An Implacable Foe: My Counterterrorism Magazine Q&A With Sean M. Wiswesser, Retired CIA Officer And The Author Of 'Tradecraft, Tactics And Dirty Tricks: Russian Intelligence And Putin's Secret War'

Counterterrorism magazine published my Q&A with Sean M. Wiswesser, a retired CIA officer and author of Tradecraft, Tactics and Dirty Tricks: Russian Intelligence and Putin’s Secret War.

You can read the pages above and below or the following text:

Mr. Wiswesser has nearly thirty years of experience working as a national security professional with intelligence, foreign service, and defense organizations.

As a senior operations officer with the CIA, he served on multiple overseas tours and many other deployments on temporary duty, including war-zone service. He was a chief of station and had multiple joint-duty assignments with intelligence community partners.

Mr. Wiswesser was a Morehead Scholar at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill with a bachelor's degree in history and Russian & Slavic linguistics. He was awarded a Master of Strategic Studies in 2023 from the Air War College and received the Russia Integrated Deterrence.

Mr. Wiswesser is the author of “Tradecraft, Tactics and Dirty Tricks: Russian Intelligence and Putin’s Dirty Tricks,” published by the Naval Institute Press.

Sean M. Wiswesser was interviewed by Paul Davis.

IACSP: I enjoyed your book on Russian intelligence. I’ve been interested in Russian intelligence since I was a teenager and read spy thrillers. I did security work while serving in the U.S. Navy as a young sailor on an aircraft carrier during the Vietnam War and later as Department of Defense civilian employee. I was trained to guard against Russian intelligence and I attended many FBI, NSA, DIA and CIA briefings and training sessions on Russian intelligence, but there was still a lot in the book that I didn't know.

My first question is why did you write the book?

Wiswesser: There is a saying, if you're going to write a book, write the book only you can write. In the CIA I was a Russia guy, which meant I had to focus on my career and tradecraft, particularly denied area tradecraft, so in other words how we operated in the toughest of environments overseas, like Russia, China, North Korea and Iran. As a member of our senior expert cadre with a focus on those areas, I had an idea about writing a book and then I went to the War College towards the end of my career, and it gave me some faith that maybe I could actually do it. I got published in a couple of books at the  War College and another one with the Cambridge Publishing House on the Ukraine War. I would never do a memoir; I’m not interested in that. I knew it would be focused on our adversaries, because that's where I want to do damage to them. I don’t have any grudges or concerns, and I didn’t want to do an expose on us. In fact, I want to do an expose on them, the bad guys. So that was the motivation and there was the added burden of having to get CIA to clear it, so that was an extra step in the process, but in the end it all worked out.

IACSP: You say the book was written for general readers, but why should everyday Americans be concerned about Russian intelligence in particular?

Wiswesser: Well, Paul. They are an implacable foe. Early in the book, I talk about a Russian intelligence officer in the period post 911. Even though I was trained, I wanted to ask him, maybe somewhat naively in retrospect, I said, well, what about Bush and Putin agreeing that the Global War on Terrorism is more important, are we all going get along? And he was betraying his country and helping us, he just laughed at me and said you have always been the main enemy, you are the main enemy, you will be the main enemy of Russia and our security services. For us, the United States comes first.

So I think that we’ve been engaged in 20 years of war, the Global War on Terrorism, the Iraq War, and now we have another war with Iran, Russia has never taken its eyes off of us, because democracy is the only ultimate threat to Putin that he's really concerned about. Democracy and Democratic institutions. Those are the only true threats to his rein.

IACSP: Your book is subtitled “Putin's Secret War.” How would you describe a secret war?

Wiswesser: The secret war is the hybrid war, the gray zone tactics. Traditional espionage, but also cyber operations and the information war. Now in Europe you see the other aspects that I touched on in the later chapters of the book. Sabotage, assassinations and “wet work.” It’s not a new thing. These are old Cold War tactics going back decades into the Cold War, even to the time of the Bolshevik revolution.  

IACSP: How would you briefly describe the Russian SVR, the FSB and the GRU?

Wiswesser: The FSB is the largest of the services, going somewhere around 400,000 officers across Russia, including 200,000 border guards. There are there are no equivalencies to the U.S. intelligence community. People say they are sort of like the FBI. Nothing could be further from the truth. They don't swear their allegiance to the Constitution; there are no laws that they have to worry about breaking. The FSB has the singular mission of protection of the regime, and the protection of Vladimir Putin as the head of it. Remember, he is the former director of the FSB. Their allegiance is to him. The FSB is responsible for counterterrorism, counterintelligence, and wide swaths of activities, including corruption and feeding their own pockets.

