Soviet industrial espionage against American military technology and the US response, 1930–1945

Between 1930 and 1945, the Soviet Union played a significant role in American domestic affairs. Although its agents’ infiltration of social movements and government agencies is well known, their parallel and highly successful practice of espionage against American industrial and military technology is less familiar. Washington officials were aware of Soviet spying, but mired in the Depression and then preoccupied with war, they mounted only a limited response, reflecting a political culture that did not emphasize active counterintelligence efforts. As a result, early Cold War revelations of unmistakable Soviet espionage shocked Americans, polarizing the Soviet‐American relationship and introducing a zealous domestic security apparatus.     

The scientist who came in from the cold: Heinz Barwich's flight from the GDR

The arms race between the superpowers made spying on science and technology very important during the Cold War. However, whether Western secret services managed to recruit valuable sources in the research laboratories of the Soviet Union is a subject about which very little is known. This article shows that in the early 1960s the distinguished East German physicist Heinz Barwich did indeed spy for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) within the Joint Institute of Nuclear Research, near Moscow. It also demonstrates that the Berlin Wall, built in 1961, had a considerable impact on Western espionage in East Germany.     

The Wennerström spy case: A Western perspective

Few spy cases during the Cold War have such an international flavour as the Wennerström spy case – a neutral Swedish attaché spying on the West for the benefit of the East. Even 40 years later, however, the literature available on the case suffers from a Swedish bias and has generally received little scholarly treatment. Therefore, this article aims to describe and analyse the Wennerström spy case from a Western perspective, based on new declassified sources as well as the most recent research available in Swedish. Among other things, the article demonstrates that the investigation after Wennerström's arrest took place in close cooperation with primarily American and British intelligence services, that Wennerström's allegation of being a double agent was either false or greatly exaggerated, and, finally, that the damage done to Western interests due to his espionage was greater than portrayed in the existing literature.     

The secret service department: a British Intelligence Bureau in mid-Victorian London,September 1867 to April 1868

In December 1867 the Earl of Derby's government established a ‘Secret Service Department’ in London to extend Dublin Castle's anti- Fenian intelligence network to England and to contend with the perceived threat posed by domestic and international secret societies. This secret detective force – an early English intelligence bureau – lasted only until April 1868, but its disbandment reflected practical and administrative difficulties rather than a pervading prejudice towards spying. Indeed, the motivations for founding the department and the actions of those involved suggest that long before the establishment of the Special Branch in the 1880s, need rather than principle determined official actions in regard to political espionage.     

我国诱惑侦查的法治化思考

诱惑侦查作为应对新型犯罪的有力手段，在我国侦查实践中被广泛的使用，但相应的立法规范却非常缺失，因此，带来一系列的问题。基于法的价值分析，诱惑侦查有确立的必要性，我国应当尽快立法完善诱惑侦查制度。     

Deadly catch: shrimp boat captains as United States Naval Intelligence informants, 1942–1945

During World War II, the United States Navy’s Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) created a confidential fishermen informants program to ensure the security of the fishing industry vital to the U.S. and its allies and to relay intelligence on enemy military and espionage activity along the coasts. In the Sixth Naval District, headquartered in Charleston, South Carolina, the program relied on shrimp boat captains who volunteered to be confidential observers. Those deemed loyal were indoctrinated, equipped with confidential grid charts and the means and procedures to communicate with case officers, and assigned code names to protect their identity as they fished the Atlantic. Although aspects of this secret domestic counterintelligence program were inherently flawed and provided limited intelligence, it reveals how ONI recruited Americans to engage in domestic spying and provide early warning without devolving into vigilantism.     

