-spy-jack-barsky-steve...
myf01d 10y ago
Just like engineers, they think they are smart and they are changing the world and blablabla but it is actually all about billions and power going to the big guys
- warent 10y ago
  This comment comes across as small minded and pessimistic without real evidence. Scientists and engineers typically help the world, with or without money. See Gates, Stallman, Page & Brin, Clair Cameron Patterson, etc
  - myf01d 10y ago
    > Scientists and engineers typically help the world, with or without money Of course they do, the actual change has always been done by engineers and scientists, however, history only remembers the rulers and recently entrepreneurs
    - maneesh 10y ago
      You're right, no one remembers Galileo or Copernicus or Mozart or Bach or Archimedes or Aristotle. Just the rulers....
    - mercurial 10y ago
      > Of course they do, the actual change has always been done by engineers and scientists That is demonstrably false. Caesar brought lasting change around him, just like Napoleon did. Alexander the Great, though his empire crumbled after his death, brought Hellenic culture to many areas in the world. And I would like to know how the work of "scientists and engineers" triggered the Arab spring.
  - quakeguy 10y ago
    To expand, Oppenheimer, Turing, Feynman and even Gauss come to mind. Really stupid comment.
    - deleted 10y ago
EternalData 10y ago
Crazy story. It's amazing what a state power can get individuals to do for it.
kev009 10y ago
I had some level of respect for The Guardian vis a vis Glenn Greenwald. But wow, the brazen seed on current events "Might Trump have been recruited by Putin?" and "right wingers are easier to convert". First class journalism right there folks, way to be taken hook line and sinker by the intelligence community while doing an article on the intelligence community. Pretty comical.
- pbz 10y ago
  Greenwald has been at the Intercept for quite some time now: https://theintercept.com/staff/glenn-greenwald/ https://theintercept.com/staff/glenn-greenwald/
- corndoge 10y ago
  I didn't see anything in the article text that references what you are talking about. Did I miss it?
  - nl 10y ago
    Yes. I ask what he thinks of the unverified allegations that President Trump was compromised during visits to Russia. The dossier of claims, compiled by former MI6 agent Christopher Steele, was published just a day before we meet. “Clearly, blackmail is a weapon in the KGB arsenal,” Barsky shrugs. “If they could use it, they would. The only question is whether our new president was foolish enough to do any of that stuff.” Today’s Russian security services seem to think in much the same way as his old handlers in the KGB, he says. “That’s the thing with big organisations anywhere: they’re very resistant to change.” And In the 1980s, Barsky’s most interesting potential recruits were radical rightwing ideologues; here, Soviet agents would pose as activists from the radical right. “There was one individual I reported on who I’m convinced would have fallen for that, because he was so strongly rightwing,” he says. I think it would be unusual not to have asked at least the first (and I don't think Trump is a Russian agent).
- arkades 10y ago
  I lost my respect for the Guardian a while back. They were reporting on hostilities in Israel. They had a side-bar for "Related Articles", which were one after the other - critical of Israel as being an unprovoked aggressor. Fine, if that's the truth, except: Every article I opened had a long lead-in about Israeli aggression, its consequences, etc. Every article had buried in the last paragraph, practically mumbling under its breath, "The IDF moved in because they were repeatedly being attacked by RPGs &tc." Nothing was provided to suggest the IDF was lying or incorrect about being provoked - so why was one headline after the other all about characterizing unprovoked unilateral aggression? I was done. It's fine to be critical of Israeli policies and military posturing; it's another to essentially lie through your teeth and then cover your ass in postscript.
pjc50 10y ago
For people who like this sort of thing: https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n16/paul-foot/the-great-times-they-could-have-had https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n16/paul-foot/the-great-times-they... (on the British Royal family being infiltrated by fascists). The TV series Deutchland 83 is also well worth watching for a snappy spy drama about a young man from East Germany being coerced into being a double agent.
- piplgobde 10y ago
  Lovely series, but first thing I thought of when reading the article was The Americans, it's about two spies in the Soviet illegals program living in a DC suburb. Would definitely recommend it if you liked Deutschland 83.
  - DerekL 10y ago
    Jack Barsky was interviewed for the behind-the-scenes podcast for The Americans. I think he might work as a consultant for the show, but I'm not sure. http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2016/03/24/a_former_kgb_agent_on_how_the_americans_compares_to_his_own_experiences.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2016/03/24/a_former_kgb_...
- quirkafleeg 10y ago
  There was also a great four part BBC comedy-drama in 1991 called Sleepers (not to be confused with the completely different 1996 movie of the same name). http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101200/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101200/
BrailleHunting 10y ago
I don't want to sound like racist/FUD but there are a lot of eastern European coders working at MetLife to this day: both in NYC and elsewhere. Maybe being cheap on staff creates a greater vulnerability to foreign/industrial espionage? Just stayin'.
diebir 10y ago
This sounds true and similar to what I thought it would be, based on how laughably bad were the Russian "illegals" caught in 2010. It is virtually impossible to fit in having been born and raised in a different culture. Even simply the accent is almost impossible to overcome (women seem to have better luck defeating the accent than men and you have a chance up to the age of 17 or so). The Americans is a cool show, but the real life illegals could not fool anyone. These days Russia probably has no need for this type of presence, since there are enough Russians living in the US and enough of them support Putin that a small percentage may choose to work as spies. Same for China. Another interesting detail that came out of the 2010 illegal bust was that America is so diverse and people are so respectful of privacy, that one of the spies was doing just fine with an American name ("Jack Ryan" or "Patric Foley" or something like), fully American "legend" and a heavy Russian accent. People wondered but nobody asked any questions. P.S. And who needs spies when you can have a whole administration? :)
- TezlaKoil 10y ago
  > Even simply the accent is almost impossible to overcome (women seem to have better luck defeating the accent than men and you have a chance up to the age of 17 or so). Accent reduction does not work for everyone (see e.g. Bela Lugosi), but its success rate is much better than what your post would suggest. Three of the 2010 illegals (Chapman, Mills and Zottoli) had Russian accents. Their neighbors knew that they were Russian, and said that they never tried to conceal their national background. On the other hand, nobody could tell that Heathfield and Foley weren't real Americans.
walterkobayashi 10y ago
Amazing story!