The next largest is the GRU, known today as the GU, military intelligence. They number probably between 70,000 and 100,000. They incorporate our DIA, NSA and NRO. They have a vast bureaucracy that they're in charge of in terms of military intelligence and signals intelligence, imagery and otherwise. And they have the Spetsnaz Brigades, the equivalent of the Tier-1 Delta Force and the Navy SEALs.

The SVR is the smallest of the three. They are the foreign intelligence service directorate, numbering probably around 30,000. They are the remnants of the old First Chief Directorate of the KGB, which was in charge of foreign intelligence. That’s a brief summary of the three. 

IACSP: You mention in the book something that was new to me, at least on the grand scale that you note, of how corruption is rampant in Russian intelligence and is a major weakness of their intelligence services. Would you explain that?

Wiswesser: The life of a Russian intelligence officer is overwhelmingly obsessed with and dominated by corruption. Russian intelligence officers and their bureaucracies are deeply embedded to the overall Russian kleptocracy, which is their government. They are constantly on the take for graft, greed, scamming and scheming of all different types, in order to make money for themselves and their patronage networks. I point out in the book that Russian intelligence services resemble more mafia gangs and giant feudal systems then they do anything that resembles the government bureaucracies in the West. These are systems that are set up where you have to make your boss look good and you have to literally line the pockets of your boss all the way up the chain. Every Russian intelligence officer that I worked with him in my career all said the obsession of their services is corruption, making money.

IACSP: In the book you state that you debriefed several Russian defectors. Why generally do they defect and how do they adjust to the US?

Wiswesser: Defectors by and large come to the West because our message resonates. Another journalist asked me if we were losing the intelligence war. No, we're winning. The reason is we will always be winning because our message is far more appealing to Russian intelligence officers. They know that corruption is there, and they know there's no chance of their children ever achieving great things based only on their merits. That's what they seek out eventually, especially in middle age. They realize they have been struggling their whole life for a lie.

IACSP: What sparked your initial interest in Russian language and culture?

Wiswesser: When I was 14 years old, I was really fortunate that I won a scholarship at an all-boys boarding school outside of Philadelphia. The school had a great language program, and I got to study Russian for four years with an excellent instructor named Rick Borger.

I don’t have a strong American accent, which later in my career that was a huge benefit for me. When I was trying to meet Russians for the first time at receptions out there it was a huge advantage that they didn't immediately identify me as an American. With that interest in Russian language came a desire to go to Russia to study, which I did in college. I was fascinated and I hopefully it comes across my great respect for the Russian people and their great language and culture and literature, but I also saw the darker side of their society. The people lived in fear. I decided that I wanted to join the intelligence community and fight back against the Soviet regime.  

IACSP:  One of the things I found most interesting in your book is that you write about how Russian intelligence interfered with our presidential elections. Did they interfere in favor of Trump or were they just interested in dividing Americans and damaging our electoral process?

Wiswesser: Their attack was fundamentally against democracy more broadly. This is not new. They have been doing it for decades.  They want to spread the false idea that you can't have free and fair elections in the West.  They want our youth in America and other democracies to give up. Any benefit to an individual candidate is incidental.

IACSP: You write about Putin, the former KGB Lieutenant Colonel and later the director of the FSB. He's a big supporter of Russian intelligence. What do you think will happen when he dies?

Wiswesser: I don't believe fundamentally that there's any opposition to Putin whatsoever. Whoever replaces him, he's going to be a hand-picked successor, most likely from Putin’s inter circle of those veterans of the KGB that came with him when he was the deputy mayor of Saint Petersburg. Those veterans are fiercely loyal to him. They're completely beholden to him. So, Putin is going to decide who's going to succeed him. 

IACSP: Thank you for your service with the CIA and thank you for speaking to us.

Paul Davis, a longtime contributor to the Journal, also writes the online IACSP Threatcon column.   

