Epstein Secrets

intelligence coups through the eyes, and mind-set, of their KGB handler might provide some historical context for the Snowden defection. So I invited Cherkashin to lunch at Gusto, a quiet Italian restaurant, located near the Chekhov Theater in Moscow. Cherkashin, a tall thin man with silver hair, showed up p

ontext for the Snowden defection. So I invited Cherkashin to lunch at Gusto, a quiet Italian restaurant, located near the Chekhov Theater in Moscow. Cherkashin, a tall thin man with silver hair, showed up promptly at 1:00 p.m., wearing an elegant gray suit and dark tie. He walked with a spry step. Because he

obert Lipka, a clerk at the NSA in the mid-1960s, who was caught in a sting operation by the FBI and sentenced to eighteen years in a federal prison. Ronald Pelton, an NSA analyst, was recruited after he retired from the NSA. After he was betrayed by a KGB double agent in 1985, he was sentenced to life imprison-

then cited the signature line from the movie Zhe Usual Suspects “The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist.” Cherkashin thinly smiled and said “CIA denial [of moles] certainly helped.” HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_020275 124 In view of such past successes of the Russian intellig

mous spy delivered 27 computer discs containing hundreds of secret documents revealing the sources and methods of American intelligence. According to Cherkashin, it was the largest haul of top secrets documents ever obtained by the KGB (although it was only a small fraction of the number of top secret NSA, De

the NSA in the HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_020324 173 mid 1960s, who was caught in a sting operation by the FBI and sentenced to 18 years in a federal prison. Ronald Pelton, an NSA analyst, was recruited after he retired from the NSA. After he was betrayed by a KGB double agent in 1985, was sentenced to life imprisonment

201 “Tt was the information in his head that we wanted.” Cherkashin said that as KGB rarely got access to any NSA officer, it was worth the risk. So he was given $5,000 in cash and a plane ticket to Vienna, where he w

the NSA would have received its full attention after he contacted Russian officials in Hong Kong. While the tactics of the SVR may have changed since Cherkashin retired, its objectives remained the same. And the NSA remained its principal target. Nor is there any reason to doubt that it still measures success

, they put the Snowden case in a new light for me. If Russian intelligence considered it worthwhile to send an ex-civilian worker at the NSA, such as Ronald Pelton, from Washington D.C. 2,000 miles to Austria so that its specialists could debrief him on the secrets he held in his head, it would have an even grea