The Wizards of Langley

by Jeffrey T Richelson

85 . Lubarsky interview; private information.

  86 . Dial Torgeson, “U.S. Spy Devices Still Running at Iran Post,” International Herald Tribune, March 7, 1979, pp. A1, A8.

  87 . Hedrick Smith, “U.S. Aides Say Loss of Post in Iran Impairs Missile-Monitoring Ability,” New York Times, March 2, 1979, pp. A1, A8.

  88 . William Sullivan, Mission to Iran (New York: W. W. Norton, 1981), pp. 21–22.

  89 . U.S. Congress, House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, Iran: Evaluation of U.S. Intelligence Performance Prior to November 1978 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1979), pp. 6, 7; Central Intelligence Agency, Iran in the 1980s (Washington, D.C.: CIA, August 1977), p. iii.

  90 . Interview with a former CIA official.

  91 . Torgeson, “U.S. Spy Devices Still Running at Iran Post.”

  92 . Desmond Ball, Pine Gap: Australia and the U.S. Geostationary Signals Intelligence Program (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1988), pp. 58–59.

  93 . Torgeson, “U.S. Spy Devices Still Running at Iran Post.”

  94 . Ibid.; Cyrus Vance, Hard Choices: Critical Years in America’s Foreign Policy (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1983), p. 342; William Branigan, “Iran’s Airmen Keep U.S. Listening Posts Intact and Whirring,” Washington Post, May 20, 1979, p. A20.

  95 . Smith, “U.S. Aides Say Loss of Post in Iran Impairs Missile-Monitoring Ability.”

  96 . Vance, Hard Choices, pp. 354–355.

  97 . Burks interview. On Teal Amber, see L. E. Dean, C. R. Johnson, and H. J. Strasler, “Teal Amber I,” Journal of Defense Research, Special Issue 78-3, 1978, pp. 151–170.

  98 . Interview with William H. Nance, Bethesda, Maryland, May 4, 1999.

  99 . Ibid.

  100 . John Newhouse, War and Peace in the Nuclear Age (New York: Knopf, 1989), p. 224; Robert S. Ross, Negotiating Cooperation: The United States and China, 1969–1989 (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1995), p. 45; William Burr (ed.), The Kissinger Transcripts: The Top-Secret Talks with Beijing and Moscow (New York: New Press, 1999), pp. 50–51, 170–171, 204; Tyler, A Great Wall, p. 98.

  101 . Nance interview.

  102 . Ibid.

  103 . Tyler, A Great Wall, pp. 205–207.

  104 . Ibid., pp. 277–278.

  105 . Philip Taubman, “U.S. and Peking Jointly Monitor Russian Missiles,” New York Times, June 18, 1981, pp. A1, A14; Murrey Marder, “Monitoring: Not-So-Secret-Secret,” Washington Post, June 19, 1981, p. 10.

  106 . Tyler, A Great Wall, p. 284.

  107 . Nance interview.

  108 . Robert Gates, From the Shadows: The Ultimate Insider’s Account of Five Presidents and How They Won the Cold War (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996), p. 123.

  109 . David Bonavia, “Radar Post Leak May Be Warning to Soviet Union,” The Times (London), June 20, 1981, p. 5; Tyler, A Great Wall, p. 284.

  110 . Tyler, A Great Wall, pp. 278, 285; “Spying on Russia, with China’s Help,” U.S. News & World Report, June 29, 1981, p. 10; Taubman, “U.S. and Peking Joint Monitor Russian Missiles”; Robert C. Toth, “U.S., China Jointly Track Firings of Soviet Missiles,” Los Angeles Times, June 19, 1981, pp. 1, 9; Walter Pincus, “U.S. Seeks A-Test Monitoring Facility,” Washington Post, March 19, 1986, p. A8.

  111 . Communication from former CIA officer.

  112 . Antonio J. Mendez with Malcolm McConnell, The Master of Disguise: My Secret Life in the CIA (New York: Morrow, 1999), p. 269.

  113 . Ibid.; Jean Pelletier and Claude Adams, The Canadian Caper (New York: William Morrow, 1981), pp. 59–60, 79, 196.

  114 . Mendez with McConnell, The Master of Disguise, p. 267; CIA Public Affairs Staff, “‘Trailblazers’ and Years of CIA Service,” 1997.

