IT'S COLD COMING OUT ONCE IN THE U.S. AND DEBRIEFED, DEFECTORS ARE OFTEN COLD-SHOULDERED. ONE BECAME A DISHWASHER IN A NOODLE SHOP, ANOTHER A BELLHOP.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP92B00478R000800020002-0
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: December 23, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 17, 2013
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: September 17, 1989
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

36
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?
aativuoricancenapthte /SEPTEMBER 17,1989
K.G.B.DEFECTORGUNDAREY
IFS COLD
COMING.
0111
Once in the U.S. and debriefed, defectors
are often cold-shouldered.
One became a dishwasher in a noodle shop,
another a bellhop.
Bo David Wise
T DUSK ON AN
evening in January
1986, two men from
different worlds
strolled together
down the street of an
Athens suburb. The
taller of the two, a sol-
idly built man with
receding red hair and
broad features, spoke
good but heavily ac-
cented English. His
name was Victor
Gundarev. He was a
full colonel in the
K.G.B. His message
was direct and elec-
trifying: He wanted to defect to the West.
His silver-haired companion, then the
C.I.A. station chief in Athens, knew just
what to do. As it happened, he was not only a
veteran clandestine operator for the agen-
cy, he specialized in Soviet operations.
David Forden had been chief of the agen-
cy's Soviet-East European ,Division only
two years earlier.
Every C.I.A. officer dreams of a high-
level Soviet "walk-in," and K.G.B. colonels
do not come along every day. Forden, fol-
lowing the rulebook, asked Gundarev, the
chief of counterintelligence and security for
the Soviet residentura, or K.G.B. station in
Athens, to remain in his post as a spy for the
United States. Gundarev declined. "They
wanted me to stay in place," he said later. "I
refused. I told him, 'I am not recruit.'"
Forden stalled and said he would have to
consult his superiors. But at a second secret
meeting, he had good news for Gundarev:
headquarters in Langley, Va., had agreed.
The C.I.A. would get him out of Greece. It
would be a high-risk operation, but when it
was over, Gundarev would have a new life
in America and a new identity. Forden gave
the K.G.B. man a phone number in Athens
and a code name to use when he dialed. The
C.I.A., he assured him, would take care of
the rest.
THREE YEARS LATER, ON JUNE 21 OF
this year, the telephone rang in my office in
Washington. "This is Victor," the voice said.
He would not, at first, give his last name, or
say from what city he was calling, nor
would he leave his telephone number. But
he said he was a former K.G.B. colonel who
had defected in Greece three years before
and had been living underground since then,
under the protection of the C.I.A. Cautious-
ly, Victor provided more details. He had be-
come so disillusioned with his treatment by
the C.I.A., he said, that he was seriously
considering redefecting. He read me a let-
David Wise is the author of "The Spy Who
Got Away," a book about Edward Lee How-
ard, the first C.I.A. officer to defect to the
Soviet Union.
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ter he had written to William H. Webster,
the . Director, of- Central Intelligence, in
April; a letter that had gone unanswered. "I
have received only promises, delays, and -
lies, the Same problems that caused me to
defect from -,the U.S.S.R.," Gundarev wrote.
"I. came to conclusion after three years in
U.S.A. that -..theSepenide Who would like to
defect' withI-tbe. help of C.I.A. should think.
twice."
"Victor" ',broke off the :conversation but
promised to call back the next day. He did:I
asked, hint a few 'key/ questions: From his
replies,4-:,Was'.:Satisfied that I was indeed
talking to Victor IGundarev, former colonel
of the : Kcimitet GosudarstvennOi Bezopas-
nosti (Committee for State Security).
Gundarestainded angry, and upset. The
agency;zhe:Clairned, had stalled for more
:than two years in providing his family with
green cards and Social Security numbers,
had searched ; his belongings, :tapped , his
telephone and short-changed him of $10,000
:in expenses they'd . promised to reimburse.
He said the had urged him not to go to
the news media. with his story, but he hoped
I would write about his case. "I want to let
them know I am not schoolboy," he said. He -
also disclosed that he had telephoned the
Soviet Embassy to ask for a meeting with .
