UNCLASSIFIED ASSESSMENT OF THE HOSTILE INTELLIGENCE THREAT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88G01116R000400410014-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 17
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 11, 2011
• Sequence Number: 14
• Publication Date: July 31, 1986
• Content Type: MEMO

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Intelligence Community Staff
MEMORANDUM FOR: See Distribution
DCI/I CS-86-0871
31 July 1986
Director, Community Counterintelligence and
Security Countermeasures Staff
SUBJECT: Unclassified Assessment of the Hostile Intelligence
Threat (U)
1. Attached is a copy of subject report which was sent to the Senate
Select Committee on Intelligence. A courtesy copy was also provided to House
Permanent Subcommittee on Intelligence. As you are aware, this report was
prepared in response to a tasking in the Interim Report on Espionage and
Security prepared by the SSCI.
2. We appreciate the contributions of those who worked on the
preparation.
STAT
STAT
Attachment:
a/s
All portion of this memorandum
are Unclassified
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DD/CC I SCMS:gab
(31 July 1986) STAT
Distribution of DCI/ICS-86-0871 (w/attachment):
1 - D/S/CIA
1 - C I Staff/DO
1 - Joseph Tierney, FBI
1 - NSA
1 - David Major, NSC Staff
1 - L. Britt Snider, OSD
1 - Robert Krell, OSD
1 - Daniel Carlin, State
1 - Francis Corry, State
1 - DIA
1 - A. R. Cinquegrana, Justice
1 - Steven Garfinkel, ISOO
1 - Louis Ritchie, Energy,
1-DCI
1 - DDC I
1 - ER
1 - D/ICS-DD/ICS
1 - LL/ICS
1 - SIG-I Secretariat
1 - ICS Registry
1 - CCISCMS subject
1 - CCISCMS chrono
STAT
STAT
STAT
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The Director of Central Intelligence
29 July 1986
The Honorable Dave Durenberger, Chairman
Select Committee on Intelligence
United States Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510
Dear Dave:
Forwarded, as requested in your Interim Report on Espionage
and Securit, is an unclassified assessment of the hostile
rote igence threat. The basic information is current through
31 December 1985. Additionally, portions of the report have
been updated through 22 July 1986.
We have made a special effort to be as forthcoming as
possible in identifying the threat, within the limits of
security and good judgment.
All portions of this
letter are Unclassified
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HOSTILE INTELLIGENCE THREAT
A. SOURCES OF THE THREAT
-- OVERVIEW
Among foreign intelligence services, the Soviet services, the KGB and
the GRU*, represent by far the most significant intelligence threat. The
Soviet threat is both the largest and, in terms of the ability and intent of
the Soviets to act against US interests, the most important. In fact, the
activities of the Warsaw Pact and Cuban intelligence services are primarily
significant to the degree which they support the objectives of the Soviets.
The threat from intelligence activities by the People's Republic of China
(PRC) is of a different character. The first arrest of an American citizen on
charges of committing espionage for the PRC occurred in 1985. The
intelligence activities of another group of Marxist-Leninist
states--Nicaragua, North Korea, and Vietnam--pose a lesser, but still
significant, threat to US foreign policy interests although these countries
have a limited official presence in the United States.
Many other countries, hostile, allied, friendly, and neutral, engage in
intelligence operations against the United States. While these activities
cannot be ignored, they do not represent a comparable threat. Nonetheless, in
1985, arrests for espionage included US Government employees who were charged
with passing classified information to Israel and who had disclosed the
identities of CIA personnel and assets in Ghana.
-- Soviet Union, Other Warsaw Pact, and Cuba
The highest Soviet collection priority is accorded to policy and actions
associated with US strategic nuclear forces. Other high priority subjects are
key foreign policy matters, Congressional intentions, defense information,
advanced dual use technology, and US intelligence sources and methods. The
Soviets also target NATO intensively, partly as a means to obtain US foreign
policy and military information. The Soviets heavily influence the collection
activity of the Cuban and Warsaw Pact services, in effect expanding their
collection resources through exploitation of ethnic ties and the normally less
stringent US controls on the activity of non-Soviets.
The open US society permits the Soviets to acquire much of the
information they require through non-clandestine means. Collection is carried
out through diplomatic facilities, trade organizations, visitors, students,
*The KGB, or Committee of State Security, and the GRU, the Chief
Directorate for Intelligence, both operate on a worldwide basis. The KGB
maintains internal security in the USSR and, as a secret intelligence service,
conducts intelligence collection abroad, as well as covert political influence
activities (active measures). The GRU as the military intelligence
organization engages only in foreign intelligence.