286 points by whitenoice 10y ago

In the end, it all seems so mundane. Secretive to be sure, but a talented life accomplishing nothing. Well, maybe an improvement on East Germany in the 80s but that's it.

oxide 10y ago
The guy looks happy now, though. His kids tracked each other down, he spends his time dead-dropping cookies for later. I wonder what might have become of him had he become a chemist. Nothing remarkable, maybe. Might have been even more mundane than the reality of spycraft.
RealityVoid 10y ago
I remember reading a book about Gunther Guillaume, an east-german spy in Germany. The same feeling resonated throughout the book, the job is, as you said, secretive, but mundane. Interestingly, I would expect people that choose to go into this line of work to know this, since most all realistic books and media leave show how utterly lonely and boring it is. On the other hand, I guess there are spy handlers ane their life might be more... exciting?
- meowface 10y ago
  Being a spymaster sounds far more fun and interesting than being a spy.
  - mathattack 10y ago
    It seems worse to me. Just sorting through all these memos trying to figure out which people are and aren't important, and which data may be relevant. id the business is mundane, middle management isn't exciting.
    - meowface 10y ago
      I don't know, I'd find that kind of analysis a lot more fun than living a mundane line for decades just for a chance of learning some interest info.
frozenport 10y ago
Article says he wrote software for a living becoming director of IT. Although nothing in React Native.
galfarragem 10y ago
> but a talented life accomplishing nothing'. For what it's worth, he managed to accomplish several 'lifes' in just one lifetime.

