SENATE SELECT COMMITTEE ON INTELLIGENCE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP85-00821R000100140024-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 12, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 30, 2002
• Sequence Number: 24
• Publication Date: March 10, 1978
• Content Type: MF

3.5c21
Approved For Release 214.ffilAt00821R000100140024-5
1 0 MAR 1978
es RESISTRY
MEMORANDUM FOR: Director of Central Intelligencrilif004
VIA: Deputy Director for Administration
PROM: Robert W. Gambino
Director of Security
SUBJECT: Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (U)
1. (U) Action: None; for your information.
2. (C) Background: The New York Magazine has run ?
series of articles by?ffdward J7175tein entftled, "War of
the Moles." The 13 March 1978 edition indicates that Epstein
obtained information for his article from an SSCI source. I
have also been informally advised that a document containing
classified information concerning oil production has *notedly
been leaked by the same Committee.
This Office has taken no action with reference to
these leaks but is prepared to do so should you desire that
we play an active or advisory role in any investigation con-
cerning these leaks.
Distribution:
Orig. - DCI
1 - DDCI
1 DDA
1 - ER 1 - DD/POI
DD/PSI
0)- OS Registry
1 - Chrono
GAMBINO:bt:rjw (9 Mar 78)
Revised:Gambino:rjw (10 Mar 78)
Robert W. Ganbino
PAM nENTIA1
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In the two weeks since "New rk hco pu Zhirg (iv! two-niirt War o the (by. )wa,rd
Jay t::pstein, Intelligeneer has plZYS:i4r..i'.i:6/1 of new inft-A-,norion Nvhiell throws into feven sharper focus the
Spirited war between the intellifiene,t.agemies the Soviet LInioa nod the United States.
0aptzre at..41pat X in.77
,.1/1?
Though it is still a closely'
guarded secret in Washing-
:on, the CIA is now reeling
from the capture within the
last few months of its most
important agent in the Soviet
Union. The documents passed
by this "mole" to .the CIA
were regarded as the most
valuable intelligence on So-
viet plans since the material
furnished by Colonel Oleg
Penkovisky before his ex-
posure in 196.2.
According tO a Senate
source with access to intelli-
gence oversight, the CIA has
been hoping that the capture
of this valued "mole" (re-
ferred to hereafter as Agent
X) would remain secret. But
within the CIA. this disaster
poses once more the enigma
that has haunted it for
twenty years: ?How has the
N013 been ? able to ferret
out every important ?western
-mole" since 1959?
To Cgch .A..1:ioie
_
As a former deputy diree-
:cc of? the CIA's Soviet .Rus-
sia section has pointed out,
"It takes a mole to catch a
mole." By this he meant that
the Soviets could only have
caught Agent X and his pre-
decessors by having their own
man (or men) planted in U.S.
intaigence.
Is this conceivable? Many
U.S. intelligence ?Gnats_ put
1
the ci,01-1 the other way
1 ii:?Otinc,I. 'T hc Soviets have
1 demansarably infiltrated ev-
ery ether western intelligence
Iservis-e. Their?triumphs have
, irclod.xt emplacement of
I s-i.1) meles as kim Philhy
I in Great Britt:in. Heinz Fellie
III WeSt GM113r1 counterin-
tAigenee.ar 3 he Topaz ring
in Frinch intelligence. To
many tn2 CIA officials, it
bceni6 inconceivable that the
Soviets have not made every
el-fort ta infiltrate li.S. spy
af.:eneics, svhich th-v consider
-
flow did tho 1< c;.; (X,t ndoL, in Afos-rolc:r.
the main ?enemy. Tin; recent. To this day, the suspicion
capture of Agent X seems to in (.1-ieCiA. persists that
be jtistOr1.:" Inelle link in a pensan tnr p?.n-scins) in the
lung ichain of evidence that FBI's Nessr York office be-
Ie Soviets have been success- toyed Popov on ? receipt of
fal in such efforts. hiis
1Md rgt liaray
In 1959. the CIA .?was
stunned by? the capture of
its only mole in the Soviet
Union?Colonel hter S.
