In anticipation of Marti Peterson’s participation on our #ReelvsRealCIA panel tomorrow (http://bit.ly/2IWoJok ), here is the Cold War story about her & Aleksandr Ogorodnik, Codename: TRIGON
http://1.usa.gov/28Jp87E pic.twitter.com/304RMzPDNB
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Because meeting face-to-face was dangerous & complicated, TRIGON & Marti instead used:
-signal sites
-radio messages
-concealments
-car drops
-dead drops – like fake bricks & dead rats
#ReelvsRealCIApic.twitter.com/SXgeYQOo70
Marti used a purse to conceal supplies & equipment that she transferred to TRIGON via dead drop exchanges.
#ReelvsRealCIApic.twitter.com/vSmUOg6zyK
TRIGON’s position in the Global Affairs Dep’t gave him access to incoming & outgoing classified cables to embassies worldwide. He provided sensitive intel about Soviet foreign policy plans & objectives.
His reporting went to the President & senior US policymakers
#ReelvsRealCIA
June 1977: A Czech penetration of CIA gained knowledge that TRIGON was working with us; info which he passed to Czech Intel who notified the KGB.
#ReelvsRealCIA
15 July 1977: As night fell over Moscow, Marti left a concealment device in a narrow window inside a stone tower on the Krasnoluzhskiy Most—a railroad bridge near Lenin Central Stadium.
It was a trap.
#ReelvsRealCIApic.twitter.com/nkRGbJAClY
A KGB surveillance team was waiting & seized Marti. They took her to Lyubianka Prison, where she was questioned for hours & photographed with the espionage paraphernalia she & TRIGON used.
She was declared persona non grata & sent back to the US immediately.
#ReelvsRealCIApic.twitter.com/5YPS3P7SLG
We later learned that on 22 June 1977, Aleksandr had killed himself after KGB arrest with a pill hidden in a pen he had earlier requested & CIA reluctantly provided.
#ReelvsRealCIApic.twitter.com/jax5Pti0ps
From Marti’s memoir, The Widow Spy: “Opening the pen as if to begin writing, he bit down on the barrel & expired instantly in front of his KGB interrogators. KGB was so intent on his confession they never suspected he had poison….TRIGON died his own way, a hero."
#ReelvsRealCIApic.twitter.com/KIhVYd0Y3x
Although the story of TRIGON ended tragically, the intel Aleksandr passed to Marti & CIA gave US policymakers valuable insights into Soviet foreign policy plans & intentions. Insights & courage like this helped win the Cold War.
http://1.usa.gov/28Jp87E
#ReelvsRealCIApic.twitter.com/X1WfG9HOgI
Looks like a good series of books to me. I might give it a 10.
Why don't you guys do real work on Red Cocaine instead trying to subvert our President?
I did not read the book Red Cocaine, and do not know how accurate the "exotic operation" was covered. But there is a funny fact - they still use the word "iconha" in Sao Paulo zona Sul.
What does that mean... "exotic operation" and "iconha"?
"Exotic operation" is a foreign trade opration (not classical), was taught in Sofia&Moscow in so called "MIO" Students were fluent in Spanish&Portuguese. It is "free-zone" practice. In Soviet time "iconha" (icon, ikona) was the code trade-name of cocaine in Latin America.
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