UNCLASSIFIED
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and other open inquiry. It is aided by Soviet access to computerized US and
other Western reference systems, by US Government programs designed to
facilitate the legitimate dissemination of information, and by the US
Government's inability to exercise stringent controls over foreign visitors
and exports.
The spearhead of the Soviet, other Warsaw Pact, and Cuban intelligence
collection effort is their official presence in the United States. In 1985,
there were about 4,250 diplomats, commercial officials, and other
representatives from Communist countries in the United States, 2,100 of whom
are from the Soviet Union and the other Warsaw Pact countries. Cuban and
other Communist country officials make up the balance. It is estimated that
30 to 40 percent of these officials are affiliated with their country's
intelligence services. The Soviet Mission to the United Nations in New York
has approximately 275 accredited diplomats; the Department of State has
recently mandated a reduction in this number to 170 by April 1988.
The Soviet Union is using effectively UN organizations, particularly the
Secretariat, in the conduct of its foreign relations and as a cover for the
activities of Soviet intelligence service officers and co-optees. The United
Nations employs, worldwide, approximately 800 Soviet nationals as
international civil servants, with about 300 of them in New York.
Approximately one-fourth of the Soviets in the Secretariat in New York are
considered to be intelligence officers, and others are co-optees. Other
Soviets in the Secretariat have been tasked to respond to KGB and GRU requests
for assistance. The Soviet intelligence services also use their developed
agents in the UN to collect information on UN activities; to spot, assess, and
recruit American and foreign national agents; to support worldwide
intelligence operations; and to collect scientific and technical information
on the United States.
The KGB has succeeded in infiltrating its officers into the UN
bureaucracy, with some reaching positions of authority. The KGB has held the
position of Assistant to the Secretary General since Viktor Lesiovskiy held
the post under U Thant. The current Assistant is a KGB China expert. The
Soviets take full advantage of UN personnel procedures such as liberal sick
leave. This permits KGB UN employees to be absent as often as they desire,
enabling them to carry out intelligence activities further abetted by the
comparative freedom of movement enjoyed by UN employees.
Within the Soviet services, GRU personnel are targeted primarily against
military and scientific and technical information while KGB personnel are
assigned to one of four operational departments or "lines"--Scientific and
Technical (X), Political (PR), Counterintelligence (KR), or Illegals Support
(N). S&T personnel specifically target US advanced technology. Often,
clandestine collection of S&T information is preferred over buying or
developing technology because it is cheaper and provides the best short-term
results, although there is a risk factor in the theft. KGB Line PR personnel
target governmental policy information and, frequently, seek to advance Soviet
objectives via contacts with persons of influence or through covert
activities. Line KR officers have the security responsibility for preventing
defections of Soviet personnel and particular concern for penetration of the
UNCLASSIFIED
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US Intelligence Community, although all lines are tasked with this important
function as a matter of general concern. Illegal support personnel comprise a
small group involved with the operation of illegals--intelligence officers and
agents infiltrated into the United States under false circumstances to operate
clandestinely, having no overt connection with the Soviet Union.
The Soviets aggressively seek information on Western technology to avoid
technological surprise and to improve their economy and weapons systems.
Indications are that their acquisition efforts are becoming more selective
than in the past, and that future collection will concentrate on technology
which is used either in developing and producing US weapons and military
support equipment or which is specifically needed in Soviet industry for USSR
weapons systems. The methods used to acquire technology will depend largely
on the cost and the risk involved. It is likely that increased controls on
trade with the Soviets and on Soviet visitors and official personnel will
cause more changes in Soviet collection techniques. Even greater use of
Warsaw Pact services as collectors, for example, is probable. More use of
clandestine methods to acquire technology is also likely, when it cannot be
obtained in other ways.
The extent of the hostile intelligence threat in the United States is
further illustrated by the fact that the intelligence services of the USSR,
other Warsaw Pact countries, and Cuba have some 130 diplomatic, commercial,
and other entities in the United States which can be used as cover for
clandestine collection activities. The commercial presence of the Soviet
Union and other Communist countries in the United States has been shown to
afford their intelligence collectors wide opportunities. These commercial
establishments (such as the USSR's Amtorg and Intourist; the Polish Polamco;
and similar East German, Czechoslovak, and other East European entities),
through their legitimate activities, have access to Americans in business,
industry, and government who are potential targets for agent recruitment.
Economic data and advanced technology are the primary interests of the hostile
collectors operating under commercial cover.
