7. Mata Hari
Who Thought What: Was working with her home country, the Netherlands, and French military intelligence, who accused her of spying for Germany.
Do Any Good? Well, since no one is so sure that Mata was really a spy, no one really knows if she really provided any intelligence to the Germans at all. Hari was a very famous Dutch exotic dancer during World War I and had many "clients" in the French military, so it's entirely possible she was a dirty, dirty spy. She may have not done that much good spying, but I'm sure she made more than enough army officers happy. I mean, she did have a sexual relationship with William, German Crown Prince who was nicknamed the "Clown Prince", but I'm sure he made up for it with that famous German wit.
Exposure: During World War I, Mata Hari told British intelligence officers she was working for the French. However, the French intercepted a series of messages from the Germans, which identified Hari as a spy for the lovely Krauts. (Who wouldn't want to spy for Germany during World War I?!) The problem was that the Germans knew the French had already broken this code but sent it anyway. This would lead a sane person to believe that the messages were contrived and made up. However, French people are neither sane nor pleasant and, thus, executed Mata Hari by firing squad.
6. Oleg Gordievsky
Who Thought What: Was a Soviet agent in the 70s spying on the Brits, who later recruited Oleg to spy for The Queen.
Do Any Good? Again, it's hard to say what actual intelligence was actually gathered for the British but Oleg was quite an agent for the Russia. He helped avert a Russian nuclear attack on Britain and identified Gorbochov as a worthy successor long before anyone else. One thing he didn't do? Change his name to something easier to spell so I didn't have to back to his wikipedia page 5 times to check if I was right. Fuck you, first person ever named Gordievsky.
Exposure: Soon, Oleg was outed to the Soviets by an American CIA double-agent fuck and ordered back to the USSR. He was arrested and questioned by eventually escaped his home with help from MI6 and was granted asylum. He's lived in Britain and is now useless, as he can't spy on anyone. However, he has written a few books about the KGB and was poisoned last year when he took Xanax a Russian gave him, while me thinks he deserved to be poisoned if he took a xanax a Russian gave him. Geez, that's like an American going to Iran to have open-heart surgery. C'mon, Oleg, your better than that.
5. Donald Duart Maclean
Who Thought What: A British diplomat who started spying for the Soviets during WWII.
Do Any Good? Well, I guess it depends on your definition of "good." If by "good" you mean "helped the Soviets develop the atomic bomb by giving them critical information about the Americans' weapons programs and allow them to figure out the exact nature of the American's nuclear arsenal." And if that is your definition of "good" than allow me to call you a communist sympathizer. Maclean also gave Stalin information that helped the Soviets blockade Berlin after the war, creating socialist East Germany, and helping to train the North Korean army during the Korean War which eventually turned North Korea into Communist North Korea. So he created two socialist states and helped progress the Cold War. AND he was gay. With other Soviet/British double agents, no less. I'm not sure on the exact criteria for going to hell, but I'm pretty sure this guys on the same level there as Dick Cheney's soul.
Exposure: Maclean was outed by an Soviet defector to America, who was later found dead via "suicide." Later on, Maclean was going to be outed to British intelligence when he and other Soviet spies concocted an escape plan into the Soviet Union. Eventually, Maclean assimilated into the USSR where he lived with his wife, who left him for one of the other spies that helped him escape, which is something like irony but I'm not quite sure what. Whatever the case may be, Maclean fucked over the Brits like a two-dollar проститутка. Spaceba bolshoi, comrades.
4. Kim Philby
Who Thought What: Was a British agent working for the KGB. Also known as "A Normal British Agent during World War II." And they wonder why they got the shit bombed out of them.
Do Any Good? Philby was already working for the Soviets when he applied for a job at MI6 during WWII. Philby had access to information on numerous British agents and smuggled info to the Soviets throughout the war. After the war, Philby's last assignment was to investigate Donald Maclean, a member of the same group of traitors and the previous mofo' on this list. However, since Philby already knew about Maclean and was kind of doing the same thing, nothing really got done since it was like a kid who was all the test answers on his hand with the teacher none the wiser. Instead he helped Maclean escape but mind-bogglingly, Philby was not discovered as a member of the same group of spies until....
Exposure: In 1962, while working for the Brits in Beirut (that's Lebanon, for you geography-challenged folk), Philby was outed when an agent overhead a woman talking to her at a party. That's kind of like your ex-girlfriend talking to someone about you while the girl your trying to sleep with overhears how small your junk is. Basically, your fucked (and not in the way you want to be). Philby was confronted by an old friend of his in Beirut and either confessed or downplayed the charges (depending on how much vodka Philby had). However, during the investigation, Philby disappeared before he resurfaced in Russia, where he sent postcards to MI6 saying "Ha Ha!". Philby started to drink like Colin Farrell at a never-ending open bar while in Moscow and stole his friends wife before he ended that affair. The Soviets sobered him up, got him a young wife, and gave him a job and a book deal. He died there and was granted a hero's funeral, which the Brits considered "crashing like Will Farrell in Wedding Crashers" but decided that Russian women aren't worth the trip. Now, you can see Philby's mug on some Russian stamps, which they use on official documents to Britain.
3. Eddie Chapman
Who Thought What: In a remarkable change of pace, Chapman was recruited by the Germans during WWII, before being recruited to work for the British against Germany.
