Human intelligence gathering (HUMINT)
is vital to the CIA
Former CIA Director Gina Haspel said that
within the Intelligence Community, CIA is the keeper of the human intelligence
mission. Technical forms of collection are vital, but a good human source is
unique and can deliver decisive intelligence on our adversaries' secrets - even
their intent. There is good reason for Haspel to value on-the-ground, human
agents, for she handled CIA assets inside Russia during the Cold War days.
In
her CIA career, Haspel collected vital information from human sources. That,
basically, is what HUMINT is. It can be done openly, as when CIA operatives
interview witnesses or make contact with the spies (assets) that they recruited. Or it may be
done through clandestine or covert means (espionage). It involves interpersonal
contact between the CIA case officer and his/her sources- perhaps, in a casual conversation
in a bar, an interview or debriefing in a secure safe house, or from someone
being waterboarded at a clandestine black site. BTW, the latter no longer
happens.
HUMINT
plays a vital role in most intelligence agencies around the world. In fact, it
remains the backbone of their intelligence collection activities. It has proved
invaluable to the US, UK, Soviet Union, and Australia throughout history,
especially during World War II and the Cold War Era. The basic principles
of HUMINT remain constant and relevant in today’s world of international and
domestic terrorism.
America’s counterintelligence teams are well-versed in the art of HUMINT,
especially after Gina Haspel’s drive to recruit and train more undercover
operatives.
The
MISSION
OF VENGEANCE spy thriller highlights skirmishes between Russian GRU and
American CIA human intelligence agents. Here’s a snippet, where CIA Spymaster
Corey Pearson reads a letter from a Former KGB agent who was murdered after
defecting to the U.S.:
Snippet: I know who murdered me. He goes by the nickname Nevidljiva Ubica and worked alongside Boris Markov and Vladimir Putin in the Cold War era. He’s an expert in HUMINT spy craft and is now embedded under deep cover somewhere inside the United States. I know this because I overheard Boris Markov talking to him on an encrypted phone at my estate.
He is a dangerous man and during the cold war, he specialized in recruiting and inserting moles inside the West German government. I highly suspect that he has been carrying out his specialty inside America for decades.
Beware
of Russia’s human intelligence gathering capabilities. Let me explain. I told you
at my defection briefing at the embassy in Santo Domingo that I worked alongside
Putin and Markov as KGB agents assigned to East Berlin. Our HUMINT abilities were unmatchable. We targeted and
befriended people of interest, then recruited them. Many were professors,
journalists and skilled professionals who had plausible reasons to travel to the
United States. We trained them in spy craft, and they stole much of your
intelligence secrets and technology. We were quite good, at least we thought we
were, until a young recruit named Andrei Vavilova was assigned to work with us.
Vavilova surpassed all of us in the art of HUMINT. He was in his mid-twenties;
the rest of us were in our thirties, but he was a genius at the art of recruitment.
Moscow recruited him out of a Spetsnaz training unit after he scored highest in
English language training and because he outsmarted his teachers. During
student training, he was assigned a sector in Moscow where he had to invent and
live his own fake identity and background. He evaded his instructors on the
streets of Moscow as he plotted fake meetings with contacts assigned to him and
penetrated a few high-security facilities by befriending people who worked in
them, persuading them to get him entry permits.
End of Snippet
Lastly, this video reveals what spy life is really like. Seasoned intelligence
officer Warren Reed doesn’t hold back in this video: The Life of an Intelligence Officer:
Robert Morton is a member of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers (AFIO), enjoys writing about the U.S. Intelligence Community, and relishes traveling to the Florida Keys and Key West, the Bahamas and Caribbean. He combines both passions in his Corey Pearson- CIA Spymaster series. Check out his latest spy thriller: MISSION OF VENGEANCE.
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