Arranging the Truth

Just a heads up listeners, this episode contains some adult language.

“Previously on the agency, we then came up with a very elaborate scheme.”

And it involved me being on an evaluation team, a museum to look to buy the year 16. So what happens is, you know, these people are recruited abroad, and then the ones that we think have the temperament to come in, when they return to Moscow, they will work with us inside. Now I went back to my hotel and then I sit down and think about this.

And I thought, if that coming for me, I won't even see it coming. I won't, it'll just happen and I won't even know. The Americans had kind of said, you know, we're not going to leave out there. But I will, that's true or not. How what could they do? What could they do?

And if I was taken out, you know, they had to face down in the passing river, vanilla or something, you know. Yeah, I had this, perhaps naive feeling that they wouldn't leave me out there. They'd come for it, they'd say me. It was probably very naive.

Because what could they do? As could Bennett's moves towards the goal of his operation against Soviet military intelligence and the Philippines, he's been given the news that another CIA operative, this one in Europe, has been killed in the similarities with what he's doing, are alarming. Stame modus operandi is doing the same thing as me.

With a GOU officer, same same to point. So his handler has given him the opportunity to press pause and take a step back. I turned it over in my mind quite a lot. I didn't feel particularly brave, you know. On balance, I should have said no, I'll go home and wait till it comes down and come back.

But, you know, and it didn't affect what I was doing. I had a couple of appointments and made Vladimir and things out there. But as soon as he's doing that.

No. And I never reported it.

No. Oh, well, the Americans, you because they told me. And they were quite happy that I agreed to stay. And I didn't make a big thing about it.

“I think I might have made a bigger thing about it in my head.”

But, you know, I never reported it to the surface, never told anyone. Now, Kit Bennett, who's doing some pretty high-pressure risk assessment on his own here, has made the decision not to tell you stories who are strictly speaking still as important. Because he's worried.

They might be a bit strict on the health and safety guidelines around this operation. Yeah, he's come a long way to get to where he is. And he doesn't want to have to turn back now. So, he's going to be economical in what he discloses to his bosses back in New Zealand. I certainly didn't report that, particularly because I was frightened if I do.

That's right. That's enough. You're going to-- You were frightened if I'd called. Pull the pen.

Yeah, never, never reported that to them.

From Bird of Paradise Productions and RNZ, this is the Agency. I'm Geineys vaner. And I'm John Danny. This is episode four,

arranging the truth. This episode is going to take us into the heart of a very audacious lie. And for that light of work, it's going to need to look like the truth.

But before we get there, we're going to look at how the lines around the truth are sometimes blurred, especially in the world of espionage. Yeah, when ever we tell a story, even to ourselves,

we make choices about how we use information. If you're a spy working in the knowledge, you might get knocked off at any moment. You might tell yourself, see, I air, has your back. Even when you know that can't be true.

“It might just be what you need to get your job done.”

And if you've decided what you're going to do is important, and you don't want anyone to stop you. You might choose not to tell your employer that you're running into potential danger. The language we use, the details we put in,

the ones we leave out, and how we frame them all up, like a difference to how the story we're telling is perceived by the person listening to it. I want to remind you, and all your listeners,

that as I like to brag,

I basically ended the Cold War in New Zealand,

and all of your listeners, he included probably only a drink. This is Professor Ruben Azizian. These days, he's an academic, but in 1991, he had another job.

I was the one who lowered the hammer and sickle flag over, the famous Kremlin Soviet embassy building in Karore. So once I do that, New Zealand formally is not in the Cold War, but if you're in it, and there's no Soviet presence officially there. But the Soviet Union straightaway, the Soviet Union embassy,

“straightaway, became the Russian embassy, didn't I?”

Yeah, absolutely. So at that point, Ruben Azizian became the Russian ambassador. And its invade capacity is a former ambassador for both countries. That we spoke with him in our previous series, the service. Yeah, we did.

And he is a respected media commentator. And you can tell, he hasn't lost that diplomatic ability to soften up the person he's talking to, by saying something nice.

And I have to start with the maybe a diplomat in me, always,

to compliment you and John for your terrific work. Because honestly, as I was telling John, I give many interviews. People always remind me of that your program, oh, you were against being there in Cold War. And then this is one and Jake's team numbered two.

So I won't tell Jake, you are his number two. Don't worry, I'll go on well. I'll put it on to Jake. Because we're running buddies.

“Yeah, I think that's the second time we've mentioned TV NZ.”

That's probably enough free cross-promotion, isn't it? Number two, Jake, it's very critical. Now, we wanted to talk to Ruben Azizian about the Soviet Union and modern Russia and his perspective on New Zealand's membership of the five eyes. And we're going to hear from him on all that.

