DC -- International Spy Museum (New Location) -- 5. Spying that Shaped History:
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SPY5H_190507_001.JPG: Why Spy?
"... Our very freedom came under attack in a series of deliberate and deadly terrorist acts."
-- President George W. Bush
"... This form of treachery shall never again endanger us."
-- President Franklin D. Roosevelt
SPY5H_190507_005.JPG: Metal garrote, US, date unknown
SPY5H_190507_012.JPG: Al Queda's Most Wanted Man
When US forces raided Osama bin Laden's compound in 2011, they reportedly found some interesting things in the Al Queda leader's home: an order to assassinate an American officer, along with a well-thumbed copy of the pamphlet he wrote. Who was the officer bin Laden so feared? Why were his ideas so dangerous?
Major Jim Gant, a US Army Green Beret, went to Afghanistan to fight a secret war against the Taliban. His strategy convinced thousands of Afghans to join him. Everything went right for Gant -- until everything went wrong.
SPY5H_190507_019.JPG: "An army without secret agents is like a man without eyes and ears."
-- Sun Tzu, 6th C BCE
Why Spy?
Why spy? With history in the balance, spying tips the scales.
In a volatile and unpredictable world, spying provides that extra edge. It bolsters political influence, military advantage, or economic clout. It provides critical insights leaders need to protect us from threats at home and abroad.
SPY5H_190507_027.JPG: "Washington did not beat us militarily, he simply outspied us!"
-- Head of British intelligence operations, Major George Beckwith
SPY5H_190507_030.JPG: "I have spied for you and lied for you, put myself in mortal danger for you..."
-- Severus Snape, double agent from Harry Potter series
SPY5H_190507_042.JPG: "Washington did not beat us militarily, he simply outspied us."
-- Head of British intelligence operations, Major George Beckwith
SPY5H_190507_047.JPG: The Culper Spy Ring
American independence hung in the balance. To defeat Britain, George Washington needed more than muskets. He needed intelligence. In 1777, he hired Nathaniel Sackett to set up American's first spy network. A year later, he replaced Sackett with 24-year-old Benjamin Tallmadge. His assignment? Provide vital intel about Britain's New York City base.
Tallmadge needed people he could trust fully, who were willing to risk their lives behind enemy lines. He found them among his close friends from Long Island. Known as the Culper Spy Ring, they helped steer the colonial army to victory.
SPY5H_190507_055.JPG: Fateful Failures
SPY5H_190507_057.JPG: "This is not an exercise, not a test."
SPY5H_190507_060.JPG: September 11, 2001 -- 2,996 killed
SPY5H_190507_062.JPG: The CIA Warns the President... or Does It?
SPY5H_190507_065.JPG: The Challenge:
Signals vs. Noise
SPY5H_190507_067.JPG: Who's the Threat? Al Qaeda... and Iraq?
SPY5H_190507_071.JPG: The Challenge:
Underestimating the Enemy
SPY5H_190507_075.JPG: See Something, Say Something...
SPY5H_190507_077.JPG: The Challenge:
Failure of Imagination
SPY5H_190507_079.JPG: The Lasting Impact on the United States
SPY5H_190507_084.JPG: The September 11 Attacks Transformed America
SPY5H_190507_088.JPG: Preparing for Their Mission:
Transforming aircraft into missiles required more than simply hijacking planes. The terrorists had to pilot them.
After the attack, investigators found this charred part of a flight manual amid the debris at the World Trade Center crash site in New York City. A number of the hijackers had taken flight lessons at schools in the United States.
SPY5H_190507_095.JPG: A Terrorist Comes Aboard:
Ahmed al-Ghamdi used this boarding pass for United Airlines flight 175 from Boston on September 11, 2001. Once airborne, he and his fellow hijackers took control of the plane and crashed it into the South Tower of New York's World Trade Center.
The 22-year-old Saudi probably trained at Al Queda camps in Afghanistan, where Osama bin Laden would likely have chosen him for the terror mission.
SPY5H_190507_099.JPG: 2,403 Killed * December 7, 1941
Japan Attacks
SPY5H_190507_104.JPG: "This is no drill..."
SPY5H_190507_105.JPG: The Challenge:
Signals vs. Noise
SPY5H_190507_110.JPG: War Warning
SPY5H_190507_112.JPG: Burn Notice
SPY5H_190507_115.JPG: War Warning
SPY5H_190507_117.JPG: The Challenge:
Underestimating the Enemy
SPY5H_190507_120.JPG: No Threat Here!
SPY5H_190507_124.JPG: "The Japanese as a race have defects of the tubes of the inner ear, just as they are generally myopic. This gives them a defective sense of balance, the one physical sense in which an aviator is not permitted to be deficient."
-- Fletcher Pratt, Sea Power and Today's War (1939)
SPY5H_190507_128.JPG: The Challenge:
Failure of Imagination
SPY5H_190507_133.JPG: The Lasting Impact on the United States
SPY5H_190507_136.JPG: The Pearl Harbor Attack Transformed America
SPY5H_190507_145.JPG: Dr. Jay's Invisible Ink
SPY5H_190507_151.JPG: Spying in WWII:
Combat troops took center stage in World War II. Yet behind the scenes were other, shadowy warriors who helped shape outcomes on the battlefield.
Spies slipped behind enemy lines to organize resistance cells, sabotage operations, and uncover enemy plans. Masters of deception scattered false clues and even created phantom armies. Wartime offered women and men from all walks of life opportunities to serve -- usually without medals or fame. And often, the more successful they were, the less their contributions are known.
