A Guide for the Aspiring Spy (The Anonymous Spy Series) (9 page)

A potential downside of NOC positions is that you are working on the “outside” of the CIA Station. You do not have access on a daily basis to other Station personnel or the services that “inside” officers receive. If your personality is such that you need to have a close association with others in the business, then a NOC position is not for you. If you have no problems working alone without close supervision, if you are a self-starter and highly self-motivated, then this aspect of the NOC position should not be a downside for you.

Managing the Cover

The cover company (CC) must be a US company that has foreign interest either as manufacturing overseas, selling overseas or buying from overseas. This covers a wide range of US companies from large multinationals to small specialized trading firms. Usually only three of four CC officials need know of the case officer’s status as a CIA employee under NOC status within the CC. This is usually the chairman, president, chief financial officer (CFO), and the immediate supervisor of the NOC officer.

The CFO must be involved since the CIA will be channeling funds into the CC in order to support the NOC officer overseas. In small companies operating overseas, only one or two CC officials may know.

The CIA prefers to use CCs that are able to provide some cover for access that will enable the NOC to more easily obtain access to targets of interest. Of course, cover for status is a given in that all CCs should enable the NOC to have the actual status of a bona fide business person overseas. Finally, if the CC is able to provide cover for action, then that’s just icing on the cake.

When the CIA negotiates a NOC position within a CC, there is mutual agreement in a formal memorandum of understanding as to the duties the NOC will perform for the CC and how much time the NOC should devote to CC duties, etc., and a cover story is laid out and agreed upon that will enable the NOC to have a comfort zone to cover his work for both organizations.

In my particular situation, I found the CC myself as it was a hometown firm where I had many relatives working. The CIA’s Central Cover Division went and made the initial pitch to provide cover and gave the president of the CC a sterile look at my resume. When he learned that I was a local boy, it peaked his interest and he agreed to meet with me. I filled out a CC employee application form, which, along with many others, was viewed by the president ands selected for vetting. He assigned me to the division of the CC that did overseas sales and I was then assigned to open a sales office in the target country where the CIA wanted me. Before going overseas, of course, I had several months of training by the CC.

The key to success as a NOC officer is to have a work ethic that surpasses the average and to have a CC supervisor who understands that your first priority is to be a NOC officer and serving the CC comes second.

Operating Funds

All operating funds are advanced to the NOC officer by the Station as a revolving fund, usually on a monthly or bi-monthly basis. All fund recipients are required to do a monthly or, in rare cases, a bi-monthly accounting to the Station on all funds expended, at which time their revolving fund will be replenished. If any NOC case officer finds himself short of operating funds, it is entirely his own fault. Fund accounting is not rocket science, so there is no excuse to be unable to account for the expenditures made.

The amount each NOC officer receives as a revolving fund is decided on a case-by-case basis and will vary depending on a number of factors, such as agent caseload and the salaries and operational budget for each agent. Also taken into consideration are such factors as the operating directives that the NOC is tasked to undertake and the Station allocation of funds for each directive. NOCs are thoroughly briefed on Station policy for operational and administrative travel expenses and discretionary entertainment expenses for meetings with agents, targets of opportunity, cold contacts, etc., and such funds are included in the revolving fund. NOCs provide input to the Station on the amount of revolving funds they may require each month based on their own anticipated needs, so again, if the NOC finds himself short of funds and must temporarily reach into his pocket, it is not the fault of the Station.

There may be rare occasions when unanticipated needs arise and the NOC finds himself out of pocket. NOCs are encouraged not to dip into personal funds and all Stations will go out of their way to accommodate and advance additional funds. These days, NOCs communicate with the Stations in real-time so a cash replenishment turnaround by dead drop or brush pass can be done in a matter of hours. Even in my day of the 1970s and 1980s, an emergency turnaround of twenty-four hours was not unheard of.

As for my own experience, I never felt for a lack of funds to administer my agent operations or for conducting agent development or making cold calls. Funding for agent operations is an annual bureaucratic event at each Station. It is the responsibility of each case officer to prepare the “annual review” of his agents, both recruited and developmental cases, that includes all anticipated financial needs. This annual review projects anticipated funds requirements five years forward. Stations encourage case officers to over-anticipate the budget just to make sure there is a buffer available for unanticipated opportunities. Headquarters usually rubber-stamps these annual reviews and thus the Station’s budget is allocated. I never had an agent case that exceeded the approved budget. If I had, it would have been my own fault.

As for targets of opportunity for which there are no “approved” budgets, all case officers work within Station funding policy. Some targets have a higher collection priority than others and the funding policy reflects that. Even here, the NOC has great personal discretion as to how he expends operating funds to develop a target, and the Station usually will not object as long as results in the form of FIRs and operational cables reflect intelligence or operational value. A NOC may request that his monthly revolving fund be increased based on new target opportunities, and it would be rare for a Station to refuse such a request.

Getting the Family Settled

When the NOC officer and his family travel to their overseas post, they travel in true name just as anyone else does. Of course, they are known in true name within the cover company and a minimum number of people inside the cover company actually know that the NOC is a CIA operative. This usually includes, but is not limited to, the chairman, CEO, CFO, and immediate supervisor of the NOC. Depending on the size of the cover company, others may know as well.

The NOC usually receives several operational aliases with documentation and pocket litter to use for his operations in the field. In most cases these aliases are backstopped with a devised commercial cover facility for the NOC to use in developing, recruiting, and handling assets in commercial cover and alias. The NOC may also be given alias documentation in some US government–backed cover such as the Department of Defense to use as well. Documentation may include a US passport in alias, alias international driver’s license, alias credit cards, etc.

