The Spy on the Wall Tour: Washington's Cold War Monuments Byvernok Loeb Ifashington Stajfwriter

The "Wi^HiNGTON Post The Spy on the Wall Tour: Washington's Cold War Monuments ByVernok Loeb IFashington StajfWriter Seven blocks on R Street in Georgetown are all that separate the rise and the fall of Americanintelligence, from the mansion of World War II spy master William "Wild Bill" Donovan to the mailbox where CIA traitor Aldrich H. Amesleft signals in chalk for his Soviet han- ; \ dlers. .! David Major calls it "Spy Street," standing infront of a tour bus one morninglast week,microphonein hand. ' He is midwaythrough "SpyDrive," a tour of 30 Wash ington espionage sites that twists and turns throu^ . 1 most of the major spy cases of the past 50 years. This may sound likejust another cheesy Washington tourist attraction, but the running commentajy provid ed by Major and his sidekick, Oleg Kalugin, is well wor^ the $35 a seat. I Major spent a career chasing foreign spies for the FBI and ultimately became counterinteUigence adviser at the Reagan White House. Kalugin was a Soviet spy BYGERALD MAfiTlNEAU—THE WASHINGTON POST David Majorcan tell youall about the history of espionage in See SPIES, C9. Col. 1 Washington—and he won't even haveto killyouafterward. SpyDrive's International Mystery Tour SPIES, fijom CJ in Washington—the youngest ma jor general in KGB history. "What we're going to show you is buildingsand monuments," Ma jorsays as thebuspulls away from the Grand Hyatt Hotel downtown. "But ... you're going to see it throughthe eyesofa counterintel- Ugence officer and an intelligence • collector." The SpyDrive (umw.spp- drive.com), whichruns a coupleof times a month, is a commercial spinoff ofa tourMajor startedrun ning several years ago for corpo rate executives and U.S. govern ment personnel to make the point that the nation's capital has long been a major playground for ^ manner of foreign spies—andstill is. "Since this is the most impor tant city in the world, it is a very, very viable target," sa^ Major, a stout, bearded man in a black leather jacket. This is not some thing stuck in the past—it faces every single one of us in the fu ture." What he's trjing to tell his bus loadofspytourists, manyofwhom Former intelligence agents David Major, left, and Oleg Kalugin expiain why alittle paranoia can be agood thing. have a certain law enforcement orama, where fired CIAofficerEd look, is that a little paranoia is not was intercepting all of its North that I never thought I would necessarilyabad thing, especially SeaNavycommunications, livedin sumeagain," says Kalugin, who is ward Lee Howard sat for hours in if you're an executive steeped in a row house a few blocks away at still a Russian citizen. "But old October 1983 pondering whether 525 P St. NW at the time of his ar habits never die." he should betray his country. Fi trade secrets or a government offi nally, he walked to thenearbySovi cial with a security clearance. If rest. On R Street—^"one of the spy you thinkyou're being followed on On K Street in Georgetown, fa streets in Washington," Major et Trade Mission and formally be camea spy.Andat 2800Wisconsin the streets of Washington, maybe mous espionage terrain, the tour says—the bus slows in front of a passesChadwick's, the pubwhere mansion on the comer of 30th, for Ave., there's what Major calls the you are. "Jennifer Miles tryst apartment," "Russian espionage is now on Ames handed over seven pounds mer home of "Wld Bill" Donovan, named after the South African in the rise," says Kalugin, a small, of top-secret material to his KGB director of the Office of Strategic handler, including the names of 20 Services, forerunner of the CIA, telligence officer who spied in dapper man who is now a perma Washington for the Cubans in the nent resident alien and works as CIA assets in the Soviet bloc, 10 of during WorldWar 11. late 1960s before the FBI caught an instructor at Major's training whom were subsequently execut Just up the street is Dumbarton her and kicked her out of the coun firm in Alexandria, the Centre for ed. Then there's Martin's Tavern Oaks, the 19th-century mansion Counterintelligence and Security on Wisconsin Avenue, where Vas- and surrounding gardens that try. Pollard's name comes up agam Studies. The U.S. us^ to be Ene sar graduate and Soviet courier would be described on some tours my Number 1. Nowit is Priority Elizabeth Bentley operated in the as an important research library in outside the Israeli Embassy in North Cleveland Park, where Ma Number 1." '30s and '40s. Byzantine and