svr s most highly valued and most vet program. we had identified richard and cynthia murphy were living in new jersey. doesn t heed field living in massachusetts, juan lazaro and vickie pelaez. in each and every case, the fbi used all of the tools in its toolbox to learn as much as they can about their residents, their habits. physical surveillance including clandestine searches was conducted. we started covert entries into the residents. the goal was to find any evidence of tradecraft and figure out exactly how they were communicating with moscow center. but that is a very high risk operation, and that s the point at which the most things can go wrong for us. we had to be very careful not to upset traps when we went into places. foreign intelligence officers will do certain things like
that s what they really are. after years and years of watching these people, we started to see a change. it became harder and harder to document fictitious people. the svr advanced and developed their tradecraft. and we started to see a new generation of illegals who could withstand the scrutiny of travel into and out of the united states with their own identities. anna chapman and mikhail semenko came to the united states utilizing their true names and their true documentation. what they didn t reveal was their affiliation with russian intelligence services. mikhail somenko arrived in the united states to attend seton hall university. somenko spoke five languages and was spotting and assessing people that had access to national defense information. anna chapman had married a
after years and years of watching these people, we started to see a change. it became harder and harder to document fictitious people. the svr advanced and developed their tradecraft. and we started to see a new generation of illegals who could withstand the scrutiny of travel into and out of the united states. with their own identities. anna chapman and mikhail somenko came to the united states utilizing their true names and true documentation. what they didn t reveal was their affiliation with russian intelligence services. mikhail somenko arrived in the united states to attend seton hall university. somenko spoke five languages and spotted and assessed people who had information. anna chapman had married a
an illegal. the agents who quietly blend into the societies of other nations and lead seemingly normal lives while secretly carrying out orders passed to them from moscow. the term illegal is an intelligence term of art that refers to somebody who is here not under with any kind of diplomatic status, that is here not in true name. they are career intelligence professionals. they are given advanced training in tradecraft, clandestine activities. then they ultimately spend years serving abroad in order to become someone they re not. these are teachers, travel agents. they re in real estate. they re going to rotary clubs. your first reaction is, this is just an ordinary joe. they can live unnoticed in the shadows, with a specific purpose. they spot and assess people with
business people, oligarchs, friends, friend of friends, to do these things, sort of missions, if you will, on behalf of the government but in a way that gives them some plausible ability. we do not do that, but that is standard operating procedure for russia, and of course the russia that is led by vladimir putin, a former kgb agent, who of course would be excellent in this particular kind of tradecraft. getting back to jared kushner, the president s son-in-law, senior adviser, he was also in attendance at this meeting with the russian lawyer. should his security clearance be revoked or at least reviewed? that s a question that s come up at the white house press briefings, at least off camera, in the last few days. they sort of dance around that question and aren t willing to answer that question. what do you make of that? there is no question in my mind that if jared kushner, instead of being the son-in-law of the president, were a military officer or a civil servant, a foreign se