But when we spoke to him in November of 2025, he'd just come back from visiting Armenia. The country where he was born, although he says, it's a bit complicated. The country there that was born in,

I was called the USSR Soviet Union, right? And Armenia was only part of the country. Yeah, this is going to feel like a bit of a war, but stick with us. It's important because Armenia, formerly part of the Soviet Union, has been on the wrong end of some brutal geopolitical calculations, and it continues to be the victim of reality,

even from our own government here in New Zealand. Perhaps the best known is what's commonly referred to as the Armenian genocide, beginning in 1915, Armenia's neighbors, the declining Ottoman Empire, modern day Turkey.

They have seen the deaths of one and a half million Armenians,

three quarters of the population. Well, the U.S. and Russia and Europe, and dozens of other countries, called us a genocide, Turkey denies that pushing back very strongly against the word. The Turks say the death toll is exaggerated,

and that people die because of things like disease or bad weather, and perhaps a few bad apples and far-flung outposts of a ramshackle administration. Yeah, now, if that feels a little bit thin as an explanation, that New Zealand government, and it's worth mentioning the Australian one too, have both gone along with some version of it for decades now.

We refuse to say it was a genocide, seemingly because to do so would a new Turkey, which would mean we would be in danger of losing access to the commemorative sites at Gallipoli,

“that have become so important to our national memory.”

Yeah, and look, either way, you make these calls based on national interest. So, can't say it's wrong. No, we're not saying it's right either. No, just that foreign affairs often involves murky trade-offs and moral compromise.

Historically, our geographical isolation has kept us relatively safe from invasion,

but the reality is that small countries need alliances,

and those allies aren't necessarily going to be perfect, and let's face it, no one, including us, will always be on the right side of history. Yeah, often you're looking at a series of fairly unpleasant choices where you just have to be pragmatic.

That's something Armenia is currently having to reckon that after a militarized land grab of minion territory by their neighbours, where their old ally Russia didn't come to the rescue. Russia didn't really do much. Being a security ally, Russia let it go.

As a result, Armenia lost that Nagorno-Karabakh region populated by Armenia, so it's no single Armenia left there. So the Armenians have lived behind Russia to realign with their former oppressors. That has accelerated Armenia's movement away from Russian influence. Turns Europe even re-establishing ties with Turkey,

and Azerbaijan, which is very challenging. People are means living overseas.

But Armenia needs friendly neighbours, Armenia needs to end this war,

and Armenia needs to get out of that one sided dependence on Russia. Here in New Zealand, so far from these conflict zones, it can be had to grasp the reality that other countries live with. In fact, we spoke with Ruben Azizian and Wellington, as he finished up teaching New Zealand Defence Force personnel,

as they got ready for overseas deployments. I'm here for a course we ran for some of our defence officials who will be appointed as defence officers in various countries.

“One of the important things is to understand cultural differences”

and culture and motivations. It's important to understand what makes people take with your working, with them or against them. He was taller than me, but that's not a great achievement. 90% of the population had taller than me.

But he was medium height, medium-built slim building at fair here, reasonably fair here in the mouth-sees of fair here. This has kept Bennett's describing his target from Soviet military intelligence, the GRU, the guy we're calling Vladimir.

Quite a good looking man. And a very good looking wife. This wife was quite gorgeous with a high-slavery cheekbones and blonde hair, she was, and then she was lovely too. She was lovely.

About your own. A little older wife. You think? Me, early to mid, early to mid. He wouldn't have been much older than me.

He had two children.

“And he was telling me about going around home-leaf.”

And the way that it worked, no matter whether they were intelligent officers or not, they were very rarely allowed to be in the West with all their children. In 1985, the British singer-songwriter Sting had a hit song called Russians.

He might remember it, John. He might sing it. Please don't worry. Now, technically, it should have probably been called Soviets, but you get the chest and I don't want to be too pedantic.

It revolved around the idea that Sting hopes the Russians love their children, because then surely they won't be a nuclear war. That's right. I was only 15.

But it was actually a kind of genuine question. Do they love their children? Because from a distance, we perceived them as being incredibly hard-hearted, stony-faced brooots, and teamed on destroying us and our freedom.

So it was kind of hard to picture them as having much time for kids. But of course they love their children. If anything, in a society that often lacked material comforts, and it was so tightly controlled it would have been

hard to know who to trust. Children must have been a straightforward joy.

“And I remember his wife was not enjoying the Philippines,”

and it was not because she didn't like the posting or what they were doing, but she didn't have the kids with them. And there were little kids, seven and eight. You know, it's terrible. But I remember one occasion.

He'd been away on home, leave here in his wife, and at a lovely time. That was when he bought me the materials good off. There had been on home, even. He said that she had a great number as a name.