In addition to the threat posed by their official establishments, these
intelligence services have infiltrated intelligence collectors into the United
States among the thousands of exchange students, commercial and cultural
visitors, tourists, and ship crewmen who enter this country each year.
Further, in recent years, a number of intelligence agents of the USSR, Cuba,
and other countries have been uncovered among the flood of immigrants into the
United States from Communist countries. While not all of these agents are
considered classic illegals, investigations have determined that many have
been sent with intelligence missions. The deep-cover illegals dispatched to
the United States in the emigre flow and through other means by the Communist
intelligence services represent a particularly perplexing problem because of
their completely clandestine manner of operation.
-- People's Republic of China
The PRC has several intelligence services whose personnel are
represented among the approximately 1,500 Chinese diplomats and commercial
community located at some 70 PRC establishments and offices in the United
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States. They also have some access to the approximately 15,000 Chinese
students and 10,000 individuals arriving in 2,700 delegations each year.
There is, of course, a large ethnic Chinese community.
The implications of the intelligence activities of the PRC are markedly
different from those of the Soviet Union and its surrogates. The forces of
the Warsaw Pact are arrayed against those of NATO; and the Soviet Union's
expansionist policy poses a current and continuing global challenge to the
United States and its allies. The PRC is not now in strategic competition
with the United States. Indeed, the United States has fundamental interests
in maintaining friendly relations with the PRC and in promoting its
modernization, to include selective upgrade of its military defensive
capabilities. Collection priorities of the two major communist powers reflect
their respective foreign policies: the Soviet services with urgent
requirements with respect to US plans, intentions, and capabilities, as well
as technology; the PRC services concentrated primarily on advance technology
not subject to release to further PRC modernization in the 1990s and beyond.
There is evidence that the PRC's traditional, careful, and patient development
of assets has resulted in the establishment of a large human intelligence
infrastructure in the United States.
-- Other Countries' Threats
Other countries conduct human intelligence collection in the United
States, both overt and clandestine. Their targets include the same range of
interests as those of the Soviets, et al, including high technology and
political, military, and economic policies and intentions which might impact
in an adverse manner on the particular country.
Among the more common activities of foreign intelligence services in
this country are attempts to penetrate emigre communities. A large number of
expatriate political and ethnic groups in the United States are viewed as a
threat by authorities in the former homelands. The list includes Libyans,
Croatians, and Iranians, to name only some. From a national security
viewpoint, these activities are of less significance than those of the USSR
and its allies, although they are clearly in violation of US sovereignty and
may have an effect on US foreign policy. Foreign intelligence services also
target ethnic groups in the United States, directly or through front
organizations, to influence US decisions on foreign aid, trade agreements, and
other issues where the foreign government has valid interests.
B. HUMAN TARGETS
-- Espionage
During 1985, a total of 11 people were arrested and accused of spying
for either the Soviet Union, its allies, or other countries. Ten of the 11
have since been convicted or pleaded guilty to espionage charges. Also, 11
persons who had been arrested on espionage charges during 1984 were
subsequently convicted. Between 1 January 1981 and 31 December 1984, 23
arrests were made; from 1 January 1976 to 31 December 1980, 11 people were
UNCLASSIFIED
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arrested; between 1 January 1966 and 31 December 1975, there were six
espionage arrests.
The spy of the 1980s has been described as a new breed, motivated more
by greed than by ideology. However, the cases uncovered in 1985 demonstrate
that this is not always the case--political beliefs, intrigue, job
dissatisfaction, and alienation also appear to have been reasons for engaging
in espionage. Moreover, nine of the 11 noted above volunteered their services
to the other side.
While in the past most espionage cases in the United States have
involved the Soviet Union or other Warsaw Pact countries, three 1985 arrests
were markedly different. One was the first arrest of an American on charges
of spying for the PRC. Larry Wu-Tai Chin, a retired CIA foreign media
analyst, was charged and convicted of spying for the Chinese. He was a
"plant" who received intelligence training before his employment by the US
Army in 1943. In a second case, charges of espionage were made against Sharon
Marie Scranage, a CIA clerk who furnished a Ghanian national the names of CIA
employees and assets in Ghana. Scranage was subsequently convicted. In the
third case, Jonathan Jay Pollard, a civilian intelligence analyst with the
Naval Investigative Service, pleaded guilty to criminal charges that he had
illegally passed classified documents to Israel.
The case involving John Anthony Walker, Jr.; his son, Michael Lance; and
his brother, Arthur James, was long-running and caused significant damage to
US national security. Walker admitted to having spied since 1968, and his
information may have enabled the Soviets to read some of the US Navy's most
secret messages to the fleet from the 1960s to the time of his arrest. His
espionage activities have possibly reduced the US lead in anti-submarine
warfare. The three Walkers have been convicted and a close friend, Jerry
Alfred Whitworth, at this writing, is on trial for espionage.