Popov. .In the .postimotcm
on this disaster, the CIA is
nown to have focused some
suspicion on the FBI's Nevv
York office.
One of Popov's lint mes-
sages concerned the arrival
by plane in Nev,- Yor'n of n
Temple Soviet az_tent, Tin: CIA
turned this inforniatinn over
to the FBI. whose rerogo-
tive of maintainimrt sceorilv
bordets hal
?vavs been -iinnonsIn
hV I. Edjisr
I hover. But !.:cori
after l'onov's new!, hlhetin
routed the ? FBI, Popo,.
was caught in Russia.
?'A'r.om- Fin
. Into. this atmosphere of
suspicion enme the crucial
iigure of ,\nritoli tvt. Gn,Itisn'n
(Dcaiiits of Crtis ease were
ontlined hy Edward Tay Ep-
stein in nn.nii 'Cork. February
2;.) In ? brief. ? this high-
level from l'slos,ann
,natesi that tiler': were SOViet
in place, not
011'1itthe Fill hid also in
th,: CIA.
Cnintsin tittded Olin the
ninle within the CIA lean
.eeact:':ie.I i l957 by
one of the
hiOntst-rankii-n;
tivei,.inaW ell. nit() paid a
puts,,r:i! visit to the United
States using a frill,: dipl\M1:11-
'IC [or cover_ (COVt?I)
KO\ 111;1\ .0 high posit-inn, it
was as though fames Angie.
ton had been sent on a per-.
sonal visit to the Sus let
Union.)
Golitsin's good faith
buttressed by his disclosure
that the Soviets had a minor
mole in the CfA, codesnomed
Sasha: Sasha was subsequent-
ly identified as a contract
employee working out of
Germany. So-ca after, he was
photographed in contact with
the atvicts nr.ni then rapidly
retired out of the service.
81.111.1ua'sLt.t 5113plaktn3
At the same time, the
FBI received iridisptitable evi-
dence that it kid been pene-
trated. Three sap-secret doc-
uments had vanished from
its 'Washing:en ofline. :lopes
that they had lucre I' been
mislaid were shattered when
a soviet tlip!ontar, offered ZO
c it heel; the-n? s.w.x
Ineti!5 to a. Inniter.,1 Stases
nava; attact-H: for S1a,ito0. I
This cOsode cntivineed
1
iinni C.. Strtlivn.in depots, di 1
ree,or t-if the, Flit. thin Soviet
moles were in place itt the 1
I ntl.
For tiftec.n. ,,,:n.i7s, Siiiiivar, I,
came to belie cc. the ?Soviets li
had been Feresing tiiiisiof-n-,. I
mation? to the Fit i c.,...', ?-,:?t: g, id
Agent ''Eed 0 Si,' a porn 51
trus:ed by il?or?vcr as an assnt
of extraordio-ar,?" stive. Nnt
r-it-ily did Sullivan eonsicier
that Fedora, -',vor-king in the
Soviet I.J.N. delnizal.inn in
New Yorlt., was a rlontt he
also inferred th?-it 1,:ct:inro
nr.ist Ty,..:. ree...iN,in.;:: 5::..,.,-,-t(i-t
from awitber S.,', i,.:1: aW.1",-; aC?
itnll.' C?mploy,C2A1 F-V the. I RI
in New ?I'orin Stilli,,,n n'as
openly reno-,.vi!?,n these. cc ,-,-
elosiens to i!'),-,5-ninn't ni-t?.nen...,i
Insinnic Iiis ,nin.,-,ilt in n. h,,,intIng
iteeidnut iri thc: tall of . 'I-177.
(At one pnint Sullivan 1-i,e,
lieved hr.' h'..k .'., i&r!...:-Icii tl,e
Soviet operative inside the.
