MOSCOW'S PRYING EYES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000707060068-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 10, 2012
• Sequence Number: 68
• Publication Date: September 30, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/10: CIA-RDP90-00965R000707060068-1
i
Moscow's Prying Eyes
The report was stamped SOVERSHENNO SExRETNO-the So-
viet Union's equivalent of "Top Secret"-and each copy was
numbered to limit distribution. The copy obtained by French
counterespionage agents was copy No. 1, which meant it came
from the office of the chief of Directorate T, the KGB division
that specializes in scientific and technical espionage. As de-
scribed by U.S. analysts, the documents detailed Soviet suc-
cesses in stealing advanced technology from the United States
and its allies-a systematic and widespread spying campaign
that, according to Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, now
poses "a far more serious [national security] problem than we
had previously realized."
Last week, amid continuing reports of a widening spy scandhl
in West Germany and a rip-roaring controversy over diplomatic
espionage between Mos-
cow and Great Britain,
Weinberger went public
with a new warning
against the dangers of
Soviet espionage against
the United States. The
Pentagon released a 34-
page report by a special
interagency task force
that offered a chilling
assessment of the Sovi-
et drive to filch Western
defense secrets. The So-
viet documents were an
uncited source of the
U.S. report: overall, they
outlined a carefully co-
ordinated campaign to
copy, buy or steal specif-
ic technological innova-
tions at the request of Soviet defense agencies. The task force
concluded the Kremlin spends up to $1.4 billion annually on
such espionage and it reported that the Soviets themselves
estimated the technological haul at up to 10,000 pieces of
equipment and 100,000 documents every year.
Spy Budget: Obtained by the French from an unnamed Soviet
double agent in 1983, the documents included the annual reports
of an obscure unit of the Soviet government, the Institute for
Inter-Agency Information (VIMI). VIMI, according to U.S.
experts, coordinates between intelligence agencies and the Sovi-
et defense industry. When Soviet researchers want a key piece of
equipment from the West, VIMI assigns the job to a spy agency
like the KGB and establishes a budget for the task. During the
late 1970s, for example, the Ministry of Aviation ordered the
theft of electronic components used in American cruise missiles;
the KGB got the job and was allocated 170,000 rubles to do it. In
another case, the Ministry of the Electronics Industry wanted
NEWSWEEK
30 September 1985
Western equipment to test semiconductor memories-an espio-
nage assignment budgeted at 4.5 million rubles.
The U.S. report did not reveal whether either of those espio-
nage operations succeeded, but Pentagon officials said there was
evidence of blatant Soviet copying of American research in other
areas. The irony is that most of the technical reports obtained by
Soviet agents in the West are readily available as unclassified
documents-and the Pentagon's goal, said Assistant Secretary
of Defense Richard Perle, is "to sensitize the scientific and
technical community to the fact that there is a very large and
well-organized Soviet apparatus that has targeted scientists and
engineers ... for military purposes."
Unequal Numbers Weinberger had another goal as well-to
argue for curtailing the number of Soviet diplomatic personnel
allowed in the United States. The State Department reports that
980 accredited Soviet personnel now live in this country, with
the largest contingent at the United Nations. By comparison, the
Weinberger presents his evidence: KGB agents on high-tech missions
United States has only
214 diplomats in the So-
viet Union. Typically, 25
per CIA man George
Carver, though others
may he p in espionage as
well. The State Depart-
ment opposes any such
limit, but Weinberger
has allies on Capitol Hill:
Congress has approved
an amendment by Sens.
William Cohen and Pat-.
rick Leahy requiring
State to come up with
a plan to equalize the
number of Russian dip-
lomats in this country
with the number of American diplomats in the Soviet Union.
Perle denied that the Pentagon's publicity offensive had been
timed to cast a pall over Ronald Reagan's November summit
meeting with Soviet party leader Mikhail Gorbachev-and
indeed, it was hardly the only sign of strain between East and
West. In Bonn, West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl's gov-
ernment was mortified when a secretary in Kohl's own office
fled to East Germany with her husband, the latest event in a
mushrooming spy scandal that began in early August. And in
London, Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's government ex-
pelled 6 more Soviet citizens on suspicion of espionage, bringing
to 31 the number of Soviet expellees since the defection of the
KGB's London spymaster in July. Moscow, which had already
expelled 25 Britons, expelled 6 more in reply-and Thatcher
announced that the game of tit for tat had gone far enough.
TOM MORGANTHAU with JOHN BARRY, KIM WILLENSON and
JOHN WALCOTT in Washington
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/10: CIA-RDP90-00965R000707060068-1