Soviet officials (in the ;safety of the State '
Department) to try to find out what fate
might await him if he returned home. "I
think I was court-martialed, but I don't
, know my sentence," he said. -
We talked on the phone , several more
times, and it became apparent that the ?
C.I.A. might be about to find itself with an-
other Yurchenko case on its hands. Vitaly
Yurchenko, the K.G.B. official in charge of
all spying in North America, defected in Au-
gust of 1985. Three Months later, he walked
away from, his C.I.A. escort in a George-
town restaurant. Two days - afterward, he
held a dramatic , press conference in the
Soviet Embassy and then flew home to
Moscow. His redefection was a great em-
barrassment to the C.I.A. In its wake, the
agency promised Congress it would-under-
take a major overhaul of its ailing defector
program.
_
AS
THE YURCHENKO AND GUNDAREV :
Cases suggest, the C.I.A. is having trouble
:handling defectors. More than mere bu?
reaucratic bungling is involved. The agen-
cy's problems with, defectors appear to be
'-rooted in its'OWn'reeent history, in its coun-
terintelligence mission and in a deeply am-
bivalent attitude toward defectors on the. -
art of; at,least'Some
_
f. theIC:tk.'S 4."reset-
staff..ehiehif'"' ,Icor:.,Gur!d4r!i"
Yet defectors are a At,:a.d,i11#iii01
Major source of infer- :fuOilan in
mation for the intelli- 'Athens, where--:
gence, community he waschief of
and the Governnient, security at the
They-provide-signifi- K.G.B.
- itatiOa ?
GREEK PHOTO AGENCY/ATHENS
-
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37
4P
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1111
The C.I.A. gives some defectors big
money. One received nearly a million dollars, but
promptly lost it in Houston real estate.
38
PAUL FETTERS
Eugeny Novikov, Yurchenko, right,
left, a former party. boarding a plane,
official, worked embarrassed
as a bellhop after the C.I.A. by his
defecting. Vitaly redefection.
cant data about Soviet weaponry, foreign
policy and intelligence operations against
the West. They may bring vital clues that
unmask moles inside the United States Gov-
ernment or spies operating on the outside.
Vitaly Yurchenko, for example, provided
information about two Soviet spies, Ronald
W. Pelton, a former employee of the Na-
tional Security Agency, and Edward Lee
Howard, a former C.I.A. officer. Howard es-
caped to Moscow, but Pelton is serving a
life sentence for espionage.
Despite the importance of the defector
program, former C.I.A. officials say that
until recently it was managed by agency re-
treads, time-servers awaiting retirement
who had been passed over for promotion.
Although the new head of the C.I.A.'s Reset-
tlement Office ? whose identity is secret ?
gets high marks from his clandestine col-
leagues, the damage done in the past still
haunts the program. And the C.I.A., despite
its promise to make improvements, was
slow to move after the Yurchenko debacle.
Defectors have been an important and
often controversial part of the intelligence
agency's history from the start. Under the
legendary counterintelligence chief James
J. Angleton, the Central Intelligence
Agency was racked by conflicts between
key defectors and a mole hunt inside the
C.I.A. that lasted for two decades. The agen-
cy's handling of the Yurchenko episode was
a direct legacy of its mismanagement of a
much earlier case, that of Yuri I. Nosenko,
a K.G.B. officer who defected in 1964. For
more than three years Nosenko was con-
fined under harsh conditions, much of the
time in a windowless eight-foot-square con-
crete cell. C.I.A. interrogators tried repeat-
edly to break him, to prove he was a plant.
They failed, but in the wake of the Nosenko
case, the agency bent over backward to
avoid violating the civil rights of defectors.
As a result, Yurchenko was able to stroll
away from his C.I.A. escort unimpeded.
Some of the agency's current difficulties
stem from its counterintelligence priorities.
When a defector "comes over," the agency's
Counterintelligence Center has the difficult
task of determining whether the newcomer is
bona fide or a plant ? a "dispatched agent':
under Soviet control. Sometimes no clear con-
clusion can be reached. Most counterintelli-
gence officials, for example, believe that Yur-
chenko was a real defector, but the matter is
not resolved.
