Have you ever met a real spy?

Ammo08Ammo08 Missouri, USAPosts: 386MI6 Agent
I have. Mr G. was one of our scoutmasters for many years. During WWII he worked for US Army Intel in Sweden monitoring the Germans and their allies. He was picked for the job because of his education and fluency in German and some other European languages. He told us he spent most of his time working with the British because they had been there longer and knew the area better. He viewed the British as far superior to the Americans in this cloak and dagger stuff.

He spent a lot of time listening to their radio transmissons, watching ships and just listening to the activity in the streets. He said the Swedes would sell anything to anyone for a price. Mr G. said it was very disturbing sometimes to be sitting in a bar or cafe right next to uniformed German soldiers. He said everyone played nice just not always friendly.

He told us that to travel between England and Sweden they had to fly certain routes and pre-arrange things so that they weren't shot down.

He also said that the Norwegians and Danes were not happy with the Swedes for what amounted to helping the Germans

He constantly told us of his admiration for the British and their operations. After the war he spent time in the Far East watching China crumble.
"I don't know if the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or imbeciles who mean it."-Mark Twain
'Just because nobody complains doesn't mean all parachutes are perfect.'- Benny Hill (1924-1992)

Comments

  • Mr BeechMr Beech Florida, USAPosts: 1,749MI6 Agent
    I'd imagine the greatest spies make sure no one knows they've just met a spy.
  • Ammo08Ammo08 Missouri, USAPosts: 386MI6 Agent
    I think his actual title was military attache' but a "rose by any other other name".

    Stockholm and Zurich must have been someting during the war.

    Mr G. never called himself a spy, but for all intents and purposes he was. I'm sure we will never know about the deep undercover people or how many oif them never made it back.
    "I don't know if the world is being run by smart people who are putting us on or imbeciles who mean it."-Mark Twain
    'Just because nobody complains doesn't mean all parachutes are perfect.'- Benny Hill (1924-1992)
  • Le SamouraiLe Samourai Honolulu, HIPosts: 573MI6 Agent
    I'm not aware of having known any spies. but I have known a few U.S. Navy SEALs and Army Rangers. Not at all like the Rambo stereotype; they tended to be small, compact, and fairly unassuming. What set them apart was the way they moved. There was a catlike fluidity, with no wasted motion.
    —Le Samourai

    A Gent in Training.... A blog about my continuing efforts to be improve myself, be a better person, and lead a good life. It incorporates such far flung topics as fitness, self defense, music, style, food and drink, and personal philosophy.
    Agent In Training
  • Mr BeechMr Beech Florida, USAPosts: 1,749MI6 Agent
    I'm not aware of having known any spies. but I have known a few U.S. Navy SEALs and Army Rangers. Not at all like the Rambo stereotype; they tended to be small, compact, and fairly unassuming. What set them apart was the way they moved. There was a catlike fluidity, with no wasted motion.

    I have met a couple of SEALs and they both were short guys! Surprised me, but they were very fit and could easily have pinned my 6'2" self down.
  • danjaq_0ffdanjaq_0ff The SwampsPosts: 7,283MI6 Agent
    Did you throw them a fish :D
    Mr Beech wrote:
    I'm not aware of having known any spies. but I have known a few U.S. Navy SEALs and Army Rangers. Not at all like the Rambo stereotype; they tended to be small, compact, and fairly unassuming. What set them apart was the way they moved. There was a catlike fluidity, with no wasted motion.

    I have met a couple of SEALs and they both were short guys! Surprised me, but they were very fit and could easily have pinned my 6'2" self down.
  • Mr BeechMr Beech Florida, USAPosts: 1,749MI6 Agent
    danjaq_0ff wrote:
    Did you throw them a fish :D
    Mr Beech wrote:
    I'm not aware of having known any spies. but I have known a few U.S. Navy SEALs and Army Rangers. Not at all like the Rambo stereotype; they tended to be small, compact, and fairly unassuming. What set them apart was the way they moved. There was a catlike fluidity, with no wasted motion.

    I have met a couple of SEALs and they both were short guys! Surprised me, but they were very fit and could easily have pinned my 6'2" self down.

    I threw something their way, specifically because she was too fishy for my tastes :v
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy Behind you !Posts: 63,792MI6 Agent
    I definitely have, He was sitting in a Bar. I don't know but there was something about him, Whether it was the combat jacket
    the Pittbull on a string , the casio divers watch or the Balaclava.
    Apparently he was a Falklands vet and a very close friend of Andy McNab. Also large parts of his life had been used for scenes in the Bourne movies.
    "I've been informed that there ARE a couple of QAnon supporters who are fairly regular posters in AJB."
  • danjaq_0ffdanjaq_0ff The SwampsPosts: 7,283MI6 Agent
    Mr Beech wrote:
    danjaq_0ff wrote:
    Did you throw them a fish :D
    Mr Beech wrote:

    I have met a couple of SEALs and they both were short guys! Surprised me, but they were very fit and could easily have pinned my 6'2" self down.