  115 . Mendez with McConnell, The Master of Disguise, pp. 270, 272–273.

  116 . Ibid., pp. 275–276.

  117 . Antonio J. Mendez, “A Classic Case of Deception,” Studies in Intelligence, Winter 1999–2000, pp. 1–16 at pp. 2–3.

  118 . Ibid., p. 3.

  119 . Ibid., p. 3; Mendez with McConnell, The Master of Disguise, pp. 128, 277–278.

  120 . Mendez with McConnell, The Master of Disguise, p. 278.

  121 . Ibid., pp. 280–282; Mendez, “A Classic Case of Deception,” p. 4; Michael E. Ruane, “Seeing Is Deceiving,” Washington Post, February 15, 2000, pp. C1, C8.

  122 . Mendez with McConnell, The Master of Disguise, pp. 284–286; Ruane, “Seeing Is Deceiving.”

  123 . Mendez, “A Classic Case of Deception.”

  124 . Mendez with McConnell, The Master of Disguise, pp. 296, 298; Mendez, “A Classic Case of Deception,” p. 6.

  125 . Mendez with McConnell, The Master of Disguise, pp. 298, 301–305; Ruane, “Seeing Is Deceiving”; Mendez, “A Classic Case of Deception,” p. 7.

  126 . Mendez with McConnell, The Master of Disguise, pp. 339–340; Ruane, “Seeing Is Deceiving.”

  Chapter 8: Breaking Down Barriers

  1 . Interview with R. Evans Hineman, Chantilly, Virginia, February 17, 1999; United States of America, Plaintiff v. Samuel L. Morison, Defendant, Case No. Y-84-00455, United States District Court, District of Maryland, Baltimore, October 15, 1985, Transcript of Trial Before the Honorable Joseph H. Young, pp. 443–444; “DS&T Leadership History,” n.d., provided by CIA Public Affairs Staff.

  2 . Interview with James V. Hirsch, Fairfax, Virginia, February 12, 1999; telephone interview with Robert Kohler, July 6, 1999; “DS&T Leadership History.”

  3 . DS&T 35th Anniversary: Celebrating 50 Years of CIA History, July 24, 1997, video.

  4 . Ibid.; Hineman interview.

  5 . ”DS&T Leadership History”; Hineman interview.

  6 . ”DS&T 35th Anniversary”; Hineman interview.

  7 . A phone interview with Thomas Twetten, March 12, 2001.

  8 . Warren E. Leary, “The Dream of Eternal Flight Begins to Take Wing,” New York Times, January 12, 1999, pp. D1, D6; Stuart F. Brown, “The Eternal Airplane,” Popular Science, April 1994, pp. 70, 100; interview with Philip Eckman, Alexandria, Virginia, May 16, 2000; interview with a former CIA official.

  9 . Brown, “The Eternal Airplane”; David A. Fulghum, “Solar-Powered UAV to Fly at Edwards,” Aviation Week and Space Technology, October 4, 1993, p. 27; “Environmental Research Aircraft and Sensor Technology: Pathfinder, Past Flight Information,” www.dfrc.nasa.gov/Projects/erast/Projects/Pathfinder/pastinfo.html, November 1, 1998.

  10 . Leary, “The Dream of Eternal Flight”; “Environmental Research Aircraft and Sensor Technology: Pathfinder,” www.dfrc.nasa.gov/Projects/erast/Projects/Pathfinder/pastfltinfo.html, November 1, 1998. In November 1998, a successor to PATHFINDER, with a 206-foot wingspan and the designation CENTURION, made its debut, flying at just over 80,000 feet and able to stay aloft for fourteen to fifteen hours during daylight. It is expected to be capable of flying at over 100,000 feet. Scientists hope the vehicle will provide data to help in the development of another advanced UAV, HELIOS, which is expected to be able to remain over a target for months using an energy storage system to power the aircraft at night. Projected possible uses for the aircraft include monitoring the upper atmosphere, long-term monitoring of ocean storms, and forest and crop monitoring.

  11 . John Boatman, “USA Planned Stealthy UAV to Replace SR-71,” Jane’s Defence Weekly, December 17, 1994, pp. 1, 3; David A. Fulghum and Peter A. Wall, “Long-Hidden Research Spawns Black UAV,” Aviation and Space Technology, September 25, 2000, pp. 28–29; private information.

