by David Wise
When Vasilenko was leaving Washington in 1981 to return to Moscow, Platt invited him and his family to come for a farewell drink. The KGB man asked his superiors for permission. “He was told not to go and came anyway,” said Platt, who founded a private security firm after he retired from the agency. “I said then, ‘When you come out I’ll find you.’
“In March of eighty-four he went to Guyana. From there, he was making calls to the SMUN—the Soviet Mission to the United Nations. Instead of saying, ‘Hey, guys, it’s Gennady,’ he was using his full name.” Platt was convinced that Vasilenko, knowing the FBI was listening, was trying to indicate to Platt where he was.
In October 1987, Platt flew to Guyana, and with an FBI agent met with Vasilenko, once more trying to recruit the KGB man, who was happy to see his friend but again turned him down. Platt did not give up; he said he would return to Guyana and they arranged to meet there again in February, on Platt’s birthday.
In the files of the CIA, Vasilenko was designated with the code name GTGLAZING. In addition, as is customary, the CIA and the FBI gave him a joint cryptonym, MONOLITE.*
A copy of Platt’s October cable to CIA headquarters reporting on his encounter with Vasilenko in Guyana fell into Hanssen’s hands, but he erroneously reported to the KGB that the Russian was working for American intelligence. By misinterpreting the cable and passing it to the KGB, Hanssen had placed yet another life at risk.
This was so because Vasilenko could not afford to report his encounter with Platt to Moscow headquarters. He had become entirely too friendly with Platt. When a KGB officer is pitched by the CIA, he is required to report it—and then is almost always recalled to Moscow to remove him from temptation. To avoid a recall, and perhaps to sidestep having to explain his actions to the KGB, Vasilenko never reported the meeting.
But Hanssen had. In January 1988, two months after Hanssen put Platt’s cable in the dead drop, Vasilenko was told to go to Havana for a KGB meeting. There he was jumped by two KGB goons who broke his arm and accused him of treason. He was sent back to Moscow, thrown into Lefortovo prison, and interrogated for about six months. Finally, he was released for lack of evidence but fired from the KGB.*
Hanssen in the same November package also provided a summary of the secrets divulged to the CIA by Vitaly Yurchenko during his three-month interlude as a defector two years earlier. Since Aldrich Ames had been one of Yurchenko’s debriefers, the KGB already knew what secrets the defector had revealed; still, it was nice to get the information from a second mole.
Also included in Hanssen’s package was a technical document describing COINS-II, the internal Internet used by the U.S. intelligence community to exchange information.† In return, the KGB left $20,000 in cash for Hanssen and a letter of best regards from the KGB chief, Vladimir A. Kryuchkov. The Russians also assured Hanssen that another $100,000 had been deposited for him in a Moscow bank at 6 to 7 percent interest.
Early in February 1988, Hanssen and the KGB exchanged documents and money once more at the PARK drop site, which the KGB, perhaps in recognition of its frequent use, had now renamed PRIME. Hanssen’s letter, in addition to acknowledging the $20,000, provided detailed information about Victor Sheymov, an important Soviet defector to whose file he had access. He promised “a full report” on Sheymov “as soon as possible.”
The CIA had smuggled Sheymov out of Moscow in 1980—“exfiltrated” him, in the agency’s jargon for clandestinely spiriting someone across a border to safety. Sheymov, a communications expert, had worked for the KGB’s eighth chief directorate, the Soviet equivalent of the NSA. He was a troubleshooter for the directorate, traveling frequently in the Communist bloc to unravel problems involving the security of codes and ciphers.
Hanssen told the KGB that he could read the Sheymov file because a special project involving the defector was about to begin. At the time, Hanssen was reviewing the file to prepare to take part in a series of debriefings of Sheymov. After meeting Sheymov, Hanssen became a personal friend of the Russian and stayed in close touch with him. Their families often socialized together. Sheymov, of course, did not realize his good friend in the FBI was reporting back to the KGB about him.
