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Karl František Koecher (21 September 1934 in Bratislava) is a Czech
mole Mole (or Molé) may refer to: Animals * Mole (animal) or "true mole", mammals in the family Talpidae, found in Eurasia and North America * Golden moles, southern African mammals in the family Chrysochloridae, similar to but unrelated to Talpida ...
known to have penetrated the
CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gathering, processing, ...
during the Cold War.


Early life

Born in Bratislava,
Czechoslovakia , rue, Чеськословеньско, , yi, טשעכאסלאוואקיי, , common_name = Czechoslovakia , life_span = 1918–19391945–1992 , p1 = Austria-Hungary , image_p1 ...
, his father was a Viennese-born Czech and his mother Irena, a Slovak
Jew Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""T ...
. As the son of an
Anglophile An Anglophile is a person who admires or loves England, its people, its culture, its language, and/or its various accents. Etymology The word is derived from the Latin word ''Anglii'' and Ancient Greek word φίλος ''philos'', meaning "frien ...
, Koecher gained his language skills from an early age attending an English grammar school and later French lyceum before the war. Prior to his entry to university, his anti-state activities in his teen years attracted the attention of the Czechoslovakia State Security after the Communists took over in Czechoslovakia in 1948. As remembered by some of his classmates, from early age he showed strong analytical capabilities, high intelligence and individualistic nature. Due to his unlikeable character, in later years, his former classmates would not invite him on annual class meetings. He studied physics and mathematics at Charles University as well as film at the Academy of Performing Arts. After university he tried a few jobs including a teacher, a reporter for state television, and a radio comedy writer. He became a radio comedy writer and was allegedly frequently scrutinized by the Communist security forces for his satire that mocked the regime (this turned out to be a pre-planned "cover story"). He joined the
Communist Party A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. ...
in 1960, and the Czechoslovak intelligence service in 1962 using the codename ''Pedro''.


Czechoslovakia State Security (StB) career

Koecher claimed that constant harassment from the Czechoslovakia State Security (StB) due to his history of anti-state and anti-social behavior, ruined his different careers and in order to end the harassment, he decided to join the StB. With the help of a friend within the StB and his language skills, he was recruited into the intelligence service. Koecher's first two years were devoted to training and counter-intelligence work against
West German West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...
s in
Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and List of cities in the Czech Republic, largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 milli ...
. Koecher was selected to become a mole in the West working with the first directorate in the Stb because of his
English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the ...
skills. ;Immigration to the United States In 1965 he and his wife, Hana Koecher (the daughter of a Communist Party official), seemingly emigrated to the
United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
via
Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
posing as defecting dissidents. His language skills and status as a defector aided Koecher in gaining employment at
Radio Free Europe Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) is a United States government funded organization that broadcasts and reports news, information, and analysis to countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, Caucasus, and the Middle East where it says tha ...
and a year long fellowship at Indiana University. He returned to New York in 1967 and he gained a doctorate in philosophy from Columbia University, and became an American citizen in 1971. ;CIA work With the purge of his superiors at the StB during the aftermath of the 1968 Soviet Union led invasion of Czechoslovakia, he found himself out of touch with the service and approached the FBI instead in an attempt to defect and use his knowledge against the Soviets but they were not interested. His supply of information to the StB dwindled from 1969 until 1971, but he continued to integrate himself in American society. Taking a CIA prescreening employment exam in November 1972, he passed and was employed. After several years as a sleeper he was hired by the CIA as a
translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''transl ...
/ analyst in 1973 due to his fake dissident credentials and skills in a number of Eastern European languages. He was given high level
security clearance A security clearance is a status granted to individuals allowing them access to classified information (state or organizational secrets) or to restricted areas, after completion of a thorough background check. The term "security clearance" is ...
and given the job of translating and analyzing documents handed over by CIA agents and transcripts of
wiretap Telephone tapping (also wire tapping or wiretapping in American English) is the monitoring of telephone and Internet-based conversations by a third party, often by covert means. The wire tap received its name because, historically, the monitorin ...
s and bugs. He quickly became one of the USSR's best sources of information, allowing them to mount an effective defense against CIA covert actions. He translated documents from a key CIA asset in Moscow, Ogorodnik. According to Martha D. Peterson, a retired CIA officer, Koecher is believed to have betrayed Aleksandr Dmitrievich Ogorodnik, a Soviet diplomat who spied for the CIA. ;KGB death threat and CIA retirement In September 1976, however, Koecher was summoned back to Prague to a meeting with
KGB The KGB (russian: links=no, lit=Committee for State Security, Комитет государственной безопасности (КГБ), a=ru-KGB.ogg, p=kəmʲɪˈtʲet ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)əj bʲɪzɐˈpasnəsʲtʲɪ, Komitet gosud ...
head of
counter-intelligence Counterintelligence is an activity aimed at protecting an agency's intelligence program from an opposition's intelligence service. It includes gathering information and conducting activities to prevent espionage, sabotage, assassinations or ot ...
,
Oleg Kalugin Oleg Danilovich Kalugin (russian: Олег Данилович Калугин; born 6 September 1934) is a former KGB general (stripped of his rank and awards by a Russian Court decision in 2002). He was during a time, head of KGB political ope ...
. Kalugin claims that after interrogating Koecher, Kalugin argued that he was in fact a triple agent and his information could not be trusted. According to Koecher, the StB then ordered Koecher to resign from the CIA or face death. After seven days of interrogation, Koecher returned to New York and retired, leaving the CIA for a post in
academia An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, ...
teaching philosophy. ; Reactivation By 1982, Koecher was rehabilitated by the KGB after Kalugin was demoted from chief of foreign counterintelligence and Koecher's past intelligence had been reassessed. In the 1980s, Koecher was one of a number of agents reactivated, when he was reproached by the StB intelligence officer Jan Fila in New York. He returned to work part-time for the CIA. Although the
FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, t ...
asserts that they had been monitoring and surveilling Koecher and his wife from the early 1980s, it was at least three years before he was arrested. To this day, neither the FBI nor the CIA will reveal what alerted them to Koecher's treachery. Koecher and other KGB officials claim it was Kalugin. Another suggestion by a CIA historian, is that it was the StB intelligence officer, Jan Fila, who betrayed him with the latter disappearing in December 1989, a month after the Czechoslovakian
Velvet Revolution The Velvet Revolution ( cs, Sametová revoluce) or Gentle Revolution ( sk, Nežná revolúcia) was a non-violent transition of power in what was then Czechoslovakia, occurring from 17 November to 28 November 1989. Popular demonstrations agains ...
.


