RUSSIANS SAY AN EX-C.I.A. MAN WHO SPIED IN INDIA HAS DEFECTED

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90B00184R000100010004-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: U
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 27, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 19, 2012
• Sequence Number: 4
• Publication Date: October 20, 1967
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/09/19: CIA-RDP90B0018456100010004-4 1MiS'
Russians Say an Ex-C.I.A . Man
Who Spied in India Has Defected I
By RAYMOND H. ANDERSON
Special to The New York Time,
MOSCOW, Oct. 24 ? Aning members of the army's Gen-
American who identifed him-' eral Staff.
self as a former agent of the Mr. Smith indicates in an in-
troduction to the excerpt pub- 1.1
Central Intelligence Agency lished today that insights about
was reported today to have de- the activities of the C.I.A. are
fected to the Soviet Union. to be expected in his book.
An excerpt from a book "It is impossible to keep
written by the American, John secrets from code clerks be-
cause of the nature of their
Smith of Quincy, .Mass., pur- work," he writes.
porting to expose United Mr. Smith says that, besides
States espionage activities in serving in the embassy in India,
India, is printed in the latest he worked in embassies in Cey-
edition of Literaturnaya Ga- Ion, South Africa, Saudi Arabia,
Pakistan and Afghanistan.
zeta, the weekly organ of the . The defector alleges that he
Union of Soviet writers. was persecuted and forced to
The book is considered by quit the diplomatic service be-
some observers in Moscow to cause of nonconformist politcal
be the latest volley in a spy- views and disagreement with
book duel between the Soviet United States foreign policies.
Before he came to the Soviet
Union, he writes, he wandered
through many countries, includ-
ing Australia, Switzerland and
Italy.
Mr. Smith does not make it
clear when he arrived in the
Soviet Union. The United States
Embassy in Moscow said that it
had no information about him.
Union and the West. It fol-
lows the publication in Britain
last month of "Man From Mos-
cow" by Greville M. Wynne, a
Briton sentenced to eight years
in a Soviet prison in 1963 as
an accomplice of Col. Oleg V.
Penkovsky, who was executed
as a traitor. Mr. Wynne was
released the next year in an
exchange for a Soviet spy jailed
in Britain.
The Soviet spy, Gordon A.
Lonsdale, was sentenced in
1961 to 25 years in prison by
the British as the "directing
mind" of an espionage ring at
the Portland naval base.
After his return to Moscow,
Lonsdale published a book,
"Spy," in 1965.
Authenticity Challenged
Tass Reports on Defector
MOSCOW, Oct. 24 (AP)?
According to a summary in
Tass, the Soviet press agency,
Mr. Smith served in the United
States Navy and went to work 11
for the State Department in
1950.
He was said to have spent
his first 17 years in Quincy,
About the same time, the
Mass. receiving his education
alleged memoirs of Colonel
at Thayer Academy in nearby
Penkovsky were published in Braintree. Then he worked at
the United States under the
yards that manufactured war-
title "The Penkovskiy Papers." ships before he volunteered for
The book, the authenticity of the Navy.
which has been challenged, After studying at naval
sheds light on the operations of schools, Tass said, he was sent
Soviet intelligence, into permanent service at a
In turn, the book of the self-
special liaison department of
t
styled Central Intelligence the Navy, which was engaged
Agency man purports to expose in deciphering enemy codes.
operations of that agency.
After the war, it said, he at-
'
Tho author, who has taken tended Washington University.
Soviet citizenship and now lives According to the account,
in Moscow, says that he was Mr. Smith and an agent called
"
recruited by the C.I.A. while he Pete Petersen" taped conver-
was serving in the United States sations of the Indian military.
Embassy in New Delhi as a dip-
Meanwhile, it said, his wife,
lomatic code clerk.
"Mary London Smith, who
He describes in detail a plot worked with the C.I.A., sup-
Inposedly told him about "many
which he says he played the secret agents of the C.I.A.
key role in gaining access to the
secret codes of an unidentified among the Indian military."
nonaligned nation.
The nation's pro-Soviet poli-
Soviet Motive Assailed
cies were troubling Washing- special to The New York Times
ton, he says. WASHINGTON, Oct. 24 ?
Mr. Smith identifies John United States intelligence of fi-
Waller, John Marsh and other cials suggested today that the
diplomats in the United States Soviet Government was pub-
Embassy in New Delhi in the licizing the memoirs of an al- L
nineteen-fifties as fellow con-lleged American defector from 5,1
spirators in the employ of ,the the Central Intelligence Agency 7
Central Intelligence Agency. to offset publicity about the
He asserts that the agency re- recent defection of a Soviet in-
cruited agents among the top telligence official, Lieut. Col.
Indian military leaders, includ- Yevgeny Y Runge.
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Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/09/19: CIA-RDP90B00184R000100010004-4
WERE U. S. DIPLOMATS
? BLIND TO THE CRISIS?
WASHINGTON?The contention has
been advanced that the State Depart-
meut downgraded the possibility of war
in the Middle East and found itself to-
tally unprepared when the crisis came
to a head.