Pyxl101 10y ago

A fair number of sleeper agents like this have been outed over the years. Another example that comes to mind is the KGB agent couple on which the TV show "The Americans" was based: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/07/discovered-our-parents-were-russian-spies-tim-alex-foley https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/may/07/discovered-our... FBI Operation Ghost Stories arrested 11 people back in 2010. https://vault.fbi.gov/ghost-stories-russian-foreign-intelligence-service-illegals/images https://vault.fbi.gov/ghost-stories-russian-foreign-intellig... What I'm wondering is: how many other agents are out there and haven't been caught yet? Or were here and left without being caught? I wonder if this type of agent is still in active use, in the sense of seeding more of them. Given the arrests just 7 years ago, I'd guess so. But perhaps not, since hacking and electronic surveillance can be so effective. You don't necessarily need an agent within a country's borders to penetrate a lot of their networks, email, and other communications. But you never know ... what lengths would Russia go to to get an agent TS/SCI clearance and access to a SCIF?

ethbro 10y ago
One of the inefficiencies of embedding agents like this seems to be that they're subject to the same vagaries of chance as all of us. What are the chances of an agent being hired and then promoted to have access to an SCI file you're interested in? It seems a pretty poor bet compared to turning individuals already in relevant positions.
- ocdtrekkie 10y ago
  Bear in mind that was also part of his job. Profiling people they could potentially turn.
- privong 10y ago
  > What are the chances of an agent being hired and then promoted to have access to an SCI file you're interested in? I think the chances are higher if you expand the realm of interest to industrial espionage.
  - 10y ago

akoster 10y ago

60 minutes produced a segment about him. Here is the transcript: http://www.cbsnews.com/news/former-kgb-spy-jack-barsky-steve-kroft-60-minutes/ http://www.cbsnews.com/news/former-kgb-spy-jack-barsky-steve...

myf01d 10y ago

Just like engineers, they think they are smart and they are changing the world and blablabla but it is actually all about billions and power going to the big guys

warent 10y ago
This comment comes across as small minded and pessimistic without real evidence. Scientists and engineers typically help the world, with or without money. See Gates, Stallman, Page & Brin, Clair Cameron Patterson, etc
- myf01d 10y ago
  > Scientists and engineers typically help the world, with or without money Of course they do, the actual change has always been done by engineers and scientists, however, history only remembers the rulers and recently entrepreneurs
  - maneesh 10y ago
    You're right, no one remembers Galileo or Copernicus or Mozart or Bach or Archimedes or Aristotle. Just the rulers....
  - mercurial 10y ago
    > Of course they do, the actual change has always been done by engineers and scientists That is demonstrably false. Caesar brought lasting change around him, just like Napoleon did. Alexander the Great, though his empire crumbled after his death, brought Hellenic culture to many areas in the world. And I would like to know how the work of "scientists and engineers" triggered the Arab spring.
- quakeguy 10y ago
  To expand, Oppenheimer, Turing, Feynman and even Gauss come to mind. Really stupid comment.
  - deleted 10y ago

EternalData 10y ago

Crazy story. It's amazing what a state power can get individuals to do for it.

kev009 10y ago

I had some level of respect for The Guardian vis a vis Glenn Greenwald. But wow, the brazen seed on current events "Might Trump have been recruited by Putin?" and "right wingers are easier to convert". First class journalism right there folks, way to be taken hook line and sinker by the intelligence community while doing an article on the intelligence community. Pretty comical.