  12 . Fulghum and Wall, “Long-Hidden Research Spawns Black UAV”; Boatman, “USA Planned Stealthy UAV to Replace SR–71.”

  13 . Fulghum and Wall, “Long-Hidden Research Spawns Black UAV”; Boatman, “USA Planned Stealthy UAV to Replace SR–71”; private information.

  14 . Fulghum and Wall, “Long-Hidden Research Spawns Black UAV”; Boatman, “USA Planned Stealthy UAV to Replace SR–71”; U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Armed Services, Department of Defense Authorization for Appropriations for Fiscal Year 1994 and th
e Future Years Defense Program (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1993), p. 477.

  15 . Peter Kornbluh, Nicaragua: The Price of Intervention, Reagan’s War Against the Sandinistas (Washington, D.C.: Institute for Policy Studies, 1987), pp. 18–20.

  16 . James Le Moyne, “The Secret War Boils Over,” Newsweek, April 11, 1983, pp. 46–50; Joanne Omang, “Historical Background to the CIA’s Nicaraguan Manual,” in Psychological Operations in Guerrilla Warfare (New York: Vintage, 1985), pp. 15, 22; “A Secret War for Nicaragua,” Newsweek, November 8, 1982, pp. 42–53; Kornbluh, Nicaragua, pp. 22–23; Robert C. Toth, “CIA Covert Action Punishes Nicaragua for Salvador Aid,” New York Times, April 18, 1984, pp. A1, A12.

  17 . Ronald Reagan, National Security Decision Directive 17, “National Security Directive on Cuba and Central America,” January 4, 1982. Top Secret.

  18 . LeMoyne, “Secret War Boils Over”; Kornbluh, Nicaragua, pp. 23–24, 40.

  19 . “The CIA Blows an Asset,” Newsweek, September 3, 1984, pp. 48–49.

  20 . Kornbluh, Nicaragua, p. 48; Philip Taubman, “U.S. Officials Say C.I.A. Helped Nicaraguan Rebels Plan Attacks,” New York Times, October 16, 1984, pp. 1, 22; “Oct. 10 Assault on Nicaraguans Is Laid to C.I.A.,” New York Times, April 18, 1994, pp. A1, A12.

  21 . Kornbluh, Nicaragua, p. 48; Taubman, “U.S. Officials Say C.I.A. Helped Nicaraguan Rebels Plan Attacks”; “Oct. 10 Assault on Nicaraguans Is Laid to C.I.A.”; John Prados, President’s Secret Wars: CIA and Pentagon Covert Operations from World War II Through the Persian Gulf (Chicago: Ivan R. Dee, 1996), p. 415; Capt. James M. Martin, “Sea Mines in Nicaragua,” Proceedings of the U.S. Naval Institute 116, 9 (September 1990): 111–116.

  22 . Kornbluh, Nicaragua, pp. 48–50; Hedrick Smith, “Britain Criticizes Mining of Harbors Around Nicaragua,” New York Times, April 7, 1984, pp. 1, 4; Fred Hiatt and Joanne Omang, “CIA Helped to Mine Ports in Nicaragua,” Washington Post, April 7, 1984, p. 1; Philip Taubman, “Americans on Ship Said to Supervise Nicaragua Mining,” New York Times, April 8, 1984, pp. 1, 12; Martin, “Sea Mines in Nicaragua.”

  23 . Prados, President’s Secret Wars, p. 413; Memorandum for Robert C. MacFarlane, From: Oliver L. North, Constantine Menges, Subject: Special Activities in Nicaragua, March 2, 1984, in National Security Archive, Nicaragua: The Making of U.S. Policy, 1978–1990 (Alexandria, Va.: Chadwyck-Healey, 1991), Document No. 01994.

  24 . Kornbluh, Nicaragua, pp. 48–50; Smith, “Britain Criticizes Mining of Harbors Around Nicaragua”; Hiatt and Omang, “CIA Helped to Mine Ports in Nicaragua”; Taubman, “Americans on Ship Said to Supervise Nicaragua Mining”; American Embassy Managua to Secretary of State, Washington, D.C., Subject: Soviet Ship Damaged by Mine at Puerto Sandino, 211755 March 1984 in National Security Archive, Nicaragua: The Making of U.S. Policy, Document No. 02017.

