How do people become spies…
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bikebryan — 20 years ago(September 08, 2005 01:11 PM)
Most of what you post I agree with, but do you really think the CIA doesn't retain foreign non-citizens? Come on, be real. They make not "officially" work for the Agency, but if the CIA is paying them for the HUMINT they provide, then they are at least contracted by the Agency thus they are employed by the CIA. They just, in general, don't work in the CIA offices either in the States or abroad.
I don't doubt for one second the CIA has paid killers on it's payroll either. However, I don't for one second think that ANY of them are ex-convicts. An assassin generally has to know why they are sent out to kill somebody, AND agree with the reason, or they won't be assigned to retire the mark. -
rocked-by-rape — 20 years ago(September 11, 2005 12:03 PM)
They have a position on the CIA.gov website that sounds like you do some killing because it requires that you have combat experience or military SF training to be considered. I think its a Specialized Skills Operations Officer if I remember reading it correctly. That might count as a hired killer or someone trained to kill.
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californiacotton — 18 years ago(February 23, 2008 01:35 AM)
They hire citizens (field ops officers) who thus "recruit" (ie. hire $$) foreign operatives to conduct surveillance and feed information to Washington through the operatives. These foreign recruits most often times are found in positions of some power in the home country.
Read Kessler's "Inside the CIA" for a good portrait of the operations of the CIA. One thing is for sure, US tax dollars are generously distributed to obtain information. -
jchamberlain-2 — 12 years ago(November 29, 2013 04:09 PM)
You are confusing some of your terms. The CIA uses case officers that are US citizens employed by the federal government to identify, recruit, and run assets which are typically local to the country where the I telligence activity is happening.
Now the CIA will recruit Americans to work for the agency in much the same way any other group does, through its web site, job boards, career fairs etc. the vetting process can be relatively complex depending on your background, work history etc. -
nitejrny282 — 14 years ago(September 26, 2011 11:03 AM)
When President Roosevelt established the OSS (now the CIA) in 1942, he expressly wanted it to be a non-military agency. And the man he put in charge of creating the agency, Major "Wild Bill" Donovan, was a bit of a snob, and focused on Ivy League schools. Professors, coaches, members of faculty were used to recruit students straight out of class and into the Agency. That's why the CIA had a rep - until the 70's or 80's - for being very WASPY. Especially compared to Hoover's FBI, which Donovan saw as a bunch of glorified cops. Blue collar agents to his white collar agents. If you watch MUNICH you'll notice the CIA men are all blond. Very good casting on Spielberg's part. As for today, it's probably more of a mix between college and military recruiting. For more, check out what's probably the best historical-fiction novel ever written on the CIA, "The Company" by Robert Littell. They made a mini-series, but it didn't even come close to the book.
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popdog011 — 20 years ago(September 19, 2005 11:00 PM)
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Thrillhouse8 — 20 years ago(September 20, 2005 02:59 PM)
Most CIA OPERATIVES are recruited out of the military. These are the jobs that we see in the movies (usually depicted inaccurately). However, many people are recruited into the CIA or other intelligence agencies out of college. They too can sometimes have assignments that take them overseas. But generally the intelligence community seeks people with skills in political and computer science, accounting (to track the financial status of terrorists), foreign languages (not the usual romance or germanic languages like spanish, french, german, italian, etc. but what they call "low-density" foreign languages like Arabic, Farsi, Uzbeki, Mandarin and so on). Unfortunately, competition for these jobs is extremely high. People have been romanced by these movies thinking that they can lead fascinating lives similar to James Bond or Jason Bourne. For the most part, careers in the intelligence community are very similar to those of a corporate nature.