pbz 10y ago
Greenwald has been at the Intercept for quite some time now: https://theintercept.com/staff/glenn-greenwald/ https://theintercept.com/staff/glenn-greenwald/
corndoge 10y ago
I didn't see anything in the article text that references what you are talking about. Did I miss it?
- nl 10y ago
  Yes. I ask what he thinks of the unverified allegations that President Trump was compromised during visits to Russia. The dossier of claims, compiled by former MI6 agent Christopher Steele, was published just a day before we meet. “Clearly, blackmail is a weapon in the KGB arsenal,” Barsky shrugs. “If they could use it, they would. The only question is whether our new president was foolish enough to do any of that stuff.” Today’s Russian security services seem to think in much the same way as his old handlers in the KGB, he says. “That’s the thing with big organisations anywhere: they’re very resistant to change.” And In the 1980s, Barsky’s most interesting potential recruits were radical rightwing ideologues; here, Soviet agents would pose as activists from the radical right. “There was one individual I reported on who I’m convinced would have fallen for that, because he was so strongly rightwing,” he says. I think it would be unusual not to have asked at least the first (and I don't think Trump is a Russian agent).
arkades 10y ago
I lost my respect for the Guardian a while back. They were reporting on hostilities in Israel. They had a side-bar for "Related Articles", which were one after the other - critical of Israel as being an unprovoked aggressor. Fine, if that's the truth, except: Every article I opened had a long lead-in about Israeli aggression, its consequences, etc. Every article had buried in the last paragraph, practically mumbling under its breath, "The IDF moved in because they were repeatedly being attacked by RPGs &tc." Nothing was provided to suggest the IDF was lying or incorrect about being provoked - so why was one headline after the other all about characterizing unprovoked unilateral aggression? I was done. It's fine to be critical of Israeli policies and military posturing; it's another to essentially lie through your teeth and then cover your ass in postscript.

pjc50 10y ago

For people who like this sort of thing: https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n16/paul-foot/the-great-times-they-could-have-had https://www.lrb.co.uk/v10/n16/paul-foot/the-great-times-they... (on the British Royal family being infiltrated by fascists). The TV series Deutchland 83 is also well worth watching for a snappy spy drama about a young man from East Germany being coerced into being a double agent.

piplgobde 10y ago
Lovely series, but first thing I thought of when reading the article was The Americans, it's about two spies in the Soviet illegals program living in a DC suburb. Would definitely recommend it if you liked Deutschland 83.
- DerekL 10y ago
  Jack Barsky was interviewed for the behind-the-scenes podcast for The Americans. I think he might work as a consultant for the show, but I'm not sure. http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2016/03/24/a_former_kgb_agent_on_how_the_americans_compares_to_his_own_experiences.html http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2016/03/24/a_former_kgb_...
quirkafleeg 10y ago
There was also a great four part BBC comedy-drama in 1991 called Sleepers (not to be confused with the completely different 1996 movie of the same name). http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101200/ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101200/

BrailleHunting 10y ago

I don't want to sound like racist/FUD but there are a lot of eastern European coders working at MetLife to this day: both in NYC and elsewhere. Maybe being cheap on staff creates a greater vulnerability to foreign/industrial espionage? Just stayin'.

diebir 10y ago

This sounds true and similar to what I thought it would be, based on how laughably bad were the Russian "illegals" caught in 2010. It is virtually impossible to fit in having been born and raised in a different culture. Even simply the accent is almost impossible to overcome (women seem to have better luck defeating the accent than men and you have a chance up to the age of 17 or so). The Americans is a cool show, but the real life illegals could not fool anyone. These days Russia probably has no need for this type of presence, since there are enough Russians living in the US and enough of them support Putin that a small percentage may choose to work as spies. Same for China. Another interesting detail that came out of the 2010 illegal bust was that America is so diverse and people are so respectful of privacy, that one of the spies was doing just fine with an American name ("Jack Ryan" or "Patric Foley" or something like), fully American "legend" and a heavy Russian accent. People wondered but nobody asked any questions. P.S. And who needs spies when you can have a whole administration? :)

TezlaKoil 10y ago
> Even simply the accent is almost impossible to overcome (women seem to have better luck defeating the accent than men and you have a chance up to the age of 17 or so). Accent reduction does not work for everyone (see e.g. Bela Lugosi), but its success rate is much better than what your post would suggest. Three of the 2010 illegals (Chapman, Mills and Zottoli) had Russian accents. Their neighbors knew that they were Russian, and said that they never tried to conceal their national background. On the other hand, nobody could tell that Heathfield and Foley weren't real Americans.

walterkobayashi 10y ago

Amazing story!