She was so happy, but he said it was all because she was with the children. And so hard for it to come back. And overseas postings, the Soviet authorities appear to have used children as leverage to ensure loyalty. Even people entrusted positions.

They were well paid. These were top jobs. These people had. Whether they'd be. And the same for the diplomats, not just the intelligence officer,

but often even particularly the diplomats. They weren't allowed to have their families. And that's not, they didn't hold to that strictly. Sometimes they'd have the whole family together, but not for very long.

And of course, the Americans of Brits would always be watching for that

because, you know, when they have got their family together, suddenly some guy might come out and say, hey, I want to stay. And they know nothing. And that's happened. Well, they didn't know anything about the guy.

He was a time magazine recruiter, or, you know, he'd decided to jump. But wasn't going to talk to anyone until he had his family with him. So the Soviets were very careful about that. Even though Vladimir has asked, could be

it's to procure some quite sensitive information and technology. It's always going to be a possibility that something I'd expect it like an approach on how to get to New Zealand. Could have it because they're so close now. Every time I got there, I'd know he was there because the station would tell me,

you know, he's not on home, leaving anything. So make sure I was there when he was there. And I'd bring him up.

And he was always happy to come and see me.

Sometimes pick me up in the hotel and we're going to have lunch. Sometimes we'd have lunch in the hotel. And there'd be long lunches. And what was this sort of substance use? Well, always about business.

And he'd be asking me about living in New Zealand. And that sort of thing. And my travels and I'd be asking him about where he'd been based.

Because he was in the commercial side.

So he's covered by-- It's a commercial cover. He's a principal. It looked like two nights. Yeah.

A various points. And when just catch you up. Yeah. Because they might be able to help. Yeah.

But a business that also enjoyed each other's company.

And I was recruiting him meanwhile.

He was looking to recruit me. So one of the many strange things about this dad is how much there is writing on the lie that keep in it is a businessman. Yeah. I mean, very banal sounding details can have an outsized importance here.

They could even be the difference between life and death. So while he's keeping one eye on the prize, he has to be very diligent about making this deception sound like the truth.

“The more important was building my commercial cover.”

And learning what I had to know about business. I mean, because I had to understand about exporting it to understand about what--

for example, if I'm in-- let's say I was in a-- or necessarily station country.

Say Thailand. And I say I'm exporting something here or I'm buying something here. I need to know what the rules are with regard to tariffs and import restrictions and things like that. Because I might well be dealing with a Soviet or East European who's a commercial expert. He's going to-- he's going to see through me.

So I have to do-- I had to do my homework. And that was, yeah. I handed on some economic survey on-- I can't remember what it was. And how I didn't write it, I got written-- I would write it now days. But it got written by people in Langley.

And I handed it off as my work to Vladimir. Now, oh, this is just a paper I did for a research paper I did for somebody or something. And that was kind of just-- it was nothing classable. I was just candlelight and looked like I knew I held a lot more than I did. I read it and didn't understand it.

But I handed it on and-- you know, it was-- yeah. But building my commercial cover was a hardest part. At the back of Kit Bennett's mind is the constant concern that has passed might come back to haunted. As involvement in the such case in Wellington in 1975 was publicized at the time.

“And remember, against the wishes of the SIES.”

Maybe that would be on a file somewhere. It's some stage in that they might have worked out what I was. And I, all the time, was puzzled that they have to know the KGB, no, my name. And I surely, they'd tell the GOU. Our understanding is that the GOU did not have a presence in New Zealand at the time of the such trial.

So it makes sense that this cover, even using his real name, would hold with the GOU. One of the reasons why they didn't want me too much with the KGB is that they felt once they started the name checking me and things I'd come up in light. Yeah, I mean, the GOU and the KGB are supposed to be on the same side, but they're also rivals and competitors. So probably not given to cross-checking every contact with someone from the West in case they give away some leverage or other.

So Kit Bennett's keeps riding us luck, and eventually he's going to be able to fall back on something he does know. Something that is going to really interest Soviet military intelligence. After numerous meetings around the time he discovers that another CIO operative has been killed during an operation against the GOU. Kit Bennett and his handler start to push towards an endgame, involving warplanes. So I had a, I've got a photograph of me standing beside a skyhawk, or gun up and flying to you and Jason, everything.

And I showed it to Vladimir. I said, yes, this is one from the old days, this is all rubbish, but you know, I showed me something like that.

“What a great first. It's a good fun. Can I have this photo?”