Note: Sean Wiswesser posted: 

Thank you, Paul! Am honored by this kind review. Here is link to my book for those that want to order, much appreciated:

https://a.co/d/07sduvsz

Thank you!
Sean Wiswesser
CIA Senior Operations Officer (Ret.) Author/Lecturer on Russian Intelligence/Defense/Security Issues                                             

U.S. Citizens And Russian Intelligence Officers Charged With Conspiring To Use U.S. Citizens As Illegal Agents of the Russian Government

 The U.S. Justice Department released the below information:

A federal grand jury in Tampa, Florida, returned a superseding indictment charging four U.S. citizens and three Russian nationals with working on behalf of the Russian government and in conjunction with the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) to conduct a multi-year foreign malign influence campaign in the United States. Among other conduct, the superseding indictment alleges that the Russian defendants recruited, funded and directed U.S. political groups to act as unregistered illegal agents of the Russian government and sow discord and spread pro-Russian propaganda; the indicted intelligence officers, in particular, participated in covertly funding and directing candidates for local office within the United States.

Additionally, in a separate case out of the District of Columbia, a criminal complaint was unsealed charging Russian national Natalia Burlinova with conspiring with an FSB officer to act as an illegal agent of Russia in the United States.

“Russia’s foreign intelligence service allegedly weaponized our First Amendment rights – freedoms Russia denies its own citizens – to divide Americans and interfere in elections in the United States,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division. “The department will not hesitate to expose and prosecute those who sow discord and corrupt U.S. elections in service of hostile foreign interests, regardless of whether the culprits are U.S. citizens or foreign individuals abroad.”

“Efforts by the Russian government to secretly influence U.S. elections will not be tolerated,” said Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Polite, Jr. of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “As today’s announcement demonstrates, the Criminal Division is committed to eradicating foreign malign influence from the U.S. political system and helping ensure the integrity of our elections.”

“Today’s announcement paints a harrowing picture of Russian government actions and the lengths to which the FSB will go to interfere with our elections, sow discord in our nation and ultimately recruit U.S citizens to their efforts,” said Acting Assistant Director Kurt Ronnow of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division. “All Americans should be deeply concerned by the tactics employed by the FSB and remain vigilant to any attempt to undermine our democracy. The FBI remains committed to confronting this egregious behavior and ultimately disrupting our adversaries and those who act on their behalf.”

United States v. Ionov, et al.

According to the superseding indictment returned in the Middle District of Florida, Aleksandr Viktorovich Ionov, a resident of Moscow, was the founder and president of the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia (AGMR), an organization headquartered in Moscow, Russia, and funded by the Russian government. Ionov allegedly utilized AGMR to carry out Russia’s malign influence campaign. Ionov’s influence efforts were allegedly directed and supervised by Moscow-based FSB officers, including indicted defendants Aleksey Borisovich Sukhodolov and Yegor Sergeyevich Popov.

“The prosecution of this criminal conduct is essential to protecting the American public when foreign governments seek to inject themselves into the American political process,” said U.S. Attorney Roger B. Handberg for the Middle District of Florida. “We thank our partners at the FBI for their tireless investigation of these events and their commitment to ensure justice is done.”

Among other illegal activities, the superseding indictment alleges that Ionov, Sukhodolov and Popov conspired to directly and substantially influence democratic elections in the United States by clandestinely funding and directing the political campaign of a particular candidate for local office in St. Petersburg, Florida, in 2019. For instance, the superseding indictment alleges that Popov expressly referred to this effort on behalf of the FSB as “our election campaign,” and Ionov referring to the candidate as the “candidate whom we supervise.” Ionov and Popov allegedly intended that this election interference plot would extend beyond the 2019 local election cycle in St. Petersburg, and subsequently discussed that the “USA Presidential election” was the FSB’s “main topic of the year.”

Moreover, from at least November 2014 until July 2022, Ionov allegedly engaged in a years-long foreign malign influence campaign targeting the United States. As a part of the campaign, Ionov allegedly recruited members of political groups within the United States, including the African People’s Socialist Party and the Uhuru Movement (collectively, the APSP) in Florida, Black Hammer in Georgia and a political group in California (referred to in the superseding indictment as U.S. Political Group 3), to participate in the influence campaign and act as agents of Russia in the United States, including the following indicted defendants:

• Omali Yeshitela, a U.S. citizen residing in St. Petersburg, Florida, and St. Louis, Missouri, who served as the chairman and founder of the APSP;
• Penny Joanne Hess, a U.S. citizen residing in St. Petersburg, Florida, and St. Louis, Missouri, who served as the leader of a component of the APSP;
• Jesse Nevel, a U.S. citizen residing in St. Petersburg, Florida, and St. Louis, Missouri, who served as a member of a component of the APSP; and
• Augustus C. Romain Jr., aka Gazi Kodzo, a U.S. citizen residing in St. Petersburg, Florida, and Atlanta, who served as a leader of the APSP and a founder of Black Hammer in Georgia.