Apprehension

The FBI apprehended Koecher on 27 November 1984, outside
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
's Barbizon Plaza Hotel, and brought him and, soon afterwards, his wife Hana in for several days of questioning. Finally, Koecher agreed to become a triple agent working for the Americans, provided that they agreed to grant him
immunity from prosecution Legal immunity, or immunity from prosecution, is a legal status wherein an individual or entity cannot be held liable for a violation of the law, in order to facilitate societal aims that outweigh the value of imposing liability in such cases. Su ...
. This was done and Koecher attempted to convince the FBI that he was cooperating. However, it was then decided that Koecher was not reliable enough to be a triple agent and was likely to defect and return to Czechoslovakia. On November 27, 1984, the day after the couple sold their apartment and hours before they were scheduled to fly to Switzerland, Koecher and his wife were arrested in
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
. Koecher was held on espionage charges and Hana Koecher as a
material witness In American criminal law, a material witness is a person with information alleged to be material concerning a criminal proceeding. The authority to detain material witnesses dates to the First Judiciary Act of 1789, but the Bail Reform Act of ...
. The arrest of the two agents was released to the media. U.S. Attorney Rudolph Giuliani led the case. The case on his wife, Hana, a purported diamond merchant but actually a courier for the StB from 1974 to 1983, had been bungled and would not result in a conviction, so the prosecutors allowed her to gain immunity in return for information against her husband Karl Koecher. It soon emerged that the FBI had badly blundered. Koecher's confession was given only after his interrogators promised him immunity as a ruse, and was thus invalid. His wife had been denied access to a lawyer despite frequent requests for one, which reportedly caused Justice Department officials to refuse to charge her. She refused to testify against Karl, asserting
spousal privilege In the common law, spousal privilege (also called marital privilege or husband-wife privilege) is a term used in the law of evidence to describe two separate privileges that apply to spouses: the spousal communications privilege and the spousal ...
, though prosecutors argued this did not apply given the two had been partners in crime. With little concrete evidence, it appeared that Koecher had a good chance of being acquitted. The issue of whether or not Hana Koecher could be compelled to testify against her husband went before the US Supreme Court but the fact that both spouses were returned to Czechoslovakia in a prisoner exchange before the court's opinion was published rendered the case moot. According to Koecher, Rudy Giuliani, as a prosecutor for the Southern District of New York, had bungled the case and was unable to gain enough evidence to convict Koecher after Koecher's arrest and instead offered immunity to Koecher in exchange for more information. Koecher was the victim of an attempted stabbing by an unnamed inmate while in prison. The inmate supposedly lunged at Koecher with a pair of scissors in an attack Koecher said was foiled by a
Hells Angels The Hells Angels Motorcycle Club (HAMC) is a worldwide outlaw motorcycle club whose members typically ride Harley-Davidson motorcycles. In the United States and Canada, the Hells Angels are incorporated as the Hells Angels Motorcycle Corporati ...
member, Sandy Alexander. Koecher claims the inmate was moved to another prison, and could not be located years later, which he says is proof of an attempt by US intelligence agencies to assassinate him. Koecher, worrying about his own safety, sent through his lawyer and his spouse's father, a request to the KGB chairman that he be part of a
prisoner exchange A prisoner exchange or prisoner swap is a deal between opposing sides in a conflict to release prisoners: prisoners of war, spies, hostages, etc. Sometimes, dead bodies are involved in an exchange. Geneva Conventions Under the Geneva Conven ...
with the Soviets. KGB chairman Kryuchkov agreed, and so did the prosecutor's office, concerned about the embarrassing chance of an acquittal. Koecher pleaded guilty on charges of conspiracy to commit espionage for Czechoslovakia, and was sentenced to life in prison, which was reduced to time served provided he left the US and never returned. On February 11, 1986, Koecher and his wife were part of a nine-person exchange at
Glienicke Bridge The Glienicke Bridge (german: Glienicker Brücke, ) is a bridge across the Havel River in Germany, connecting the Wannsee district of Berlin with the Brandenburg capital Potsdam. It is named after nearby Glienicke Palace. The current bridge, the ...
in
Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...
, of which the most prominent member was noted dissident Anatoly Shcharansky.