Yeah, should we get whatever? You know, I thought it would be on my GOU file. It's probably still there. I thought it's funny every time I look at that photo, I think it is. I think the neat thing about this is this is on my file in Moscow, but yeah. Before he's come up with the seemingly chance photo, it'll make some other snap to his wife and whatever he's been up to lately. Weeks and months of work have been put into his backstory through CIO liaison with the SIS and then through the warm using an Air Force,

who had taken Kit Bennett up in the Air Force Skyhawk and a tech aircraft with guns, missiles, rockets, even capable of carrying nuclear bombs. All this, so his cover would sound legit. I went up a few times in the Airplane, and I flew the strikemaster a few times too, with friends of mine that were flying. But I went on attachment, a kind of an attachment to the squadron to make sure that I understood about strike operations. So I went out on lots of on things refueling, strikes up on the, you know, mock strikes and things like that.

So I did, I spent some time in the Airplane. This is what really interests me, is the sense of, so this is this massive deep background. Yes, in order to be able to have the moment of contact.

Credibility. Yeah.

It's a, you know, but suddenly comes up in conversation about something or other, and you can, you can answer.

Yeah. Honestly, you know, it's a great.

“And look, you know, probably after the third brandy he might have said to me, so what are these things like to fly?”

I've got to be able to say what they like to fly, you know, what happens if you have an engine failure shortly after take off, you know, if you're under 150 knots, you know, you're, you're punch out if you, you know, whatever, you know, or I can't remember any of it now, but I did have it all in there then. So, you know, because the fake, the failure is to be found out. That's right. An instantaneously.

Yeah. Yeah. So that was, that was good. And that worked very well. Well, the RNZA, if combat wing was disbanded in 2001, behind them in 1980s, 75 squadron, running the A4 Skyhawk, was hit could have just outside the small town of Bulls.

Yeah. That's all hard here, Air Base, about half an hour or so, west of Palmerston North. I have a hard here. And a couple of officers up there. So I shot and I'm a really great, but doing that, but she's very staffed, agreed to it. And it was, it was all on our nod.

“I don't think anything was ever written down.”

Two officers at our hockey knew that the rest of them just knew me because I used to go up and, I was at an officer in the get-at force. So I used to go up and run the commissioning courses for the adults that did it. So people on base knew me. So the guys on 75 squadron all knew me.

So they didn't think it was unusual that I was there. And they actually called on me once before this, too. It was a triad exercise. And they were short of officers. And they wanted an intelligence officer to do it.

So I went up and worked on that. So some of the new I was in the service. But they didn't know what the rest of this was about. They didn't know anything about me being winning over season. Nothing about the agency.

Didn't know that I actually ran a business. They, you know, it was all compartmentalized. So you were able to do that? They allowed you to actually fly or...

Oh, it's always someone with the short.

But you were in the A4. Oh, yeah, yeah. They allowed you to do that so that your cover would be good enough. Yes, to do that. That's extraordinary, isn't it?

In fact, all of this is designed to get kid minutes to a point where he can quietly. He ever so discreetly allowed Vladimir to discover that he's on a real news energy force committee, evaluating the possibility of buying if 16s, a more up-to-date combat aircraft than the A4 Skyhawk. And New Zealand did look at the A6 teams, but that was much later.

But yeah, we, there was talk about it then. But at this time, we were talking about replacements for the A4. And so it would. It's there. Layer upon layer of sub-defuge and dissection,

or the building of a really good type of... Order online. Yeah, it's a long game. You've got to play a long game. It hasn't changed since that we're willing horses into Troy.

You know, intelligence work goes on and on, but down here. One of the recent CIA success stories has come in Ukraine. This is an ABC news story from January 2025. Tonight on Prime, the remarkable story of how the CIA and Ukrainian intelligence forged a deep,

“secret partnership that began a decade ago and has been crucial in helping Ukraine defend itself against Russia's invasion.”

Ukrainian intelligence officials say that not only did the CIA give them warning of the imminent invasion, but the troops they had trained were on the front lines and able to push back against the invaders. All this guy was the first line of our defense, which meet Russia in the first day of invasion. Following the invasion, many restrictions on CIA operations were lifted. Ukrainian officials say, without the intelligence support, Ukraine could not have held off Russia's game.

While we understand that Ukraine and Russia have been in this hot war since 2022, what's less obvious is that Europe is now in conflict with Russia. This is driven largely by what have described as "greyzone" attacks from Russia. Not direct attacks that kill people, but things like "all identified drones over the airports,

the destruction of undersea cables, sabotage of rail lines, they're kind of crucial infrastructure."

Greyzone attacks are deliberately kept below the three-should of the kind of thing that would lead to a flat-out declaration of war and an escalation of conflict that could be hard to stop. Just to keep it hard to understand, Russia typically refuses to acknowledge responsibility. But there has been a ramping up of Greyzone warfare over the last few years that makes you wonder whether we haven't moved from a kind of cold war into a hot one.