One focus of Ionov’s alleged influence operation was to create the appearance of American popular support for Russia’s annexation of territories in Ukraine. For example, in May 2020, Ionov allegedly sent a request he stated was from “Russia, the Donetsk People’s Republic” – an apparent reference to a Russian-occupied region in eastern Ukraine – to Yeshitela and members of other U.S. political groups to make statements in support of the independence of the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic, a Russian-backed breakaway state in eastern Ukraine. Ionov later allegedly touted to the FSB that Yeshitela’s video-recorded statement of support was the first time that “American nonprofit organizations congratulated citizens” of the occupied region.

Ionov’s use of the APSP to promote Russian propaganda relating to Ukraine allegedly continued after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. On the day Russia invaded Ukraine, Feb. 24, 2022, Ionov allegedly emailed Nevel an “URGENT MESSAGE” which contained pro-Russian talking points in support of the invasion. Thereafter, throughout March 2022, the APSP repeatedly hosted Ionov via video conference to discuss the war, during which Ionov falsely stated that anyone who supported Ukraine also supported Naziism and white supremacy, and Yeshitela and another APSP member allegedly made statements of solidarity with the Russian government.

Ionov, Sukhodolov, Popov, Yeshitela, Hess, Nevel and Romain are charged with conspiring to have U.S. citizens act as illegal agents of the Russian government within the United States without providing prior notification to the Attorney General, as required by law. If convicted, they each face a maximum penalty of five years in prison. Yeshitela, Hess and Nevel are also charged with acting as agents of Russia within the United States without such prior notification. If convicted, they each face a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison. If convicted, a federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

Assistant U.S. Attorneys Daniel J. Marcet and Risha Asokan for the Middle District of Florida, Trial Attorney Menno Goedman of the Justice Department’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section, and Trial Attorney Demetrius Sumner of the Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section are prosecuting the case.

United States v. Burlinova

According to the affidavit in support of the criminal complaint unsealed in the District of Columbia, Russian national Natalia Burlinova, a resident of Moscow, conspired with an FSB officer to recruit U.S. citizens from academic and research institutions to travel to Russia to participate in a public diplomacy program called Meeting Russia. The program was operated by PICREADI, a Russian organization led by Burlinova, funded by the Russian government and devoted to promoting Russian national interests.

“The defendant is accused of subverting our foreign agent notification laws to promote Russian national interests here in the United States, concealing from the public that her recruitment efforts were funded by a Russian security service,” said U.S. Attorney Matthew M. Graves for the District of Columbia. “We will continue to expose these serious crimes and hold all who perpetrate them accountable.”

The affidavit alleges that the FSB officer provided funding and other support for Burlinova’s foreign recruitment and her efforts to advance Russian interests in the United States. In return, Burlinova provided the FSB officer with extensive information about U.S. citizens who were recruited to attend her programs, including their résumés, passport information, photographs and analyses of their views toward Russia. Burlinova further identified for the FSB officer particular U.S. citizens who, in Burlinova’s view, had expressed positive attitudes towards Russia and were prepared to continue to collaborate. During a recruitment trip to the United States in fall 2018, Burlinova met with U.S. citizens at various universities and research institutions and provided to photographs of her meetings to the FSB officer. The FSB officer used the information Burlinova provided prepare FSB intelligence reports. Burlinova never notified the Attorney General of these efforts or otherwise disclosed to the public that her recruitment efforts were supported and funded by a Russian security service.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael J. Friedman for the District of Columbia and Trial Attorney Emma D. Ellenrieder of the National Security Division’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section are prosecuting the case.

An indictment and a complaint are merely an allegation. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.

Russian National Charged With Conspiring To Have U.S. Citizens Act As Illegal Agents Of The Russian Government

The U.S. Justice Department released the below information:

An indictment was unsealed today in Tampa, Florida, charging a Russian national, working on behalf of the Russian government and in conjunction with the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), with allegedly orchestrating a years-long foreign malign influence campaign that used various U.S. political groups to sow discord, spread pro-Russian propaganda, and interfere in elections within the United States.