SPY5H_190507_153.JPG: America's Secret Soldiers
SPY5H_190507_156.JPG: From OSS to CIA:
1945. The war was over. So too, many felt, was the need for a spy agency. President Truman dissolved the OSS. But as Cold War tensions grew, it became clear the US needed to ensure it would never again be blindsided by a surprise attack.
What was a peacetime spy agency's role? Some feared creating a "Gestapo," the Nazis' dreaded secret police. Finally, in 1947, Truman approved formation of the Central Intelligence Agency, staffed by many OSS alumni.
SPY5H_190507_160.JPG: The OSS compiled this confidential catalog of weapons and devices that could be used in the field. Categories include "Explosive," "Automotive Attack," and "Harassing Agents."
SPY5H_190507_169.JPG: Chief of Spies
SPY5H_190507_171.JPG: Founding Father of the CIA
SPY5H_190507_173.JPG: Defying Danger (and Orders)
Stay away from the perilous D-Day landing, William Donovan was warned in 1944. He ignored that order, however, hitting the Normandy beach in France alongside David Bruce, European head of the OSS.
Under heavy enemy fire, Donovan assured Bruce: "If we are about to be captured, I'll shoot you first. After all, I am your commanding officer."
SPY5H_190507_178.JPG: Donovan wrote this letter to former OSS members in September 1945, expressing gratitude that they had "provided our Nation with an unprecedented service which hastened the day of victory."
SPY5H_190507_183.JPG: OSS forgers produced this German ID card for William Donovan to demonstrate their skill in creating realistic German credentials and other documents.
SPY5H_190507_186.JPG: The Lady Who Limps
SPY5H_190507_190.JPG: Wanted -- But Undaunted
SPY5H_190507_193.JPG: The Power of Film
"I want every mother in America to see this film," said President Roosevelt after screening The Battle of Midway. John Ford's documentary celebrated a key US victory while vividly depicting the sacrifices required.
Ford and his team risked their lives to film actual battle footage; it would be many Americans' first view of real combat. Wounded by enemy fire, Ford earned a Purple Heart -- and the film won this Oscar for Best Documentary.
SPY5H_190507_197.JPG: Another Kind of Shooting
SPY5H_190507_199.JPG: Serving Her Country (Not Just Dinner)
SPY5H_190507_203.JPG: Naval Reserve Commander John Ford (left) during his World War II work as head of the photographic unit of the OSS.
SPY5H_190507_204.JPG: John Ford, photographed during World War II.
SPY5H_190507_206.JPG: Julia Child, photographed in her Cambridge, Massachusetts kitchen in 1978.
SPY5H_190507_208.JPG: Julia Child reading on her bunk during her OSS deployment in Asia.
SPY5H_190507_211.JPG: Chick Parsons (L) with General Douglas MacArthur (C) in Brisbane, Australia, 1942.
SPY5H_190507_214.JPG: Chick Parsons was infiltrated into the Philippines on a covert mission in 1942 on this submarine, the USS Narwhal.
SPY5H_190507_219.JPG: Conned by Committee
SPY5H_190507_222.JPG: Operation Mincemeat
SPY5H_190507_229.JPG: Best Actor Award Goes To...
SPY5H_190507_231.JPG: The corpse of a homeless man outfitted to be the fictitious Major William Martin.
SPY5H_190507_234.JPG: Juan Pujol Garcia disguised. Pujol's work as a double agent was so convincing that the Germans never knew of his deception until well after the war ended.
SPY5H_190507_238.JPG: Fake engagement ring receipt, one of the details used to create a believable identify for "Major Martin."
SPY5H_190507_245.JPG: An Unlikely Hero
SPY5H_190507_247.JPG: An Enchanted Childhood
SPY5H_190507_249.JPG: Risking Her Life For Her Beliefs
SPY5H_190507_251.JPG: "Set Europe Ablaze"
SPY5H_190507_253.JPG: The Personal Touch
SPY5H_190507_262.JPG: Can You Spot the Difference?
SPY5H_190507_264.JPG: Not Over-Burdened With Brains
SPY5H_190507_268.JPG: Betrayed. Beaten. Unbowed.
SPY5H_190507_274.JPG: The D-Day Landings:
Where? When?
SPY5H_190507_279.JPG: D-Day Dummies
SPY5H_190507_281.JPG: Phantom Armies
SPY5H_190507_282.JPG: The British dummy tank was made to look enough like the real tank next to it when viewed from afar.
SPY5H_190507_284.JPG: While Americans created decoy armies for the invasion of France, the British Fourth Army, using decoys such as this plane, fooled Germans about an invasion through Norway.
SPY5H_190507_286.JPG: The Fighting Fakes!
Every military unit has its own insignia. But does every insignia have a military unit?
To fool German spies into thinking that there were more troops ready to invade France than there really were, the US Army created several fake military units, with phony uniform patches to match. The patches were easily interchanged to trick spies into filing false reports of troop strength.
SPY5H_190507_291.JPG: D-Day:
The Allies Arrive
SPY5H_190507_296.JPG: Top Secret
SPY5H_190507_298.JPG: Secrets Kept
Executing the Rosenbergs
Public Trial ... Secret Evidence
SPY5H_190507_301.JPG: The "Trial of the Century"
SPY5H_190507_303.JPG: A Fearful Decade
Exhibit 8: How to Make an A-Bomb
SPY5H_190507_305.JPG: FBI arrest photos of accused atomic spies Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, 1950
SPY5H_190507_307.JPG: The Evidence: Damning or Dubious?