The C.I.A. is much more interested in the
information defectors may bring than in
their future welfare and comfort. Several
defectors interviewed complained that
once debriefed, they were cast aside. "I got
a lot of promises when I was 'fresh lemon,"
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F
Victor Gundarev wrote to Webster, the Di-
rector of Central Intelligence. "Up to now
those things are still promises."
Clearly in the eyes of the agency, there is a
hierarchy among defectors. Soviet intelli-
gence officers are resettled and supported;
some are given startlingly large amounts of
money. Others may literally end up as dish-
washers.
In the past, many of those handling defec-
tors looked down upon their charges. As a
former covert operator for the agency put
it, "Too many of our people had the attitude
that these guys were traitors to their own
country. They could never be trusted."
MY ARTICLE ON THE GUNDAREV
case, disclosing his complaints and his
threat to redefect, appeared on the Op-Ed
page of The New York Times on July 9. The
next day, the C.I.A., which normally con-
fines itself to a "no comment," issued a 307-
word statement vigorously defending its
defector program. The agency said that
Gundarev had been paid "a substantial
amount of money," and it assailed some of
his complaints as "false," including the "al-
legation that the C.I.A. invades the privacy
of individuals." The statement ended on an
odd note; it said the C.I.A. "welcomes" a
Congressional inquiry.
It got one. Since executive branch agen-
cies, especially secret ones, do not normally
welcome Congressional investigations, it
was obvious that the agency was trying to
get the jump on an inquiry already brewing.
Prodded by William W. Geimer, the presi-
dent of the Jamestown Foundation, a pri-
vate group that aids defectors, the Senate
and House intelligence committees had
been preparing for some weeks to scruti-
nize the C.I.A.'s defector program.
The Gundarev disclosure brought mat-
ters to a head. On July 25, the Senate Select
Committee on Intelligence began closed
hearings on the defector issue. The House
Permanent Select Com-
mittee on Intelligence
launched its own secret
inquiry. William Webster
testified before the Senate
panel, as did several de-
fectors. Victor Gundarev
was not invited.
ALTHOUGH THE C.I.A.
admits that as recently as
this year it has found
"certain deficiencies" in
its program for handling
defectors, it says that its
program has been sub-
stantially improved in a
number of ways, a view in
which several respected
former intelligence offi-
cers concur. It is not, how-
ever, a view shared by all
defectors. In a number of
cases, defectors have had
major problems with the
C.I.A. Some examples:
? Anatoly Bogaty, the acting K.G.B.
resident in Morocco, who defected in 1982,
lost almost a million dollars that he had
been paid by the C.I.A. after he entrusted
his money to an investment adviser recom-
mended by the agency. Bogaty, who lives
in the Washington area under another
name, declined to be interviewed. But
he has told his story to several friends
who confirmed the details.
? Eugeny Novikov, a
former top Arab special-
ist for the international
department of the Central
Committee of the Com-
munist Party, found him-
self working as a bellhop
at an upscale Alexandria,
Va., motel after the C.I.A.
had finished debriefing
him.
? Alexandra Costa, the
wife of the First Secre-
tary of the Soviet Em-
bassy in Washington, who
had been a professor in
Moscow with university
degrees in sociology and
Scandinavian languages,
was urged by the C.I.A. to
go to secretarial school
when she defected a dec-
ade ago.
? Vladimir N. Saltharov,
a former Soviet diplomat
(Continued on Page 82)
MICHAEL GEISSINGER/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Stanislav Levchenko and
Alexandra Costa each
defected in the late 1970's.
They were married last year
and now are writing a novel.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Alcur vnla TIMPC M (1 A 711%1P /SEPTEMBER 17.1989 39
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DEFECTORS
Continued from Page 39
in the Middle East who had
been co-opted by the K.G.B.,
risked his life to work as an
agent in place for the C.I.A.
before he defected in 1971. He
was devastated when the in-
telligence agency sent him to
a motel management school
in Hollywood.
