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Phillip Agee Dead
CIA whistleblower and communist agent Philip Agee has died at his residence in Cuba. The New York Times fills in some of the details of his life:
Mr. Agee, whose disillusionment with his work at the agency led him to embrace leftist views, had spent nearly four decades as an avowed enemy of American foreign policy and particularly of the covert intelligence work that supported it. Deprived of his American passport and expelled from several countries at the request of the United States, he had lived for the most part in Germany and Cuba, where he operated a travel Web site, cubalinda.com.
His 1975 book, "Inside the Company: CIA Diary," infuriated American officials by identifying about 250 officers, front companies and foreign agents working for the United States. His example inspired several more books and magazines, including Covert Action Information Bulletin, written by close associates and sometimes with Mr. Agee's help, which published the names and often the addresses of hundreds more agency officers working under cover around the world.
As documented by former KGB archivist Vasily Mitrokhin, Covert Action Information Bulletin also published forgeries and misinformation provided to the magazine by Soviet intelligence (Mitrokhin makes clear that Agee did so deliberately). As the Times acknowledges, Agee's "troubled conscience," which he detailed in his autobiography On the Run, worked in only one direction. Having been initially rebuffed by the Soviets, who presumed he was a double agent, Agee, who later carried Grenadian (issued by Maurice Bishop), Cuban and Nicaraguan passports, went on to work for sundry totalitarian regimes:
Oleg D. Kalugin, a former K.G.B. general who now lives outside Washington, said Mr. Agee approached Soviet intelligence in Mexico in the early 1970s but was rejected by an officer who thought he was a plant. He then approached Cuban intelligence, supplying details of C.I.A. operations in Latin America that were passed on to the K.G.B.
"He was a valuable source," Mr. Kalugin said.
According to this 2000 account in the New York Times, Agee began doing spadework for Cuban intelligence way back in 1973:
Mr. Riera said he had worked with Mr. Agee for years. He said the work began in 1973, when he was a liaison between Mr. Agee and the Cuban Politburo, when Mr. Agee was writing a book exposing C.I.A. secrets. Mr. Riera said that he conveyed suggestions from the government about what information Mr. Agee should disclose in his book. He said telephone numbers for C.I.A. officials in the United States Embassy in Mexico City provided by Mr.Agee proved useful to Cuba years later, when Mr. Riera was posted here, helping him identify which embassy personnel were C.I.A. officers.
Check out Jesse Walker's terrific recapitulation of the Agee story and the absurdity of the law he inspired, the Intelligence Identities Protection Act, here.
lunchstealer|1.10.08 @ 5:34PM|#
Isn't he the guy who precipitated the laws that made the Plame debacle an issue?
|1.10.08 @ 5:36PM|#
This is the first notice of his death I've seen outside Far
Right World that didn't call him a brave foreign policy
dissenter.
How uncosmopolitan.
|1.10.08 @ 5:42PM|#
Wow, so this guy's "troubled conscience" led him to expose and
help kill his fellow countrymen.
See you in hell, Agee.
Why so glowing about this dick, Moynihan? I thought one of the
libertarian principles is that "small" wars can be fought with the
CIA and like agencies.
charlie|1.10.08 @ 5:58PM|#
Call me shrill, but I don't think very man CIA agents are "defending our freedom" or anything remotely close to that. I mean, Reason readers are aware of the CIA's role in backing death squads throughout Latin America, right?
highnumber|1.10.08 @ 6:01PM|#
charlie,
Reason readers are also aware of the actions of the Cuban gov't.
What's your point?
|1.10.08 @ 6:07PM|#
I'm all for the CIA if it takes out thugs and terrorists. But as
it exists now, one of its functions is to prop up and support our
disastrous foreign policy. That I don't support.
However, that doesn't mean I have to applaud a fucking traitor like
Agee. It'd be like showering praise on an Army defector who gives
away troop positions in Iraq, even though you disagree with the
Iraq war.
Like I said, fuck you Agee, and I'll see you in hell.
R C Dean|1.10.08 @ 6:11PM|#
Since when is someone who betrays his fellow agents to foreign
intelligence a "whistleblower"?
Is there a body count for this guy? Has anybody tracked the fates
of the people he ratted out?
|1.10.08 @ 6:22PM|#
I can dislike the CIA's involvement in the various "dirty wars"
in Latin America and elsewhere without becoming a tool of the KGB
or Cuban Intelligence.
If he wanted to be a whistleblower, there were plenty of outlets in
the US and Western Europe that would happily have published
whatever he fed them.
I hope his medical treatment in Cuba was what the average Cuban
got, not what the party elites got.