As alleged in the indictment, from at least December 2014 until March 2022, Aleksandr Viktorovich Ionov, a resident of Moscow, together with at least three Russian officials, engaged in a years-long foreign malign influence campaign targeting the United States. Ionov is the founder and president of the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia (AGMR), an organization headquartered in Moscow and funded by the Russian government. Ionov utilized AGMR to carry out Russia’s influence campaign.

“Ionov allegedly orchestrated a brazen influence campaign, turning U.S. political groups and U.S. citizens into instruments of the Russian government,” said Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen of the Justice Department’s National Security Division. “The Department of Justice will not allow Russia to unlawfully sow division and spread misinformation inside the United States.”

According to the indictment, Ionov — working under the supervision of the FSB and with the Russian government’s support — recruited political groups within the United States, including U.S. Political Group 1 in Florida, U.S. Political Group 2 in Georgia, and U.S. Political Group 3 in California, and exercised direction or control over them on behalf of the FSB. Specifically, Ionov provided financial support to these groups, directed them to publish pro-Russian propaganda, coordinated and funded direct action by these groups within the United States intended to further Russian interests, and coordinated coverage of this activity in Russian media outlets. Ionov also relayed detailed information about this influence campaign to three FSB officials.

“Secret foreign government efforts to influence American elections and political groups threaten our democracy by spreading misinformation, distrust and mayhem,” said Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Polite, Jr. of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “The department is committed to ensuring U.S. laws protecting transparency in the electoral process and the political system are not undermined through foreign malign influence.”

According to the indictment, Ionov allegedly targeted U.S. Political Group 1 based in St. Petersburg, Florida. In May 2015, Ionov funded an all-expense paid trip to Russia for the leader of U.S. Political Group 1 (Unindicted Co-Conspirator-1, UIC-1) in order to “communicate on future cooperation” between U.S. Political Group 1 and AGMR. Following that trip, and for at least the next seven years, Ionov exercised direction and control over senior members of U.S. Political Group 1.

“The prosecution of this criminal conduct is essential to protecting the American public when foreign governments seek to inject themselves into the American political process,” said U.S. Attorney Roger B. Handberg for the Middle District of Florida. “We will continue to work with our partners at the FBI to investigate these events, and we will continue to follow the evidence to ensure justice is done.”

Early in the conspiracy, senior members of U.S. Political Group 1, UIC-1, UIC-2, and UIC-3 exchanged emails about the fact that Ionov was working on behalf of the Russian government. For example, in September 2015, Ionov paid for UIC-1 to attend an AGMR-sponsored “Dialogue of Nations” conference in Moscow. Upon his return to Florida, UIC-1 reported to the leadership of U.S. Political Group 1 that AGMR is “a solid institution of Russian politic,” and that it was “clear” that AGMR was “an instrument of [the] Russian government,” which, UIC-1 wrote, did not “disturb us.” The following week, in an email discussion, U.S. Political Group 1 leaders observed that it was “more than likely” that the Russian government was using AGMR “to utilize forces inside of the U.S. to sew [sic] division inside the United States.”

“The impact of Russian malign foreign influence cannot be overstated,” said Assistant Director Luis Quesada of the FBI’s Criminal Investigative Division. “The FBI will aggressively pursue any foreign government that attempts to divide American citizens and poison our democratic process.”

Ionov used his control over U.S. Political Group 1 leaders to foster discord within the United States, to spread pro-Russian propaganda under the guise of a domestic political organization, and to interfere in local elections. For example, in January 2016, Ionov guaranteed financing for — and ultimately funded — a four-city protest tour undertaken by U.S. Political Group 1 in support of a “Petition on Crime of Genocide against African People in the United States,” which it had previously submitted to the United Nations at Ionov’s direction. Later, in 2017 and 2019, Ionov monitored and supported the St. Petersburg, Florida, political campaigns of UIC-3 and UIC-4. In 2019, before the primary election, Ionov wrote to a Russian official that he had been “consulting every week” on the campaign. After UIC-4 advanced to the general election, FSB Officer 1 wrote to Ionov that “our election campaign is kind of unique,” and asked, “are we the first in history?” Ionov later sent FSB Officer 1 additional details about the election, referring to UIC-4 as the candidate “whom we supervise.”