Operation ‘Piet’: The Joseph Sidney Petersen Jr. Spy Case,a Dutch ‘Mole’ Inside the National Security Agency

In 1986 it was discovered that Jonathan Jay Pollard, an employee of US Naval Intelligence, had worked as a spy for Israel. Until then the case of Joseph Sidney Petersen was the most important example of espionage against an US intelligence service by an ally. Petersen, who worked for the National Security Agency, was arrested in October 1954 and charged with obtaining top secret documents to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of a foreign nation. According to the International Herald Tribune this represented a case with worldwide implications. During the subsequent trial it emerged that Petersen had forwarded these top secret codeword documents to the Netherlands. For the first time an attempt will be made here to fully reconstruct the Petersen affair based on declassified American and Dutch archival holdings. Special attention will be paid to when Petersen was recruited and by whom, how long his spying lasted, what intelligence he delivered to the Dutch, what led to his arrest and trial and what the impact that had on American–Dutch relations. This article will close with some still remaining and unanswered questions.     

政府信息公开行为的可诉性及相关制度思考

主动公开信息的行为具有有限的可诉性,应从程序上保障第三方救济的权利。被告在诉讼中负有举证责任,但涉及国家秘密信息的举证应允许被告补充证据;对于信息不存在的证明,原告应该提供信息存在的初步线索。政府信息公开诉讼可以借鉴美国的"秘密审查模式",进行不公开单方审理。对于不予公开信息的司法认定,应基于法益判断进行利益衡量,以使申请人权利与第三方隐私权、商业秘密、国家保密权等权利达到相对的平衡。     

What News on the Rialto? The Trade of Information and Early Modern Venice’s Centralized Intelligence Organization

This article explores one of the earliest centrally organized state intelligence services in world history. Contrary to the orthodoxy that sees systematized intelligence as a modern political phenomenon, this was developed in early modern Venice. The article reveals the complex organization of Venetian systemized intelligence that distinguished it from other contemporaneous states’ espionage networks. It also shows how Venetian authorities commodified intelligence by engaging citizens and subjects in a trade of information for mutual benefits. Ultimately, the article challenges our understanding of early modern political communication and offers a fresh vista of intelligence as a business trait and economic necessity.     

Shared secrecy in a digital age and a transnational world

ABSTRACT

This article examines the notion of shared secrets and the procedures by which secrecy is not the opposite of exchange of information, but the restriction of it to a certain ‘circle’ of people and the maintenance of others in ignorance. It creates corridors depending on the objectives of secret information, the persons having access, and the knowledge of this access by other people. Shared secrecy has been considered as an exception to common practice, but it has changed in scale with digitization and transnationalization of information, especially when suspicion is becoming used in statistical terms for prevention purposes.     

Does Effective Espionage Lead to Success in Science and Technology? Lessons from the East German Ministry for State Security

This article explores the question of whether effective scientific-technical intelligence can enhance an economic and technological level of a country. It opens with a general discussion of Eastern Bloc scientific-technical espionage, then presents some common elements of effective espionage and turns to the East German Ministry for State Security's Sector for Science and Technology in order to explore the question. Examples from the computer industry and three biographical cases of agents working in digital telephone switching, computers and military technology reveal the extent to which the espionage was integrated into the science system—the ultimate success of scientific-technical espionage.     

An ethical defense of treason by means of espionage

This essay argues that treason by means of espionage is ethically justified when six factors are present, two of which are: that the political community being betrayed fails to secure for its citizens basic human rights and other means of peaceful or otherwise lawful protest are unavailable. The paper begins by analyzing the application of several theories of ethics to treason, including: consequentialism, deontology, the Just War tradition, and Michael Walzer’s influential concept of ‘dirty hands.’ It then criticizes these points of view and offers an account of jus ad proditione per intelligentia (just treason by means of espionage) based upon Aristotelian thinking about ethics and politics.     

Investigating soviet espionage and subversion: the case of Donald Maclean

This essay sets out the dimensions of investigating Soviet espionage and subversion, highlighting how Maclean's image as a Soviet agent has developed over the past 50 years. It will then consider to what extent new documents at the Public Record Office alter his image. Maclean's crime was treachery but what exactly is the intellectual challenge in investigating espionage? Just what can be achieved? Sir Dick White former head of MI6 offered this advice: Espionage is a crime that often leaves no trace of evidence. The investigator relies upon intuition for coincidences. After considering the circumstances, he might reach the moment of epiphany when all the facts added up to one conclusion¹     