In the same exchange, Hanssen also identified a KGB illegal in the United States, an officer operating without diplomatic cover, who had been recruited as a double agent by the FBI. Once again, Hanssen had placed a bureau source in great jeopardy.
In his package, Hanssen also included certain secret details about U.S. communications intelligence, describing just what Soviet traffic the NSA was unable to read. Along with several classified documents on paper, Hanssen for the first time enclosed a computer floppy disk on which he had downloaded additional secrets.
In return, the KGB gave Hanssen $25,000 in cash and another letter of thanks from Vladimir Kryuchkov, the KGB chairman, for the information about M—Gennady Vasilenko. The KGB asked for more information about M and about the FBI’s operations in New York.
In March, Hanssen mailed three more computer disks to the KGB. Once during that month, when the Russians tried to clear the newly named PRIME drop site, they could not, because there were too many people in the park. When the exchange finally took place, Hanssen included a particularly sensitive TOP SECRET report entitled “The FBI’s Double Agent Program.” The document was a detailed description of the FBI’s double agent operations worldwide over a ten-year period, including joint operations with other U.S. intelligence agencies. The report would have included everything learned by every American double agent over a decade. It would also have helped the KGB to weed out any fake walk-ins floated by the bureau to offer their services to the Russians.
The KGB’s package contained another $25,000 in cash and a letter saying it had been unable to read some of the computer disks. The letter also asked Hanssen for information about codes, submarines, and the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), President Reagan’s proposed antimissile system, better known as Star Wars.
Early in April, the KGB received a letter from “Jim Baker” with a note that said: “use 40 TRACK MODE. this letter is not a signal.” Hanssen, the computer whiz, was explaining to the KGB that he had formatted the floppy disks in a mode that hid the data on specific tracks. The disk would appear blank to anyone who did not use the correct codes to decrypt it.
Two days later, Hanssen sent another note, with another disk, explaining in greater detail how to decrypt the computer disks. The new disk included more information about Victor Sheymov, as well as details about another KGB officer and about two Soviet FBI recruitments.
Hanssen also renewed his request to be paid in diamonds, a subject he had raised early on with the KGB, in 1985. All that spring of 1988, he continued to funnel secrets to the KGB.
It was on Monday, May 30, that the KGB got its only fleeting glimpse of Robert Hanssen. A KGB officer arrived at the PRIME dead drop at 9:03 P.M., three minutes after the time that the exchange was scheduled to take place. In the dark, the KGB officer saw a man remove the signal, get into his car, and drive away.
It was mid-July before Hanssen made contact again, with a letter grumbling about arrangements. A spy’s life, he seemed to be saying, was not easy, so please shape up:
I found the site empty. Possibly I had the time wrong. I work from memory. My recollection was for you to fill before 1:00 A.M. I believe Viktor Degtyar was in the church driveway off Rt. 123, but I did not know how he would react to an approach. My schedule was tight to make this at all. Because of my work, I had to synchronize explanations and flights while not leaving a pattern of absence or travel that could later be correlated with communication times. This is difficult and expensive. I will call the number you gave me on 2/24, 2/26 or 2/28 at 1:00 A.M., EDST. Please plan filled signals. Empty sites bother me. I like to know before I commit myself as I’m sure you do also. Let’s not use the original site so early at least until the seasons change. Some type of call-out signal to you when I have a package or when I can receive one would be useful.
Also, please be specific about dates, e.g., 2/24. Scheduling is not simple for me because of frequent travel and wife. Any ambiguity multiplies the problems.
My security concerns may seem excessive. I believe experience has shown them to be necessary. I am much safer if you know little about me. Neither of us are children about these things. Over time, I can cut your losses rather than become one.
Ramon
P.S. Your “thank you” was deeply appreciated.
On July 18 the exchange took place at PRIME, and this time the KGB received a truly enormous haul of secrets—more than 530 pages of documents, including a CIA analysis, classified TOP SECRET, of Soviet intelligence-gathering aimed at U.S. nuclear weapons capabilities. The CIA report evaluated how much Moscow knew about America’s early warning systems and about the nation’s ability to retaliate against a massive nuclear attack.