VM|1.10.08 @ 6:23PM|#
oh mah gawd. charlie. yooo're like soooo schrilllll, there,
man.
J sub D: ooh. good stuff. (how'd you get my med pics,
Brandy?)
jah jah.
*fights off urge to hump the ottoman*
T|1.10.08 @ 6:26PM|#
What baffles me about guys like Agee is that he bailed on the Company because of the horrible things it did. But then he goes and works with the Soviets and the Cubans, who by any objective accounting have done even more horrible and loathsome things. That makes it seem a lot less like principle and a lot more like pique.
|1.10.08 @ 6:27PM|#
BTW, It was this stuff, over ice, and delicious..
When you open the bottle does it say, "M A R S... Mars,
bitches?"
sv|1.10.08 @ 6:28PM|#
Jamie Kelly | January 10, 2008, 5:42pm | #
Wow, so this guy's "troubled conscience" led him to expose and help kill his fellow countrymen.
See you in hell, Agee.Why so glowing about this dick, Moynihan? I thought one of the libertarian principles is that "small" wars can be fought with the CIA and like agencies.
I didn't really find Moynihan's account 'glowing;' if anything, it
was merely brief, except for this, which agrees with you: "As
the Times acknowledges, Agee's "troubled conscience," which he
detailed in his autobiography On the Run, worked in only one
direction."
In any case, I'm sure most of us agree with you; Agee was a traitor
and deserved to be shot. After a trial and guilty verdict, of
course.
shecky|1.10.08 @ 6:32PM|#
Spy business is pretty nasty stuff. I applaud the guy for reminding us of that fact that the cloak and dagger business has to be some of the most vile and often amoral work on the planet, and filled with characters perfectly suited to the task.
|1.10.08 @ 6:35PM|#
Is there a body count for this guy? Has anybody tracked the
fates of the people he ratted out?
That's what I'd like to know. I thought that there wasn't any
evidence that his actions led to the deaths of any agents,
otherwise he would have been charged with something. He always said
the reason he quit, the reason he exposed agents was because at the
time those agents were helping governments round up and/or murder
dissidents and labor organizers.
I think people forget that, during the Cold War, the CIA regularly
supported terrorism and mass-murdering dictatorships, making it, in
my book, a perfectly fine group of people to "betray."
That said, I think he was pathetically misguided (there's never a
good reason to join Team Fidel) and went well overboard in his
worthless efforts to sabotage U.S. foreign policy (which, arguably,
deserved to be sabotaged).
|1.10.08 @ 6:38PM|#
What baffles me about guys like Agee is that he bailed on
the Company because of the horrible things it did. But then he goes
and works with the Soviets and the Cubans, who by any objective
accounting have done even more horrible and loathsome things. That
makes it seem a lot less like principle and a lot more like
pique.
I agree with this, and that the Soviets killed more people, but I
don't think the Cubans ever had enough resources to murder as many
people as the U.S. did during the Cold War. Though I think they
would have if they could have.
Paul|1.10.08 @ 6:39PM|#
which published the names and often the addresses of
hundreds more agency officers working under cover around the
world.
Never piss off the person who serves your food, never alienate the
person who holds all of your secrets.
SIV|1.10.08 @ 6:53PM|#
If our CIA was worth a shit Agee wouldn't have lived so long or died in his bed.
|1.10.08 @ 7:02PM|#
I think people forget that, during the Cold War, the CIA
regularly supported terrorism and mass-murdering dictatorships,
making it, in my book, a perfectly fine group of people to
"betray."
During the cold war? They've stopped since then?
|1.10.08 @ 7:03PM|#
Jamie Kelly | January 10, 2008, 5:42pm | #
Why so glowing about this dick, Moynihan? I thought one of the libertarian principles is that "small" wars can be fought with the CIA and like agencies.
Uhh, Jamie Kelly learn to read this blog before you make more of an
ass of yourself.
See that grey line on the left hand side of the text? Yeah, that
indicates that it's a "block quote". In Moynihan's case it's a
quote from the fucking New York Times. In other words, he wasn't
"glowing" or "showering praise", he was excerpting from an article
printed elsewhere.
VM|1.10.08 @ 7:10PM|#
*hands Kwix the magnifying glass*
that oughta do it. But I need it back later - for batin, you
know.
VM|1.10.08 @ 7:13PM|#
(for a self-described or a self sympathizing christian, that's not very charitable of you - or is that just another of your obvious Larry Craig fronts?)
|1.10.08 @ 7:15PM|#
...it's a quote from the fucking New York Times.