Ronald William Pelton, a former NSA communications specialist from
1965-1979, was convicted of selling the Soviets information about a highly
classified US intelligence collection project targeted at the Soviet Union.
Edward Howard, a former CIA officer, is accused of selling intelligence
secrets to the Soviets based on his knowledge of CIA operations in the Soviet
Union. Howard, who resigned from CIA in 1983, disappeared from his home in
New Mexico in September 1985.
Soviet intelligence efforts also include active programs outside the
United States against US Government personnel and businessmen. Even those
recruited agents who live in the United States are frequently met in third
countries to avoid US domestic counterintelligence. KGB residencies emphasize
that the principal targets are American embassy employees, particularly code
clerks and other communications personnel with access to classified
information. Other targets include American journalists, businessmen, and
scientists who can furnish sensitive technology information, and students with
job prospects in sensitive positions for long-range development. Of concern
are reported instructions from KGB Headquarters to its residencies that the
KGB connection of some Soviet embassy officers is to be made-known so that a
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US official considering volunteering his services would be aware of the right
person to contact.
US military installations and personnel abroad continue to attract major
Soviet intelligence interest, both to gain potential access to military plans
and to acquire sensitive technical data. There have been some recent
instances in which the Soviets have contacted and attempted to recruit
military personnel who have discussed financial or other personal problems
during long distance telephone calls to the United States from their overseas
posts.
The widespread use of foreign nationals in US embassies and consulates
compounds the problems faced by US intelligence in most hostile countries.
Over 9,800 foreign nationals are so employed for a number of reasons,
including cost considerations. Despite their value in dealing with local
government organizations because of their language fluency and understanding
of local customs and regulations, the threat to US security has been
recognized. Even when barred from restricted areas in the official US
establishment, foreign nationals can glean information useful to the hostile
security service, such as personal data on pay, movements, assignments,
telephone calls, and vulnerabilities to recruitment.
The employment of foreign nationals in US establishments in the Soviet
Union and other Eastern European countries, as well as in numerous other
countries where the Soviet Bloc has influence, affords hostile security
services the opportunity to conduct a variety of technical penetrations.
Offices, residences, and cars are all vulnerable to the planting of audio
devices by foreign nationals with access, legitimate or otherwise, to the US
target.
Although all high technical threat posts have eliminated the access of
foreign nationals from the vicinity of classified work areas, there remains a
serious problem of common walls with uncontrolled adjacent areas from which
technical attacks can be mounted. Offices and residences are also vulnerable
to planted devices when access by foreign nationals is not properly monitored
and routine technical countermeasures are not employed.
The US Embassy in Moscow poses particular problems. Soviet nationals
operate the carpool, including making mechanical repairs; staff the canteen
where embassy personnel gather for food and conversation; and, until recently,
operated the telephones. Approximately 200 Soviets are employed at the
embassy, contrasted to fewer than a dozen Americans in the Soviet
establishments in Washington.
Soviet intelligence continues to successfully target foreign nationals
employed by US establishments abroad. The foreign nationals are used by the
KGB to obtain assessment information on possible recruitment targets among the
American personnel (e.g., those with money, family, drinking, or drug
problems). The Soviets strictly limit the use of local hires in their own
embassies, apparently concerned that if they can succeed, so can US
intelligence.
UNCLASSIFIED
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Third countries are commonly used by the Soviets as meeting places with
recruited agents. Vienna, Austria, for example, was used as the meeting place
for John Walker, who was convicted of spying for the Soviets.
Both as a command structure and as part of each member country's
governmental structure, NATO is also a high priority target of the Soviet
Union and other Warsaw Pact countries. These intelligence services place a
very high priority on the recruitment of human assets with all levels of
access to NATO classified information; based on what is known of Soviet modus
operandi in general, it is also presumed that a similar effort is made to
effect physical penetration of NATO installations wherever they exist. Recent
arrests in West Germany and Greece are indicative of the successes the USSR is
having in targeting US and NATO classified weapons systems.
The Chin case is an example of one of the PRC intelligence services'
recruitment techniques. Chin, who admitted to passing classified information
to his PRC contacts, operated in place for a very long period of time
following his recruitment as an agent. He admitted to suggesting a
recruitment approach to another ethnic Chinese CIA employee. To use a
recruited agent as a talent spotter of other potential agents among his peers
is a standard intelligence practice employed by most intelligence services.