Such a view was expressed by the
former U. S. charge: d'affaires in Cairo,
David C. Nes. Mr. Nes was the acting
chief of the U. S. Embass,: in Cairo. His
was the ; responsibility evacuating
Ameri( an personnel from 1.1:erot, a job
he bit it it off without a NI ch.
5iit when /qr. Mis ryai lied his horne
Baltimore, he voiced it few observa-
111 tiOns Which stunned male of his col-
iengues'' at the State Department. In
eOnversat ions with newsmen, Mr. Nes
made these points?
? Despite warnings from Cairo early
4!: this year, the State Department made no
*efforts to deter Carnal Abdel Nasser
from his military adventure.
? Washington ignored repeated pleas
?,, from the Cairo Embassy to send a top-
flight trouble shooter to Cairo.
? When a new U. S. Ambassador ar-
rived in Egypt and was asked about
the impending crisis, he replied: "What
State Department reaction to the Nes
t statement- Warnings had been received
of troubh to come, but there was little
i;. the:, U: S. I Mild do about it.
1;. REAL COST TO ISRAEL
ON THE BATTLEFIELD
;1 Just how badly was Israel hurt, in
-jterms of killed and wounded, by the
;1 Mideast conflict?
!, When judged against Arab losses?as
shown by the chart on this page?the
Israeli casualties seem minor.
In relation to population, however, Is-
. rads losses appear in a different light.
Compare, for example, Israeli casualties
iii the war's six days with U. S. casual-
ties in six years of fighting in Vietnam,
measure them against the populations of
the two countries, and this picture
emerges?
o In battle deaths, on a population
basis, Israel's were nearly five times as
Itch as those of the U. S.
e III wounded, on the same basis, Is-
were three times as high.
The figures that back this up?
The U. S. population is about 76
tliat ? if Israel.
iirael Ii al 679 killed in the Mideast
in pact equal to 51,604 deaths
i.. the U. S. population. American bat-
C.! deallis in Vietnam have been 10,958. ?
Israel had 2,563 wounded?equal to
tie. impact of 194,788 casualties in the
THE SCORE
ON MIDEAST
WAR LOSSES
These, are the losses
suffered by each side in
the Israeli-Arab conflict, as
compiled from both offi-
cial and unofficial sources.
Some figures are firm.
Most are estimates.
-16,t1po
ISM
? ?
?Wide World Photo
CASUALTIES
Israel 679 killed, 2,563 wounded, 16 captured
Arab countries 15,000 killed, 50,000 wounded, 11,500 captured
Egypt's losses are estimated at 7,000 to 10,000 killed,
many thousands wounded, 10,500 captured. Jordan's:
15,000 killed and wounded. Syria's: 35,000 killed,
wounded and captured.
Israel
AIRCRAFT
21 planes destroyed
Arab countries 441 planes destroyed
Israel
61 destroyed
TANKS
Arab countries 670 destroyed, 100 to 300 captured intact
Israel
NAVAL FORCES
No losses reported
Arab countries 2 or 3 Egyptian submarines sunk
A few Egyptian rocket boats damaged
Israel
ECONOMIC LOSS
100 million dollars in military equipment, lost business,
salaries, etc.
Arab countries 700 million dollars in weapons, aircraft, supplies and
ammunition, plus hundreds of millions in interrupted oil
sales, Suez Canal revenues and tourist spending
IN ADDITION: Israel, through capture, gained a great arsenal. Up to
300 Russian-built tanks, taken from the Egyptians, are judged to be
Immediately usable. Also captured by the Israelis:
? A complete missile base, equipped with Soviet surface-to-air
rockets
? Hundreds of field guns, more than 70,000 tons of ammunition
? Thousands of trucks and other vehicles
? A large part of the supplies and equipment 'of seven Egyptian
divisions
.. Declassified . and Approved For Release 2012/09/19: CIA-RDP90B00184R000100010004-4
-
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/09/19: CIA-RDP90B00184R000100010004-4
could be home to living organisms. In
balloonlike form, Venusian life could
float in the dense atmosphere, never ap-
proaching the searing surface.
In the Clouds. Of the planetary en-
vironments investigated so far by tele-
scope and space probe, the scientist,
write in Nature, conditions in the atmo
phere of Venus resemble those on edit.
more than anywhere else. In the lowI.
Venusian clouds, they say, there is ci,1?
bon dioxide, water and sunshine?pi-L..
requisites for photosynthesis. The tem-
peratures are chilly, but above free. , .g.
If small amounts of minerals v,e,:e
stirred up to the clouds from Venus' sur-
face, the scientists believe that an in-
digenous biology?based entirely on
biochemical principles observed on
earth?could exist.
Because the organisms would encoun-
ter severe cold if they drifted farther
up in the clouds, or extreme heat if
they descended too far toward the sur-
face, Morowitz and Sagan speculate
that they must be regulated to hover at
an essentially fixed altitude. Thus, the
organisms could well take the form of
a gasbag or float bladder containing hy-
drogen gas?which the organism itself
could produce by decomposing water.