And so we asked Professor Azizin if he thinks there is actually an unannounced hot war,

Yes, there is.

“I mean, we can always argue about definitions and some people think that we are not in World War 3,”

but depends on how you define World War 3. We could very well define what's happening as a World War 3. Professor Azizin was then pointing to the way countries are lining up on either side of Ukraine, and Russia war as an indication of how the battle lines are drawn as a side back in November 2025. Look, we have 50 or so coalition partners of Ukraine, including New Zealand supporting Ukraine

and doing military and other support.

We have basically North Korea and Iran very much aligned to Russian interests

and China basically being sympathetic at least. So there are all the features of a third world war where some reason we are careful not to call it that. And you can see why. And remember, what the intelligence agencies are doing here is often referred to as political warfare. And while what is happening in Ukraine is definitely a hot war,

the one that's playing out across Europe is in this gray zone where intelligence agencies operate as they did back in the Cold War. So they're working on containment of their adversaries, intelligence and counterintelligence. They're probing the opposition trying to get an advantage without resorting to the kind of weaponry that would escalate the situation.

There is hesitance to provide in a long range missiles. So there's a restrained support for Ukraine. And that makes it a little bit uneven in terms of a full war in my opinion is when both countries contribute equally in terms of enthusiasm and ambition.

“Here we see, I think, Europe and US being involved and supporting but to a degree.”

Of course, people will say, come on, Ruben. We don't want to escalate. We don't want to make it a full third world war, which they mean by the use of nuclear weapons. I think that's a difference. So we are worried that Russia will use nuclear weapons.

That's a different question. I frankly, I don't want to make any predictions because I got it wrong in 2022. When like many X, I'm afraid I didn't expect a full invasion by Russia or Ukraine. That happened.

So we can't say that will never happen.

But in my view, that will be almost a suicidal decision by Mr Putin. And the answer to earlier question by John, the end game of Putin is not to commit a suicide. We'll come back to this, to Ruben and Zizian and Vladimir Putin's Russia and the America of Donald Trump. And what that all means for the Five Eyes Alliance. When you sit alongside, it's major security pan.

Yeah, this kind of moment in Ukraine and across Europe is a pretty useful reminder of the stakes involved. And these more intimate spy games. If Kit Benets can maneuver Vladimir into the right spot, they could be a pay off for the US and the West more generally. In this cold war that through the 1980s, they're still pretty hot.

“Remember, Kit Benets and CIA are now aiming to pass on deed in technology to Soviet military intelligence.”

Well, it isn't necessarily a well known technique. He sees it's been around for a long time. There's an egg at the Christie story on that. So, down in the 30s where they, you know, the story had them getting technology to their Germans. That was dead in technology.

So, this is not new, probably been tried and intelligence serves us all over. But that's what we were looking to do. And the way we did that was that sometimes in an operation, you take it to a certain point and then you're cut out of it and someone else comes in. And that can be deep in frustrating, because you then cut out and then need to know a rise and you don't know what happened. You don't know.

And that was the case with us. So, having carefully crafted a deception around his level of expertise as a pilot, Kit Benets and the CIA determined that the most credible next step is to use the story to get in a new man with ties to the US military. And I was on this non-existent evaluation team that the museum government had set up and I was the reserve officer on that. And they were clamoring for this. Oh, you know, I've got this.

I've got this mate that I met. They actually, he is, I'm hoping to meet him next time. I'm out because he's doing some work with a, a clerk or something. And so, and I piggybacked him in. And then he was going to be passed.

He was theoretically an armaments, a guiding system guy. This new man will offer fresh possibilities for the GOU.

Yeah, we're never told exactly what the DNA technology was because Kit Benets wasn't told.

Which must be pretty frustrating, but given we know this new American man was posing as an expert in missile guidance and weaponry, you would imagine it's something along those lines. Those really meaty mechanical details that interest the Soviets either to be able to counteract the weapons or to copy them. You say you know something about this, that really, this is the time for you to. Yeah, I, one of these guys that I was working with really great American guy. And he's coming through here because we were talking the other day.

“You must meet him, you know, and he was on the design team of the 16 and he's good guy and pretty easy going, you know, that sort of thing.”

But does it make it scream, I mean, yeah. Yeah, I want to make that sort of vibe. Yeah, well, why would he be so, why would you mean, why have you been on the design team? Come to Manila. Come to Manila.

Come to Manila. It's a chat, I agree with. He was going up to Clark Airbase to do something or super Bay or something to do something. Now, you can hear that I'm exhibiting a certain amount of skepticism. We'll come back to this in a second.

Keep in it, understand why. The part that should have had them concerned was that, yeah, now we're dealing with an American. Who's dealing with guidance systems? It all has top secret stamped on bottom. And he is a Russian diplomat.