? Andrey Sorokun, a Soviet
graduate student fluent in
three languages who de-
fected in Japan six years ago,
was dumped in Manhattan
penniless after four months
of debriefing by the C.I.A. in
Munich. He found, a room in
Spanish Harlem and consid-
ered himself lucky to get a
job as a dishwasher at an
Oriental noodle restaurant on
East 45th Street.
Y FRIDAY, FEB. 14,
1986, Gundarev had
made his final decision
to change sides. Despite glas-
nost and perestroika, the cold
war, or its modern equiva-
lent, is still being fought in the
shadows by the intelligence
agencies of East and West.
Gundarev was well aware
that the greatest risk lay
ahead in the next few hours.
For months, he had been
feuding with his chief, the
Athens K.G.B. "resident,"
Nikolai Tikhonovich Krestni-
kov. He had learned that
Krestnikov planned to ship
him back to Moscow early,
action that could lead to a
reprimand at headquarters.
Only a week before, Gunda-
rev's wife, Tatiana, had met
with Krestnikov to air a num-
ber of complaints, not least
among them her husband's
affair with Galina N. Gromo-
va, a somewhat younger,
blond woman who taught at
the school maintained by the
Soviet mission in Athens.
Gromova was, in fact, the
teacher of the Gundarevs'
7-year-old son, Maxim. (An-
other son, Igor, 14, was at
school back in Moscow.)
"I told the embassy I was
going to a doctor," Gundarev
recalled. "I drove to the
school and picked up Maxim
and Galina, who lived at the
school. I called David from a
pay phone and gave the code
name." Gundarev drove to a
suburb of the Greek capital.
There, C.I.A. officers were
waiting. "We switched cars. I
was flown out of Greece and
taken to a safehouse near
Washington."
As Gundarev was flying the
Atlantic, four heavily armed
K.G.B. men in two cars with
their headlights switched off
82
circled the American Em-
bassy in Athens for hours.
When arrested at 1 A.M., they
said they were looking for a
tavern.
At the safehouse, Gundarev
said, "I was debriefed for sev-
eral months." When the de-
briefing was over, the agen-
cy's counterintelligence staff,
headed by Gardner R. (Gus)
Hathaway, a veteran C.I.A.
officer, turned the former
-K.G.B. man over to the agen-
cy's Resettlement Office.
Gundarev was given a new
identity. With agency finan-
cial support, he was relo-
cated in another city along
with Galina ? who is now his
wife ? and Maxim. Although
Gundarev will not reveal
where he lives, the city is ap-
parently in the Western part
of the United States. By the
fall of 1986, both Gundarev
and the C.I.A. hoped he would
blend into the populace and
quietly disappear.
THE JAMESTOWN FOUN-
dation occupies the ground
floor of an aged, four-story,
gray stone town house a few
blocks north of Dupont Circle
in northwest Washington. It
TOPHAM PICTURE LIBRARY
ONE GUNDAREV REVELATION:
The Strange Case
Of Officer Bothwell
When a Soviet defector comes out, the first cies-
tion that C.I.A. counterintelligence asks is whether
he or she knows of any Soviet penetrations of United
States intelligence. Vector Gundarev gave the C.I.A.
the name of John H. Bothwell, a fanner officer of the
C.I.A. who had, before that, served as a submarine captain in the United States Navy.
Gundarev claimed that he had been running Bothwell as his agent.
Two days after Gundarev's defection, officers from Scotland Yard's Special Branch sur-
rounded Bothwell and arrested him as he stepped off a train at London's Packlington sta-
tion. The 59-year-old retired C.I.A. man was booked on espionage-related charges, ac-
cused of violating Britain's Official Secrets Act by arranging to communicate information
"useful to an enemy." Bothwell was imprisoned for six weeks, then freed on bail.
In July, all charges against him were suddenly dropped. The embarrassed British prose-
cutor, Michael Bibby, told the Bow Street Magistrates Court that Bothwell had been ar-
rested on information "from a very good source" that he had passed NATO secrets to the
Soviets. In Athens, the court was told, "he had legitimate business with the Russians, but
pressure was put on him by them to supply information. He also adnitted mating dead let-
ter drops to the Russians but it is now conceded that any information he did pass was to
dupe the Russians."