-- Counterintelligence
Over the past several years, the KGB has stepped up its efforts to
penetrate the CIA. The KGB recognizes the difficulty of this tasking in view
of the lack of opportunities to approach CIA officers. Greater use of
recruited agents, either local or third country nationals, who have easier
access to Americans abroad, may be the result. The KGB has not lessened its
efforts to penetrate the FBI, but apparently believes it may be less difficult
to attack CIA personnel who are not on their "home turf."
State Department employees, military personnel, and other government
employees with access to classified information continue to be actively
targeted, as are personnel of US allied governments who have access to
classified US foreign and security policy information or US weapons and
military doctrine.
Additionally, hostile intelligence services try to gain access to our
communications or office equipment in order to "read our mail." In 1978,
security officers discovered that a shipment of IBM Selectric typewriters
destined for the US Embassy had been shipped from Antwerp to Moscow by a
Soviet trucking line, thus affording the Soviets access to the typewriters.
Fortunately, the equipment was returned to the United States before being
placed in service. Subsequently, the Soviets again gained access to several
similar IBM machines. These typewriters, like their 1978 predecessors, were
shipped to the Soviet Union by unaccompanied commercial means. When
discovered, the technical compromise of these typewriters ended a Soviet
operation of some duration.
UNCLASSIFIED
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-- Technology Transfer
The Soviet drive to achieve technological equality with the United
States and other Western countries has required the USSR to commit enormous
resources to the effort. As a result, the Western lead in many key
technological areas has been reduced. The clandestine Soviet program to
acquire illegally Western technology continues to be a massive undertaking.
Information from the past few years indicates that the success in this program
has had serious economic and military consequences for the United States.
Moscow has devised two programs to obtain Western technology. The
first, under the Military Industrial Commission (VPK) of the Presidium of the
Council of Ministers, seeks to obtain military and dual-use hardware,
blueprints, product samples, and test equipment to improve the technical
levels and performance of Soviet weapons and defense manufacturing equipment.
By adapting design concepts from the acquired hardware and documents, the
Soviets reduce their own research and development costs. In the early 1980s,
more than 3,500 requirements were levied by the VPK each year, with about
one-third satisfied. Some 60 percent of the most significant acquisitions (to
the Soviets) was of US origin, although not necessarily collected in the
United States. Nearly half of the up to 10,000 pieces of military hardware
and 20 percent of the 100,000 engineering and research documents the USSR
acquires annually (worldwide) are used by the Soviets to incorporate Western
technology into their military research projects. Most of these documents,
about 90 percent of which are unclassified, are patented or copyrighted
proprietary information illicitly obtained. The R&D cost savings to the
Soviet Union is believed to be enormous--the Ministries of Defense Industry
and Aviation Industry alone are estimated to have saved half a billion rubles
(the 1980 dollar cost of equivalent research would be $800 million) between
1976 and 1980. The saving figures may be biased since the ruble figures
probably reflect operating cost.
The GRU is believed to have satisfied considerably more VPK requirements
than the KGB for defense-industrial activities such as the communications
equipment industry and various machine building, and other industries. This
success is attributed to the GRU's greater scientific orientation, a wider
variety of technology-related cover positions, and other factors. The
approximately 1,500 GRU officers serving outside the USSR have
technological/scientific collection as an integral part of their
responsibilities.
The KGB First Chief Directorate's Line X has nearly 300 officers on
foreign assignment operating under cover of Soviet embassies, trade and
commercial organizations, as members of exchange groups, and as employees of
international organizations (the United Nations, for instance). The largest
KGB contingents are believed to be in New York, Bonn, Cologne, Vienna, and
Tokyo. Until the French mass expulsion of 47 KGB officers in 1983, Paris was
counted as one of the larger KGB establishments, as was London before the 1985
expulsion of a large number of Soviet officials. The KGB, more so than the
GRU, relies on the collection capabilities of other Warsaw Pact intelligence
services, notably those of East Germany, Poland, Bulgaria, and
Czechoslovakia. In recent years, these services, especially the Polish, have
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had some significant coups--the 1983 case of James Harper, Jr., a California
"Silicon Valley" engineer who worked as a Polish agent in the late 1970s and
early 1980s, and the case of William Bell, the Hughes Aircraft engineer who
was arrested in 1981. The success of East European services can be attributed
to the Western misperception that Poland, Czechoslovakia, etc., are less of a
threat than the USSR; East European nationals operating in most Western
countries have fewer (or no) travel restrictions and, in some cases, find it
easier to work in a Western cultural and commercial environment.
