In Search of Enemies - A CIA Story - John Stockwell

[88] IN SEARCH OF ENEMIES
trays for pick-up by secretaries from each branch. Inside the
branches they are distributed to the appropriate desks and one copy
is put on the reading boards for general interest within the branch.
The speed with which the system operates is breathtaking. For a
FLASH or CRITIC cable the appropriate computers and lines are held
open while all other traffic stops. until the message comes through.
A chief of station in any corner of the world can report a crisis or
disaster to the division chief in seven minutes, no more time than it
takes him to draft the text. IMMEDIATE cables are generally delivered
within one or two hours, PRIORITY within six hours, and ROUTINE
within twelve to twenty-four, depending on the volume of other
traffic.
For all the technical marvels of the cable system, it is still run by
fallible human beings. CIA officers know that security liabilities lie
in the human activities on each end-the disposal of classified trash,
the guarding of offices and safes, and the care and discretion of those
who know about the cables and the operations they represent.
The reading boards can be a weak spot in the cable system's
security if the branch's senior secretary is sloppy. In my first branch
where I sat as an interim junior officer trainee, IMMEDIATE cables
and dispatches were arriving daily from an African post that was
trying to recruit a Soviet. The chief of station had managed to
persuade a young American couple (representatives of a large American
corporation) to encourage an alcoholic, fifty-year-old KGB
officer in his amorous pursuit of the wife. The COS, who had a flair
for writing and a sense of drama, reported in detail the Soviet's
advances, the wife's ambivalent reactions, and the husband's confused
hostility. For a period of weeks this made good reading; the
branch chiefs secretary gossiped with a stream of jo11y voyeurs who
came from all over the building, to read the latest episodes. The
branch chief, a jovial GS 15 who had never served an operational tour
overseas enjoyed the publicity his branch was getting. He would
stand in his door and beam at his visitors as if holding a reception.
Eventually, KGB security became aware of the affair, conceivably
from a leak at CIA headquarters, but more likely because such
liaisons inevitably become conspicuous in a little African post. The
KGB officer was last seen being escorted aboard a Moscow-bound
commercial jet by two KGB security officers. Some months later, the
American couple was reported to be in marital discord. By then no