Greenhouse Effect. Depending on the
thickness of the membrane, they ca,-
culate, the organisms could range from
the size of a pingpong ball to more com-
plex and thicker-skinned gas spheres
many times larger. Despite their inter-
nal hydrogen, Sagan jokes scientifically,
there would be little danger of min-
iature Hindenburg disasters; there is lit-
tle or no free oxygen in the Venusian
atmosphere to support an explosion of
hydrogen.
To critics who point out that it wouiu
be difficult for life to arise spontaneous
ly in the atmosphere, Morowitz anti
Sagan have a ready answer: it did not.
,Instead, they postulate, ancient Venus
had a much thinner atmosphere; its sur-
face, now superheated by the green-
house effect of a thick carbon-dioxide-
filled atmosphere, was once cool enough
to spawn life. As more gas was spewed
into the atmosphere by volcanic action,
however, the surface temperatures grad-
ually became unbearable and could have
driven the more buoyant organisms into
the clouds, where they evolved and may
well exist today.
SCIENCE
ECOLOGY
Fighting for Aldabra
Almost 10% of the wildlife on the
tiny raised atoll of Aldabra, 400 miles
cast of Africa, can be found nowhere
else on earth. Owing to its isolation, Al-
dabra's ecosystem has remained unique.
Soaring with 7-ft. wingspreads at al-
titudes of more than half a mile, hun-
dreds of thousands of frigate birds,
which use Aldabra as their major In-
dian Ocean nesting site, blot 'out the
rays of the sun. Thousands of rare
giant land tortoises, some 4-ft. across
and weighing as much as 600 lbs., creep
across the pitted coral and ridged lime-
stone surface of the island. Tiny flight-
less rails nestle amidst Aldabra's bushy
scrub and mangrove forests, while above
them swoop red-footed boobies, sacred
. ibises and fruit-eating bats. Twenty of
the island's plant species are nonexistent
elsewhere in the world; so are a host
of its insect inhabitants.
Aldabra, with only a tiny human colo-
ny on one of its islands, is to scientists
a unique natural laboratory for the
study of evolution; as early as 1874,
Charles Darwin fought successfully to
keep the atoll unsullied by man. Now
British scientists once again have to
fight for Aldabra. The opposing force:
Her Majesty's Defense Ministry, which
late last year announced that Britain
was weighing the possibility of develop-
ing the island as a major airbase and
satellite tracking station in cooperation
with the U.S.
Collision Hazard. Building such a
base on Aldabra would be an ecologi-
cal disaster, said Britain's Royal So-
ciety of scientists in a memorandum to
Defense Minister Denis Healey last
May. Healey responded noncommittally,
so the society mounted an eleven-man
midsummer expedition to the island to
prove its point.
This month, seven members of the
group returned after studying Aldabra's
? ROYAL SOCIETY
--- ? .
'k AtT
' , ? 4.,..i.,,,?_rA71,-A5.3,-,42.2q..
,e- ? - ?-Nir-4,for
wildlife and the hazards posed to it by
the construction of such a base. To es-
tablish an airstrip on Aldabra would
require dredging and damming the
atoll's 18-mile-long lagoon, creating a
harbor and building a I3-mile cause-
way from the harbor to the airstrip.
Such an invasion of bulldozers, con-
crete mixers and men, said the sci-
entists, would irreversibly damage the
ecosystem of the island. They added
that the frigate birds would constitute
one of the worst aircraft-collision haz-
ards in the world. The frigate is a sea
bird that spends its adolescent years
far from the island, returning to mate
only after it is mature. Each year, a
new crop of adults arrives for the mat-
ing ritual, thus posing a problem to
aircraft that could last longer than a dec-
ade even if an extermination program
were undertaken.
Healey has remained noncommittal.
"No decision has yet been made on the
use of Aldabra for defense purposes,"
he 'said. But the scientists were obvious-
ly unwilling to settle for bureaucratic
vagueness. One biologist dryly noted
that, of course, the giant land tortoise
could always survive in the London
Zoo. "The Union Jack flying over Alda-
bra is evidence of our custodianship of
a biological treasure house," the mag-
azine New Scientist reminded Healey.
"It is not a license to kill."
EXOBIOLOGY
Gasbags of Venu,s,
After four-month journeys through
space, Russia's Venus 4 and the U.S.
Mariner 5 spacecraft will both reach
Venus this week. No matter what the
space probes find, most scientists have
already written off the possibility that
Venusian life exists; the planet's ap-
parent surface temperature is approxi-
mately 800? F., above the melting point
of lead.
Just the same, say Astronomer and
Exobiologist* Carl Sagan and Biophys-
icist Harold Morowitz, it is conceivable
that earth's nearest planetary neighbor
* Exobiology: the science of extraterrestrial
life.
60
,
4.0ailiesioNsakaa"
GIANT LAND TORTOISES
Better there than the zoo.
RA ATOLL
Main Channel
(harbor & dam Red-footed
proposed) boobies
MIDDLE ISLAND
agO?11.
WEST
SOUTH
ISLAND
o 2 1 mf.
TIME Map by V. Puglisi
git14
land
tortoises
osed
ield
Frigate-
brrds ?
TIME, OCTOBER 20, 1967
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/09/19: CIA-RDP90B00184R000100010004-4