John Bothwell, who grew up in Narberth, Pa., a Philadelphia suburb, joined the Navy dur-
ing World Wall and rose to the rank of commander. He was skipper of three submarines.
The C.I.A. recruited 6ot/evel after he retired in 1965 and sent him to Athens under com-
mercial cover as a shipping-supply agent. When he left the C.I.A. in 1972, he remained in
Athens in the slipping business, later moving to England. Gundarev arrived in Athens in
1983, his cover a job as representative of the Soviet Ministry of Merchant Marine. In in-
terviews Bothwell gave after the spy charges against him were dropped, he said he often
met with Gundarev. He said he began supplying harmless information to the K.G.B. agent
so that he could Worm the United States Government of "what the Russians were inter-
ested in."
Bothwell did not return telephone calls last month asking for comment on Gundarev's
charges. Gundarev said another K.G.B. agent handled Bothwell before him for about six
years and left. "That's why I was sent to Greece, to handle him," Gundarev said. "He was
considered to be a vaksable agent." He said senior officials of the K.G.B.'s First Chief Di-
rectorate from Moscow "met Bothwell abroad several times." Gundarev claimed in the
Interview that Bothwell "provided information about submarines, about what the C.I.A.
wanted to know about the Soviets, and he identified many C.I.A. officers, both in London
and Athens. He described their family life, kids, money ? identifying those that we might
be able to remit. The most valuable information he provided was about Ohio-class nu-
clear subs," better known as Tridents.
The former K.G.B. man also claimed that Bothwell took a trip to the United States and
the Far East around 1982 and "the K.G.B. paid for it." He added: "I paid him $40,000 to
$50,000 a year. He was paid in cash, no receipts." Bothwell was paid "more or less the
same" amount for 9 or 10 years, Gundarev dams ? for a total of between $360,000
and $500,000.
Could Bothwell have been a double agent, or merely duping the Soviets as he later
claimed? "I had some doubts," Gundarev said. "But the bosses believed in Bothwell."
? David Wise
looks slightly spooky, just
how one would imagine the
headquarters of an obscure
foundation that deals with the
C.I.A. and with defectors
from Soviet and other com-
munist nations. William
Geimer, the foundation's
president, chain-smokes
Salem Lights as he talks
about what he perceives as
the shortcomings of the Gov-
ernment's defector handling.
He is an intense, dark-haired
man of 52, a lawyer who
served in the Nixon Adminis-
tration. Later, he represented
Arkady N. Shevchenko, Un-
dersecretary General of the
United Nations and the high-
est-ranking Soviet ever to de-
fect, in Shevchenko's rather
stormy dealings with New
York publishers over his
memoirs.
It was after that experience
that Geimer decided there
should be an organization to
help defectors. With money
from wealthy business as-
sociates in Chicago, he
started the foundation and
now works for it full time. He
said Jamestown receives no
C.I.A. or other Government
money. "Some people think
we're part of the agency, but
it's not true," Geimer said.
"There's been a war between
us, a quiet war. For years I've
been going over there com-
plaining. Typically, I have a
list of things I want them to
take action on. They agree to
look into it. Then nothing hap-
pens. I've given up on my
ability to deal with them qui-
etly."
In mid-June, Geimer met
with the chairmen and rank-
ing members of the Senate
and House intelligence com-
mittees. He turned over to
them a six-page memo
stamped "Confidential" that
amounts to a devastating cri-
tique of the C.I.A.'s defector
program. After defectors are
debriefed, Geimer's memo
said, "the agency no longer
has much use for them. In
fact, it has tended to view
them as problems."
Geimer lit up another filter
cigarette. "Defectors should
be helped because they are
unique sources of informa-
tion, insight and analysis on
the Soviet Union and Eastern
Europe," he said. "Glasnost
doesn't make defectors less
needed.. Quite the contrary.
They should be listened to
more than ever before. These
people make a contribution to
us. We have a duty to them."
Donald F. B. Jameson, a
former C.I.A. officer who
oversaw the handling of de-
fectors during a long career
in Soviet operations, agrees,
but for a practical reason. If
(Continued on Page 94)
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Continued from Page 82
defectors are helped, he
said, "it may encourage
others."
