US intelligence sees opportunity to recruit Russian spies amid war in Ukraine – CNN
Photo: cia.history.com
The Russian Federation's full-scale invasion of Ukraine provided a rare opportunity for US intelligence agencies to recruit Kremlin insiders angered by the conduct of the war.
CNN reports this.
The current recruiting process is not a secret at all. The CIA has released videos in Russian on social media, urging dissatisfied Russians with valuable information to show their patriotism and share it with the US.
The videos offer detailed guidance to potential Russian whistleblowers on evading detection by Russian authorities. The recommended methods include utilizing virtual private networks (VPNs) and the Tor web browser to anonymously and securely communicate with the agency through the Dark Web.
"That business is the exchange of information that the asset or agent would provide for something they want. We want people who have some sense of what [Russian] leaders' priorities are – what they're trying to accomplish," says David McCloskey, former CIA officer and author of the book "Moscow X."
CNN quoted CIA Director Bill Burns speaking last year in the UK:
"Disaffection creates a once-in-a-generation opportunity for us. We're very much open for business."
Burns said in a speech at Goodwin University in Connecticut on April 19 that the CIA video "was very productive."
"It made my Russian colleague extremely angry, to say the least," the official remarked jokingly.
Earlier, Kremlin spokesman Peskov tried to ridicule the CIA video, pointing out that if they wanted more Russians to watch it, they should have posted it on the VKontakte network, not X.
The FBI has launched a similar effort to recruit Russian government sources in the US, including targeting social media ads to phones registered near the Russian embassy in Washington.
"This direct appeal is an unusual approach, but one which could effectively reach a Russian populace with few options to express their discontent," said Douglas London, a former CIA station chief posted abroad. "Russians angry with the Kremlin's state-sanctioned corruption and abuse, with no way to act openly, are left with few alternatives other than finding external support."
More than 30 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the world returned to a period of conflict between the great powers. In his latest book, chief national security analyst Jim Sciutto describes it as "the final gap between the post-Cold War era and an entirely new and uncertain era."
"You have to know your enemy,"said presidential historian Tim Naftali. "If you don't, you can scare your enemy into doing something neither of you wants to see happen."
For reference:
As previously reported, as part of a new project, the American Central Intelligence Agency is offering Russian citizens who are dissatisfied with the war against Ukraine and life in the Russian Federation the opportunity to share secrets with the US special services. For this purpose, a recruitment video was posted on the Internet.