  25 . Duane R. Claridge, A Spy for All Seasons: My Life in the CIA (New York: Scribner’s, 1996), p. 205; Leslie H. Gelb, “Officials Say CIA Made Mines with Navy Help,” New York Times, June 1, 1984, p. A4; Claridge, A Spy for All Seasons, p. 386.

  26 . United States of America, Plaintiff v. Samuel L. Morison, pp. 1022–1024.

  27 . Interview with Robert M. Huffstutler, Falls Church, Virginia, March 23, 1999; Résumé, Robert M. Huffstutler, n.d.

  28 . Hineman interview; Huffstutler interview; John J. Hicks, Director, National Photographic Interpretation Center, Memorandum for: Deputy Director for Science and Technology, Subject: Use of Photointerpreter and Supporting Resources, July 25, 1975. The problem persists to this day. In fall 1999, Congress threatened to cut the funding for the next generation of imagery satellites unless the administration came up with sufficient funds to pay for a processing and exploitation capability to match the new generation’s collection capability. (Vernon Loeb and Walter Pincus, “New Spy Satellites at Risk Because Funding Is Uncertain, Pentagon Told,” Washington Post, November 12, 1999, p. A7.)

  29 . Hineman interview.

  30 . Huffstutler interview.

  31 . Ibid.

  32 . Ibid.

  33 . Ibid.

  34 . Hineman interview; Huffstutler interview.

  35 . Huffstutler interview.

  36 . Ibid.

  37 . Ibid.

  38 . Ibid.

  39 . Nigel Hawkes, Geoffrey Lean, David Leigh, Robin McKie, Peter Pringle, and Andrew Wilson, Chernobyl: The End of the Nuclear Dream (New York: Vintage, 1986), pp. 99–103.

  40 . Stephen Engelberg, “U.S. Says Intelligence Units Did Not Detect the Accident,” New York Times, May 2, 1986, p. A9.

  41 . Hawkes, Lean, Leigh McKie, Pringle, and Wilson, Chernobyl, p. 122; Huffstutler interview.

  42 . “Meltdown,” Newsweek, May 12, 1986, pp. 20–35; Boyce Rensberg, “Explosion: Graphite Fire Suspected,” Washington Post, April 30,1986, pp.A1, A17; Carl M. Cannon and Mark Thompson, “Threat to Soviets Grows, U.S. Spy Photos Indicate,” Miami Herald, April 30, 1986, pp.1A, 14A.

  43 . “Meltdown.”

  44 . Robert C. Toth, “Satellites Keep Eye on Reactor,” Los Angeles Times, May 2, 1986, p. 22.

  45 . “Meltdown”; Bernard Gwertzman, “Fire in Reactor May Be Out, New U.S. Pictures Indicate; Soviet Says Fallout Is Cut,” New York Times, May 2, 1986, pp.A1, A8.

  46 . Philip M. Boffey, “U.S. Panel Calls the Disaster in the Ukraine the Worst Ever,” New York Times, May 4, 1986, pp. 1, 20.

  47 . Serge Schemann, “Soviet Mobilizes a Vast Operation to Overcome the Disaster,” New York Times, May 19, 1986, p. A8.

  48 . Walter Pincus and Mary Thornton, “U.S. to Orbit ‘Sigint’ Craft from Shuttle,” Washington Post, December 19, 1984, pp.A1, A8-A9.

  49 . Edward H. Kolcum, “Night Launch of Discovery Boosts Secret Military Satellite into Orbit,” Aviation Week and Space Technology, November 27, 1989, p. 29; private information.

  50 . James Gerstenzang, “Shuttle Lifts Off with Spy Cargo,” Los Angeles Times, January 25, 1985, pp. 1, 11; “Final Launch Preparations Under Way for Signal Intelligence Satellite Mission,” Aviation Week and Space Technology, November 6, 1989, p. 24; interview with Bernard Lubarsky, Alexandria, Virginia, May 9, 2000; interview with a former CIA official.

  51 . Kohler interview.

  52 . Lubarsky interview; telephone conversation with Albert Wheelon, November 15, 1999; Kohler interview, July 6, 1999.

  53 . Kohler interview.

  54 . Ibid.

  55 . Ibid.

  56 . Ibid.

  57 . Ibid.

  58 . Ibid.

