On SpyCast: The hunt for Russian spies in the US

15 years have passed since the FBI arrested Russians living double lives, in a sprawling investigation that came to be known as Operation Ghost Stories.

Every year, right around this time, Alan Kohler bakes a special banana bread. It might be a counterintuitive detail about the former Assistant Director of the FBI’s Counterintelligence Division, but I came to learn it in this episode of SpyCast.

For a number of years, while monitoring Russian spies living under deep cover in the U.S., Alan would hear one man in New Jersey brag about his bread. “Then when we searched his house in June of 2010, we actually found the bread recipes. And they’re actually pretty good.”

Fifteen years have passed since FBI agents rounded up Russian operatives in coordinated arrests across Boston, New York, Northern Virginia, and New Jersey. They had been living like ordinary Americans — as professors, financial planners, and journalists. A new wave of Russian illegals had even begun to operate under their real names. And they were sending information back to Moscow through advanced tradecraft.

The FBI’s investigation came to be known as Operation Ghost Stories. “They were called, literally, the ‘back room cases’ for about five or six years,” Alan said. Until he told a colleague, “We have to come up with a better name.”

Alan recounted how the scope and sophistication of the illegals program surprised even a seasoned agent like him. He also described the experience of monitoring them — listening to their arguments, their parenting struggles, and even their disillusionment with their Russian handlers. “We absolutely developed what’s called a parasocial relationship with them, where we felt like we knew them intimately and they had never heard of us,” he told me.

This episode is a window into one of the FBI Counterintelligence division’s most significant undertakings, complete with close calls that nearly exposed agents and a waiting game with the White House.

Episode length: 33 minutes

Listen: On Spotify | On Apple Podcasts