medieval studies. Andjust a blockup Wisconsin, On the SpyDrive, it is the place jor points to the gate where the There is, of course, no more fa Navy analyst drove in—and was mous monimient to espionage in there's Au Pied de Cochon, the where Navy analystand convicted Washington than the old ^viet French bistro where KGB defector spyJonathanPollard methisIsrae expelled byIsraelisecurityguards, Vitaly Yurchenko bolted from his li handler. right into the waiting arms of the Embassy on 16th Street, now the FBI in 1985. For Pollard buffs. Ma Russian ambassador's residence. CIA handlers in 1985, walked to A little farther down, at 37th Kalugin calls it "the hub of in the new Soviet Embassy at the top and R, is the famous blue mail jor points out yet another obscure telligence operations in this coun of the hill and un-defected—a box—Ames's "signal site." The espionage monument—an eighth- floor Israeli "safe house" across try." route retraced by the SpyDrive CIA malcontent and alcoholic, Major points to the front door bus. who started spying in 1985,would Connecticut Avenue in the Nelson that three of the most damaging There's debate to this day in mark the box with chalk so that apartments, where Pollard made American spies—Ames,Navywar . U.S. intelligence about whether the KGB would know to check a ample use of a specially installed photocopyingmachine. rant officer John Walker and Na Yurchenko was a legitimate defec prearranged"dead drop"for a new tional Security Agency employee tor or a KGB plant. But Kalugin— cache of top-secret reports. It's Nearing the end, the tour pro Ronald Pelton—walked throu^ who debriefed Yurchenkoupon his just a plain blue mailbox now. ceeds past the embassies of Hun to begin their careers in treason. return to Moscow—says the KGB Indeed, what makes the Spy- gary and the Czech Republic on Major, whosawWalker in hand believed he was a genuine defector Drive an intriguing jaunt through the edge of Rock Creek Park, cuffs immediately after his arrest who simply grew disenchanted as town is its mix of buHdingslike Al- which Major says presented a par - in 1985, knows the case inside and a ward of the CIA. ger Hiss'srowhouseat 2905P St. ticularly difficult surveillance out. He tells the driver to pull up Kalugin worked for 12 years as a NW, and monuments like a spot on problem for the FBI during the Cold War. 10 feet and directs everyone to spy in Washington before return Sheridan Circle—"right where look down an alley n(^ of the em inghometo run the KGB's foreign that red car is right now," Major Isolated in a wooded ravine, he bassy a^the back door,where the counterintelligence program. He says—where a car bomb planted says, there simply was no place to Soviets spirited Walker and Pelton was elected to the Russian parlia by Gen. Augusto Pinochet's in park a surveilliice van and eaves out of the building to avoid detec ment in 1990 after the fall of the telligence service in 1976 killed drop on what the two aggressive tion by an FBIsurveillance team. Soviet Union before coming back former Chilean diplomat Orlando communist spy services were up Pelton, who told the Soviet to the United States as part of a Letelier and his American col to. Union that U.S. intelligence had joint venture with AT&T. league Ronni Moffitt. What to do? Major asks. He tapped its underwater cable and "Now I am back to the old trade There's Mitchell Park in Kal- pauses for a moment as the bus •• •• > Martin's Tavern in Georgetown was a spy hangout inthe '30s and '40s. ' pulls away from the embassies and longer with us. On the other baft^ stops in front of the Art Barn by it would be naive to believe tn^ the park. Ah yes, the Art Barn. since the collapse of the U.S.SiR'.v- During the ColdWar, Majorex espionage has stopped. Infact,^ plains, the Art Barn's attic was a pionage will go on as long as major intercept station, full of an tional interest exists. This is anl^ tennas and other sophisticated lis er-ending story, and you h^^ tening devices. heard only part of it." As the bus turns into the park and heads back downtown, past the Cuban Interests Section and the oldBulgarian Embassy on 16th Street, Kalugin ranks the former Soviet bloc spy agencies, rating the East Germans as the most effi cient, the Bulgarians as the most obedient and the Hungarians as the least effective. But the more things change, the old Soviet spy says, the more they stay the same. "The Cold War is over," Kalugin saysat tour's end."Some ofthe old practices of the Cold War are no.

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