about its source. Any intelligence service would wish to double-check it. Any counter-intelligence agency would be deeply alarmed by a senior official meeting a known spy from a hostile country; it would allow such contact to continue only under the closest scrutiny. Simm claims that he would have liked to confide in British or American intelligence but was too scared to do so. âI did consider telling someone,â he says, while insisting: âBut I used that material and passed it on.â But what material, and to whom? Whether Simmâs claim of a âtwo-way streetâ is self-delusion, mischief making, or a fragment of a bigger story remains one of several unsolved puzzles. Others are even more intriguing.
Zentsov was an old-style spy: a hardened KGB veteran from Soviet-occupied Estonia. While he was guiding Simm into the heart of the Defence Ministry, a new Russian intelligence presence was developing in the region, in the form of Antonio Graf, a plump, bearded man from Madrid. Apart from his slightly exotic middle names (de Jesus Amorett) he cut an unremarkable figure in the Baltic states. A Portuguese citizen, born in Brazil and working in Spain, he was one of thousands of consultants and go-betweens getting to know the continentâs new eastern frontier lands. Until 1989 , West European businesses had been almost wholly ignorant of the markets and suppliers behind the Iron Curtain. Dealing with the communist bureaucracy involved marathon negotiating sessions, best conducted with strong government support. Shortage of hard currency made customers stingy; NATO controls on the export of sensitive products meant that the deals that looked most promising were probably illegal. When communism collapsed, most businesses were initially deeply sceptical about the new markets. Would bills be paid? What was the work ethic? Could the communists come back? Would civil war and chaos spread from the Balkans? What about organised crime? And corruption? Even the most basic data about household income, family structure, education levels, property rights, currency regulations and the like were unknown.
So Antonio (as he was known to his many acquaintances and contacts) sounded completely plausible in his many trips to the Baltic states, which seem to have started in the mid 1990 s. He assiduously collected information about business conditions and the political and economic outlook, apparently spending some years building his âlegendâ as a regular and credible visitor before engaging in any spying. His mission seemed anodyne and convincing. One contact recalls:
Â
He told me that he was representing Portuguese businesses. He said: âIt appears you guys are going to join the European Union â we want to know more about your countries.â
Â
People who met him recall nothing suspicious, and little that was even distinctive, except possibly his odd choice of tipple: a revolting mixture of Campari and tonic. Anyone suspicious about his motives or background would have found it hard to check them. Spain and Portugal, and their languages, were all but unknown in the Baltic states in the 1990 s. If his Spanish sounded faintly accented, that would be because he was Portuguese. If a Portuguese speaker noticed a stray syllable, the answer was that he was born in Brazil â which from a Baltic point of view could have been the far side of the moon. The idea that he was in fact a Russian intelligence officer named Sergei Yakovlev, working under an elaborately constructed illegal identity, would have seemed paranoid fantasy.
When Zentsov retired, it was Antonio who took over as Simmâs case officer. Relations were poor from the start. Zentsov had excellent tradecraft and good people skills. Antonio did not. He was already known to Simm as a postman, handling the huge amounts of classified material that the Estonian was passing to the Russians. They had met once at a suburban railway station
Zentsov was an old-style spy: a hardened KGB veteran from Soviet-occupied Estonia. While he was guiding Simm into the heart of the Defence Ministry, a new Russian intelligence presence was developing in the region, in the form of Antonio Graf, a plump, bearded man from Madrid. Apart from his slightly exotic middle names (de Jesus Amorett) he cut an unremarkable figure in the Baltic states. A Portuguese citizen, born in Brazil and working in Spain, he was one of thousands of consultants and go-betweens getting to know the continentâs new eastern frontier lands. Until 1989 , West European businesses had been almost wholly ignorant of the markets and suppliers behind the Iron Curtain. Dealing with the communist bureaucracy involved marathon negotiating sessions, best conducted with strong government support. Shortage of hard currency made customers stingy; NATO controls on the export of sensitive products meant that the deals that looked most promising were probably illegal. When communism collapsed, most businesses were initially deeply sceptical about the new markets. Would bills be paid? What was the work ethic? Could the communists come back? Would civil war and chaos spread from the Balkans? What about organised crime? And corruption? Even the most basic data about household income, family structure, education levels, property rights, currency regulations and the like were unknown.
So Antonio (as he was known to his many acquaintances and contacts) sounded completely plausible in his many trips to the Baltic states, which seem to have started in the mid 1990 s. He assiduously collected information about business conditions and the political and economic outlook, apparently spending some years building his âlegendâ as a regular and credible visitor before engaging in any spying. His mission seemed anodyne and convincing. One contact recalls:
Â
He told me that he was representing Portuguese businesses. He said: âIt appears you guys are going to join the European Union â we want to know more about your countries.â
Â
People who met him recall nothing suspicious, and little that was even distinctive, except possibly his odd choice of tipple: a revolting mixture of Campari and tonic. Anyone suspicious about his motives or background would have found it hard to check them. Spain and Portugal, and their languages, were all but unknown in the Baltic states in the 1990 s. If his Spanish sounded faintly accented, that would be because he was Portuguese. If a Portuguese speaker noticed a stray syllable, the answer was that he was born in Brazil â which from a Baltic point of view could have been the far side of the moon. The idea that he was in fact a Russian intelligence officer named Sergei Yakovlev, working under an elaborately constructed illegal identity, would have seemed paranoid fantasy.
When Zentsov retired, it was Antonio who took over as Simmâs case officer. Relations were poor from the start. Zentsov had excellent tradecraft and good people skills. Antonio did not. He was already known to Simm as a postman, handling the huge amounts of classified material that the Estonian was passing to the Russians. They had met once at a suburban railway station
Similar Books