SPY5H_190507_312.JPG: Guilty... or Wronged?
SPY5H_190507_313.JPG: Evidence Finally Revealed
SPY5H_190507_324.JPG: Don't Blame Us!
SPY5H_190507_326.JPG: Soviet spies in New York City sent this cable to the head of the KGB's First Chief Directorate in Moscow (code-named VIKTOR) in 1944. US intelligence deciphered it as part of the VENONA program, adding a key at the bottom.
SPY5H_190507_331.JPG: Feisty pamphleteer Irwin Edelman self-published this tract. Chased from an LA coffee shop the night of their death, he shouted, "If you are happy about the execution of the Rosenbergs, you are rotten to the core!"
SPY5H_190507_336.JPG: Artist Pablo Picasso pleaded to save the Rosenbergs, writing, "Do not let this crime against humanity take place." He gave their sons his original portrait of their parents, while lithographs like this were sold to raise funds for legal appeals.
SPY5H_190507_341.JPG: Watching the Watchers
SPY5H_190507_344.JPG: Secret No More
SPY5H_190507_350.JPG: Mailer sent by the Conservative Solutions Project, December 2015
SPY5H_190507_352.JPG: Chan Lowe cartoon for South Florida's Sun Sentinel, June 11, 2013
SPY5H_190507_354.JPG: Secrets Revealed
SPY5H_190507_357.JPG: A Long-Running Debate
SPY5H_190507_359.JPG: The FBI's field office in Media, PA
SPY5H_190507_361.JPG: This sketch of burglar Bonnie Raines circulated among FBI offices in 1971. Raines had visited the Media, PA office before the break-in to study its security setup, posing as a college student doing research for a class.
SPY5H_190507_364.JPG: Targeting a Civil Rights Icon
SPY5H_190507_367.JPG: Protection Vs. Privacy?
SPY5H_190507_370.JPG: Emory Douglas was an integral member of the Black Panther Party, serving as Minister of Culture. His graphics, like this 1976 illustration showing the impact of COINTELPRO, became potent symbols of the movement.
SPY5H_190507_375.JPG: Investigating the FBI:
In 1971, citizen activists broke into an FBI office in Media, Pennsylvania. To their surprise, they found papers detailing COINTELPRO, a secret counterintelligence program to infiltrate, monitor, and disrupt US social and political movements.
The burglars have the files to the press. Some appeared in The Washington Post and elsewhere. In 1972, WIN magazine published them all. The burglars were never caught.
SPY5H_190507_382.JPG: Memo sent by Special Agent in Charge, Mobile, Alabama, to FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, January 4, 1956.
SPY5H_190507_396.JPG: Cyber:
The New Battlefield
SPY5H_190507_399.JPG: Cyber Covert Action
SPY5H_190507_409.JPG: Spreading the Virus!
Iran's nuclear plants weren't connected to the Internet. So how did the virus reach their computers?
Programmers designed Stuxnet to infect systems at outside companies working with Iran. "Someone" carried it into the Iranian plants. Was the carrier a spy, or just scientists unaware that their equipment was infected? We don't know.
When they plugged into the Iranian computers, the virus attacked.
SPY5H_190507_413.JPG: Stuxnet Targets Iran
SPY5H_190507_416.JPG: A Drone of Their Own?
SPY5H_190507_419.JPG: Testing the Threat
SPY5H_190507_423.JPG: Hack Us If You Can!
(Spoiler Alert: They Can)
SPY5H_190507_433.JPG: Digital Invaders!
Hackers inside Russian took control of this server in 1998. It was one of their main access points into US government networks in the Moonlight Maze cyberattack.
Turla, a current Russian hacker group believed to have Kremlin ties, still uses computer code from Moonlight Maze. This suggests that Turla evolved from those 1990s Russian hackers.
It became one of history's longest-lived cyberespionage operations.
--
Moonlight Maze
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Moonlight Maze was a 1999 US government investigation into a massive data breach of classified information. It started in 1996 and affected NASA, the Pentagon, military contractors, civilian academics, the DOE, and numerous other American government agencies. By the end of 1999, the Moonlight Maze task force was composed of forty specialists from Law Enforcement, Military, and Government. The investigators claimed that if all the information stolen was printed out and stacked, it would be three times the height of the Washington monument (which is more than 550 ft tall). The Russian government was blamed for the attacks, although there was initially little hard evidence to back up the US' accusations besides a Russian IP address that was traced to the hack. Moonlight Maze represents one of the first widely known cyber-espionage campaigns in world history. It was even classified as an Advanced Persistent Threat (a very serious designation for stealthy computer network threat actors, typically a nation state or state-sponsored group) after two years of constant assault. Although Moonlight Maze was regarded as an isolated attack for many years, unrelated investigations revealed that the threat actor involved in the attack continued to be active and employ similar methods until as recently as 2016.
SPY5H_190507_438.JPG: Moonlight Maze
SPY5H_190507_480.JPG: Who Would Have Guessed?
They seem like the most unlikely candidates for spies: the lady down the street, the businessman on the train, the celebrity you've seen on stage or screen. Look again...
Each of these people has a surprising spy story to tell. Most of them took advantage of an opportunity to defy expectations and stereotypes, using their gender, race, fame, or just plain everydayness to serve their country -- or betray it.
Discover the stories behind these faces. You may never look at anyone the same way again.