Suck my dick, Kwix.
I can see that my forswearing obscenies this year will not
constitute a significant statistical reduction at H&R. ;-)
VM|1.10.08 @ 7:17PM|#
j sub d: just be happy you're not in St Chuck, MO.
Is JK's theme song "knock three times", too?
|1.10.08 @ 7:38PM|#
Edmund Hillary dies, senselessly, at the age of
88.
KingHarvest -
He died of
too many years of old age, Dingle said today.
I don't get the "senselessly".
TallDave|1.10.08 @ 7:54PM|#
I think people forget that, during the Cold War, the CIA
regularly supported terrorism and mass-murdering dictatorships,
making it, in my book, a perfectly fine group of people to
"betray."
---
What baffles me about guys like Agee is that he bailed on the
Company because of the horrible things it did. But then he goes and
works with the Soviets and the Cubans, who by any objective
accounting have done even more horrible and loathsome things.
Ah, the self-answering thread.
It's strange that we often hear how awfully the U.S. behaved during
the Cold War, yet the decision to support Stalin during WW II
(without which support Russia might have never have expanded into
Eastern Europe and started the Cold War in the first place) is
rarely questioned.
|1.10.08 @ 8:16PM|#
What baffles me about guys like Agee is that he bailed on
the Company because of the horrible things it did. But then he goes
and works with the Soviets and the Cubans, who by any objective
accounting have done even more horrible and loathsome things. That
makes it seem a lot less like principle and a lot more like
pique
Some people can't see past the end of their nose. Agee starts out
as an idealistic patriot who wanted to serve his country and the
CIA people he met during the "rush" process seemed like terrific
heroes. Then he's shocked - shocked! - to discover that, ZOMG, the
CIA does terrible things.
So then he's an idealistic dissenter who wanted to rid the world of
CIA evil, and his handlers show him lots of inspiring bullshit
about happy red peasants and whatnot, and they seem like really
terrific fellas. So he works with them, and they keep feeding him
stories, some true some not, about CIA atrocities.
I can see how someone who never really makes an effort to see the
big picture could end up this way.
|1.10.08 @ 8:21PM|#
Jamie Kelly | January 10, 2008, 7:05pm | #
Suck my dick, Kwix.
Even if I could find it, I sure as hell ain't driving to Montana to
do it.
You get a might bit testy when someone calls you out on your
bullshit don't you?
Look man, there are plenty of things in the world to complain
about. You don't have to try to "read between the lines" in
Moynihan's articles to fabricate them.
|1.10.08 @ 8:29PM|#
What Shecky and TallDave and Joe said.
This situation where everyone selectively locates their patriotism
while conveniently forgetting the thuggish role the CIA have played
in South America is pretty disappointing. Unless you slept through
1965-85, you knew how much of a purely corrosive force the CIA was.
But then maybe I'm just a bit too hung up on the notion that people
should be allowed to elect their own governments without fear of
some cloak and dagger prick lurking in the shadows.
|1.10.08 @ 8:32PM|#
J sub D | January 10, 2008, 7:15pm | #
I can see that my forswearing obscenies this year will not constitute a significant statistical reduction at H&R. ;-)
Did you make that New Year's resolution? 'Cause I know I didn't.
:D
And yes, the "Fucking New York Times" cums out every weekend
baby!!
|1.10.08 @ 8:48PM|#
pinko,
I agree with you, and yet, I wouldn't have pissed on Phillip Agee
if he was on fire.
|1.10.08 @ 9:27PM|#
Did you make that New Year's resolution? 'Cause I know I
didn't. :D
Yep, only 355 days to go. I expect I'll blow it commenting on a
Radley Balko post, but so far I'm OK.
|1.10.08 @ 9:37PM|#
It's strange that we often hear how awfully the U.S. behaved
during the Cold War, yet the decision to support Stalin during WW
II (without which support Russia might have never have expanded
into Eastern Europe and started the Cold War in the first place) is
rarely questioned.
I think the difference is we didn't help the Soviets jail, torture,
and murder dissidents. We didn't provide weapons to them knowing
they'd use them on unarmed men, women, and children. And I believe
we stopped giving them military aid once the war was over.
|1.10.08 @ 9:50PM|#
I read in the paper this morning that he died of a related infection after having surgery for uclers in Cuba. I would be more than a good bit of karmic justice if the filth in a state run hospital in a communist system he loved so dearly was in fact what killed him. I am sure he is getting a nice education on the evils of communism in hell right now. Hopefully his cell is next to Che's.
