Espionage or
Spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered
secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently
clandestine, as the legitimate holder of the information may change plans or take other countermeasures once it is known that the information is in unauthorized hands. See
clandestine HUMINT for the basic concepts of such information collection, and subordinate articles such as
clandestine HUMINT operational techniques and
clandestine HUMINT asset recruiting for discussions of the "tradecraft" used to collect this information.
History
Incidents of espionage are well documented throughout
history. The ancient writings of
Chinese and
Indian military strategists such as
Sun-Tzu and
Chanakya contain information on deception and
subversion. Chanakya's student
Chandragupta Maurya, founder of the
Maurya Empire in India, made use of
assassinations, spies and secret agents, which are described in Chanakya's
Arthasastra. The
ancient Egyptians had a thoroughly developed system for the acquisition of intelligence, and the
Hebrews used spies as well, as in the story of
Rahab.
Feudal Japan often used
ninjas to gather intelligence. More recently, spies played a significant part in
Elizabethan England (see
Francis Walsingham). Many modern espionage methods were well established even then.
The
Cold War involved intense
espionage activity between the
United States of America and its allies and the
Soviet Union and the
People's Republic of China and their allies, particularly related to
nuclear weapons secrets. Recently, espionage agencies have targeted the
illegal drug trade and those considered to be
terrorists.
Different intelligence services value certain
intelligence collection techniques over others. The former Soviet Union, for example, preferred
human sources over
research in open sources, while the United States has tended to emphasize technological methods such as
SIGINT and
IMINT. Both Soviet political (
KGB) and military intelligence (
GRU) officers were judged by the number of agents they recruited.
Various forms
Unlike other forms of
intelligence collection disciplines, espionage usually involves accessing the place where the desired information is stored, or accessing the people who know the information and will divulge it through some kind of
subterfuge. There are exceptions to physical meetings, such as the
Oslo Report, or the insistence of
Robert Hanssen in never meeting the people to whom he was selling information.
The US defines espionage towards itself as "The act of obtaining, delivering, transmitting, communicating, or receiving information about the national defense with an intent, or reason to believe, that the information may be used to the injury of the United States or to the advantage of any foreign nation. Espionage is a violation of United States law, and Article 106 of the
Uniform Code of Military Justice". The United States, like most nations, conducts espionage against other nations, under the control of the
National Clandestine Service. Britain's espionage activities are controlled by the
Secret Intelligence Service.
Espionage is usually part of an institutional effort (i.e.,
governmental or corporate espionage), and the term is most readily associated with
state spying on potential or actual enemies, primarily for
military purposes, but this has been extended to spying involving
corporations, known specifically as
industrial espionage. Many
nations routinely spy on both their enemies and allies, although they maintain a
policy of not making comment on this. In addition to utilizing agencies within a government many also employ private companies to collect information on their behalf such as
SCG International Risk and others.
Black's Law Dictionary (1990) defines espionage as: "...gathering, transmitting, or losing...information related to the
national defense".
While news media may speak of "spy satellites" and the like, espionage is not a synonym for all types of intelligence functions. It is a specific form of human source intelligence (
HUMINT). Codebreaking (
cryptanalysis or
COMINT), aircraft or satellite photography (
IMINT) and research in open publications (
OSINT) are all intelligence gathering disciplines, but none of them are espionage. Not all HUMINT activities, such as interviewing prisoners, reports from military reconnaissance patrols and from diplomats, etc., are espionage.
A spy is a person employed to obtain such secrets. Within the US intelligence community, asset is a more common usage. A
case officer, who may have
diplomatic status (i.e.,
official cover or
non-official cover) supports and directs the human collector. Cutouts are
couriers who do not know the agent or case officer, but transfer messages. A
safe house is a refuge for spies.
In larger networks, the organization can be complex, with many methods to avoid detection, including
clandestine cell systems. Often the players have never met and are sometimes unaware that they are participating. This is often referred to as "the
Tyson Effect", where important players are unaware of their own participation. See
Clandestine HUMINT for details of the actual operations and people of espionage systems.
Case officers are stationed in foreign countries to recruit and supervise intelligence agents, who in turn spy on targets in their countries where they are assigned. A spy may or may not be an actual citizen of a target country. While the more common practice is to recruit a person already trusted with access to sensitive information, there are cases where a person may attempt to infiltrate a target organization, with a well-prepared synthetic identity for them, called a
legend in tradecraft.
These agents can be
moles (who are recruited before they get access to secrets),
defectors (who are recruited after they get access to secrets and leave their country) or
defectors in place (who get access but do not leave).