The psychology of defectors
has been little studied, al-
though one intelligence vet-
eran cited two characteristics
"that almost all defectors
share ? career frustration
and problems with spouses."
Typically, he said, defectors
tend to be "bright and ambi-
tious."
Since the number of Soviet
and other defectors handled by
the C.I.A. is classified, the total
can only be estimated. But
Clair George, the agency's for-
mer deputy director for opera-
tions, has said privately that
there are about 750 defectors
in the program, some dating
back to World War II.
According to Geimer, there
are three distinct categories
of defectors. "Most of the
C.I.A.'s defectors are '110's,'"
Geimer said. Under Public
Law 110, the Central Intelli-
gence Agency Act of 1949, the
director of the C.I.A., with the
approval of the Attorney
General and immigration au-
thorities, can quietly bring in
up to 100 aliens a year for in-
telligence or national se-
curity reasons. "The 110's are
well paid," Geimer continued.
"There's a commitment to
support them for life, if nec-
essary. But the defectors are
not told that." Keeping the de-
fectors uncertain about how
long their C.I.A. payments
will continue helps the
agency to control them,
Geimer indicated.
A second group of defectors
are partially supported. "At
the C.I.A. they call them '55's.
It's a sort of in-house slang ?
you know, half of 110." Unlike
the "110's," who are mostly
K.G.B. or other Soviet intelli-
gence officers or persons who
spied for the United States,
the "55's" tend to be medium-
to high-level defectors from
the Soviet Union or other
countries ? diplomats, mili-
tary officers and government
officials. The third group con-
sists of lesser officials, stu-
dents, athletes, artists and
others. "The third category,"
Geimer explained, "get a
hearty handshake and that's
it."
LATE IN JULY, GUNDA-
rev agreed to be interviewed
in person. There were two in-
terviews on successive days,
lasting a total of more than
five hours. The meetings took
place in separate locations in
Washington. There were no
C.I.A. officials or other per-
sons present.
Toward the end of the sec-
ond interview, Gundarev
agreed to be photographed
with his face in shadow. Why
not live openly, as some de-
fectors ? but very few from
the K.G.B.? do? "Neighbors
would say I am K.G.B. My
son might be bothered at
school." Was he worried
about what the K.G.B. might
do to him, about his personal
safety? "For sure. There's
some risk. True, times
change."
"So you are less worried
about 'wet affairs?'" I
asked. (The chilling phrase
is K.G.B. jargon for assassi-
nations.)
"Yes, they had mokrie
dela," he said ? Russian for
"wet affairs." "I don't know a
single case in the last 15
years or more. But there is
risk."
Now 49, Gundarev was born
in Siberia and entered the
K.G.B. at 19. He was a member
of the party and before that of
Komsomol, the Soviet youth
organization. He rose through
the ranks of the First Chief Di-
rectorate, the K.G.B. arm that
spies in other countries, and
before arriving in Greece six
years ago had served in India
and Portugal. A barrel-
chested man of military bear-
ing, just under six feet tall, he
speaks in a rapid-fire style, oc-
casionally groping for the cor-
rect English word. He is
bright, highly articulate and
independent-minded. He would
have to be to voice his discon-
tent with the agency in public;
defectors under C.I.A. protec-
tion are supposed to be silent
and invisible.
The bureaucracy in Lang-
ley is not the first Gundarev
has battled. In Athens, he
clashed with Krestnikov, the
resident, and others in the
mission because of what he
said were his efforts to ex-
pose rampant corruption.
"An engineer in the trade
mission in Athens hanged
himself," Gundarev said. "I
prepared a report saying he
committed suicide because
he was not promoted because
his bosses were corrupt; they
had taken bribes from Greek
businessmen. The engineer
had tried to stop it and he
couldn't. My report was not
sent to Moscow. I was not al-
lowed to tell the truth."
Gundarev says that his mo-
tive for defecting was per-
sonal in part, but claims that
his larger reason was politi-
cal: "I was a little ahead of
Gorbachev in trying to follow
perestroika in the K.G.B."