  59 . Ibid.; Wheelon telephone conversation; telephone conversation with Albert Wheelon, February 15, 2000.

  60 . Wheelon telephone conversation, November 15, 1999; Wheelon telephone conversation, February 15, 2000.

  61 . Kohler interview.

  62 . List of Directors, Office of Development and Engineering, n.d.

  63 . Interview with a former CIA official.

  64 . Lubarsky interview; Jeffrey T. Richelson, America’s Space Sentinels: DSP Satellites and National Security (Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1999), pp. 131–136.

  65 . Richelson, America’s Space Sentinels, pp. 131–136.

  66 . Ruth Marcus and Joe Pichirallo, “Chin Believed Planted in U.S. as Spy,” Washington Post, December 6, 1985, pp. A1, A22; Philip Shenon, “Former C.I.A. Analyst Is Arrested and Accused of Spying for China,” New York Times, November 24, 1985, pp. 1, 31; Joe Pichirallo, “Ex-CIA Analyst Gave Secrets to China for 30 Years, FBI Says,” Washington Post, November 24, 1985, pp. A1, A24.

  67 . Pichirallo, “Ex-CIA Analyst”; Stephen Engelberg, “30 Years of Spying for China Is Charged,” New York Times, November 27, 1985, p. B8.

  68 . Pichirallo, “Ex-CIA Analyst”; “A Chinese Agent in the CIA?” Newsweek, December 2, 1985, p. 49.

  69 . Marcus and Pichirallo, “Chin Believed Planted in U.S. as Spy”; Philip Shenon, “U.S. Says Spy Suspect Had Access to Highly Classified Data,” New York Times, January 3, 1986, p. A12; Michael Wines, “Bigger Role Laid to Suspe
cted Spy,” Los Angeles Times, November 28, 1985, pp. 1, 10; United States of America v. Larry Wu Tai Chin aka Chin Wu-Tai, United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, Alexandria Division, Criminal No. 85-00263-A, January 2, 1986, pp. 2–3, 14.

  70 . Joe Pichirallo, “Retiree Kept Close CIA Ties,” Washington Post, November 27, 1985, pp. A1, A10; Robin Toner, “Bail Denied Ex-CIA Worker in China Spy Case,” New York Times, November 28, 1985, p. B8; Joe Pichirallo, “Ex-CIA Analyst Gave Secrets to China,” Washington Post, November 24, 1985, pp. A1, A24.

  71 . “‘Ministry of State Security’ Set Up on Mainland China,” Issues and Studies, July 1983, pp. 5–8; Nicholas Eftimiades, “China’s Ministry of State Security: Coming of Age in the International Arena,” Intelligence and National Security 8, 1 (January 1993): 23–43; “Chinese Official Said Ex-poser of CIA Turncoat,” Washington Post, September 5, 1986, p. A18; Michael Wines, “Spy Reportedly Unmasked by China Defector,” Los Angeles Times, September 5, 1986, pp. 1, 12; Daniel Southerland, “China Silent on Reported Defection of Intelligence Official,” Washington Post, September 4, 1986, p. A30.

  72 . “Chinese Official Said to Be Exposer of CIA Turncoat”; Wines, “Spy Reportedly Unmasked by China Defector”; Thomas Allen and Norman Polmar, Merchants of Treason: America’s Secrets for Sale from the Pueblo to the Present (New York: Delacorte, 1988), p. 302.

  73 . Ronald Kessler, Spy vs. Spy: Stalking Soviet Spies in America (New York: Scribner’s, 1988), pp. 202–203.

  74 . Remarks by William O. Studeman, Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, at the Symposium on “National Security and National Competitiveness: Open Source Solutions,” December 1, 1992, McLean, Va., p. 4; Robert Pear, “Radio Broadcasts Report Protests Erupting All over China,” New York Times, May 23, 1989, p. A14.

  75 . Bob Woodward, VEIL: The Secret Wars of the CIA, 1981–1987 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1987), p. 32; NBC, Inside the KGB: Narration and Shooting Script, May 1993, p. 39.

  76 . Peter Earley, Confessions of a Spy: The Real Story of Aldrich Ames (New York: Putnam, 1997), p. 117.

  77 . Ibid., p. 118.

  78 . Ibid.

  79 . Ibid., pp. 118–119, 197.