Compartmentalized minds: the Communist security services’ understanding of the Western espionage threat to the Communist bloc during the Cold War

ABSTRACT

Marxism-Leninism required the counter-intelligence officers of the East German Stasi and Soviet KGB to believe in a Western espionage threat to their states which was far greater and more malevolent than was actually the case. In fact, the two counter-intelligence staffs knew that the Western states were trying to create small agent networks on their territory, tasked only with collecting intelligence. This accurate understanding enabled them to contain Western espionage during the Cold War. They ‘compartmentalized’ their knowledge of the real Western espionage threat from their belief in a much greater threat. They believed in one, but knew of another.     

The Dentist Chair: Dr. Gessel Schkolnikoff and the mysteries of Soviet espionage

The history of Soviet espionage is largely the story of failures and defections. This article considers the possibility that a low-key dentist, who had a surgery in London in the middle of the last century, was one of the exceptions and successfully avoided detection. While I was researching in the files of several well-known Soviet agents, the name of Dr. Gessel Schkolnikoff often appeared, and then in early 2018 a Home Office file was released to the National Archives of the UK that has provided some of the missing background to this Russian immigrant. There are precedents for Soviet intelligence agencies using a dental surgery as a conduit for passing on information and there are persuasive indications that Dr. Schkolnikoff’s surgery can be added to their list.     

TICOM: The Last Great Secret of World War II

Recent releases from the National Security Agency reveal details of TICOM, the mysterious 1945 operation targeting Germany's cryptologic secrets. Often mentioned by such authors as Kahn, Bamford, Parrish and Aldrich, for the first time the public has access to this information. This article provides a review in greater depth than has been previously covered in the open literature of the history of the TICOM operation, and its resulting intelligence, including the Germans' efforts against Soviet communications. In addition, some comments are provided on why TICOM has remained classified long after other similar information from World War II was declassified, and why locating TICOM documents is still difficult.     

Do Industrial Tax Abatements Spur Property Value Growth?

Despite ongoing debate regarding the effectiveness of tax abatements, Michigan's Industrial Facilities Tax (IFT) abatement program has been widely and extensively used to boost local economic development. In this article, we estimate the effects of industrial property tax abatements on industrial, residential, and commercial property value growth in the context of regional competition for a panel of 152 communities in the five counties surrounding Detroit from 1983 through 2002. We find that: (1) offering tax abatements yields statistically significant positive impacts on industrial property value growth; (2) the impacts are larger in high tax than in low tax communities; (3) there are positive spillover effects of industrial tax abatements on residential and commercial property value growth; (4) tax abatements offered in competitor communities do not appear to influence own industrial property value growth; and (5) changes in the own as well as competitor property tax rates are important determinants of industrial property value growth. However, the fiscal benefits of tax abatements are quite small as compared with the costs of offering abatements even when spillover benefits to residential and commercial properties are considered.     

Planting the espionage tree: the French military and the professionalization of intelligence at the end of the nineteenth century

Abstract

Intelligence in France evolved as it professionalized at the end of the nineteenth century, led by determined individuals within the French army. However, in the centuries prior to the professionalization of espionage and counterespionage, military men rejected intelligence, viewing the practice with skepticism and disdain. This article asserts that there was a change in views towards espionage, particularly among the military, beginning in the middle of the nineteenth century. As the army went from eschewing intelligence to embracing it and taking the lead in its practice, the nature of intelligence work in France consequently reflected the goals and aims of the army, prioritizing military intelligence over others.     

Aesop’s wolves: the deceptive appearance of espionage and attacks in cyberspace

Abstract

Appearances in cyberspace are deceptive and problematic. Deception in the cyber domain poses an immensely difficult challenge for states to differentiate between espionage activities in cyberspace and cyber attacks. The inability to distinguish between cyber activities places US cyber infrastructure in a perilous position and increases the possibility of a disproportionate or inadequate response to cyber incidents. This paper uses case analysis to examine the characteristics associated with the tools and decisions related to cyber espionage and cyber attacks to develop a framework for distinction leveraging epidemiological models for combating disease.