Like so many defectors, Gun-
(Continued on Page 112)
Arkady Shevchenko, the Undersecretary General of the United Nations and the highest
ranking Soviet official to defect, became a U.S. citizen in 1986. His wife, Elaine, is by his side.
A-I PLAN YOUR SPECIAL EVENT FOR 2-600 GUESTS
Declassified and Approved For Release 2013/12/17: CIA-RDP92B00478R000800020002-0
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111
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DEFECTORS
Continued from Page 94
darev, once safely resettled,
found the transition trau-
matic. The C.I.A. pays him
well, he said, declining to
name the figure except to
say it was "niore than
$30,000 a year. But it's not
enough to cover my 30-year
mortgage, state and Federal
taxes, and provide for my
son's future."
Gundarev's main com-
plaint is that the C.I.A.
"promised a lot but they
haven't given me the docu-
mentation you need to exist in
this society." He is particu-
larly bitter about what he
says was a promise of fast
citizenship. "At first they
promised citizenship and
then they said I was a party
member and sorry, wait five
years and then you may
apply."
Most immigrants must
wait five years to become
naturalized citizens. Soviet
defectors who were party
members may have to wait
an additional five years.
Under a little-known section
of the immigration law, how-
ever, persons who make an
"extraordinary contribu-
tion" to "United States intel-
ligence activities" may be
given citizenship after one
year. The Director of Central
Intelligence can recommend
five such persons each year.
The C.I.A. declined to com-
ment when asked whether
Victor Gundarev had been
promised early citizenship,
but officials familiar with his
case insisted he had not.
However, Gundarev is not
the only defector to suggest
that the C.I.A. promised
quick citizenship and re-
neged, and the subject is an
especially touchy one in
Langley.
When asked about delays
in providing defectors with
immigration and Social Se-
curity documents, C.I.A. offi-
cials tend to blame the other
agencies involved. Still, the
suspicion lingers among
some defectors that the
agency uses delay as a lever
of control over their lives.
In its angry response to
Gundarev's initial com-
plaints, the C.I.A. maintained
that Gundarev had "rejected
the agency's efforts to place
him with firms" in a suitable
job. "To our knowledge, he
has' not sought employment
on his own," it added. But
Gundarev said the agency
had come up with "only one
job offer, in March of this
year. I agreed to meet with
the company but the meeting
didn't take place."
It was true he had not
sought employment on his
own, Gundarev said, but for a
good reason. "I cannot, be-
cause I have no documents
except green card. I can't
just walk in, because the
company would say 'Who are
you? What jobs have you
held, where are your docu-
ments?'" The C.I.A., 'he said,
had promised to provide "a
legend to back up my life," a
euphemism for a false
r?m?"I can't admit my
true name," he said. "They
say I have not applied for
In the past, said
a former agent,
'Many of our
people had the
attitude that
these guys were
traitors to their
own country.'
jobs on my own. Sorry guys,
how can I? They have not
provided documentation in
my new name, to back it up."
For its part, and despite the
Gundarev affair, the C.I.A.
continues to insist that its de-
fector program has been sub-
stantially upgraded. James
W. Greenleaf, who directs the
agency's public affairs office,
said the C.I.A. devotes "sig-
nificant resources" to helping
defectors and their families,
paying for educational ex-
penses, and in some cases,
medical bills. The defector
program's budget and staff
have been "increased sub-
stantially," with more senior
managers, "more language-
qualified personnel," and
strengthened psychiatric and
psychological counseling
services. In addition, Green-
leaf said, "an independent ex-
ternal review board has been
established to address griev-
ances" by individual defec-
tors.
Former C.I.A. officials
who closely monitor the
treatment of defectors say
that improvements have
been made. Donald Jameson,
who has worked with many
defectors, said he was opti-
mistic. The official ulti-
mately responsible for the
defector program is the
agency's deputy director for
operations, known as the
D.D.O., a job held since 1987
by Richard F. Stolz, a C.I.A.
veteran whom Webster
brought back from retire-
ment. "The head of the reset-
tlement program is now an
excellent D.D.O. person with
Soviet experience," Jameson
said. "They have the best
person I could imagine their
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112
Declassified and Approved For Release 2013/12/17 : CIA-RDP92B00478R000800020002-0