On Thu, 22 Jul 2004, Major Variola (ret) wrote:

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My point is only that they will be killed should they leak their actual capabilities.

Well... I am reading a book about intelligence now. Specifically, "Ernst Volkman: Spies - the secret agents who changed the course of history". Amusing book; describes many ways of intelligence fieldwork, most of

At 12:40 PM 7/23/04 +0200, Thomas Shaddack wrote: them

pretty lowtech.

You would enjoy the tradecraft described in the Brit book, which JYA has stopped propogating, but is available on the P2P net. As exercise, they broke into brits' houses. But then, no BoR, all your serfs belong to us.

Eg, using business representatives as business/technology spies (as eg. a skilled steelworker can assess the capacity and capability and current processing of a factory quite at a glance, and he's often let in during contract negotiations), using pretty women to lure officers into honeytraps... or, recruiting young pretty men to seduce the not exactly

pretty old maids who so often work as secretaries in important places.

Yes a friend of mine's wife was a Russkie with a Biz degree, he posted her CIA recruitment letter on his cube door....

You don't need a *LOT* of money to pull smaller-scale tricks of this kind. Also, using "amateurs", private enterpreneurs in the arts of burglaries, safecracking and other relevant areas, instead of "governmental" employees, poses a counterintelligence advantage that these recruits are unknown to the adversary (and to most of your side too, so there's less

chance somebody will be caught or changes sides and squeaks on them).

And as the Operatives have found, you get caught, you are Halal meat, at best.

There are many ways to get access to even pretty sensitive info. Patience and persistence and plethora of approaches are important here.

H. saps. be the weak link.

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Undersea taps are hard. No matter how you figure it.

That's why you pay taxes, bub.

Depends on whom. Often the money are the main motivation. Of course, your own country won't pay you as well as the other one, and will try to appeal to your "patriotism" like a bunch of cheapskates - it's better to be a contractor.

Until your head is separated from your body...

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What I meant was, Ames and that FBI dude Hansen (sp?), at least the KGB got Ames' wife as part of the package, whereas the FBI CI dude let his wife off as part of the deal he cut. Nice xian that he was, he was into strippers.

All under $2e6, all capable of reading their own records. Go figure,

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eh?

And many of them disclosed their colleagues when politely asked.

Well duh, that's part of the deal..

But a big truth remains here - SIGINT and COMINT aren't everything, often a drop of HUMINT is the missing secret sauce.

Yes, but HUMINT tends to lose its head when questioned.... on video, no less... Madrid == October, 2004, dig?