Question for spy novel/thriller gurus

Hello all,

I’ve got a (naïve, lay-person) question about the lives of intelligence officers. I’ve found a little info on this particular question, but a little more would be helpful. I’ll use KGB counterintelligence in the 70’s as a reference point.

Very generally speaking, how closely would such individuals be monitored by their own employers/higher-ups while in their own countries provided they haven’t given any reason to make anyone suspicious?

So, for example, how much would they have monitored a KGB officer whom they felt to be trustworthy while that person was living in, say, Moscow? Are we talking “Keep us informed if anything in your life changes.” or “We trust no one so we’ve got a bug in your living room and wiretap on your phone?” I’m thinking the human resources required to monitor every worker that heavily would be make such monitoring entirely unfeasible, but the Stasi seemed to do a fairly efficient job of stuff like that, so I don’t know.

Any info on any location is welcome. I realize there may be quite dramatic differences from one location to another, but I really would appreciate any input.



Thanks in advance.

Thank you for your input, everyone.

Kurtz,

I'm not surprised. As far as I know, they were one of the worst if not the worst at the time. My neighbor's from East Germany, but I can't ask her because she's still unsettled by certain things (which she mentioned herself once. I didn't bring the topic up.)

Raburrell,

Yes, makes sense, hotels being full of potential spies and all. As for the mood reports or whatever they called them, I'd imagine that was going on all over the place. But then, that's largely conjecture on my part, too. A friend of mine once told me where he lived in the (at the time) Soviet Union if you even got a wrong number call from "the west," the police would show up and interrogate you. But even now in that particular now-independent country, landline international calls are still routed through an operator, so there was no need to wiretap to find out who got a call from the west.


RJK,

I think I've heard something like that about U.S. intelligence workers. Thank you for the example. I would expect and hope the U.S. wouldn't be bugging their officers' sneakers, but then, what do I know? Makes sense other countries would also require the same type of reports at minimum.

Today I found this article in which a former KGB worker claims they didn't really have the wherewithal to monitor all their workers efficiently. Of course, he may have lied or fudged the facts. So, hmm.

I'd go to the library and look up more info, but where I am at the moment, I can't read the books.

Kurtz,

The all-the-way-to-China part wouldn't surprise me. They got their bad reputation somehow, after all.

I do remember reading something about surveillance in a book by a former KGB officer who defected to Britain. He said in the eighties while he was working outside the Soviet Union, he was told, "It takes 10 of them to watch one of us." If that's true, it would eat up a lot of resources and may not be/have been worth it for less paranoid nations.

Thanks again for responding.

Thanks for your reply, Tsu.

>>sucking up about 40% of the East German budget
Holy...! That explains a lot. Sad. And they say translators suck up too much of the EU common budget. Pfft.

>>The KGB had agents report on other agents, as well as on the person they were watching.
Ah ha! That's what I was wondering about. Of course, that was overseas, right? I wonder if they were more lax with counterintelligence workers on Soviet soil.

>>So we played mind games with them
LOL. How fun. Especially the jaunts to crazy places.

Thanks again.

ETA: Woo-hoo, this was my 100th post!