SPY5H_190507_483.JPG: The American Civil War:
America's bloodiest conflict, the Civil War (1861-1865), pitted North against South, state against state, brother against brother.
In that era, few would have expected free blacks or enslaved people to be secretly gathering information or passing information. And women of any color were seldom suspected. Civil War spies used this to an effective advantage.
SPY5H_190507_485.JPG: A Curious Copybook:
Elizabeth Van Lew used this notebook to practice penmanship as a young girl. The phrase she copied -- "Keep your mouth shut and your eyes and ears open" -- hints at her future double life.
Part of a prominent southern family, Van Lew was troubled by slavery. Living in Richmond, Virginia, the heart of the Confederacy, she built and operated an extensive Union spy ring of free and enslaved people.
Van Lew's copybook, US, ca 1830
SPY5H_190507_490.JPG: Union Spy Elizabeth Van Lew:
General Ulysses S. Grant praised the "valuable information" she sent through enciphered dispatches.
SPY5H_190507_492.JPG: Coco Chanel:
Simple elegance was the hallmark of French fashion designer Coco Chanel. Her groundbreaking creations helped liberate women from the confines of corsets with clothes that were chic and fashionable, yet comfortable.
SPY5H_190507_495.JPG: Coco Chanel:
Papers declassified after WWII suggest Chanel (codename WESTMINSTER) spied for the Nazis. In 1942, they sent her to Spain with a secret letter to her friend, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, proposing the UK and Germany sign a separate peace.
SPY5H_190507_496.JPG: Robert Smalls:
An enslaved African American in South Carolina, Robert Smalls spent years on ships in Charleston Harbor. At the outbreak of the Civil War, he began working aboard the Planter, which carried munitions for the Confederate Army.
SPY5H_190507_498.JPG: Robert Smalls:
On May 13, 1862, Smalls seized control of the Planter, evaded Confederate checkpoints, and delivered the ship, cargo, and valuable intelligence to the Union. The covert action won Smalls his freedom, fame, and later, a seat in Congress.
SPY5H_190507_503.JPG: Harriet Tubman:
Born into slavery, Harriet Tubman escaped bondage in 1849 and became a conductor on the Underground Railroad. Known as Moses, she led more than 300 enslaved people to freedom and "never lost a single passenger."
SPY5H_190507_506.JPG: Harriet Tubman:
A Union spy and military commander, Tubman collected intel behind enemy lines. She also led three US gunboats and 150 African American soldiers on a raid rescuing 750 enslaved people and destroying Confederate estates.
SPY5H_190507_507.JPG: World War II:
The Second World War (1939-1945) touched people from every walk of life. And people from every walk of life answered the call to serve.
As the Allied and Axis powers fought across Europe, Asia, and Africa, they enlisted the aid of men and women of every background and field, from sports to fashion, from the cabaret stage to the silver screen.
SPY5H_190507_510.JPG: Passing Notes... Among Notes!
American entertainer Josephine Baker was a celebrity in Paris. She was also an agent for French intelligence. How did she smuggle information to the Allies? On sheet music like this.
Concealed among the musical notes were other notes -- in invisible ink -- about German military strategies and troop movements. While helping the French Resistance, Baker even hid messages in her underwear.
Sheet music, France, 1928
SPY5H_190507_520.JPG: Professional baseball player Moe Berg was a third-string catcher... and a first-rate spy for US intelligence, sent behind Nazi lines during WWII.
SPY5H_190507_530.JPG: Moe Berg medal honoring his induction into the Jewish-American Hall of Fame, US, 2006
SPY5H_190507_543.JPG: Moe Berg:
He played for the Chicago White Sox, Cleveland Indians, Boston Red Sox, and Washington Senators. But with a Princeton degree and fluent in at least eight languages, Moe Berg was hardly a typical Major League ballplayer.
SPY5H_190507_547.JPG: Moe Berg:
The OSS, America's WWII spy agency, sent Berg on missions to South American and occupied Europe. Meeting with a top Nazi scientist in Switzerland, Berg had ordered to shoot him if Germany was close to building an A-bomb.
SPY5H_190507_552.JPG: Josephine Baker:
To escape racism at home, African American singer-dancer Josephine Baker left the US for France in the 1930s. She swiftly became the toast of Paris, among France's most successful and beloved entertainers, and a French citizen.
SPY5H_190507_560.JPG: Josephine Baker:
During WWII, the Deuxieme Bureau (Free French military intelligence) recruited Baker. Her fame opened doors to parties where she rubbed shoulders with German, Italian, and Japanese officials... and reported to the ... [missing]
SPY5H_190507_561.JPG: Melita Norwood:
Known to friends as Lettie, Melita Norwood was a sweet, elderly great-grandmother living quietly in a London suburb. She was famous among her neighbors for her homemade chutney.
SPY5H_190507_563.JPG: Melita Norwood:
Norwood may have been the longest-acting Soviet spy in Britain, volunteering in 1937 at age 25, and working until 60. A secretary at Britain's nuclear weapons research center, she passed intel that may have hastened Stalin's atomic bomb program.
SPY5H_190507_564.JPG: The Cold War:
From the mid-1940s through the late 1980s, communist and capitalist nations -- led by the Soviet Union and the United States -- faced off across the globe.
The decades-long war between competing ideologies and alliances was mostly fought not with military battles, but with deceit and intrigue. This made it ripe for the shadowy struggles of spy vs. spy.