According to the indictment, Ionov’s relationship with U.S. Political Group 1 continued until at least March 2022. Specifically, in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, U.S. Political Group 1 repeatedly hosted Ionov via video conference to discuss the war, during which Ionov falsely stated that anyone who supported Ukraine also supported Nazism and white supremacy. In a report to the FSB, Ionov explained that he had enlisted U.S. Political Group 1 to support Russia in the “information war unleashed” by the West.

Alongside his malign foreign influence efforts with U.S. Political Group 1, Ionov also exercised direction and control over U.S. Political Group 3, an organization based in California whose primary goal was to promote California’s secession from the United States. In January and February of 2018, Ionov supported U.S. Political Group 3’s efforts — led by the organization’s founder (UIC-6)—to orchestrate a protest demonstration at the California Capitol building in Sacramento. Ionov partially funded the efforts and attempted to direct UIC-6 to physically enter the governor’s office. Later, Ionov sent various media reports covering the demonstration and U.S. Political Group 3’s broader efforts to FSB Officer 1, writing that FSB Officer 1 had asked for “turmoil” and stating, “there you go.” 

According to the indictment, Ionov also directed the efforts of U.S. Political Group 2, based in Atlanta. For example, as recently as March 2022, Ionov paid for members of U.S. Political Group 2 — including its founder (UIC-5) — to travel from Atlanta to San Francisco to protest at the headquarters of a social media company that had placed content restrictions on posts supporting Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Ionov sent UIC-5 designs for signs used at the protest and funded cross-country travel for UIC-5 and other members of U.S. Political Group 2. After the protest, Ionov sent UIC-5 a picture of a Russian news website’s social media page, which displayed a Russian-language news story about the protest.   

Ionov is charged with conspiring to have U.S. citizens act as illegal agents of the Russian government. If convicted, he faces a maximum penalty of five years in prison. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.

Assistant U.S. Attorneys Daniel J. Marcet and Risha Asokan, Trial Attorney Menno Goedman of the Justice Department’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section, and Trial Attorney Demetrius Sumner of the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section are prosecuting the case.

The FBI Tampa Field Office is investigating the case.

No One Ever Truly Retires From Russian Intelligence

Retired Lt Colonel Ralph Peters, who served a U.S. Army intelligence officer, offers his take in his column at the New York Post on the so-called “retired” Russian intelligence officer who attended a meeting with President Trump’s son 

Of all the creatures rumored to roam the earth, we can be certain that three do not exist: unicorns, fire-breathing dragons and “former” Russian intelligence agents. Moscow’s security services are like the mob: Once you’re in, you’re in for life. Whether the “former” spy or hit man is doing billion-dollar deals through Cypriot banks or running a tanning parlor in Murmansk, when the capo di capo calls, the game’s back on.

We can’t take the measure of Russians by applying American rules. Here, when you leave an intelligence agency, you leave your access and duties completely behind you (unless you go to work for a Beltway Bandit, in which case there’s a record of your employment). When I retired from US Army Military Intelligence, I was “read off” and could not be tapped for classified work any longer, unless I were formally rehired and processed for a renewed security clearance.

We also have robust firewalls between intelligence agencies, the rest of government, the private sector, the media, NGOs and so forth. In Russia, there are no firewalls. You can be a businessman, a propagandist, a human-rights lawyer (I love that one) and a spy simultaneously. You can be a billionaire cruising the Greek islands on your mega-yacht, but if Putin’s dogsbody rings your cell with a task, vacation’s over.

Russia is, in the end, Putin Incorporated.

But when we know that a Russian has formally worked as a “former counterintelligence agent” — as we learned Friday about an additional person present at the now-famous meeting last year between Trump family members and Russians promising dirt on Mrs. Clinton — we can mentally drop that word “former.”

And to claim that a meeting with the Russian equivalent of a mob lawyer and a “former” Russian counterintelligence officer is business-as-usual for any American political campaign is utterly untrue.

(Yes, the Clintons have had more ugly connections than there are rats in Manhattan. But shabby as they are, the Clintons never sought campaign collusion with Russian intelligence agents. The Clintons prefer being bought over being fooled.)

There are no good guys on this political landscape. But as we go forward, let’s remember who the real bad guys are: the Russians. Not the Ukrainians, who are fighting for democracy and survival while under attack by Putin. Not journalists, who are doing their work as foreseen by the First Amendment. And certainly not the special counsel, who embodies our core belief in justice for all.

The bad guys are the Russians, who have tried, with unprecedented audacity, immense resources and breathtaking cynicism, to subvert the fundamental tool of our self-government, our elections.

