SPIES GETTING BAD NAME

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000503940001-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 12, 2012
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: September 22, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000503940001-3
ARTICLE AP? D
ON PAGE
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
22 September 1985
Will] IN Il A
Spies getting bad name
ft ROBERT MACKAY
urww Pa Mwnw"
A
W SHINGTON-On the chess-
board of international espio-
nage, this year has been a
dangerous time for pawns.
Britain and the Soviet Union had a
furious exchange of pieces, playing
tit for tat on "spy" expulsions; some
-of West Germany's pawns changed,
color to defect to the East; and
France wound up with two underwa.
ter knights jailed in New Zealand,
accused of sinking a peace ship.
A rash of bungled espionage cap-
ers, top-level East-West defections
and diplomatic expulsions around the
world this year has been enough to
make the fictional superspy James
Bond blush with embarrassment.
Citing the spy scandals, President
Reagan said the United States and
other nations are now reevaluating
the amount of information they share
with their allies. And Defense Secre-
tary Caspar Weinberger has opined
that when it comes to Soviet officials
in the U.S., there may be more than'
we need.
For the Soviets, the French and,
the West Germans, it has not been a
memorable year.
A total of 54 Soviets so far have
been kicked out of various countries
for spying this Year, far surpassing
the 19 suspected agents ejected in
1984, the State Department said. Brit-
ain accounted for 36 of them; Liberia
expelled 13.
Britain pulled off what appears to
be the major intelligence coup of the
year when it announced on Sept. 12
that Oleg Gordievski-the chief of the
KGB operation in London-had
defected.
N o higher-ranking Soviet official
had publicly defected to the
West since Arkady Shev.
chenko, undersecretary to the United
Nations, came over to the U.S. in
1978.
It later was revealed that Gordievs-
ki had been working as a double agent
for the West for the last 20 years.
"This is the biggest, most impor-
tant defection to the West in 25
years," said British espionage expert
Brian Freemantle.
The British, using information
supplied by Gordievski, immediately
ordered the expulsion of 25 Soviet
diplomats, journalists and business-
men for spying.
What ensued became an almost
comical "spy war."
The Soviet Union retaliated by
expelling 25 Brits. Britain waited, a
couple of days and th eft=kicked out
six more Soviets. The Soviets match-
ed them again, kicking out six more
Britons.
Declaring victo 'y, Britain called a
halt to the exchanges.
Receiving far less publicity was
the defection in may of Sergei
Bokhan, the first secretary of the
Soviet Embassy' in Athens and re-
portedly the deputy station chief in
Greece of the GRU-the Soviet mili-
tary intelligence agency.
stern diplomats said Bokhan
provided the U.S. with a
wealth of information on
spies and Soviet organizations in
Greece. A Greek navy lieutenant ex-
posed by Bokhan as a Soviet spy was
arrested last week
In West Germany, Chancellor Hel-
mut Kohl's government was stunned
Aug. 19 when the head of its counter.
intelligence office, Hans-Joachim
Tiedge, fled to East Berlin. But that
was only the beginning.
Two secretaries and an army
messenger quickly vanished-mall
apparently to the East-and a secre-
tary in the office of President
Richard von Weizsacker was arrested
on suspicion of having been a spy for
18 years.
The scandal widened when a secre-
tary in Kohl's office and her husband
defected to East Berlin.
The West German government was
embarrassed and its ally, France,
fared no better. It is suspected of
bungling, with tragic consequences,
an attempt to scare off the antinuc-
lear Greenpeace protest group-and
of getting caught
Two French agents are in jail in
New Zealand and waiting trial for the
June 10 sinking of the Rainbow War-
rier, the Greenpeace flagship.
The vessel, which was to lead a
flotilla to protest French nuclear
testing at the Mururoa Atoll, was
sunk by two explosive charges
attached to its hull in Auckland har-
bor. A photographer aboard the ship
went below deck after the first blast
and was killed by the second
explosion.
Despite denials by French Presi-
dent Francois Mitterrand, the
sinking was reported to be the
work of a team of French military
divers.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000503940001-3