Nephilium|1.10.08 @ 10:03PM|#
J Sub D: Bah... I'll pour my good stuff, and
toast with you...
I still need to get a bottle of this... To put
with the rest...
Oh... and allow me to say... Jury duty is hell... Where I live it's
like being stuck in corporate meetings all day...
Nephilium
|1.10.08 @ 10:25PM|#
It's strange that we often hear how awfully the U.S. behaved
during the Cold War, yet the decision to support Stalin during WW
II (without which support Russia might have never have expanded
into Eastern Europe and started the Cold War in the first place) is
rarely questioned.
Well, there was that German guy, you know. Making a mess of things,
creating strange bedfellows, cats and dogs living together, the
whole mass hysteria thing. Its sort of like what Churchill said
about Hitler invading Hell. Something along the lines of "I'd put
in a good word or two about Lucifer in the Commons."
|1.10.08 @ 11:40PM|#
Jammer | January 10, 2008, 10:25pm
Keep in mind that the western allies who were so upset about
Hitler's invasion of the western half of Poland in September of '39
completely forgot to declare war on his ally (remember that old
Ribentrop-Molotov treaty thingy) who invaded the eastern half only
a few days later.
Oh, and which country was it that was the only one that
gained territory as a result of WWII again?
Warmongering Lunatic|1.11.08 @ 1:12AM|#
Les, if U.S. supplies weren't used directly in things like moving the entire Chechen and Ingushs peoples into camps in 1944, it's still true that out Lend-Lease trucks helped relieve logistics problems elsewhere to make it easier. The Soviet Army regularly engaged in atrocities against unarmed men, women, and children. And I'm pretty sure we stopped giving Latin American dictatorships aid once the Cold War was over, too.
The Wine Commonsewer|1.11.08 @ 1:44AM|#
*hands Kwix the magnifying glass*
So, you gonna pass me the paper towels so as to clean off the wine
I shot outta my nose all over the monitor?
Cameron|1.11.08 @ 8:18AM|#
"It'd be like showering praise on an army defector who gives
away Army positions in Iraq..."
This would certainly be politically incorrect, as giving away Army
positions would be treasonous. However, given that the U.S.
military is brutally occupying a country which it invaded on no
provocation....is giving away Army positions actually
unethical?
And if the CIA was doing all the horrible things which of course it
was doing, then what is so evil about betraying it?
This is not to say that Agee is worthy of admiration. His active
support of totalitarian regimes is reprehensible. Still, the things
which some posters think he ought to be shot for, such as naming
names of operatives and exposing CIA operations, seem to me to be
quite creditable.
Guy Montag|1.11.08 @ 12:40PM|#
Hillary He died of too many years of old age, Dingle said
today.
Yet another assasination by nature.
tarran|1.11.08 @ 1:21PM|#
I think the difference is we didn't help the Soviets jail, torture, and murder dissidents. We didn't provide weapons to them knowing they'd use them on unarmed men, women, and children. And I believe we stopped giving them military aid once the war was over.
Les, I have bad news for you.
Remember those box cars used to ship Jews to death camps? Well,
American and British soldiers, after the war, loaded tens of
thousands of Cossacks into them and sent they
carried the COssacks to death camps in the Soviet Union.
It was called Operation
Keelhaul.
|1.11.08 @ 2:16PM|#
tarran,
Thanks for the fascinating (and depressing) link. I'm sorry if I
implied that the U.S. didn't do horrible things during WW2 with the
Russians. But it seems to me that an atrocity like Operation
Keelhaul was a small part of the plan to join with the Soviets to
defeat the Axis, whereas the material and strategic support of
terrorism and mass murder/torture in order to prevent foreign
populations from electing leftist governments was a crucial and
ongoing strategic element of U.S. foreign policy during the Cold
War.
That doesn't mean, of course, that what we did in Operation
Keelhaul was less terrible in any way. I just think the fact that
we happened to help the Soviets commit atrocities during WW2 is
irrelevant to the fact that it was standard U.S. foreign policy to
help a variety of dictatorships and terrorist organizations commit
atrocities for forty five years after that.
|1.11.08 @ 2:27PM|#
I know the reason people bring up our support of the Soviets is
because they're trying to say something like, "Just like we needed
to do terrible things to win WW2, we needed to do terrible things
to win the Cold War."
Well, obviously, terrible things have to be done in any war, but we
certainly didn't need to help out with Operation Keelhaul in order
to win WW2 any more than we needed to support terrorism and mass
murder/torture in order to win the Cold War.
I think it's hard for people to accept that the U.S. acted like the
bad guys for so long, so they have to try to construct a
rationalization for it.
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