    I threw something their way, specifically because she was too fishy for my tastes :v

    :)) :)) :))
  • thesecretagentthesecretagent CornwallPosts: 2,151MI6 Agent
    Mr Beech wrote:
    I'm not aware of having known any spies. but I have known a few U.S. Navy SEALs and Army Rangers. Not at all like the Rambo stereotype; they tended to be small, compact, and fairly unassuming. What set them apart was the way they moved. There was a catlike fluidity, with no wasted motion.

    I have met a couple of SEALs and they both were short guys! Surprised me, but they were very fit and could easily have pinned my 6'2" self down.

    I've met a few SAS. My unit was to provide fire support for an operation they were planning, so we trained and worked the scenarios for a week. Basically a shed-load of fire-power, plus guarding the two Chinooks. The operation never actually went ahead and we were all gutted not to have been a part of something so out of the ordinary. Anyway, what I noticed was how small and wiry they were. There was one big guy who had hit the weights a bit, but otherwise - 5'8" to 5'10" and twelve stone tops. At that time I was 6' and pushing 16st. I was fit but had done weights etc, and had to lose two stone to get to just under 13st when I joined the army to meet entry requirements. These guys were all smallish, but seriously strong and fit. They mocked up some doors and a killing house out of sandbags and the sides of trucks and just went through it all day, every day. Then some of them paired off for runs or weights when they'd finished!
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  • thesecretagentthesecretagent CornwallPosts: 2,151MI6 Agent
    I have met "spies" for real. Or intelligence personnel at least. I drove and provided security in Northern Ireland for what I was told were SIS and Security Service. Two things I noticed. The SIS, or MI6 lot were by far and away more up themselves. Seriously Oxford/Cambridge grads - and well monnied IMO. I got the impression they came from great homes and wealthy families, and basically knew it. They didn't want to know the guys in the detail, just if we were armed and knew our way around. Secondly, the MI5 lot seemed not only more down to earth, but cared more about what they were doing. SIS were going through the motions. Of course, I don't have a clue what they were doing, so maybe the observation isn't fair.
    Later, out of the army and contracting for a while I met some CIA guys in Iraq and Afghanistan. These guys were really funny. They dressed like war-zone camera men - all khaki and pockets! Low slung guns and aviator glasses. They told everyone they couldn't tell them who they worked for, which was really funny because then they would drop heavy clues and even refer to their bosses in Langley! Great stuff!

    Maybe they were a decoy!? :))
    Amazon #1 Bestselling Author. If you enjoy crime, espionage, action and fast-moving thrillers follow this link:

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  • WildeWilde Oxford, UKPosts: 621MI6 Agent
    Two very interesting anecdotes, mate - I always enjoy service-stories. I guess this was in the 90's? From my understanding since MI6 opened recruitment to the commons, the whole 'toff' stakes have decreased. Entry is less of a tap on the shoulder next to the Radcliffe Camera and more like most other civil departments today with assessment afternoons and various interviews.
  • LexiLexi LondonPosts: 3,000MI6 Agent
    Indeed I have.

    Didn't really know the significance at the the time.... but it was David Spedding (who later became Sir David, the head of M16 :o) My father was the Military Defence Attache in Amman, Jordan (back in 1984) and David was an 'advisor' - he didn't really have a title so to speak, although our family used to call him the 'hush hush' man... my Father knew exactly what he was but was never really allowed to say!
    She's worth whatever chaos she brings to the table and you know it. ~ Mark Anthony
  • Number24Number24 NorwayPosts: 21,709MI6 Agent
    edited April 2012
    When I was in my teens I saw one of the "Heroes of Telmark" I was while hiking in the mountains. He was the leader of the Special Operations Executive team who sabotaged the heavy water plant in Rjukan, Norway, during WWII. The allies feared the nazis where planning to use the heavy water to produce atom bombs, so the stakes were high! I recognized him at once, for me it was like seing David Bowie or some other star. I should have shook his hand and thanked him for what he and his friends did, but I was so star-struck he was gone before I could think.

    During a college exursion an other member of SOE spoke to us, but on another subject. He was the official historian of the Norwegian SOE so he would be very interesting to talk to, but I had to catch the bus.

    About the post about the man who was a spy on Sweden during the war: The Swedes were pretty pro-German until the nazis lost the battle of Stalingrad. At least the upper classes were, the father of the current king of Sweden was pro-Hitler. Lucky for Sweden he died before his father and was never crowned.
  • thesecretagentthesecretagent CornwallPosts: 2,151MI6 Agent
    Wilde wrote:
    Two very interesting anecdotes, mate - I always enjoy service-stories. I guess this was in the 90's? From my understanding since MI6 opened recruitment to the commons, the whole 'toff' stakes have decreased. Entry is less of a tap on the shoulder next to the Radcliffe Camera and more like most other civil departments today with assessment afternoons and various interviews.