The 1,500 high-technology companies in the California area known as
"Silicon Valley" constitute the largest collection of electronics and computer
manufacturers in the United States. For example, ITT, Ford Aerospace,
Teledyne, and Hewlett-Packard are among the US defense contractors in the
Valley who are primary Soviet targets. Soviet trade or scientific
representatives travel to California about four times a month in delegations
ranging from two to 10 people, and the Soviet San Francisco Consulate has a
staff of 41 persons. Based on the widely accepted figure that intelligence
officers comprise 30 to 40 percent of the personnel in each Soviet
establishment, and that the same percent of the personnel in a Soviet visiting
delegation are intelligence officers and/or co-optees, the KGB has the means
to target "Silicon Valley" and employees of the industries there.
The second program, managed by the Ministry of Foreign Trade and the
KGB/GRU, seeks, through trade diversions, to acquire relatively large amounts
of dual-use manufacturing and test equipment for direct use on production
lines. This program attempts to obtain export-controlled microelectronic,
computer, telecommunication, machining, robotic, diagnostic, and other
sophisticated equipment. This second program utilizes both legal and illegal
means to achieve success.
Major Soviet collection efforts are targeted at microelectronics
fabrication equipment and computers; nearly one-half of detected trade
diversions fall into these categories. The acquisition of much of the
information and, in some cases, the hardware, concerning these high-technology
areas is not particularly difficult. Many US Government agencies make
information available to the public and it is, therefore, accessible to the
Soviets and their surrogates. The Soviets and professional trade diverters
hired by them can use dummy firms, false end user certificates, diplomatic
pouch smuggling, and export license falsifications to acquire equipment and
other hardware. Many advances in Soviet microelectronics have been made
possible by the illegal acquisition of equipment from the West. The result
has been a marked reduction in the Western technological lead of about 10 to
12 years a decade ago to about half that today.
Richard Mueller, a West German citizen, has been involved in illegal
technology acquisition for the Soviets for more than a decade. Using dummy
and front firms, he has diverted advanced computers and microelectronics
equipment of significant value to the Soviets. Mueller was the moving force
in the 1983 attempted diversion to the USSR of several US Digital Equipment
Corporation VAX computers which would have assisted the Soviets in
computer-aided design applications for microelectronics fabrication. Recent
information reveals Soviet interest in the Cray family of supercomputers and
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efforts to access these computers both in the United States and abroad. The
more advanced Soviet computers are believed to be much slower than the Cray,
and any Soviet access to Cray machines could lead to another situation similar
to that in which the Soviets acquired IBM documents enabling them to produce a
very versatile computer that is a functional, although less capable, duplicate
of the IBM 370.
-- Open Source Exploitation
The task of responding to VPK technology collection requirements is made
easier for the KGB and GRU by the openness of US society--both government and
industry. The Soviet intelligence services are aided by certain of the
surrogate services of other Warsaw Pact countries, which openly acquire large
amounts of information of value to Soviet engineers, economists, scientists,
military managers, and many others. A Czechoslovak, Polish, or other East
European official is frequently able to contact US companies without arousing
the suspicion that contact by a Soviet official would occasion.
Commercial data bases provide a wealth of information--the Commerce
Department's National Technical Information Service (NTIS), NASA, the
Government Printing Office, the US Geological Survey, and the General Services
Administration are readily accessible. NASA, for example, from the mid 1970s
to the early 1980s, was the source, in the form of unclassified documents and
contractor studies, of the Soviets' best information in the aerospace area.
The information obtained concerned airframe designs, materials, flight
computer systems, and propulsion systems. NTIS has been a productive source
of data dealing with design, evaluation, and testing of US weapon systems.
Unclassified electronic data bases are regularly interrogated by the Soviet
Institute for Automated Systems of the Academy of Sciences.
The Soviets and their allied intelligence services have for many years
been regular attendees of scientific, technical, and industrial conferences in
the United States and abroad. The Soviets considered some of the information
obtained from these conferences to be among the most significant contributions
to their military projects. The VPK identifies those having the most
potential--and, in recent years, these have included the International Radar
Conference, Conference on Integrated Optics, and the Conference of the
Aerospace and Electronic Systems Society of IEEE.