Yeah, I mean, it's an ask, but these things happened. And remember, you know, I was talking about the frog kissing that they would do. You know, saying to guys with Russian names and CIA would, you know, we want you to come home. We need you to work for us. Okay, so this is something you mentioned separately.

The idea that the KGB were kissing a lot of frogs in the hope that one of them might turn into a Prince. In this case, so if you'd intelligence had approached a number of intelligent officers in diplomats of Russian heritage and pitched them to come over and work for the land of their fathers.

And, you know, you get a lot of knockbacks, but, you know, you never know.

You just might get lucky. And so they thought, well, what have we got to lose? So this is the parallel he's drawing with the operation against Vladimir and the GRU. What do we got to lose? Talk into this guy.

“That's how I think they would have viewed it.”

If it got triggered or spraying or didn't work, the Philippine government was turmoil. They weren't going to be doing anything. So effectively, what kept been it to say is that yes, the GRU aren't forms. They know if something looks too good to be true. Like what a friend in New Zealander who just happens to offer them an introduction to an American missile guidance expert?

Yeah, something crazy like that. Then, one that probably is too good to be true. They can afford not to follow it up. And in any case, there's no downside. And he says, the bait wasn't presented as clumsily as it might sound.

There's a series of, you know, very decently spaced wavelengths. Yes, rather than like a massive sandwich. Exactly. Yeah. Come and meet this, this F-16 designer.

He's coming to Manila. Yeah. It was not like that. It was done over a period of time.

“But what, you don't think that's the full story, do you?”

All right. This is kind of a crux of everything we've been talking about. So it's take a moment and get into it. And then we haven't seen, is that we have a sick and source for almost all of what Kubernetes has told us so far.

Yeah, I suppose it's always theoretically possible that we are the victims of an elaborate influence operation run by anyone from the SIS to the G-R-U.

This is the wilderness of Mirrors after all. But we're as confident as we can reasonably be in the story and we'll family background, John and your knowledge of cabinets and his work. It goes a long way, too, right? We'll play a long game, but it will be like decades on our off chance that I get into making podcasts. In this second source, it's backed up pretty much everything until now.

That's right. We're either, it's been possible to cross-cheek. Kit in the second source have continued. Except in one area. Money.

Yeah. Kit Bennett's has told us that money was not a factor in the relationship with Vladimir. Even when it came to the shopping list, we told you about that. Vladimir was only covering his expenses rather than compensating him for the risks he was starting to run by bringing in the sense of material. You know, I didn't say to him, you know, well, I can get that stuff for you, but, you know, I need, I need dead presidents, you know, you guys.

I've got to think this is attacking some risks here, so we never got to that point.

But the second source says that isn't right. In fact, Kit Bennett, on the instructions of a CIA handler, began relatively early to make the move into a transaction relationship, pushing for money to change hands. And that this was a deliberate point to increase his credibility as a source of good material. Yeah, that makes sense, doesn't it? They might get on well, but not well enough to be going out of your way to get into danger.

I mean, you need a real motive for that.

And we put that to Kit Bennett, and he agreed that he must have misremembered the single. And in fairness, it is 40 years ago, and he could easily forgotten us, because in any case, he couldn't keep the money. He couldn't keep any money, because while Americans funded his expenses generously,

they always took any of the cash his businesses brought in.

Like the sheepskin coats, he says they sold quite a few of them that never kept a cent.

“It's always a problem with the Americans, if you make money, what they held are we doing with the money, you know?”

You know, if I make money in the business, what do you do with it? What did it earn? Uncle Sam? So if Uncle Sam kept it, you can see why he wouldn't necessarily remember any money coming in 40 years later, because for Kit Bennett, this relationship with Vladimir is built on trust and friendship.

The money is just from one government to another. And if you're quietly thinking, he might have held on to the money and kept quite about it for 40 years. That's highly unlikely for another reason. That is also confirmed by the second source. All the meetings with Vladimir were recorded.

Yeah.

I had a sophisticated system of recording.

It was sophisticated for those days. It was very sexy for those days.

“What kind of kettle you're talking about?”

Like something hadn't in the room? No, hidden with me. Yeah. On your person. Not I'm actually on my person.

I'm just in my, you know, had a briefcase. Yeah. And I had a briefcase that I carried up through through customs. And I carried a back to customs, but it wasn't in that briefcase. It was in an identical briefcase that I picked up when I arrived.

So you went wearing a white? No, I wasn't wearing a white. No. No. Okay.

So you're thinking that it's more likely. Kit Bennett has told Vladimir that he can get access to this weapons expert for money. Yeah. Look, it fits the pattern of what had been going on until now. The stuff it's been doing exactly this kind of thing for years.

