Spycraft - Melton [300]
26 Tomlinson, The Big Breach, 82-83.
27 Ibid., 65.
28 Ibid., 65-66.
29 Ibid., 127. The chemical formulation for the reagent was not specified by Tomlinson.
30 See: Melton, Ultimate Spy, 150.
31 A microdot communication to an agent would normally carry several identical dots buried in different locations. One longtime microdot user explained, “Three dots to an agent was the minimum. The first he wouldn’t find. He would find the next but would drop it or a gust of wind from an open window would blow it away. Hopefully he would find and read the third one.”
32 The original “bullet” lens was invented by Charles Stanhope in London in the late 1700s. This small magnifying lens (the “Stanhope”) was used originally in the textile industry to count the number of cotton fibers in a field, and was further refined by Henry Coddington in 1830. The Stanhope lens was used well into the 1800s and later saw popular use in the making of “peeps” for viewing tiny “girlie pictures” that were sold at carnivals and sideshows, and even for a miniature version of “The Lord’s Prayer.”
33 Ibid.
34 The original magazine is displayed inside Moscow’s FSB Counterintelligence Museum.
35 Wise, Nightmover, 259-260. The message continued to describe each signal site and dead drop to be used in Moscow. Signal site ZVONOK was accessed by boarding a number 10 trolley bus traveling toward Krymsky Most. The agent was to get off at the fifth stop and locate a specific phone booth where he would make his mark, a 10 cm Cyrillic “R” on the building wall to the left of the phone booth and drainpipe. The mark was to be made waist high using black crayon or red lipstick so that it could be easily read from a passing vehicle. The CIA would acknowledge receipt of Vasilyev’s signal by parking a car with the license plate number D-004 opposite the Lenin Central Museum.
36 Ibid.
37 Cellulose base film, both cellulose nitrate and cellulose acetate, was the primary choice for creating “soft films.”
38 Xidex Corporation acquired Kalvar Corporation in March of 1979 and three months later closed the New Orleans plant and fired the production personnel. See: www.keypointconsulting.com/downloads/pub_Event_Studies.pdf .
39 To produce “soft film” a frame of Kalvar was placed between two pieces of glass together with a developed negative containing the message for the agent (emulsions sides together). The glass plate was exposed to a 500 watt lamp for 40 to 50 seconds and then held with tweezers and dipped into boiling water for two seconds. As it cooled, the emulsion was carefully peeled away from the backing and allowed to dry. The resulting image on “soft film” was ready to be camouflaged and passed to the agent.
40 Weiser, A Secret Life, 66.
41 Tomlinson, The Big Breach, 66.
42 Messages were created by adding the random series of numbers (the “keys”) on the designated page of the OTP to the plaintext message. The person receiving the ciphered message subtracts the random numbers (found on his matching copy of the OTP) to recover the original message.
43 It needed to be a good-quality shortwave receiver capable of single sideband reception.
44 These are often referred to outside the CIA as “numbers stations” or “counting stations.” For more information on “spy numbers stations” and an opportunity to listen-in on sample transmissions, go to: www.spynumbers.com/enigma.html
45 A 150 five-number message would contain 750 numbers. It was possible, but less common, for transmissions to also be sent using phonetic language where letters were “spoken” (alpha, bravo, charlie, delta, foxtrot, etc.). Most messages were usually fixed at a length of 150 five-number groups, but could be longer. If the message was shorter than 150 groups, additional numbers would be added as “pads or “filler” at the end.