Hanssen also turned over an even more highly classified 1987 document, prepared for the director of central intelligence, entitled “Compendium of Future Intelligence Requirements: Volume II.” This was a wish list of what the CIA wanted to know about the military strength of the Soviet Union and other countries, which thus amounted to a road map of what the CIA did not know. Hanssen also passed to the KGB a March 1988 CIA study classified SECRET and entitled “The Soviet Counterintelligence Offensive: KGB Recruitment Operations Against CIA.”
The study of recruitment efforts aimed at the CIA contained a warning notice that read: “Intelligence Sources or Methods Involved (WNINTEL). National Security Information. Unauthorized Disclosure Subject to Criminal Sanctions.”
Finally, Hanssen turned over the pièce de résistance, the study of Soviet penetrations of the FBI that he had personally directed and prepared with the assistance of Jim Milburn and Bob King. The KGB could now enjoy the product of this intensive effort by the FBI’s Soviet analytical unit. The study, classified TOP SECRET, identified the sources that had hinted at moles in the bureau, and exactly what each had said.
In exchange, the KGB gave Hanssen another $25,000 in cash, and asked for data on several fronts, including FBI surveillance techniques and recruitment operations. The Russians also proposed two new dead drops near Hanssen’s home in Vienna. Both were under footbridges in parks, one designated BOB—were the Russians trying to tell him something?—and the other CHARLIE.
On the last day of July, Hanssen mailed the KGB another computer disk, this one with information about the bureau’s technical surveillance operations, which of course Hanssen knew a great deal about, details of a new recruitment in New York City, and the identities of several other Soviets the FBI had targeted for recruitment attempts. The following month, the KGB informed Hanssen that another $50,000 had been placed in his Moscow bank account.
This extraordinary pace of spying continued through the rest of the year. The last Monday in September brought another exchange, this time at BOB. Hanssen hid a package with about three hundred pages of material, including FBI documents and a verbatim transcript of a meeting of the Counterintelligence Group.*
Perhaps sensing from the tone of Hanssen’s letters that their super-spy was a man who needed a great deal of stroking, the Russians left yet another letter from KGB chairman Kryuchkov expressing his deep gratitude. They also advised Hanssen that by way of thanks another $50,000 had been deposited in his escrow account.
But business is business. The letter also discussed communications procedures and security measures and once again pushed for a personal meeting. Ever hopeful, the KGB included a discussion of passports.
It also asked Hanssen to provide information about the CIA’s secret wiretap operations in the Soviet Union, details about agent networks, intelligence sources of U.S. allies, various FBI programs, and past spy cases. Up to this point, much, although by no means all, of the information Hanssen provided was about the spy wars between U.S. and Soviet intelligence—recruitments, targets, double agents, and the like. But this time, Moscow asked for data about missile technology.
Hanssen obliged, with a Christmas present for the KGB. On Monday, December 26, 1988, after celebrating the holiday with his wife and children and exchanging gifts in the warmth of his home on Talisman Drive, Hanssen hid another sort of package at dead drop CHARLIE.
Included with a floppy disk and 356 pages of material were six recent National HUMINT Collection Plan (NHCP) documents. The acronym stands for human intelligence—information gathered by spies, as opposed to that collected by electronic or other technical means.
Since the KGB wanted to know about missiles, Hanssen was certain they would be interested in the highly secret U.S. assessment and projection of Moscow’s nuclear missile arsenal, including the number, strength, and details of its ICBMs and warheads. He gave them a document entitled “Soviet Armed Forces and Capabilities for Conducting Strategic Nuclear War Until the End of the 1990s.”
Hanssen’s neighborhood in northern Virginia was festooned with Christmas lights. The carolers on his quiet street had serenaded Hanssen in the frosty air with “O, Little Town of Bethlehem” and the other songs of the season of peace on earth. But Hanssen was following another star, passing secrets in the night that dealt with the unimaginable destruction of his own country.