SPY5H_190507_567.JPG: Top Secret!
In 1945, the KGB sent an encrypted communique to its London station. It referred to an agency codenamed TINA, who'd provided intel about the US-British atomic bomb effort (Operation ENORMOZ).
The top secret US and British VENONA project intercepted that message. It took until 1965 before it was decrypted, and until 1999 before TINA was publicly revealed as Melita Norwood. The 87-year old expressed no remorse: "I would do it again," she said.
SPY5H_190507_574.JPG: Shi Pei Pu:
Claiming to have been a Chinese opera star, the shy, delicate, French-speaking Shi Pei Pu taught Chinese to diplomats in Beijing in the 1960s. Shi said he was born female but lived as a man because his father had wanted a son.
SPY5H_190507_577.JPG: Shi Pei Pu:
During a 20-year-affair with French embassy accountant Bernard Boursicot, Shi stole more than 500 diplomatic documents for China. Both men were arrested in 1982... and prison doctors revealed Shi was a man. Boursicot, surprised, said they'd always slept in the dark.
SPY5H_190507_578.JPG: Harpo Marx:
With honks, whistles, and rubber-faced wackiness, Harpo Marx -- playing a wild-eyed silent character -- tickled funny bones in Vaudeville, on Broadway, and in more than a dozen films. He was among the most beloved of the famed comedians, the Marx Brothers.
SPY5H_190507_580.JPG: Harpo Marx:
After the US established diplomatic relations with the USSR in 1933, Marx visited Moscow for six weeks on a goodwill tour... doubling as a secret courier. He smuggled messages to and from the US embassy under his pants, in a sealed envelope taped to his leg.
SPY5H_190507_584.JPG: Eli Cohen:
Kamel Amin Thaabet, a wealthy, Syrian-born businessman, moved from Argentina back to Syria in 1962. His lavish parties -- and an apartment filled with wine and women -- helped him forge close ties to senior Syrian officials.
SPY5H_190507_587.JPG: Thaabet was actually Egyptian-born Eli Cohen. Working undercover for Israeli intelligence, he passed intel on Syrian defenses for three years -- until caught during a radio transmission. Sentenced to death, he was hanged in Damascus in 1965.
SPY5H_190507_588.JPG: Spying Today
SPY5H_190507_598.JPG: Legere's uniform jacket, US, ca 2010
SPY5H_190507_600.JPG: Three Stars for an American Star
SPY5H_190507_621.JPG: License to Thrill
SPY5H_190507_632.JPG: An Alien Threat?
SPY5H_190507_635.JPG: Little Green Men!
SPY5H_190507_642.JPG: Corgi Toys' model of James Bond's famous car was the biggest selling toy in 1964, the year the tricked-out car first appeared in the hit film Goldfinger.
SPY5H_190520_037.JPG: America Outspies the British
SPY5H_190520_052.JPG: Hiring America's First Spy
In this letter, General Washington offers Nathaniel Sackett $50 a month (more than $1,000 today) to spy for the Continental Army, plus another $500 to set up a spy network.
SPY5H_190520_063.JPG: Secret Writing
SPY5H_190520_079.JPG: "Washington did not beat us MILITARILY. He simply OUTSPIED us."
-- Head of British Intelligence Operations Major George Beckwith
SPY5H_190520_081.JPG: The Culper Spy Ring
American independence hung in the balance. To defeat Britain, George Washington needed more than muskets. He needed intelligence. In 1777, he hired Nathaniel Sackett to set up American's first spy network. A year later, he replaced Sackett with 24-year-old Benjamin Tallmadge. His assignment? Provide vital intel about Britain's New York City base.
Tallmadge needed people he could trust fully, who were willing to risk their lives behind enemy lines. He found them among his close friends from Long Island. Known as the Culper Spy Ring, they helped steer the colonial army to victory.
SPY5H_190520_093.JPG: How Did the Culper Ring Work?
In an era before radio, telegraph, or cameras, how did the Culper Ring pass intelligence quickly to General Washington? To find out, follow the journey of an important secret message.
In July 1780, a French fleet bringing vital men and supplies to the Americans arrived at Rhode Island. Did the British know that? Were they laying a trap? Washington turned to Tallmadge and his spy ring for answers.
SPY5H_190520_097.JPG: Captain Benjamin Tallmadge
SPY5H_190520_105.JPG: Robert Townsend
SPY5H_190520_110.JPG: Tavern Secret Overheard
The British are plotting an ambush! New York merchant Robert Townsend overhears that the British are massing troops on Long Island to trap the French fleet. He must get word to General Washington -- and fast!
SPY5H_190520_115.JPG: Austin Roe
SPY5H_190520_121.JPG: Sending a Message
The clock's ticking! In New York, Townsend races to his ship and uses invisible ink to hide his news in an innocent-looking letter. He gives it to Austin Roe, who saddles a horse and races 55 miles to Setauket, Long Island.
SPY5H_190520_124.JPG: Abraham Woodhull
SPY5H_190520_128.JPG: Passing it Hand-to-Hand
Roe brings the letter to Abraham Woodhull on Long Island, who adds a note to Caleb Brewster: "Let not an hour pass... You have news of the greatest consequence... perhaps that ever happened to your country." Anna Strong may have used her laundry code to signal Brewster.
SPY5H_190520_136.JPG: Captain Caleb Brewster
SPY5H_190520_138.JPG: From Land to Sea
Woodhull delivers both Townsend's letter and his own note to Captain Brewster, who furiously rows his boat across Long Island Sound to Connecticut, where he hastily passes the secret message to a trusted courier.
