Blogbat: Russia's Spies: Was West Blinded by Cutbacks?

« To the Success of our Hopeless Cause! | Main | Political People »

December 04, 2006

Russia's Spies: Was West Blinded by Cutbacks?

Some news accounts are actually now saying that Britain might have had a long history of being infiltrated by Russian spies.

You don’t say! What an epiphany!

Britain has often been literally “owned” by Russian and Soviet spies since well-prior to World War II. Does anyone recall the success of the Great Illegals, the Magnificent 5, Kim Philby, et al? It’s a list of double-agents working in intelligence all over the world ostensibly for Britain, but not really, not to mention others reporting on political developments inside confidential British halls, developments in science and technology, and so forth.

Philby, by no means the only one, but one of the grandest among the Cambridge 5 succeeded in becoming Britain’s man in charge of Section IX – Britain’s counter-Soviet section. Philby and others of course passed so many secrets on to the Soviets that often Russian leaders knew better what was going on in the most secret parts of British government than did Britain’s own government. This of course led to failures of many of Britain’s intelligence operations and shouts by British Labour Party members that MI6 needed to be done away with, since it was obviously such a weak case. Besides, they added, there’s no real Soviet problem (or some such precursor to a steaming dish of crow).

Enter today:

“…The [Sunday Telegraph] quoted unnamed government sources as saying that Russian agents are as active in Britain now as they were during the height of the Cold War.” (London fears diplomatic fall-out over 'poisoned' spy: report AFP / LexisNexis)

Who said this was so before this press account? Ah yes, I remember. It was I, among a few others.

"’The sophisticated ring represents the greatest espionage threat facing Britain’, it added, claiming that more than 30 spies are now operating in Britain.”

And why? Weak counterintelligence, of course. Why does the UK have weak CI? Ah yes, Labour. Spaciba! Of course Democrats in Washington also have scars from their own denials of Soviet espionage: Alger Hiss and countless others appointed to high places in Washington government circles.

“Most were monitoring the movements and activities of exiled Russians and opponents of President Vladimir Putin's government, it added, although other areas of interest were the finance, energy, defence and electronics industry.”

Brilliant. We can all sleep knowing the newswires are letting us in on these difficult-to-research facts. A better question is why is this allowed to continue. And why are the Chinese allowed to do it in the US along with the Russians relatively unmolested? Though some other articles are suggesting there are a number of former Russian spies in hiding both in the US and UK, which was something else some of us anticipated.

If I recall, I stated five days ago,

The question Putin has to be asking himself is this: is there another Visili Mitrokhin out there quietly documenting every damning piece of evidence against the Kremlin and Lubyanka. What if there are several? And if so, how long before la ruse de la Russie …ist am Ende.

The German was for Putin’s time as a spook working in East Germany, the French is free of charge.

In fact, this probably just the tip of the iceberg. Indeed, I will assume the cockroach rule applies: for every one you find out in the light, scores are hiding out of sight. And when scores turn out, it means they are literally bleeding out the cracks. A few days before my post above, even Canada was turning up Russian illegals (spies using false papers to gain entry). Even Canada!

It’s fast becoming a messy turkey shoot. And Vladimir Putin is far more the amateur than his ego had led him to believe. I’m sure the Democrats in Washington are right on it though, as is Labour in London…

I admit I have my doubts as to whether the newly discovered realization that the British Isle has been a de-facto ward of Russian intelligence operatives will move anyone in the Labour government to do anything of consequence to change it. After all, if Labour hates anything more than hostile foreign spies on its soil – even ones basically committing radiological terrorism – its MI6 followed closely by MI5 (though America’s CIA is certainly up there ahead of the Russians too).

Oh, but post-Cold War Russian activity is a relatively new development. Not exactly:

Flashback 1992:

On April 15th Tatyana Samolis, spokeswoman for the Russian foreign-intelligence service (SVR), said: “We have begun reducing our intelligence network in Germany and other countries. We hope our colleagues from the German intelligence service will follow suit.'' The cut in Russian agents worldwide was put officially at 30%. However, on June 29th the German prosecutor-general, Alexander von Stahl, said Russian intelligence was “currently making considerable efforts to expand its network of agents on German soil.'' His office reckoned some 300 former East German spies had transferred their allegiance to the SVR. Samolis called this statement a deliberate attempt to “whip up fear''. She grumbled that none of Russia's “opposite numbers'' among intelligence services were proposing to reduce their espionage in Russia.

Curiously, both sides are telling the truth.

The SVR is indeed reducing its international operations, yet spying goes on apace. The espionage is partly by the SVR, keeping up the tradition of its predecessor, the defunct KGB. But more often than not it is carried out by the GRU, the ex-Soviet military-intelligence service. The GRU is almost beyond the reach of civilian control, as indeed are the ex-Soviet armed forces (see next story). On the other side, the Russians are right that western intelligence services are monitoring Russian affairs as closely as they can. Their masters are anxious about developments in Russia and need to be well briefed. (Jane’s Foreign Report, “Russian Spies”, 30 July 1992.)

In fact, there is zero firewall seperating the type or extent of activity of the Soviet Union and present-day Russia, as is often believed. What in fact happened is that Russia changed some names and the West pulled back.

Sadly as we now know, much of Western counterintelligence efforts that did exist at the end of the Cold War were stripped nearly to the bone in the naïve belief they were no longer needed. Meanwhile, Russia reorganized and redeployed… en masse.

PREVIOUS BLOGBAT POSTS:

To the Success of our Hopeless Cause!

More-on the Putintate Putz: Radiating the Love

Ode to the Putintate Putz

BLOGBAT POSTS PRIOR TO THIS WEEK:

Soviet-Era Intelligence & Ideology (Part I)

Soviet-Era Intelligence & Ideology (Part II)

The Life and Times of a Puny Putintate Putz

Russia: Secrets Well-Ignored and Poorly-Kept

Russia: Oil Slick of Contradictions

Let’s Talk About the Axis of Oil

Moving Forward on the EMP Threat