In addition, the Ministry of Foreign Trade and academic-related
collectors contribute to Soviet open source exploitation of Western
information availability. The Ministry of Foreign Trade has hundreds of trade
organizations and companies around the world. KGB and GRU officers operating
under cover of these establishments collect quantities of data openly in
addition to that derived from their covert operations. The Ministry, as an
independent collector, helped meet about 15 percent of all fully satisfied VPK
requirements during the late 1970s and early 1980s. It specializes in
acquiring microelectronics, manufacturing equipment, and communications
dual-use products. The Soviet Academy of Sciences, the GKNT, and the State
Committee for Foreign Economic Relations not only collect overt information
for non-defense industries, but also covert data in response-to VPK tasking
for military research projects. Some 2,000 Soviets come to the United States
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each year under the auspices of these and other Soviet agencies. The number
of US universities and institutes targeted by the Soviets increased from 20 to
over 60 from the late 1970s to the early 1980s. The additions include MIT,
Harvard University, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, University of Michigan,
and Carnegie-Mellon, to name but a few.
-- Active Measures
"Active measures" and "disinformation" are the Soviet covert action
operations designed to implement Soviet policy goals by attacking US policy
and to promote a positive image of the Soviet Union. They remain major
weapons in the Soviet strategy to discredit and deceive the United States and
its allies. Soviet use of front groups, influence agents, and media
manipulation continues at a high level. There is evidence of a major Soviet
active measures campaign against US development of the Strategic Defense
Initiative (SDI). The Soviets are making every effort to convince a world
audience that SDI will destabilize an already precarious superpower armaments
balance.
While the active measures emphasis is in the Third World countries,
where the Soviets play to a less sophisticated audience, more subtle use of
the techniques involved has been necessary in furthering Soviet objectives in
the West. During July 1984, the Soviet Union began a widespread
disinformation campaign to discredit the Los Angeles Olympic games and bolster
worldwide support for their boycott of them. This "active measures" campaign
featured three forged documents threatening Third World athletes with bodily
harm if they participated in the Olympic games. Shortly after their
discovery, former Attorney General William French Smith announced that the
letters were KGB forgeries and part of a major Soviet disinformation effort.
It has been determined that these documents fit the pattern of other Soviet
forgery operations and were part of the overall Soviet "active measures"
campaign to discredit the Reagan administration and its handling of US-USSR
relations.
Soviet active measures directed at US allies, such as in West Germany
and Japan, are designed to sow distrust of American policies and to intensify
financial and commercial rivalries by holding out the promise of favorable
terms to the business communities in both countries. These are all part of
the Soviet campaign to split the United States from its friends.
Currently, the Soviets appear to be employing active measures in South
Asia in an effort to depict the United States as interferring in the affairs
of India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh. The media in all three countries have
consistently carried stories to this effect. One long-running disinformation
ploy concerns alleged attempts by CIA to aid separatist movements in India,
thereby splitting the country to US economic advantage. Discrediting US
intelligence agencies, particularly the CIA, has long been an important
objective of Soviet active measures.
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C. TECHNICAL THREATS
-- Interception of Communications
The Soviet electronic monitoring effort represents a significant
worldwide threat to US military and civil telecommunications. This threat
derives from large collection facilities which are operated in the Soviet
Union, as well as in other countries around the world, such as Cuba. The
Soviets also maintain a fleet of intelligence collection vessels which operate
worldwide--including off both coasts of the United States. The latest of
these vessels has been built from the keel up specifically for this role. The
Soviets also use merchant ships and possibly commercial aircraft to perform
collection operations against targets of opportunity.
A serious threat is posed by the Soviet intelligence collection facility
located at Lourdes near Havana, Cuba. Established in the mid 1960s, the site
has steadily grown to its present size of about 2,000 technicians, and
represents the most sophisticated collection facility outside the Soviet
Union. From this key listening post, the Soviets are able to monitor US
domestic satellites, US military and merchant shipping communications, and US
space program activities.
Evidence of the seriousness of the threat to electronic communications
was emphasized by the issuance in 1985 of National Security Decision Directive
No. 145 which concluded that "the compromise of US information, especially to
hostile intelligence services, does serious damage to the United States and
its national security interests."
The technology to exploit US electronic communications is widespread,
and many foreign countries use it extensively. Certain terrorist groups and
criminal elements also have the capability. Currently, more than half of all
telephone calls in the United States made over any distance are transmitted by
microwave. Calls which the caller believes to be on land-line circuits
(unsecured) may be automatically switched to microwave. The Soviet diplomatic
facilities at the Riverdale complex in New York City, at the consulate in San
Francisco, and at the new Mt. Alto embassy in Washington all occupy high
ground, thus providing superior opportunities for communications intercept.
The "Silicon Valley" concentration of high technology centers and the
government's sensitive facilities in Washington and New York are at risk of
intercept because of these Soviet sites.