SPY5H_190520_139.JPG: Anna Strong
SPY5H_190520_145.JPG: Receiving the Message
The courier rides to New Jersey, where Alexander Hamilton reveals the invisible ink message. Gadzooks! An ambush! He sends word to the French, George Washington scrutinizes all the information... and plans his next move.
SPY5H_190520_184.JPG: Virginia Hall
SPY5H_190520_188.JPG: The British made Virginia Hall a "Member of the Order of the British Empire" (MBE) for her courageous work with resistance fighters in France in 1941-42.
SPY5H_190520_197.JPG: The Lady Who Limps
SPY5H_190520_201.JPG: Hall receiving the Distinguished Service Cross from OSS Director Donovan, September 1945
SPY5H_190520_207.JPG: Wanted -- But Undaunted
SPY5H_190520_210.JPG: Hall's ID bracelet
SPY5H_190520_238.JPG: Pedal-Powered Intel
In constant danger of discovery by the Germans, Virginia Hall used this suitcase radio to send intelligence reports to the OSS in Morse code. It was no easy task.
To generate electricity for the radio, it was attached to a bike frame connected to a car battery. Pedaling charged the battery, powering the radio.
SPY5H_190520_247.JPG: Modified Japanese Torpedo
SPY5H_190520_251.JPG: Spying in WWII
SPY5H_190520_266.JPG: Harriet Tubman:
A Union spy and military commander, Tubman collected intel behind enemy lines. She also led three US gunboats and 150 African American soldiers on a raid rescuing 750 enslaved people and destroying Confederate estates.
Harriet Tubman:
Born into slavery, Harriet Tubman escaped bondage in 1849 and became a conductor on the Underground Railroad. Known as Moses, she led more than 300 enslaved people to freedom and "never lost a single passenger."
SPY5H_190520_271.JPG: Robert Smalls:
On May 13, 1862, Smalls seized control of the Planter, evaded Confederate checkpoints, and delivered the ship, cargo, and valuable intelligence to the Union. The covert action won Smalls his freedom, fame, and later, a seat in Congress.
Robert Smalls:
An enslaved African American in South Carolina, Robert Smalls spent years on ships in Charleston Harbor. At the outbreak of the Civil War, he began working aboard the Planter, which carried munitions for the Confederate Army.
SPY5H_190520_283.JPG: Coco Chanel:
Papers declassified after WWII suggest Chanel (codename WESTMINSTER) spied for the Nazis. In 1942, they sent her to Spain with a secret letter to her friend, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, proposing the UK and Germany sign a separate peace.
Coco Chanel:
Simple elegance was the hallmark of French fashion designer Coco Chanel. Her groundbreaking creations helped liberate women from the confines of corsets with clothes that were chic and fashionable, yet comfortable.
SPY5H_190520_291.JPG: Moe Berg:
The OSS, America's WWII spy agency, sent Berg on missions to South American and occupied Europe. Meeting with a top Nazi scientist in Switzerland, Berg had ordered to shoot him if Germany was close to building an A-bomb.
Moe Berg:
He played for the Chicago White Sox, Cleveland Indians, Boston Red Sox, and Washington Senators. But with a Princeton degree and fluent in at least eight languages, Moe Berg was hardly a typical Major League ballplayer.
SPY5H_190520_303.JPG: Josephine Baker:
During WWII, the Deuxieme Bureau (Free French military intelligence) recruited Baker. Her fame opened doors to parties where she rubbed shoulders with German, Italian, and Japanese officials... and reported to the ... [missing]
Josephine Baker:
To escape racism at home, African American singer-dancer Josephine Baker left the US for France in the 1930s. She swiftly became the toast of Paris, among France's most successful and beloved entertainers, and a French citizen.
SPY5H_190520_313.JPG: Melita Norwood:
Norwood may have been the longest-acting Soviet spy in Britain, volunteering in 1937 at age 25, and working until 60. A secretary at Britain's nuclear weapons research center, she passed intel that may have hastened Stalin's atomic bomb program.
Melita Norwood:
Known to friends as Lettie, Melita Norwood was a sweet, elderly great-grandmother living quietly in a London suburb. She was famous among her neighbors for her homemade chutney.
SPY5H_190520_318.JPG: Shi Pei Pu:
During a 20-year-affair with French embassy accountant Bernard Boursicot, Shi stole more than 500 diplomatic documents for China. Both men were arrested in 1982... and prison doctors revealed Shi was a man. Boursicot, surprised, said they'd always slept in the dark.
Shi Pei Pu:
Claiming to have been a Chinese opera star, the shy, delicate, French-speaking Shi Pei Pu taught Chinese to diplomats in Beijing in the 1960s. Shi said he was born female but lived as a man because his father had wanted a son.
SPY5H_190520_323.JPG: Harpo Marx:
After the US established diplomatic relations with the USSR in 1933, Marx visited Moscow for six weeks on a goodwill tour... doubling as a secret courier. He smuggled messages to and from the US embassy under his pants, in a sealed envelope taped to his leg.
Harpo Marx:
With honks, whistles, and rubber-faced wackiness, Harpo Marx -- playing a wild-eyed silent character -- tickled funny bones in Vaudeville, on Broadway, and in more than a dozen films. He was among the most beloved of the famed comedians, the Marx Brothers.
