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'Russian spies' bungle was epic


WestVirginiaRebel

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WestVirginiaRebel
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UK Guardian:

It is heartening to know that even alleged Russian spies have problems with their computers. Anna Chapman complained about the difficulties she had establishing a private wireless local area network to her handler UC-I, so that she could communicate with the van parked outside the coffee shop. Suspicions were mutual. C or Moscow Centre never quite understood why the couple who went under the name of Richard and Cynthia Murphy had to buy that house in New Jersey: "We are under the impression that C views our ownership of the house as a deviation from the original purpose of the mission," they said in an intercepted message.

The Murphys told C, perhaps somewhat defensively: "It was a convenient way to solving the housing issue, plus 'to do as the Romans do' in a society that values home ownership."

What did C expect? If they want 11 "illegals" to go native in America in order to establish a long-term, deep cover, then obviously home ownership in New Jersey beckons. Mrs Murphy did a good job. She certainly fooled the neighbours. "They couldn't have been spies," said Jessie Gugig. "Look what she did with the hydrangeas."

The 55-page indictment filed by the FBI revealing the existence of 11 (the 11th has been arrested in Cyprus) alleged spies who had spent years adopting false US identities, will not, however, make pleasant reading for C – otherwise known as Russia's External Intelligence Service, the SVR.

The FBI operation represents the biggest penetration of the SVR communications in recent memory. The FBI read their emails, decrypted their intel, read the embedded coded texts on images posted on the net, bugged their mobile phones, videotaped the passing of bags of cash and messages in invisible ink from one agent to another, and hacked into their bogus expenses claims.

Spies who defect paint a lurid picture of their former bosses. Their kiss-and-tell books are inevitably presented as "wake-up" calls to their new masters. Sergei Tretyakov, who worked as a press officer at the Russian Mission of the United Nations in New York, but in fact ran a number of agents in the US and the UN, was the last SVR spy to defect.

In Comrade J: The Untold Secrets of Russia's Master Spy in America After the End of the Cold War, by Pete Earley, Tretyakov said that nothing had changed. The "main enemy" defined by Soviet military doctrine in the cold war, had simply become the "main target".


"Nothing has changed. Russia is doing everything it can today to embarrass the US. Let me repeat this. Russia is doing everything it can today to undermine and embarrass the US. The SVR residenturas in the US are not less, but in some aspects even more active today than during the cold war. What should that tell you?"

But something, surely has changed. The tradecraft used by the alleged SVR ring was amateurish, and will send shivers down the spine of the rival intelligence organisations in Russia. This was bungling on a truly epic scale. No secrets about bunker-busting bombs were actually obtained, but the network was betrayed. The defendants are not charged with espionage, but with charges like conspiracy to act as unregistered agents of a foreign government. To have a spy ring uncovered before they could actually do any serious spying is doubly embarrassing.
________

Maybe the Russians are simply out of practice? :rolleyes:
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Or was it intentional? How does a magician preform his trick? Look over here...while the trick is being somewhere else.

 

 

Just saying things are not always what they appear to be.

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SrWoodchuck

Or was it intentional? How does a magician preform his trick? Look over here...while the trick is being somewhere else.

 

 

Just saying things are not always what they appear to be.

shoutValin!

 

Exactly what I was thinking. You'd never see the successful op. I also think about what the Chinese are doing to render our country "harmless"......besides owning our debt.

 

Obama has been such a gift to hostiles.....taking our country in a friendly direction & blunting our edge.

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The only thing I can discern from this odd incident is that these "spies" were playing the SVR for all they could get, living a good life in the U.S. while pretending to pass on valuable (?) information.

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clearvision

Spies are not the only ones bungling it...

 

The Russian espionage drama intensfied tonight as one of the suspects in the alleged "deep cover" spy ring failed to answer bail in Cyprus.

 

An arrest warrant was issued for Christopher Metsos, the 11th suspected member of the operation, after he failed to report to a police station in Larnaka, the Guardian has learned.

 

Metsos, 55, was arrested in Cyprus on Tuesday but, to the surpise of Cypriot police, was released on bail. Ten other accused are in custody in the United States, after the FBI broke up the alleged ring on Monday.

 

Cypriot police are now searching for Metsos. "An arrest warrant has been issued and if found he will be arrested immediately," an officer at the police station in Larnaka told the Guardian. "He has broken his pledge to be here."

 

Metsos was first stopped at 9am yesterday at Larnaca airport by officers acting on an Interpol "red notice", moments before he was about to board a plane bound for Budapest.

 

Appearing before a district court judge, Metsos was told he could walk free, pending an extradition hearing within 30 days, if he posted €20,000 (£16,000) bail.

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