Using Russian intelligence officers attached to embassies to build up and network of dozens of agents embedded in Western companies specialising in high-end engineering. And stealing the tech. Exactly, but in the early 1980s, a KGB cool Vladimir Vietrov co-named "Fearwell" had passed on the names to French intelligence via an ordinary French businessman who traveled to Moscow for work.

This became known as the "Fearwell Affier". The French made a film about it. It felt me that more than one, it's been totally up on one. The man in women in the free world, oh, you've allowed them as a performer. Let's win them to vote, playing a CIA officer.

CIA got these files from the French in late 1981. Most of the people working for the Russians were arrested, but in some cases, they were used to feed disinformation back to the KGB. We mentioned the failure of the Soviet Space Shuttle program in the last episode. There was reportedly also an explosion on the trans-Siberian pipeline because of this dead-end technology transfer.

And it's quite possible that information from the "Fearwell" dossier about what the Soviets were looking for is used by CIA technicians as they prepare fake-science for this operation in the Philippines. It keeps the G-I-U. Now the aim here is to tie up resources and spread uncertainty inside a system that became increasingly reliant on stealing tech to try to keep up.

So it really fits that when Kit Benz is talking to a Soviet content that they would have to take it seriously. It's worked for them in the past, so they do know it's feasible. People in the West will exchange secrets for money. And the Soviets are increasingly desperate because these old sources have been blind

and they need to get new ones. Now in the next episode, we'll look at how one American at the heart of the CIA's Soviet program was on the Soviet payroll from 1985, passing secret information to the KGB.

“For now, let's remember that while we have had a second source until this point, from here on,”

we are having to take the word of Kit Benz. We have every reason to think he's telling it straight. There may be slight errors around memory as you'd expect, but this idea of money being part of the equation that really does seem to make sense here. In any case, as he comes to the end of his involvement in the operation, Kit Benz brings in a new man to take over.

He tells Vladimir this guy can give him better information about the technical aspects of combat aircraft.

And then we will demand my close friend who I'd never met before.

And we got together and met and chaired and we got my story straight and his story straight.

And you did a sort of a million? No, no. In fact, our final meeting was clearly a final meeting for both of us. He was kind of, we both knew that we were closing.

And so, you know, you never know whether or not they were on to us, but they kept going.

So they kept going in the hope that they were on something that I, you know. That was, it was the end, I knew it was the end, and I was gone. So I didn't get the glory for recruiting someone.

“In that, did you feel you remember, you know, I probably didn't feel waiting for more, and you remember yourself?”

Um, yeah. In an odd way, I was sad because I liked the guy. We enjoyed each other's company. And I liked the guy. So I was there to do a job.

And I guess the disappointment that I didn't do, the real story thing to recruit. You know, that's, that's the real time James Bond stuff. You know, if you talk about the sexy, spying stuff, people think of the James Bond, the fast cars. Yeah. But really, in the real game, the sexy stuff is recruiting someone in place and having them run back and working for you.

And because I didn't get to do that, I was cut out. You know, and that's, but I knew that. I mean, that's what, that's what we did. That was the job. I know complaints about that, just, you know.

But it was sad that I didn't see him again. You know, you know, like I would love to know how he would happen in his life. And I just hope it doesn't tragic. We'll come back to what happened to Vladimir.

But in the meantime, it's important for Kit Bennett and the CIA man, his close friend that he's never met before,

to push the story on to the next level. So they organised a meet and give this story straight in a way that corresponds with their covers. So drinking in the flash pots of Manila. We made arrangements for him to meet me in a bar place called the Kangaroo Club, which is where lots of Australians.

There was lots of activities occurred up at Angelus. You know, as you can imagine, the city ringing in there, you were safe or space. So people went up there to show some things that were not necessarily cultural. And anyway, but this guy was going to meet me. So I had this time that he was going to meet me in an alternate.

So if he didn't show up or I didn't show up, we had an alternate, which is two hours later. Somewhere else. This is standard practice for intelligence officers. If they have a feeling they're being followed or their spider senses are off or whatever. They can break off the first meet and go to the second.

But of course, they might not make the first meet because something's gone seriously wrong. And they've been picked up or even replaced by someone from the other side. And if you were not who's been warned that your operation might have been compromised. That the GRU have killed another guy in a similar situation in Europe. So you're already feeling jittery out being on your own in the hinterland of Manila.

And you'll collaborate and it doesn't show with the first meet. It could be a long couple of hours waiting for you to. So anyway, he didn't show up the first meeting.

“And it always makes you a little bit nervous, you know?”

Maybe he got held up, maybe he would have.