And a Russian spy once means a Russian spy forever.

You can read the rest of the column via the below link:

http://nypost.com/2017/07/14/no-one-ever-truly-retires-from-russian-intelligence/ 

Note: The top photo is of Putin as a KGB officer. The middle photo is of Ralph Peters and the last photo is of Putin today.

Spies, Sleepers And Hitmen: How The Soviet Union's KGB Never Went Away

 

Luke Harding at the Guardian offers an interesting piece on Russia's secret police.

 

Vladimir Putin was never an especially distinguished spy. In the 1980s, the KGB dispatched him not to a glamorous western capital but to provincial East Germany. It was here, in Dresden, that he sat out the collapse of the Soviet Union, an event that filled him with horror and rage.

 

For a brief moment in the 90s, the KGB – now re-branded as the FSB, the Federal Security Service – was on the back foot. Since becoming president in 2000, however, Putin has transformed Russia into a giant spy state. He has brought back many of the cold war espionage techniques he first learned as a young recruit in Leningrad’s KGB spy school. Not that they ever quite went away.

FSB spies are a paranoid, conspiratorial and deeply xenophobic bunch. They see themselves as the direct descendants of the Cheka, Lenin’s feared, terrifying secret police. They are obsessed, as in cold war times, with finding and defeating Russia’s “enemies”. Some of these so-called “enemies” are foreign, some are homegrown.

In the 70s, the KGB employed a wide repertoire of operational tricks. Typically, they would eavesdrop on western diplomats, harass British and American journalists (slashing the tyres of their cars was a favourite) and carry out break-ins and buggings. Writing about Soviet dissidents or Jewish emigration got you into trouble

When I got to Moscow in 2007 as the Guardian’s correspondent I was surprised to discover that such ancient KGB practices were back. For reasons that are still mysterious, the FSB decided that I was one of its enemies. Unpromising young men in black leather jackets trailed me round Moscow’s icy streets. This time, the reporting taboos were Putin’s money, top-level Kremlin corruption and the vicious war in the north Caucasus.

As well as demonstrative surveillance – always more Inspector Clouseau than John le Carré – Putin’s spies made it clear that they were listening to my calls. They pulled the plug, for example, whenever I made a joke about Russia’s president. Like other despots, Putin doesn’t have a sense of humour (though he can do sardonic repartee). 

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/nov/19/spies-spooks-hitmen-kgb-never-went-away-russia-putin

Former KGB General Says Snowden Is Cooperating With Russian Intelligence

Richard Byrne at venturebeat.com offers a piece on a former KGB general who suugests that NSA leaker Edward Snowden is cooperating with Russian intelligence.

Former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden probably never envisioned that he’d someday be working for the Russian federal security service, or FSB.

But according to former KGB Major General Oleg Kalugin, he is now, albeit as a consultant or technical advisor.

“These days, the Russians are very pleased with the gifts Edward Snowden has given them. He’s busy doing something. He is not just idling his way through life.”

“The FSB are now his hosts, and they are taking care of him,” Kalugin boldly claimed in an interview with VentureBeat.

The 80 year-old retired Soviet intelligence officer is Russian spy royalty personified. At 34, he became the youngest KGB general in history, and Kalugin famously helped run Soviet spy operations in America during a career that spanned over three decades.

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://venturebeat.com/2014/05/22/former-kgb-general-snowden-is-cooperating-with-russian-intelligence/

Was The Arrest Of A CIA Officer In Moscow Meant To Conceal What The Russians Know About The Boston Marathon Bombing?

David Satter at the National Review offers a piece on the Russian takedown of a CIA spy.

The comic-opera arrest of an American CIA agent in Moscow this week is less of a joke than it seems. The timing, nature, and public character of the arrest all point to the possibility that the Russian authorities, far from being concerned about the arrest, are using it to conceal what they know about the Boston Marathon bombers.

The arrest of Ryan Fogle for supposedly trying to recruit an agent of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) who was working on the North Caucasus — and therefore might have been able to tell U.S. authorities more about the attack on American civilians than they have gained officially — has been the occasion for an enormous amount of ridicule of the American intelligence services in the Russian media.

A video of the arrest was shown on Russian television, and Russian officials took the almost unprecedented step of publicly naming the American CIA resident in Moscow. The head of U.S. and Soviet intelligence operations was not named publicly even during the Cold War.

You can read the rest of the story via the below link:

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/348748/arrest-moscow