Risks
The risks of espionage vary. A spy breaking the host country's laws may be deported, imprisoned, or even executed. A spy breaking his/her own country's laws can be imprisoned for espionage or/and treason, or even executed, as the
Rosenbergs were. For example, when
Aldrich Ames handed a stack of dossiers of
CIA agents in the
Eastern Bloc to his KGB-officer "handler", the
KGB "rolled up" several networks, and at least ten people were secretly shot. When Ames was arrested by the
FBI, he faced life in prison; his contact, who had diplomatic immunity, was declared
persona non grata and taken to the airport. Ames's wife was threatened with life imprisonment if her husband did not cooperate; he did, and she was given a five-year sentence.
Hugh Francis Redmond, a CIA officer in China, spent nineteen years in a Chinese prison for espionage—and died there—as he was operating without diplomatic cover and immunity.
Many organizations, both national and non-national, conduct espionage operations. It should not be assumed that espionage is always directed at the most secret operations of a target country; national and terrorist organizations and other groups needed to get agents into target countries to learn security routines around their targets. They also needed to arrange secure ways of transferring money.
Communications both are necessary to espionage and clandestine operations, and also a great vulnerability when the adversary has sophisticated SIGINT detection and interception capability.
See espionage organizations for national and non-national groups that conduct clandestine human operations, for any of a number of reasons: assessment of national capabilities at the strategic level, warning of the movements of security and military organizations; financial systems; protective measures around targets.
Spies in various conflicts
Espionage under Elizabeth I of England
Espionage in the American Revolution
Espionage in the Napoleonic Wars
Espionage in the American Civil War
One of the innovations in the American Civil War was the use of proprietary companies for intelligence collection. See
Allan Pinkerton.
Espionage in the Second Boer War
Espionage in World War I
Espionage in World War II
FBI file photo of the leader of the Duquesne Spy Ring (1941)
With a few notable exceptions, most espionage in World War II was conducted by "rings", or teams of agents.
Espionage technology and techniques
Spy fiction
An early example of espionage literature is
Kim by the English novelist
Rudyard Kipling, with a description of the training of an intelligence agent in the
Great Game between the
UK and
Russia in 19th century
Central Asia. An even earlier work was
James Fenimore Cooper's classic novel,
The Spy, written in 1821, about an American spy in New York during the
Revolutionary War.
During the many 20th century spy scandals, a large amount of information became publicly known about national spy agencies and dozens of real-life secret agents. These sensational stories piqued public interest in a profession largely off-limits to human interest news reporting, a natural consequence of the secrecy inherent to their work. To fill in the blanks, the popular conception of the secret agent has been formed largely by 20th and 21st century
literature and
cinema. While it is obvious from reading news accounts that many real spies, such as
Valerie Plame, are attractive and sociable, the fictional secret agent is often a loner, sometimes amoral—an
existential hero operating outside the everyday constraints of society. Loner spy personalities may have been a stereotype of convenience for authors who already knew how to write loner
private investigator characters that sold well from the 1920s to the present.
While fictional secret agents, such as
Johnny Fedora, were popular during the 1950s and 60s,
James Bond, the protagonist of
Ian Fleming's novels, who went on to spawn an extremely successful film franchise, is the most famous
fictional secret agent of all: he uses the best toys and excels at fighting and seduction, completely ignoring the more tedious side of espionage. In direct contrast to this,
John le Carré's character
George Smiley is often considered the "anti-Bond" and one of the more realistic fictional spies: he is a finite and imperfect man, initially defeated by enemies within the Secret Service, who eventually prevails by patience, intelligence, and compassion. Another is the boy spy
Alex Rider, created by
Anthony Horowitz; Rider is said to be useful due to his youth. Other popular spies are the characters
Johnny Fedora by
Desmond Cory;
Quiller by
Adam Hall;
Philip McAlpine by
Adam Diment. Nikita, played by
Peta Wilson, and Michael Samuelle, played by
Roy Dupuis, in the TV series
La Femme Nikita (1997–2001),
Jack Ryan in numerous
Tom Clancy novels, as well as
Jason Bourne from
Robert Ludlum's Bourne trilogy, and
Sydney Bristow, played by
Jennifer Garner, in the TV series
Alias (2001–2006). The British TV series
Spooks is another example of spy fiction.
Spy fiction has also become prevalent in video gaming, where the "
wetwork" aspect of espionage is highlighted. Game situations typically involve agents sent into enemy territory for purposes of subversion. These depictions are more action-oriented than would be typical in most cases of espionage, and they tend to focus on infiltration rather than information-gathering. Some examples are
GoldenEye 007,
Perfect Dark,
Thief,
Metal Gear and
Splinter Cell. Recent incarnations have attempted to introduce more psychological aspects of infiltration, such as social camouflage and moral decision making, into gameplay.