*Using the six coefficient, Hanssen actually wrote the time and date as 1 P.M. on March 22. The true dates are given here for clarity.
†The Russians could have done so any time up to July 1, 1994. On that date a new law protecting drivers’ privacy took effect in Virginia, where Hanssen’s cars were registered. Under the state law, the name and address of the owner of a license plate was no longer a matter of public record.
*The Vasilenko story is hinted at in the affidavit and indictment in the Hanssen case. But the affidavit, using only the first letter of his joint cryptonym, refers to the KGB man simply as “M,” and it nowhere mentions him by name.
*Jack Platt learned of Vasilenko’s arrest in 1988 but did not know who had betrayed him. The arrest of Aldrich Ames in 1994 pointed to one possible answer. But Platt was dubious that Ames was responsible, since Ames was in Rome in 1987 and would not have been likely to see the cable from Guyana. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Platt learned that Vasilenko had survived prison and the two went into business together. In a remarkable post-Cold War story, Vasilenko became Platt’s partner in the Hamilton Trading Group, Inc., their private security company with offices in McLean, Virginia, and Moscow.
†The acronym stood for Community On-Line Intelligence System.
*The Counterintelligence Group was an interagency task force created during the Reagan administration that met monthly. It was unrelated to the Counterintelligence Group in the Soviet division of the CIA, which was headed in 1983 by Aldrich Ames.
11
Hanssen’s Gods
One of the intriguing questions about Robert Hanssen was how he reconciled his religion with his treachery. By all accounts from close friends and colleagues, he was not merely religious; he was devout.
Hanssen went to mass almost every day, often at Our Lady of Good Counsel before work, and on Sundays at St. John’s, both near his home in northern Virginia. But to take Holy Communion, as Hanssen did, to become one with the body and blood of Christ, Catholics are required to go to confession to unburden themselves of any serious sins to a priest, who will ordinarily absolve them if they show genuine contrition. They will be told to do penance, usually in the form of prayer. This cycle of sin—which, after all, is part of the human condition—confession, and absolution, or forgiveness, is a familiar and basic element of the Catholic tradition.
Hanssen told at least two persons who visited him in prison that he regularly confessed his espionage over a period of more than two decades. It is possible he did so obliquely, of course, in vague or general terms. There is no question that he disclosed his spying outright to priests at least twice, and almost certainly more often.
But Hanssen was confident that his secret would hold; confession is an inviolable
sacrament of the Roman Catholic Church. Under the church’s canon law, a priest who reveals what is said in confession faces excommunication. The priests to whom Hanssen confessed were under no formal obligation to advise him to stop spying, or to turn himself in, although they were free to suggest those options.
According to Professor Chester Gillis of Georgetown University, a leading theologian, it is possible for a penitent to confess the same sin many times. “Technically you can go back as many times as you want and forgiveness is without end in the Catholic tradition. Provided the sacrament is valid and there is true contrition on the part of the penitent, then if it is a repetitive act and the person asks for forgiveness again, he or she will be granted forgiveness again.
“This can be as simple as masturbation in pubescent youths, to murder. The gravity of the offense doesn’t really matter.* If Hanssen confessed to espionage he would get absolution. If he said he intends to continue doing it, the priest has the right to refuse absolution. It would be rare.
“The priest might or might not ask about the details. The priest might not probe too deeply. For some people the sacrament takes place face-to-face. So the priest knows who it is, but he would never break the bond.”
Superficially, Hanssen’s religion might appear to have made it easier for him to spy, since he could confess and be granted absolution for his crime. But in reality his religion may have made his espionage more difficult, since he surely knew he had sinned and could not easily escape his burden of guilt. “A person in a state of grace can receive the Eucharist,” Gillis said. “If a person is in a state of sin, he is not in a state of grace. Being in a state of grace means you have confessed a serious sin and been given absolution. In a state of grace means you are in a proper relationship with God. But if Hanssen’s conscience was finely honed, he may have realized internally he was not in a state of grace. He might have felt he was juridically, but not internally.”