    Yep, my tours of Northern Ireland were mid/ late nineties. And these MI6 chaps were pretty Tarquine and Perrigrin types. :)) The MI5 blokes and women were more like police (but pretty well spoken and educated). I was part of a search at the end of my last tour to find a missing SA80 weapon system and Special Branch were involved, these guys were different still - more like something from Ashes To Ashes! We had RUC, Special Branch, The Det, MI5 and Red Caps on that one, as well as twenty of our guys in plain clothes. It was recovered, but the sight was never found. Apparently no ammunition went missing. I've never read about the incident since.
    Amazon #1 Bestselling Author. If you enjoy crime, espionage, action and fast-moving thrillers follow this link:

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  • Silhouette ManSilhouette Man The last refuge of a scoundrelPosts: 8,648MI6 Agent
    Ian Fleming himself may have been a spy and his Mercury news agency was cover for this. He often talked of meeting spies in his club in interviews. He of course also had the 30 AU 'Red Indians' during the war under his wing also.
    "The tough man of the world. The Secret Agent. The man who was only a silhouette." - Ian Fleming, Moonraker (1955).
  • SherbrookSherbrook Melbourne AustraliaPosts: 137MI6 Agent
    I was attending a Red Cross charity function on Cyprus about 18 years ago

    The hostess was the wife of a retired British army officer who had worked on one of the British sovereign bases on the island

    The English man introduced me to several American guys who seemed to be having having a great time

    I asked him who they were and he told me they were on the base to maintain some of the American-made equipment used there

    Later on in the night he sidled up to me when no-one was watching and said "You realise those men were spies, of course?"

    I wished I'd hung out with them more!

    The second interesting character was not strictly a spy but I'll throw him in to the mix

    In 1981 the US Secretary of State Alexander Haig visited Australia and part of my job involved checking out a Chev Monte Carlo temporarily imported by his security chief

    This guy was a great story-teller and boasted that he could kill a person using just a pencil
    I must be dreaming
  • don pdon p Posts: 589MI6 Agent
    i have,
    i work in afghanistan for ISAF/NATO, ive worked in southern afghan and now at HQ ISAF , they dont advertise who they are, but they have a certain way, and i had to brief a few , about my depts role here,
    and answer questions they had,
  • always shakenalways shaken LondonPosts: 6,287MI6 Agent
    I was on a massive OP years ago on the channel tunnel it was a multi service job
    run by Kent police the scenario was a Euro star train was hijacked and driven about 7k under
    the sea,with hostages ,and Kent had to deal with it,there was all sorts there
    but when the spooks turned up in a fleet of artics with their kit they got on with the
    intel part but nice guys it was then handed over to the Hereford lads to deal with and as the secret
    agent says none of them was over 5 9 tall and they where all good lads from the TYNE and CLYDE
    but i did drop an agent off in a car park in the middle Kent at 2am and it was like the films
    you flashed (headlights) at the collection vehicle, and then drove upto each other to offload your passenger
    until out of the blue a marked police traffic car pulls up to see whats going on
    then all the arguments broke out ,who are you what are you doing ect cant say reply blah blah
    so to see the STATE at work was very interesting if not worrying
    By the way, did I tell you, I was "Mad"?
  • The Domino EffectThe Domino Effect Posts: 3,631MI6 Agent
    Some years ago when in my early 20s, I met an elderly man at a reunion in London. He was a perfect gentleman and we had a lovely chat. One of those priceless moments spanning the generations when age difference is irrelevant. It was only years later when his obituary popped up in the Telegraph that I realised just who it was I had met. In 1961, this man - an MI5 officer - was responsible for breaking the Portland spy ring run by KGB agent Konon Molody (whose cover name was Gordon Lonsdale). He also later caught John Vassall, the Russian spy in the Admiralty. Two of the biggest spy cases of the Cold War and I had chatted with the very modest man at the centre without ever having a clue. As someone else said, the true spies are probably like him and never let on.
  • Silhouette ManSilhouette Man The last refuge of a scoundrelPosts: 8,648MI6 Agent
    Some years ago when in my early 20s, I met an elderly man at a reunion in London. He was a perfect gentleman and we had a lovely chat. One of those priceless moments spanning the generations when age difference is irrelevant. It was only years later when his obituary popped up in the Telegraph that I realised just who it was I had met. In 1961, this man - an MI5 officer - was responsible for breaking the Portland spy ring run by KGB agent Konon Molody (whose cover name was Gordon Lonsdale). He also later caught John Vassall, the Russian spy in the Admiralty. Two of the biggest spy cases of the Cold War and I had chatted with the very modest man at the centre without ever having a clue. As someone else said, the true spies are probably like him and never let on.

