Spycraft - Melton [45]
George recalled, “The analyst is thinking that we handed this guy a cheap Pentax camera. I remember what we went through to get those images back and what the techs had to come up with technically and operationally. Think about what the agent had to do and the pressure he was under. So all I could do is laugh when this analyst offered a solution to the part of the problem he saw. ‘Spend an extra three hundred bucks and get us a little bit clearer image. ’”
Later, as the operation matured, the agent communicated that he would be visiting a missile test site and offered to try to recover a piece of a spent missile. Soviet military materials were veritable “gold” for Department of Defense and CIA weapons analysts since the material’s composition could yield otherwise unobtainable intelligence about a weapon’s capability, design, and production processes.
The agent advised that officials of his rank traveling on government business were allowed to buy quantities of goods and foodstuffs from regions outside the cities and bring those purchases back home. This made it common practice for officials to travel with large empty suitcases to fill with local items such as meats, cheese, fish, vegetables, and other hard to obtain delicacies. The area of the missile test range, the agent noted, happened to be famed for its herring, exactly the type of fish that his family enjoyed. Since he would take two large cases to fill with herring for family and friends, there would certainly be enough room in one of them for a small piece of rocket assembly.
So important was the acquisition of a fragment from an operational missile that Langley approved a high-risk clandestine moving-car delivery on the streets of Moscow. The plan instructed the agent to arrive at a predetermined site in an alley that also served as a through street. The alley had no lights and the meeting would be scheduled for a moonless night. The agent, carrying a shopping bag, would hide the missile part under whatever was available at the market that day and remain at the location no longer than five minutes.
On the appointed afternoon, an American whose pattern of activity frequently involved early-evening shopping and a drink at one of the hotels catering to Western businessmen drove away from his house. As usual, KGB surveillance fell in behind the car, maintaining a polite distance.
For more than three hours, the American attended to routine activities with surveillance trailing behind. After finishing a nightcap consisting of more tonic than gin, he headed home at an unhurried speed. With surveillance hanging back at a steady fifty meters, the American assured himself there was ample distance for what would come next. After five more minutes of driving, surveillance did not close the gap. Apparently they were not going to “bumper lock” this evening, but neither were his KGB watchers going to abandon their surveillance. With both cars maintaining their respective speeds, the American concluded the surveillance vehicle was far enough back. This was the moment. If wrong, he would be signing the agent’s death warrant.
Making an abrupt right turn down an alley that served as a shortcut to his house, the American’s car was shielded temporary by three-story buildings on either side for a few seconds. Surveillance could see neither the brake lights blink nor the car’s three-second pause in the darkened alley. As the KGB team rounded the corner, the American was driving just a bit slower due to the narrowness of the alleyway and a few minutes later parked at his residence.
The next morning’s report by the surveillance team no doubt included details of an uneventful evening. No mention would have been made of a darting shadow that appeared from a hidden doorway at the very instant the American’s car turned the corner or that an old shopping bag