Double life as a KGB agent

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/feb/11/thought-smarter-everybody-kgb-spy-jack-barsky

by whitenoice • 9 years ago

286 75 9 years ago

CalChris• 9 years 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• 9 years 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• 9 years 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?

meowface2• 9 years ago

Being a spymaster sounds far more fun and interesting than being a spy.

frozenport• 9 years ago

Article says he wrote software for a living becoming director of IT. Although nothing in React Native.

galfarragem• 9 years ago

but a talented life accomplishing nothing'.

For what it's worth, he managed to accomplish several 'lifes' in just one lifetime.

Pyxl101• 9 years 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...

FBI Operation Ghost Stories arrested 11 people back in 2010. 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?

ethbro2• 9 years 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.

ocdtrekkie3• 9 years ago

Bear in mind that was also part of his job. Profiling people they could potentially turn.

privong• 9 years 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.

im3w1l2• 9 years ago

You can provide them with covert help. If they have a team of 10 people helping them out, they will seem like a 10x performer...

PhilWright• 9 years ago

You can shortcut that process, waiting 20 years to get your agent promoted to a senior position is slow and relies on a lot of luck.

Much easier to get your person into an IT position. Edward Snowden gained access to more secret documents than almost any individual person in the NSA. Get your infiltrator into the IT department and then help them with hacker tools and zero day exploits needed to extract data. Who knows how often this technique has already been used already.

TheCowboy• 9 years ago

From what I read, initially the Soviet "illegals" programs were successful. This was before the Cold War and during the early parts. After that, it was less successful and often viewed as a waste of resources.

If interested, I recommend "The Sword and the Shield: The Mitrokhin Archive and the Secret History of the KGB". There was a post-Cold War defection of an individual (Mitrokhin) who worked for the KGB in their archives and provided a large trove of intelligence. A researcher (Christopher Andrew) collaborated with him to produce 2 books, which included a large amount of data about the Soviet "illegals" programs.

It's often going to just be more effective to bribe and blackmail people with access, rather than hope your illegals have successful careers and gain the right access.

quirkafleeg3• 9 years ago

There was a post-Cold War defection of an individual (Mitrokhin) who worked for the KGB in their archives and provided a large trove of intelligence.

The article refers to that; in fact it's how this agent was identified:

    Barsky had in fact been trailed for several years
    by the FBI. His name had been discovered in files
    copied from KGB archives by Vasili Mitrokin, an 
    archivist who walked into the British embassy in 
    Riga in 1991 to offer up his secrets.

akoster• 9 years ago

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

myf01d2• 9 years 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• 9 years 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

myf01d2• 9 years 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

quakeguy• 9 years ago

To expand, Oppenheimer, Turing, Feynman and even Gauss come to mind. Really stupid comment.

Gracana• 9 years ago

Those people are about as atypical as they come.

knieveltech• 9 years ago

Income inequality, labor arbitrage, job loss to industrial automation, exponential increases in the surveillance state, healthcare cost increases, this list could go on indefinitely. Scientists and engineers intentions are largely moot as long as their inventions and innovations are consistently used to further concentrate wealth and power in the hands of a vanishingly small minority of the world population.

ocdtrekkie3• 9 years ago

Page and Brin have repetitively again and again compromised their stated moral positions in pursuit of money. They are billionaires that put thousands of smaller businesses out of business on a regular basis. The company they operate has paid off a large number of government officials to protect them from prosecution, and they have a level of power and influence that rivals oil companies.

If you were trying to show altruistic examples of scientists and engineers, you fell very far astray.

Cyph0n3• 9 years ago

Please stop throwing around Gates as an example of "working for humankind". His charitable work begun only very recently. Before that, he was a cold and ruthless money making machine.

sn92• 9 years ago

Scientists and engineers are just people. They can be moved to good or evil or anything in between just like anyone else.

madengr• 9 years ago

I'm an EE, and you are totally correct.

im3w1l2• 9 years ago

Change isn't always for the better.

dang• 9 years ago

Please don't post unsubstantive comments.

EternalData• 9 years ago

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

kev009• 9 years 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• 9 years ago

Greenwald has been at the Intercept for quite some time now: https://theintercept.com/staff/glenn-greenwald/

corndoge• 9 years ago

I didn't see anything in the article text that references what you are talking about. Did I miss it?

nl• 9 years 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• 9 years 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.

quirkafleeg3• 9 years ago

why was one headline after the other all about characterizing unprovoked unilateral aggression?

That's hard to say, since you haven't provided any examples of it.

markdown3• 9 years ago

Israel is occupying Palestine. When Palestinians fight back, Israelis can't claim to have been provoked, when their occupation is the original provocation.

It's like claiming Hitler just justified in killing 6 million jews because after he killed 1 million, a few jews tried to fight back, and he had to kill another 5 million because he was provoked.

hibikir• 9 years ago

I was born and raised in Spain, and now live in the US. In my experience, the coverage of news about Israel in the US and Spain are about as different as black and white. What you describe about The Guardian seems like normal coverage in Spain.

The experience mase me understand that, in practice, all sources have major amounts of spin where you might not expect it, and that it is very difficult to figure out which spin, if any, is closer to reality. It's not about fake news, but about how wide the journalist's sources are, and how much did they care about digging for what is real.

dgrealy• 9 years ago

What do you think of the american intelligence agencies who say the same thing?

jimnotgym• 9 years ago

With the Guardian I think more about the individual writer rather than paper as a whole, as it is run rather differently from most news outlets [0].

And of course a journo is going to try and use current events to shoehorn in a half written story they have had for a while. A bit like how almost every piece of software now has a cloud version.

But the Guardian is critical to the landscape of UK news. It is one of very few newspapers not controlled by a press baron like Murdoch or the 'Weird Twins'. The UK press as a whole is much much more right wing (notably on immigration and the EU) than properly fits the UK IMHO and the Guardian is an important antidote. As well as Snowden, it also broke the important 'phone hacking' scandal, where some tabloids were getting their stories with very questionable ethics. It was also the only newspaper to cover the 'Snoopers Charter' legislation, that allows random parts of the UK government to look at users browsing history (and share it with the US gov).

It shows up so much on HN for its other important trait, no paywall.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Guardian

twblalock• 9 years ago

Unlike the American press, which generally tries to promote a naive concept of objectivity, the UK press is not shy about taking a side. It's the reader's job to decide what to believe, and that's true in the US as well -- even though many Americans want to believe in an objective press, that's clearly not the case. At least the Brits are honest about it. You can't outsource your critical thinking to journalists.

77pt772• 9 years ago

I had some level of respect for The Guardian vis a vis Glenn Greenwald

Are you familiar with Sam Harris' objections to his character?

lern_too_spel• 9 years ago

Or that he continues to claim that his PRISM reporting was correct, despite lacking any evidence to support his claims and having seen irrefutable evidence to the contrary.

pjc50• 9 years ago

For people who like this sort of thing: 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• 9 years 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• 9 years 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_...

quirkafleeg3• 9 years 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/

diebir• 9 years 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• 9 years 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• 9 years ago

Amazing story!

Double life as a KGB agent

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