1-111, but the investCon
sinas int ininnted an rni.Iers
front Washinin:m. 1
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UDNIgURJEU
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Tigt, 7Alp ratt1"n
In 1IK32 came another dis-
aster: the capture of Colonel
Oleg Penkovsky. The official
account pat out by the So-
viets was that Penkovsky had
been dentitted .thro.;:li rou-
tine surveillance. Such a ver-
sion would evidently provide
a protective a:TIN-it:11a for a
betrayer of Penkovsky. work-
ing for the Russians within
the CIA (or.any other intelli-
gence service). Indeed, CIA
counterinielligenee still had
some doubts on the case.
Its reasoning displays the
Byzantine workings of coonterinrellii,?ence. On his re-
lease ?kurn- the Soviet Union
in 1962, the British .agent
Grit:stifle Wynne -reported that
the KGB in the course of
interrogation had quizzed
him about someone named
"Zen." Since ZCp was a giri
in London with whom Pen-
kovsky had been briefly ?in-
yoked in t1ttt,.i; CIA, sur-
mised that" the il.ussimis had
PerikovAy under closc tar-
veillitucc well before the
time he had officially come
under suspicion. This once
again suggested the otistence
of a Soviet mote somewhcre
in the CIA.
'CttViar VIV:ctin tiva CIA
it is hard to overestimate
the fears. suspicions, and
paranoia generated within the
U.S. intelligence agencies -by
the hunt for the Soviet moles.
At the height of the debate
over the credentials a Yuri
Noscrtko (who defected in
19(1:1-, claiming that Oswald.
had had no contacts-with the
-KGB). no esr a person than
the head of the Soviet, Russia
Division within the CIA was?
accused by ?lie of his own
men of Iteing,a tioviet ati.ent.
It k-es only after -a ;.til in-
vestigation by the- 1.'13I that
the head
Iklatnai suspicion between
the CIA and FBI of cath
othev's rvit.,1s and stanstes
hcLarne 50 intense that in
1971 Hoover broke oil re13-
rions with the agency. The
war within the CIA ir:;?_711
came to a iniriti with Director
William Colby's summary
urine, ofAnOcten and forced
reste,nation of ?his- three top
aides at the cnd of 1974.
In the wake of the Colby
massacre. the notion of a So-
viet mole within the CIA was
dismissed as ?sickthink.- Bat
the capture of Agent -X has
once again brought the issue
to the fore_ Now that it is
kriiwn that Nosenko, actual-
ly indicted by the CIA's So-
Let Russia Disision as a So-
viet spy, has been reltabili-
tarlal and is handling 120
ca,:cs for both the, CIA and
the PnI. the 5-rnro,E? cluesrion
h ;35 10 asked: Did he have
any access to the Agent X
1
I:eiote the bnCt-.1- c6p-
tore?
Admiral l?;tirisfieid 'furrier,
dit'ector of the CIA confided
last rn:intli in a secret session
or the Senate Ititchigenee
Over7.1i,ht Committee that he
consiclerut the disclosures
made by Fr.i.ittl, .:;riepp,. the
anchor of the CIA exposii
Decent Interval, or-IL. Of the
most serious problems fac-
ing the agency_ Turner now
might ask himself if the
prosecution of Snepp for his
innocuous revelations is really
t:1: pressing .a problem as
detection of the presumed
betrayer of Agent X.
Over at the FBI, its new
head, kicige William WcAlster;
might also inquire why the
burcau, which has Ce-n1 to
many years harrying pre-
sumed Communist subver-
tives in other organizations,
has yet to ferret out the cause
of so much suspicion within
its own New York office. Kzor
'
?
? .144,..m.?????14.,B......510%.,011,M,....,
7?')' ''t7kA ? Aili''S.:16)"1:1
The t;,:):::.c on 69th Street: .Docs .-!ussian cf,?,ent go r/t7iough ificse tIOerS crery day to tuor,(? for the FBI? Sn-spii;io!t
Hue! an FB)-cepa, working for the Soviets, may have been ILT the caP:wc 01 01,7 moic 2 KGB.
1/n- -Agent X.' case has a precedent in the .apprehen:5:-en ci Col:,;-.1 Oicg Peakov.,:ky.Tbs 0:?? el
g his ar7-est indicated the .presence of a Soviet truth, within CI I.
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1.1A51CH 13, tatarrulw y?L-iax, 13