Do Any Good? Chapman actually did quite a bit of good for the Brits during the war, even going as far as to offer himself up in a suicide attack against Hitler, which was wisely declined by the British, because if they did that, the Nazi's would've been badly crippled. Anyways, Chapman gave the Nazi's false info about the V-1 and V-2's missle accuracy, allowing the bombs to land outside of London. Chapman went to Norway, which was under German control, to "help the Germans" but continued to supply them with false information throughout the war.
Exposure: Chapman wasn't exposed by the Germans until after the war, when he was living comfortably in Britain on the German's stipend. He lived in many posh areas of London, got out of many criminal offenses because of his war-time services. He also received royalties for being portrayed in a movie and owned a castle in Dublin, where he also had a "Health Farm" which was probably more like a "Herb Farm" or something. Amazingly, during the war, Chapman was married to a girl in England and a girl in Norway, both under protection by the respective host governments. However, after the war, he ditched both of them for his previous flame and married her instead. Ouch. Talk about a cool dude, he was a double agent and a two-timer (or three-timer). Sounds like my life after I met that Iranian reporter in Greece. Or....does it? Let's move on, I got dinner at the Ahmadinejad's house in an hour.
2. Katrina Leung
Who Thought What: Was working for the FBI in China earlier this decade, but was actually working for the MSS (like the Chinese FBI) in China, which makes more sense if you think about it (don't).
Do Any Good? According to the FBI, Leung contaminated 20 years of FBI intelligence on China, as well as compromising all of their counterintelligence programs in China. She gained so much respect from visiting Chinese diplomats for her "hospitality" and the FBI for her "information" (that probably shouldn't be in quotes), that she was trusted with more serious projects from both sides. She even formed a relationship (unclear if it involved nookie) with the Chinese President and a relationship (clearly it involved nookie) with an FBI agent. She even got information to the CIA about China after the Tiananmen Square thinger, when information out of the country was rarer than a Asian without black hair.
Exposure: Eventually, Leung was caught on tape giving some Chinaman an American diplomat's itinerary. The FBI officer she was sleeping with, however, convinced them to keep her on as an asset without any bias in the situation whatsoever. The FBI started investigating her, finding an FBI directory, missing pictures of FBI agents, a copied top secret document given to the MSS, and found out about her affair with the FBI dude. She was arrested for what has to be the stupidest name for a simple crime "Unauthorized Copying of National Defense Information with Intent to Injure or Benefit a Foreign Nation in violation of U.S.C. 18." How bout treason or espionage or leaking classified information? Because the FBI charged her with this weak charge, she only spent 3 months in jail and 18 months probation for a crime that you can get the death penalty for. All this while marijuana traffickers are doing 2-4 at state. Guess giving away weed is worse than possibly giving away nuclear secrets. Better hide the stash (the secrets, not weed).
1. Juan Pujol (aka "Garbo")
Who Thought What: Signed up as a German agent in order to give secrets to the British.
Do Any Good? What makes Mr. Pujol so special is that, while most hated the Germans, he hated them so much he approached the British to become involved with taking them down. They declined. What most people would do in this situation is resign to the fact that they might not be able to do anything to stop Germany. Not Juan. Oh, on the contrary. Juan signed up as a German agent, with no other intent than to fuck them over harder than that Nazi chick fucked over Indy in the third Indiana Jones film. He told Germany that he was in Britain spying, but was actually in Portugal supplying them with false shipping information he found in newspapers and films. He created (read: made up) a large network of people working for him in England and was paid by Germany for all 27 of them. Finally, the Brits recruited him while he made up excuses about why his agents weren't catching certain information. He took out newspaper ads claiming they died or were arrested. He sent genuine information but postmarked it earlier than it was sent, so that by the time it got there, it would be harmless. He even informed them about Normandy but it was too late, which put him in high standing with the Germans. Later, the Germans wondered how they didn't catch all the fake names of his agents such as "Sawyer Kraut," "Fyuck Natsis," and "Faike Aliass."
Exposure: When the Germans asked Pujol to complete a mission he couldn't lie about without being compromised, the British faked his "arrest" and sent a "fake" letter of apology to the Germans, which was actually fake. He returned to work for British intelligence a few days later. Pujol is one of less than a dozen people who received medals of honor from both Germany and Britain. When asked later about that, a German official asked "Umm, year, about that. Can we maybe have that back?" To avoid being capped by angry German people, Pujol faked his own death and moved to Venezuela, where he lived under an alias until he died in 1988. The Germans contend that, even though Pujol deceived them about the nature of the Normandy Invasion, "yeah? well, we would have lost anyway. So there!" Burn, mein deutscher freund.
Well, there you have it. Perhaps I pumped you up for the new Bond movie. Perhaps I pumped you up for a new career in espionage. Either way, you can now cease to doubt my excellent skills as an informant of important information to the web community. Just don't tell the FBI (or the KGB, for that matter). I would rather avoid the gulags. Now excuse me, ladies and gents, while I go watch that "SAVED BY ZEROOOOOOOO" Toyota commercial with a sitcom in-between. Until next time, 爱你过后，我的可爱的读者. Codename "DolanSan" over and out.
But if this were the Coen Brothers' Blog, "I'm Drawn to You" would be considered the Ladykillers of all your blogs. Secret agents are much cooler though.
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