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Welcoming 2012 With A Look At The Past

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Since launching this blog on January 1, 2010, I have written 184 posts. In an average month, between 2,000 to 3,000 readers check to see what I have posted. When a blog is especially controversial that number can jump to  6,000. Readers have posted 1,000 comments. Thank you for your interest.

I started this blog after several New York publishers rejected an idea for a book that I called HOPE.  I wanted to write about successful mental health treatment programs that were helping people recover. Unfortunately, the editors who heard my pitch were not interested in a book about success stories. I began this blog because I wanted to continue writing about issues, mostly mental health related, that are important to me, especially hope.  

The start of a New Year is a good time for reflection –  so I have reviewed my 184  posts and picked out a handful to highlight.  If you didn’t read them when they were originally posted, perhaps you will glance at them now. 

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Russian Who Exposed Femme Fatale Is Identified

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Former Russian Spy Now Peddles Spy Gear

Thanks to a Russian military court in Moscow, we now know who told the FBI and CIA about ten Russian “illegals,” who were arrested last year in the U.S., including the femme fatale,  Anna Chapman.

In case you have forgotten, Chapman and her colleagues where caught in June 2010 and accused of being “sleeper agents” employed by the Russian Federation’s external intelligence agency, the SVR (formerly the KGB.)  Illegals are a Russian specialty. Yuri Andropov, who oversaw the KGB from 1967 until 1982, was a huge proponent of dispatching KGB-trained Russians into foreign countries under the guise of being immigrants. Their assignment was to blend into a target country’s society and, if possible, quietly work their way into jobs where they could collect information. In some cases, sleepers were told they might never be called on by Mother Russia unless a war broke out. If that happened, the sleeper agents would be ordered to carry out military assignments, such as blowing up targets.

The idea that your seemingly ordinary next-door neighbor might secretly be a foreign spy is juicy stuff and when Chapman turned out to be both young and sexy, her arrest sparked international headlines. Most foreign intelligence agents conduct their spying activities under the guise of being dipolmats. This gives them immunity from prosecution.  But “illegals” don’t have diplomatic immunity, which means they can be arrested, just as Chapman and her co-horts were. They were later returned to Moscow as part of a spy swap. We sent them ten Russians and they gave us four alleged spies from our side.

When Chapman and the others were arrested on June 27th, my phone began ringing. Everyone assumed that Sergei Tretyakov had told the FBI and CIA about the sleeper agents. Tretyakov is the subject of my book, COMRADE J: The Untold Secrets of Russia’s Master Spy in America After the End of the Cold War.  He began working for the U.S. sometime in the mid-1990s and as the deputy rezident of the KGB/SVR’s New York office, common sense dictated that he must have known about Chapman and her pals.

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Putin says “Traitors always end badly” But “illegals” can end up in Playboy

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“Traitors always end badly. They finish up as drunks, addicts, on the street…”
This is what Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said recently during a visit in the Ukraine. He also told reporters that he had met earlier in Moscow with the ten Russian “illegals” who had been expelled from the U.S. for being agents of the Russian government.
While Putin said the illegals would “have interesting, bright lives,” he explained that traitors never are happy after they betrayed their homelands.

A radio interview with Helen Tretyakov

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Because there has been much speculation about Sergei Tretyakov’s death, I am posting this link to an interview with his wife, Helen.  Click here.

Sergei Tretyakov, Nathan Hale, and Benedict Arnold? Is there a difference between our traitors and their’s?

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The CIA turncoat, Aldrich Ames told me that one country’s traitor is another country’s hero.
But is that true?
Ames said it was true because the end result was betrayal — the breaking of an oath and allegiance to one’s homeland.

Sergei’s Death. Mistakes. Nonsense and a Chuckle

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I’ve been a journalist for more than three decades, but I’ve never had a day like yesterday.
My morning began at 5 a.m. when I announced on my blog that my good friend, Sergei Tretyakov, had died unexpectedly on June 13th. We became good friends while collaborating on Comrade J. I posted this news after speaking several times during the week to Helen, his wife, and to several sources in the U.S. government familiar with his case.