SPY5H_190520_334.JPG: Kamel Amin Thaabet:
Thaabet was actually Egyptian-born Eli Cohen. Working undercover for Israeli intelligence, he passed intel on Syrian defenses for three years -- until caught during a radio transmission. Sentenced to death, he was hanged in Damascus in 1965.
Kamel Amin Thaabet:
Kamel Amin Thaabet, a wealthy, Syrian-born businessman, moved from Argentina back to Syria in 1962. His lavish parties -- and an apartment filled with wine and women -- helped him forge close ties to senior Syrian officials.
SPY5H_190520_338.JPG: Spying in WWII
SPY5H_190520_344.JPG: Top Secret
SPY5H_190520_365.JPG: A mysterious "hacktivist" known only as The Jester (th3j35t3r) shuts down websites he opposes, such as WikiLeaks and radical Islamist sites. He used the laptop on the left to conduct some of these attacks. Once he successfully disabled a target, he triumphantly tweeted, "TANGO DOWN."
SPY5H_190520_379.JPG: Secrets Revealed
SPY5H_190520_390.JPG: Stop Mass Surveillance
SPY5H_190520_396.JPG: Secrets Kept
SPY5H_190520_413.JPG: Cyber:
The New Battlefield
SPY5H_190520_423.JPG: Cyber Covert Action
SPY5H_190520_431.JPG: Hacking the 2016 Election
For decades, spy agencies have secretly tried to influence the political workings of a rival. But using cyber to sway an election is a recent development.
In 2016, Americans were choosing a new president. Russian intelligence wanted a vote. A month before the election, US intelligence announced it had "high confidence" Russians had hacked political organizations of the Democratic National Committee. The result? Thousands of stolen emails released to the public, possibly hurting Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton's chances against Republican Donald Trump.
Details of Russian attacks continue to emerge. This story is still unfolding.
One month before the election, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton addressed the issue of Russian election hacking in a presidential debate.
--
The text of that debate:
WALLACE: Secretary Clinton, I want to clear up your position on this issue, because in a speech you gave to a Brazilian bank, for which you were paid $225,000, we've learned from the WikiLeaks, that you said this, and I want to quote. "My dream is a hemispheric common market with open trade and open borders." So that's the question...
TRUMP: Thank you.
WALLACE: That's the question. Please quiet, everybody. Is that your dream, open borders?
CLINTON: Well, if you went on to read the rest of the sentence, I was talking about energy. You know, we trade more energy with our neighbors than we trade with the rest of the world combined. And I do want us to have an electric grid, an energy system that crosses borders. I think that would be a great benefit to us.
But you are very clearly quoting from WikiLeaks. And what's really important about WikiLeaks is that the Russian government has engaged in espionage against Americans. They have hacked American websites, American accounts of private people, of institutions. Then they have given that information to WikiLeaks for the purpose of putting it on the Internet.
This has come from the highest levels of the Russian government, clearly, from Putin himself, in an effort, as 17 of our intelligence agencies have confirmed, to influence our election.
So I actually think the most important question of this evening, Chris, is, finally, will Donald Trump admit and condemn that the Russians are doing this and make it clear that he will not have the help of Putin in in this election, that he rejects Russian espionage against Americans, which he actually encouraged in the past? Those are the questions we need answered. We've never had anything like this happen in any of our elections before.
WALLACE: Well?
TRUMP: That was a great pivot off the fact that she wants open borders, OK? How did we get on to Putin?
WALLACE: Hold on -- hold on, wait. Hold on, folks. Because we -- this is going to end up getting out of control. Let's try to keep it quiet so -- for the candidates and for the American people.
TRUMP: So just to finish on the borders...
WALLACE: Yes?
TRUMP: She wants open borders. People are going to pour into our country. People are going to come in from Syria. She wants 550 percent more people than Barack Obama, and he has thousands and thousands of people. They have no idea where they come from.
And you see, we are going to stop radical Islamic terrorism in this country. She won't even mention the words, and neither will President Obama. So I just want to tell you, she wants open borders.
Now we can talk about Putin. I don't know Putin. He said nice things about me. If we got along well, that would be good. If Russia and the United States got along well and went after ISIS, that would be good.
He has no respect for her. He has no respect for our president. And I'll tell you what: We're in very serious trouble, because we have a country with tremendous numbers of nuclear warheads -- 1,800, by the way -- where they expanded and we didn't, 1,800 nuclear warheads. And she's playing chicken. Look, Putin...
WALLACE: Wait, but...
TRUMP: ... from everything I see, has no respect for this person.
CLINTON: Well, that's because he'd rather have a puppet as president of the United States.
TRUMP: No puppet. No puppet.
CLINTON: And it's pretty clear...
TRUMP: You're the puppet!
CLINTON: It's pretty clear you won't admit...
TRUMP: No, you're the puppet.
CLINTON: ... that the Russians have engaged in cyberattacks against the United States of America, that you encouraged espionage against our people, that you are willing to spout the Putin line, sign up for his wish list, break up NATO, do whatever he wants to do, and that you continue to get help from him, because he has a very clear favorite in this race.
So I think that this is such an unprecedented situation. We've never had a foreign government trying to interfere in our election. We have 17 -- 17 intelligence agencies, civilian and military, who have all concluded that these espionage attacks, these cyberattacks, come from the highest levels of the Kremlin and they are designed to influence our election. I find that deeply disturbing.
WALLACE: Secretary Clinton...
CLINTON: And I think it's time you take a stand...
TRUMP: She has no idea whether it's Russia, China, or anybody else.
