Spycraft - Melton [272]
Safe house— A location used for clandestine meetings and assumed temporarily safe.
Second Chief Directorate— KGB organization responsible for internal security and counterintelligence operations.
Secret writing (SW)— Use of special inks or chemically treated “carbon papers” to produce a hidden message.
Seventh Chief Directorate— KGB organization during the Cold War responsible for surveillance.
Short-range agent communication (SRAC)— A device that allows agent and officer to communicate clandestinely over a limited distance.
Signal site— A covert means of communication using a nonalerting signal, such as a chalk mark on a lamppost, to either initiate or terminate a clandestine act.
Signals intelligence (SIGINT)— Intelligence gathered from the interception of either electronic emissions or transmissions.
Silent call—An operational signal in which the agent or intelligence officer places a call from an anonymous phone and then hangs up after a predetermined amount of time without speaking.
SIS (Secret Intelligence Service)— See MI6.
Special Operations Executive (SOE)— A British Special Forces organization charged with sabotage operations and support of underground forces during World War II.
Station— A forward-deployed operational office of the CIA.
Station chief— See Chief of station.
Surveillance detection run/route (SDR)— A planned route taken by an agent or handler prior to conducting a clandestine act in hostile territory, designed to identify or elude surveillance.
Target— A location, thing, facility, organization, or person against which an intelligence or counterintelligence operation is directed.
Technical Operations Officer (TOO)— A DS&T officer providing direct technical support to clandestine operations.
Temporary duty (TDY)— A field assignment of short duration.
Tradecraft—The techniques, technology, and methodologies used in covert intelligence operations. Tradecraft applies to both the procedures, such as surveillance detection routes, as well as the use of devices in covert audio surveillance and agent communications.
Tray rocker— OTS slang for one working in clandestine photography. The name derives from the way in which prints were developed in trays of chemicals.
TSCM—Technical Surveillance Countermeasures.
TSD—Technical Services Division (1960-1973), predecessor to OTS.
TSS—Technical Services Staff (1951-1960), predecessor to OTS.
Walk-in— A volunteer who approaches an intelligence agency for the purpose of espionage.
Wood block—An audio device concealed within a block of wood that can then be attached to a piece of furniture or an architectural detail within the targeted room.
SELECTED INTELLIGENCE ACRONYMS
Notes
PREFACE
1 CIA’s senior ranks were reshuffled in 1995. When John Deutsch moved from Deputy Secretary of Defense to DCI, he brought with him Nora Slatkin as the Executive Director. Dave Cohen, previously Associate Deputy Director for Intelligence, became DDO and Dr. Ruth David from Sandia National Laboratories became DDS&T. George Tenet was appointed CIA Deputy Director in July 1995.
2 These components and functions are presented in detail in the unclassified OTS fiftieth anniversary booklet, “The Central Intelligence Agency’s Office of Technical Service, 1951-2001” by Benjamin B. Fischer, 2001.
3 “Budget weenie” is not an authorized CIA occupational title. The more formal designations are budget analyst, financial officer, or resource manager.
4 All of these capabilities were critical to agent operations and covert action programs but all were strapped for resources until 1999. OTS power-sources scientists solicited support from other government agencies to save the battery program. Programs such as the effort to understand and counteract the use of “spy dust” by the Soviets to track CIA officers were closed. Consideration was given in 1994 to closing, due to cost, the OTS counterterrorism training and explosive test range. Other OTS