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leobourne — 12 years ago(April 04, 2013 01:49 PM)
I was looking for someone like Thrillhouse8 to make a statement about Bond and Bourne. Everyone is swept away with movies and how glorious it looks to be swimming around the world in posh cars and jets. It's like the 'lowest rung' of everything. Just like how a driver or secretary can be the biggest leak, because they are the only ones who know minute details of a scheduleI'd have to make an argument with 'corporate nature'The lowest funded Governments and the poorest Governments bank on spies for everything, because they simply don't have the money to wage warsAnd what they do is this - Use them, hang them out to dry, make them beg in some circumstances (like even for food)And care two hoots if one dies because they're too busy with money and powerThe game is disgusting, the politicians worse and plenty of other unethical things they do just for the name of 'saving the country', whatever that means. It means nothing. Each soldier has to save their own life.
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Razar_C-1 — 11 years ago(December 10, 2014 10:23 AM)
Actually, most of the worlds intelligence agencies do the very same thing:
They all list an ad in the 'employment' section of the newspaper. Sorry to burst your bubble, but "scouting for talent' and such would make up a very small minority of admissions.
If you're genuinely interested in intelligence agency work then you should know that the reality of it is far different from the sensationalised version. Most intelligence work is actually just listening to and analysing gathered intelligence. The Pitt/ Redford/ Bond/ Etc type of spies just aren't very common any more.
If that doesn't dissuade you, then keep a sharp eye on the newspapers, because they only list their employment ads once a year or once every two years. If you're lucky enough to find their ads and you're lucky enough to have your application accepted, then get prepared to join a LOT of people who want to prove that they are better candidates than you. Also, be prepared for multiple different phases of aptitude testing where undesirables are weeded out. Things like physical testing/ psychological screening/ various types of intelligence/ common-sense tests (sometimes called idiot-tests)/ etc
If at any point, you either fail to live up to what they expect, or you are outperformed by other applicants, then say goodbye to what you hoped would be your new career, for up to two years, because they won't allow you to apply again for -usually- that long.
Of course, the easy way to get in, would be to transfer in. Either join the army/ police force, and then work very hard to get into military intelligence/ whatever the police equivalent of M.I. is, and then request a transfer. You still have to wait for an actual intake-period, but you start out ahead of the curve of most of the applicants.
Peace
Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most -
defiant-10 — 19 years ago(October 03, 2006 10:14 AM)
There are all manner of "spy" jobs.
You may already have been "interviewed", depending on where you've worked and what was done there. How do you "become" anything?
Some things can't be taught- only learned.
What I had in mind was boxing the compass. -
ihidetheremote — 18 years ago(August 16, 2007 03:22 PM)
Ok, some of you have no idea what your talking about, especially about the assassin things. While in office Ronald Reagan signed and executive order stating that it is illegal for the CIA to have any part in assassinations (including paying independent contractors) or killings (unless self defence). If anyone references a movie to contradict this well your an idiot because its a movie.
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liakyh — 18 years ago(February 13, 2008 11:40 PM)
In times of conflict most spies tend to be locals, in the area where the spying takes place. In Cold War GDR for instance, the spy network consisted mostly of unhappy officials high up in the government hierarchy or military officers looking to defect to the 'land of the free'. Many of these people didn't do it for profit, they did it out of a personal want to see the socialist government fall. Most of these people never killed anyone either. Spies aren't supposed to be killing people. They got recruited mostly by approaching known NATO officials. Once a case officer feels that he isn't a double agent, the spy is set to work collecting information.
In more modern times, because of a lack of real established enemy states, the CIA's network has been greatly reduced when it comes to field agents. Most on the CIA's roster are analysts who work at Langley sifting through information from around the world. These analysts tend to be picked straight from graduating college batches who show promise in the relevant areas. People who work field ops tend to, like Mike Spann, killed at Qala-i-Jangi in 2001, be ex-military. Field ops in the modern CIA involves mostly open information gathering and building up of allies in warzones. For example prior to the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, CIA field operatives were dropped in with money to buy the loyalty of local warlords to help fight the Taliban, or in fact just to promise not to attack US forces. Penetrating large governments like the Soviets during the Cold War doesn't happen any more. This is in part because most of the United State's enemies are radical Islamic groups. These groups recruit from students who attend madrassahs for years gaining the trust of the higher ups, or from tribes who have lived together as family in remote parts of the Middle East and former Soviet Central Asia.