-- Other Forms of Electronic Surveillance
The Soviets have a long history of electronic attacks on the US Embassy
in Moscow, dating back to the 1950s when a replica of the Great Seal of the
United States in the embassy was found to contain an audio device. In the
late 1970s, a Soviet antenna was found in the chimney of the chancery. Common
wall facilities are particularly vulnerable to electronic penetration.
As noted previously, foreign nationals, with access to US embassies and
other establishments abroad, provide a means whereby hostile-intelligence
services can make electronic penetrations.
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-- Penetration of Computer Systems
The hostile intelligence threat to US computer systems is magnified by
the enormous growth in the number and power of computers and the vast amount
of data contained in them. The GSA has estimated that the number of US
Government computers has increased from 22,000 in 1983 to over 100,000 in
1985. The increase in the number of computers in use in industry, business,
and other private sectors has been equally staggering.
Computers and computer software are high priority items of both the
VPK's and the Ministry of Foreign Trade's technology acquisition programs by
legal or illegal means. The Soviet and other Warsaw Pact intelligence
services have also obtained information concerning the methods used in the
West to provide computer security, and constantly seek more knowledge. Over
the past decade, the Soviets have acquired over 300 different types of US and
other Western computer hardware and software which has enabled them to develop
the technical ability to penetrate at least some US automated systems. The
Soviets are making a concerted effort to access state-of-the-art computers
like the Cray supercomputers.
-- Collection of Emanations from Equipment
The discovery of sensing devices in several typewriters in the US
Embassy in Moscow and Consulate in Leningrad, noted previously, demonstrate
the Soviets' technical ability to electronically penetrate such equipment.
Placing the sensors required access to the typewriters, either while they were
in the process of shipment or undergoing maintenance while out of US control.
The Soviets' technical threat continues to grow as their advances in
microelectronics increase. Compounding the threat is the hostile environment
in which many US establishments abroad must operate. The opportunity for
technical attack is far greater in the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact
countries than in friendly or neutral countries. In many countries where US
facilities share building space with other uncontrolled offices, the potential
threat is maximized. New construction or remodeling involving US
establishments where local laborers and materials are used also create
vulnerabilities to technical penetration.
-- Imagery
Intelligence collection against the United States and US interests
worldwide using photographic means, or imagery, is carried out principally by
the Soviet Union (with some assistance from its Warsaw Pact allies and Cuba).
The Soviet imagery effort is mainly conducted from spaceborne and airborne
platforms. The continued proliferation of Soviet satellites has given the
USSR the concomitant capability for increased photoreconnaissance of its most
obvious targets, US and NATO strategic and tactical military forces, and
crisis situations anyplace in the world. In addition to these uses of
photoreconnaissance, the Soviets employ it to conduct earth resources surveys
for economic and agricultural data.
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Soviet spaceborne satellite reconnaissance capabilities are supported by
the capability of military and civilian aircraft to collect photographic
intelligence. The potential value of airborne reconnaissance conducted by the
Soviet airline Aeroflot, which, in April 1986, resumed operations to the
United States, and other Warsaw Pact national airlines' flights remains of
concern. These Communist country overflights in the United States are under
the jurisdiction of an FAA committee.
The Soviets continue to pursue their manned space programs. In February
1986, they launched a new type of modular space station, the MIR, replacing
the older SALYUT-type modules. The MIR, as did the SALYUT, gives the Soviets
the capability to perform a number of functions in space, including the use of
cosmonauts to augment their other reconnaissance and surveillance efforts.
The apparent military usefulness of their manned space program has been
indicated in the Soviet announcement that "earth surface surveys" have been
conducted; however, no photographs were ever published.
The seriousness of the imagery collection threat posed by the Soviets
and Bloc overflights in the NATO area can be illustrated by two examples. In
March 1985, Norway banned or restricted Soviet and Bloc passenger airplanes
from several airports on the basis that they were conducting electronic
surveillance. Bulgarian aircraft were specifically mentioned as having
departed from scheduled routes to overfly sensitive areas. In West Germany,
some 1,500 Soviet Bloc overflights occurred in a three-month period in 1985,
offering a tremendous opportunity for both electronic and photographic
reconnaissance.
In summary, the intelligence collection threat posed by the activities
of the Soviet Union, its Warsaw Pact surrogates and Cuba, and other countries
must continue to be of concern to the national security interests of the
United States both in this country and abroad. The techniques employed by
hostile intelligence services range from the use of human agents to the most
sophisticated technical means. The open nature of US society makes the task
of the foreign intelligence officer easier than in most countries.
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