CLINTON: I am not quoting myself.
TRUMP: She has no idea.
CLINTON: I am quoting 17...
TRUMP: Hillary, you have no idea.
CLINTON: ... 17 intelligence -- do you doubt 17 military and civilian...
TRUMP: And our country has no idea.
CLINTON: ... agencies.
TRUMP: Yeah, I doubt it. I doubt it.
CLINTON: Well, he'd rather believe Vladimir Putin than the military and civilian intelligence professionals who are sworn to protect us. I find that just absolutely...
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: She doesn't like Putin because Putin has outsmarted her at every step of the way.
WALLACE: Mr. Trump...
TRUMP: Excuse me. Putin has outsmarted her in Syria.
WALLACE: Mr. Trump...
(CROSSTALK)
TRUMP: He's outsmarted her every step of the way.
WALLACE: I do get to ask some questions.
TRUMP: Yes, that's fine.
WALLACE: And I would like to ask you this direct question. The top national security officials of this country do believe that Russia has been behind these hacks. Even if you don't know for sure whether they are, do you condemn any interference by Russia in the American election?
TRUMP: By Russia or anybody else.
WALLACE: You condemn their interference?
TRUMP: Of course I condemn. Of course I -- I don't know Putin. I have no idea.
WALLACE: I'm not asking -- I'm asking do you condemn?
TRUMP: I never met Putin. This is not my best friend. But if the United States got along with Russia, wouldn't be so bad.
Let me tell you, Putin has outsmarted her and Obama at every single step of the way. Whether it's Syria, you name it. Missiles. Take a look at the "start up" that they signed. The Russians have said, according to many, many reports, I can't believe they allowed us to do this. They create warheads, and we can't. The Russians can't believe it. She has been outsmarted by Putin.
SPY5H_190520_436.JPG: Cyber Destruction
This shard was once part of a sturdy diesel-powered electric generator. US government researchers destroyed the machine in Aurora, a 2007 test demonstrating that cyberattacks can destroy hardware as well as software.
Aurora wrecked the generator by altering its operating cycle. That made the device vibrate so violently that it tore itself apart, shearing off this piston and hurling some pieces as far as 80 feet.
SPY5H_190520_451.JPG: Holding Computers Hostage!
Pay up... or else! That's the message of ransomware, which "locks" computers until victims send money. It often targets vital systems, as in a 2017 attack on Britain's National Health Service.
Another attack that year crippled 10% of Ukraine's computers -- and radiation monitors at its Chernobyl nuclear power plant. It cost billions globally, disrupting production and shipping.
US intelligence linked the attack to Russia.
SPY5H_190520_464.JPG: Is Your Government Spying On You?
SPY5H_190520_468.JPG: Testing the Threat
SPY5H_190520_479.JPG: Digital Invaders!
SPY5H_190520_518.JPG: Spreading the Virus!
SPY5H_190520_521.JPG: Cyber: The New Battlefield
SPY5H_190520_551.JPG: Girls and Boys Love G-Men Toys!
SPY5H_190520_594.JPG: The cover story of this February 1, 1978, edition of Time Magazine detailed the unprecedented public scrutiny of the CIA under then-Director Stansfield Turner.
SPY5H_190520_599.JPG: Little Green Men!
SPY5H_190520_604.JPG: In The X-Files, fictitious FBI agents Mulder and Scully pursued government conspiracies surrounding UFOs. The TV show inspired the CIA to invite people to "Take a Peek into our X-Files" on its webpage about declassified UFO documents.
SPY5H_190520_608.JPG: Poster for the 1956 American film Earth vs. the Flying Saucers, made during the height of the UFO craze.
SPY5H_190520_618.JPG: An Alien Threat?
SPY5H_190520_622.JPG: This September 24, 1952, internal CIA memo was declassified in 1978 -- one of hundreds detailing the CIA's earlier investigations into UFOs.
SPY5H_190520_642.JPG: An Unlikely Hero
SPY5H_190520_650.JPG: An Enchanted Childhood
SPY5H_190520_652.JPG: Risking Her Life for Her Beliefs
SPY5H_190520_657.JPG: "Set Europe Ablaze"
SPY5H_190520_660.JPG: Not Over-Burdened with Brains
SPY5H_190520_668.JPG: Gone But Not Forgotten
SPY5H_190520_669.JPG: Betrayed. Beaten. Unbowed.
SPY5H_190520_673.JPG: After the war, SOE officer Vera Atkins went to France and Germany to investigate the fates of missing agents, including Noor Khan. In this voluntary statement from Hans Kieffer, the Paris Gestapo Commandant, he recalled Khan's bravery and inner strength.
AAA "Gem": AAA considers this location to be a "must see" point of interest. To see pictures of other areas that AAA considers to be Gems, click here.
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I still have them though. If you want me to email them to you, please send an email to guthrie.bruce@gmail.com
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2020_DC_Spy: DC -- International Spy Museum (5 photos from 2020)
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2019 photos: Equipment this year: I continued to use my Fuji XS-1 cameras but, depending on the event, I also used a Nikon D7000.
Trips this year:
a four-day jaunt to Massachusetts (Boston, Stockbridge, and Springfield) to experience rain in another state,
Asheville, NC to visit Dad and his wife Dixie,
four trips to New York City (including the United Nations, Flushing, and the New York Comic-Con), and
my 14th consecutive San Diego Comic-Con (including sites in Utah).
Number of photos taken this year: about 582,000.
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