Russian Spy Ring in US is not the Way It Used to Be

On reading the accounts of the Russian spy ring operating in the US in the morning papers, it was difficult to keep the caffeine from shooting out one's nose. This isn't the great game anymore. Russia is no longer a superpower, but rather is on a par with such states as Spain, Brazil and India. Moreover thanks to the Internet, America's secrets are less secret than ever before. The fake IDs, the brush passes and the rest of George Smiley's tradecraft are less and less important than they have ever been.

Espionage is, of course, a noble and honorable profession for which one can get shot. The organization of James Bond fame, "Smersh," actually existed as a Soviet counterintelligence entity. The name was a contraction of "smyert shpionam," which means "death to spies." Spies scare the bejesus out of governments and the military because one person with access to the right kind of information can destroy the best laid plans.

And so it was a throwback to the bad old days when these alleged "illegals," that is, spies working without diplomatic cover, went to work against America. The big difference was that they didn't really achieve much. The New York Times reported:

Unlike famous spies such as Aldrich H. Ames and Robert P. Hanssen, who did incalculable damage to U.S. national security, those charged this week were ordered not to seek classified data, some federal officials said.

'They were here under deep cover, as a network in case Russian intelligence ever needed anything,' said one law enforcement official, who like others quoted in this report spoke on the condition of anonymity because the investigation is continuing. 'The idea was that they would become so Americanized that no one can ever find any connection between them and Russia.'