And when I met him at the second meeting, he said to me, "I, I'm going to have it never to make the first meeting."

And I thought you were younger. Really, you know, that's, you've been reading too many spy books. You do the job. If you don't make the first meeting, this should be a reason for it not. You know, hey, there's a matter of course. But he was different to most of them.

Most of the guys end up with what, hugely professional. Even then, this prolonged dance with Vladimir and the other operations he was running was clearly beginning to take a toll on kid benefits and his own relationships. Particularly with his wife. If this is yet another instance of kid benefits, having to arrange the truth in such a way that it would hopefully work for him.

He was allowed to tell his wife some of what he was doing. But he couldn't share much of his work with her. Bluntly, she didn't have the security care. So she didn't need to know. And once I'm doing psychological need to be close, double going like that.

I think it comes and gets you. I mean, I really liked Vladimir. I really liked him. He was a really nice guy. His wife was like, he was a good player. And all he was doing was what I was doing, only for the other side.

I mean, I liked him. And yeah, it's, it's deceptive.

“But that's the name of the game, I think.”

So you can treat it a little bit like a sport. Like you go on the rugby field. You're playing the sky. Yeah. And you know it's kind of a game.

Is that how you sleep? Yeah. Compartmentalize it in your heat. I was like returning to a real relationship after your mind's head to do that.

Yeah. Well, sort of thing to do.

“My case, it certainly was because, you know, it was major in costing me a marriage.”

I was going to get back that sort of psychological situation. Probably. Yeah, I, yes, I think I was. There's no doubt that I was a little damaged by at all.

As he says, ultimately, that would lead to his marriage breaking up.

When it comes to his relationship with Vladimir, he'd like to keep thinking about that in a positive way. And I go right back to that sales training ahead. You know, people buy from people they like. Why did Vladimir and I get on well together? Because we liked each other.

Deception as it was. We liked each other. And I tried to recruit him. And he tried to recruit me. And it was like, man.

He had magazine, you know, spy was kind of, you know, think about it now. Probably, but like that. But you had to like each other to be able to keep the relationship going.

And then I suppose that's when your guard drops.

I don't know. Yeah. Hmm.

“Would you like for us to try to find out about Vladimir?”

No. No. No, I don't, I don't actually want it. I don't think I want to know. There are a couple of options.

One, they got on to the operation. They probably maybe they got it once they started checking back into me. Maybe the guy that I piggybacked in wasn't successful. No matter how hard he tried. Maybe he was successful.

And maybe they wasted a lot of time and effort on it.

Would they necessarily blame Vladimir? You know, it's. It's like the drawer. It's the sort of thing that happened. However, you know, maybe his vulnerabilities were identified by.

Handsome more likely by, be by aims. And he might have gotten the shit. You know, I don't know. I don't want to know. I don't want to know.

Well, he don't. Yeah, he'd rather not know. Rather not.

“This is the moment when the penny drops for guard and me.”

Not just that we don't know what happened to Vladimir. But that for 40 years. Kid Bennett has had to live with a heavy uncertainty. Before that moment of silence between the three of us, Kid Bennett's mentioned two names.

You know, maybe his vulnerabilities were identified by. Handsome more likely by, be by aims. He's talking about old rich aims of the CIA and Robert Hansen from the FBI. These two men that was discovered after the Cold War ended and were both passing information to the Soviets from the mid-1980s,

including names of people working for CIA. And a number of these people were arrested and subsequently shot. The brutal truth is that if the operation was successful, if a guy kept in it and handed off to him, had managed to hit the GAU in Tangled and Emissive Program

revolving around dead in technology. Or even the peace prize, he managed to recruit him in place. Within a year or two, the Soviets almost differently found out about it through a fellow CIA officer who was selling secrets to the KGB. So while we don't know what happened to Vladimir,

there's a good chance for something there. The agency was produced, written and hosted by John Daniel and me. Guy and Espinum, executive producer, four RNZ was John Hardvelt and our executive producer, four bird of paradise productions, is Noel McCarthy.

The original music by Anthony Taunin, graphic design by Oliver Wal. For RNZ, sound production and final mix was by Mark Chesterman. Production coordinator was Brianna Eurich Greek, thanks to Steve Barrage, L. E. Martin, Jeremy and Soot and William Saunders. Thanks to Megan Willan and thanks also to Susan Bellvatchin.

The visual director at RNZ was coal, eased him fairly, and our camera operator was Jess Chalton. Thanks also to Sarah Gaitanos for the article about Bill Sachs that appears on RNZ.co. dottingsed. Thanks also to CNN TVNZ BBC, the ABC, Universal and Paramount.

To read more about the documents and articles we've mentioned, you can go to RNZ.co.nz/theagency and you can see the links in the show notes.