NOC officers must use extreme caution and clandestine tradecraft when going from true name into alias and visa versa. For example, when the NOC goes to his cover company office to work each morning, he does so in true name. But perhaps on some occasions, the NOC may have to meet an agent in alias for debriefing at a local safehouse in the middle of his normal workday. To ensure that he is not compromised, he must employ counter-surveillance, if he has a second person to help him, or conduct an SDR if he works alone. Each time the NOC goes from one status to another, he must do this. Done properly, it is a long process that usually takes more time than the agent meeting itself. The agent, too, should also conduct an SDR to and from the meeting site to make sure he is not being followed.

The NOC must also use extreme caution to ensure that his true-name documentation and alias documentation are not on his body at the same time and that they are properly and securely stored when not in use. To do this, the CIA provides the NOC with concealment devices to use in his office and his home. In fact, the concealment devices are used to store all CIA materials in the NOC’s possession.

Role of the Spouse and Old Family and Friends

The spouse of a CIA case officer is truly a valuable asset and a full partner in this business, and the CIA expects the spouse to assist the officer in many aspects of the business of intelligence. There are many functions that the spouse may well perform that lighten the load of responsibility for the CIA case officer and in some cases the spouse may provide better services than the case officer. My spouse frequently acted as a live drop to receive documents and film from agents. She also on many occasions acted as my counter-surveillance to help detect possible hostile surveillance prior to me going to agent meetings. She also performed as a cutout and message drop to receive and deliver clandestine communications between me and my agents. Perhaps the best example of my spouse supporting my professional activities was in the area of spotting, assessment, and development of potential targets of interest. Spotting, assessment, and development of potential new agents requires numerous meetings under various social circumstances to determine personal information useful to evaluation of the target. Many of these meetings were held in a couples environment with the target and his own spouse. The point of view of my spouse was often very insightful and helpful to the agent-acquisition process. Her presence at meetings also helped to reinforce my own recollections of events in the meetings. In the agent-spotting environment of large social gatherings, my spouse’s ability to recall names was invaluable since I had essentially trained myself not to remember agents’ true names—a practice that unfortunately carried over to normal social life as well.

Involving the spouse in this process has another benefit as well. It gives the spouse an appreciation of the case officer’s real job and relieves internal stress the spouse may have about the case officer being gone so much of the time, often without being able to explain the reason for the extended absences.

The benefit to the CIA, of course, is that it essentially gets a force multiplier in the form of the spouse free of charge since the spouse is not paid for the services provided in support of the case officer. The support of the spouse, however, is expected by the CIA.

Hopefully, when you join the CIA either as an OC or NOC case officer you have not told this fact to your family and friends. I’m guessing you have heard it comically said that the best way to keep a secret is to tell someone the secret, then shoot them. Well, the best way is just not to tell anyone. Just stick to the cover story you are given by the CIA. If you are an OC case officer, that cover story may be that you have joined the state department or perhaps the department of defense or some other government agency. If you are a NOC, the cover story will be that you are employed as the overseas representative of some corporation that is secretly providing you the cover at the request of the CIA. Whatever the case, LIVE YOUR COVER.

If you have already taken a few special people into your confidence about your CIA affiliation, you should strongly impress upon them the need to maintain secrecy. Also, you should disclose to the Company the names of all persons outside the CIA who are aware of your affiliation.

Regarding your historical relationships with friends and family, there is no need to distance yourself from them. Today’s technologies—email, Facebook, etc.—allow you to have nearly instantaneous communication with friends and relatives all over the world. In my day, it was overseas mail or occasional long-distance phone calls and faxes. Shutting out friends and family, especially those who are aware of your CIA affiliation, will only cause them to worry. This may cause a security problem when they, out of concern, start inquiring about you.

Your social life should become more active as a CIA case officer. You will maintain normal personal social activities, but you will also add social venues to your social schedule as a tool to spot and develop targets of interest to the CIA. You will join appropriate clubs and professional organizations once you are overseas, all at the expense of the CIA. These may include the local American Club, Chamber of Commerce, sports clubs such as golf and tennis, etc. In my situation I joined engineering societies and scientific and academic organizations in the countries where I served in order to find targets of opportunity. I also frequently trolled clubs and bars near government ministries and military organizations in an effort to meet foreign government officials who frequented there. Believe me, your social life will not at all suffer as a consequence of your CIA employment.

The Company does not expect the NOC officer’s spouse to become involved in any agent handling role. In fact, such participation is not desired, but it is also not unheard of. However, the Company does expect the spouse to be involved in a supporting role in the agent recruitment cycle, such as spotting, vetting, development, assessment but not directly in agent recruitment itself. In fact, in some cases the NOC officer’s spouse may receive some training, both in the US and abroad, at Company expense. My own spouse received several years of foreign language training in three different languages at Company encouragement and expense. She was also trained by me in dead drop loading and unloading. In one of my cases, my wife and infant daughter acted as live drops to receive film drops from one of my agents who refused to brush pass them directly to me. My daughter was probably the youngest co-opted agent in the history of the Company. In this case, the agent knew me only in operational alias and did not know my wife or daughter by any name. He was a long-term valued asset in a country under martial law where foreigners were all suspect. My wife’s ethnicity fit well into the local society where I stood out like a Christmas tree.