    Lovely story. Thanks so much for sharing. I imagine this is what the true world ofg espionage is like. :)
    "The tough man of the world. The Secret Agent. The man who was only a silhouette." - Ian Fleming, Moonraker (1955).
  • 96mn1296mn12 Posts: 632MI6 Agent
    A former neighbor of my parents was FBI counterintelligence...
  • Silhouette ManSilhouette Man The last refuge of a scoundrelPosts: 8,648MI6 Agent
    I was on a massive OP years ago on the channel tunnel it was a multi service job
    run by Kent police the scenario was a Euro star train was hijacked and driven about 7k under
    the sea,with hostages ,and Kent had to deal with it,there was all sorts there
    but when the spooks turned up in a fleet of artics with their kit they got on with the
    intel part but nice guys it was then handed over to the Hereford lads to deal with and as the secret
    agent says none of them was over 5 9 tall and they where all good lads from the TYNE and CLYDE
    but i did drop an agent off in a car park in the middle Kent at 2am and it was like the films
    you flashed (headlights) at the collection vehicle, and then drove upto each other to offload your passenger
    until out of the blue a marked police traffic car pulls up to see whats going on
    then all the arguments broke out ,who are you what are you doing ect cant say reply blah blah
    so to see the STATE at work was very interesting if not worrying

    Sounds rather like the plot to John Gardner's Death is Forever (1992).
    "The tough man of the world. The Secret Agent. The man who was only a silhouette." - Ian Fleming, Moonraker (1955).
  • Absolutely_CartAbsolutely_Cart NJ/NYC, United StatesPosts: 1,740MI6 Agent
    There's an undercover guy at the store I work at and it's entertaining to watch him catch thieves.
  • Asp9mmAsp9mm Over the Hills and Far Away.Posts: 7,483MI6 Agent
    Some of the most exceptional people I've met, and very much heroes of mine - the SOE agents of Operation Grouse. As well as a few SOE that were dropped into occupied France including Harry Ree who was a friend of my grandfather.
    ..................Asp9mmSIG-1-2.jpg...............
  • stagstag Posts: 2,083MI6 Agent
    edited March 2015
    Do Special Branch count?

    I have been involved in a similar 'multi agency' exercise to that which AS mentions however the venue was a country house which - I can't remember the details - but it was supposed to be some Embassy or suchlike. The police acted only to contain the scene while the negotiators did their stuff. Authority was given from the Home Secretary (I think) & the matter was turned over to the military. The SAS eventually stormed the building & rescued the 'hostages'. I wasn't there though when that happened so missed the show.

    Whilst doing selection myself with the TA SAS (I failed!) there were no bodybuilder types among the badged members, indeed there was only one bloke who could have been described as stocky. He was an Asian chap who was a senior NCO with the Squadron, but only about 5'7".

    BTW I've posted something in the random chat thread. You may wish to check it out.
  • AlphaOmegaSinAlphaOmegaSin EnglandPosts: 10,924MI6 Agent
    I was on a massive OP years ago on the channel tunnel it was a multi service job
    run by Kent police the scenario was a Euro star train was hijacked and driven about 7k under
    the sea,with hostages ,and Kent had to deal with it,there was all sorts there
    but when the spooks turned up in a fleet of artics with their kit they got on with the
    intel part but nice guys it was then handed over to the Hereford lads to deal with and as the secret
    agent says none of them was over 5 9 tall and they where all good lads from the TYNE and CLYDE
    but i did drop an agent off in a car park in the middle Kent at 2am and it was like the films
    you flashed (headlights) at the collection vehicle, and then drove upto each other to offload your passenger
    until out of the blue a marked police traffic car pulls up to see whats going on
    then all the arguments broke out ,who are you what are you doing ect cant say reply blah blah
    so to see the STATE at work was very interesting if not worrying

    Sounds rather like the plot to John Gardner's Death is Forever (1992).

    I agree.
    1.On Her Majesties Secret Service 2.The Living Daylights 3.license To Kill 4.The Spy Who Loved Me 5.Goldfinger
  • always shakenalways shaken LondonPosts: 6,287MI6 Agent
    but not as glamorous ,real life never is , :D
    By the way, did I tell you, I was "Mad"?
  • ThunderpussyThunderpussy Behind you !Posts: 63,792MI6 Agent
    :)) I guess for many of us, if we were to meet a spy ( intelligence officer)
    We'd never know ( if he was a good one). So if we have met one and remembered
    He must have been a bad one. :)) more a Johnny English than James Bond. ;)
    "I've been informed that there ARE a couple of QAnon supporters who are fairly regular posters in AJB."
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