Type of spy
In
espionage
jargon, a
mole
(also called a "penetration agent",
[1]
"deep cover agent", "illegal" or "
sleeper agent
") is a long-term
spy
(espionage agent) who is recruited before having access to secret intelligence, subsequently managing to get into the target organization.
[2]
However, it is popularly used to mean any long-term clandestine spy or
informant
within an organization (government or private).
[2]
In police work, a mole is an undercover law-enforcement agent who joins an organization in order to collect incriminating evidence about its operations and to eventually charge its members.
The term was introduced to the public by
British
spy novelist
John le Carre
in his 1974 novel
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
[3]
[4]
and has since entered general usage, but its origin is unclear,
[1]
as well as to what extent it was used by
intelligence services
before it became popularized. Le Carre, a former British
intelligence officer
, has said that the term mole was actually used by the
Soviet
intelligence agency, the
KGB
,
[2]
and that a corresponding term used by Western intelligence services was
sleeper agent
.
[5]
While the term
mole
had been applied to spies in the book
Historie of the Reign of King Henry VII
written in 1626 by Sir
Francis Bacon
,
[1]
[2]
Le Carre has said he did not get the term from that source.
Overview
[
edit
]
A mole may be recruited early in life, and take decades to get a job in government service and reach a position of access to secret information before becoming active as a spy. Perhaps the most famous examples of moles were the
Cambridge Five
, five upper-class British men recruited by the
KGB
as communist students at
Cambridge University
in the 1930s who later rose to high levels in various parts of the
British government
.
[3]
By contrast, most espionage agents, such as CIA counterintelligence officer
Aldrich Ames
and FBI agent
Robert Hanssen
, who spied on the US government for the KGB, were either recruited or offered their services as spies after they were in place as members of the target organization.
Because their recruitment occurred in the remote past, moles are difficult for a nation's security services to detect. The possibility that a top politician, corporate executive, government minister, or officer in an intelligence service could be a mole working for a foreign government is the worst nightmare of
counterintelligence
services.
[
citation needed
]
For example,
James Angleton
, director of counterintelligence for the
CIA
between 1954 and 1975, was reportedly obsessed with suspicions that the top levels of Western governments were riddled with long-term communist agents
[1]
and accused numerous politicians such as former U.S. Secretary of State
Henry Kissinger
, former Canadian Prime Ministers
Lester Pearson
and
Pierre Trudeau
, former British Prime Minister
Harold Wilson
and many members of Congress before he was removed in 1975.
[
citation needed
]
Moles have been featured in numerous espionage films, television shows, and novels.
Reasons for use
[
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]
The most common procedure used by
intelligence services
to recruit agents is to find the location within the foreign government or organization of the information they want (the
target
), find out which people have access to it, and attempt to recruit one of them as a spy (
espionage agent
) to obtain the information. However, the people with access to top secret government information, who are government employees with high
security clearances
, are carefully monitored by the government's security apparatus for just that sort of espionage approach. Thus, it is difficult for a representative of the foreign intelligence service to meet with them clandestinely to recruit them. Private organizations, such as large
corporations
or
terrorist groups
, have similar security monitors.
In addition, the security clearance process weeds out employees who are openly disgruntled, ideologically disaffected, or otherwise having motives for betraying their country, so people in such positions are likely to reject recruitment as spies. Therefore, some intelligence services have tried to reverse the above process by first recruiting potential agents and then having them conceal their allegiance and pursue careers in the target government agency in the hope that they can reach positions of access to desired information.
Because the spy career of a mole is so long-term, sometimes occupying most of a lifetime, those who become moles must be highly motivated. One common motivation is ideology (political convictions). During the
Cold War
, a major source of moles in Western countries was so-called
fellow travellers
, Westerners who, in their youth during the 1920s to 1940s, became disaffected with their own governments and sympathetic to world
communism
without actually joining a
communist party
.
See also
[
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]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
c
d
Smith, W. Thomas (2003).
Encyclopedia of the Central Intelligence Agency
. Manhattan, New York City, USA:
Infobase Publishing
. p. 171.
ISBN
9781438130187
.
OCLC
586163250
.
- ^
a
b
c
d
Green, Jonathon (March 28, 2006).
Cassell's Dictionary of Slang: A Major New Edition of the Market-Leading Dictionary of Slang
(2nd, revised ed.). New York City, New York, USA:
Sterling Publishing
. p. 953.
ISBN
9780304366361
.
OCLC
62890128
. Retrieved
August 26,
2012
.
- ^
a
b
Carlisle, Rodney P. (April 1, 2003).
Complete Idiot's Guide to Spies and Espionage
(illustrated ed.). Indianapolis, Indiana, USA:
Alpha Books
. p. 142.
ISBN
9780028644189
.
OCLC
52090218
. Retrieved
August 26,
2012
.
- ^
Shapiro, Fred R. (Oct 30, 2006).
The Yale Book of Quotations
(illustrated ed.). New Haven, Connecticut, USA:
Yale University Press
. p.
448
.
ISBN
9780300107982
.
OCLC
66527213
. Retrieved
August 26,
2012
.
According to the
Oxford English Dictionary
"it is generally thought that the world of espionage adopted [the term mole] from Le Carre, rather than vice versa.
- ^
Le Carre, John; Bruccoli, Matthew J; Baughman, Judith (2004).
Conversations with John le Carre
(illustrated ed.). Jackson, Mississippi, USA:
University Press of Mississippi
. pp. 33?34.
ISBN
9781578066698
.
OCLC
55019020
. Retrieved
August 26,
2012
.
interview with Le Carre in Melvyn Bragg
The Listener
, January 22, 1976 BBC1, (reprint)
Further reading
[
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]