Return

Koecher returned to Czechoslovakia to a hero's welcome and was given a house and a Volvo car as a reward for his services. He was also given a job at the Prague Institute for Economic Forecasting, where many future politicians worked;
Václav Klaus Václav Klaus (; born 19 June 1941) is a Czech economist and politician who served as the second president of the Czech Republic from 2003 to 2013. From July 1992 until the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in January 1993, he served as the second ...
and
Miloš Zeman Miloš Zeman (; born 28 September 1944) is a Czech politician serving as the third and current President of the Czech Republic since 2013. He previously served as the Prime Minister of the Czech Republic from 1998 to 2002. As leader of the Cze ...
the future Czech presidents were among them. Some U. S. journalists stated they had seen Koecher issuing orders at the Laterna Magika theatre during the early days of the
Velvet Revolution The Velvet Revolution ( cs, Sametová revoluce) or Gentle Revolution ( sk, Nežná revolúcia) was a non-violent transition of power in what was then Czechoslovakia, occurring from 17 November to 28 November 1989. Popular demonstrations agains ...
(1989). Koecher denied any involvement in the Velvet Revolution, saying that journalists must have mixed him up with the then unknown Václav Klaus, who had a similar appearance. The
fall of communism The Revolutions of 1989, also known as the Fall of Communism, was a revolutionary wave that resulted in the end of most communist states in the world. Sometimes this revolutionary wave is also called the Fall of Nations or the Autumn of Nat ...
has seen Koecher fall from prominence, with the exception of his alleged involvement in a scheme run by Oswald LeWinter, a self-professed former CIA operative, to defraud
Mohammed Al-Fayed Mohamed Al-Fayed (; arz, محمد الفايد ; born 27 January 1929) is an Egyptian-born businessman whose residence and chief business interests have been in the United Kingdom since the late 1960s. His business interests include ownership of ...
with false documents that would support his conspiracy theories about the death of Princess Diana. He continues to live in the
Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...
in relative obscurity. His wife, Hana Koecher, made the headlines in the Czech Republic, when she was fired from her new job as a translator for the British Embassy in Prague. The British were completely unaware of her espionage past until a Czech newspaper reporter notified them. A suit she filed against a media organisation for revealing her past as a spy, damaging her business, was rejected. An episode of the 2004 Canadian documentary series ''Betrayal!'' covered the Koecher case.


See also

* Larry Wu-Tai Chin *
Sexpionage Sexpionage is the involvement of sexual activity, or the possibility of sexual activity, intimacy, romance, or seduction to conduct espionage. Sex or the possibility of sex can function as a distraction, incentive, cover story, or unintended par ...
*
Wolfgang Vogel Wolfgang Vogel (30 October 1925 – 21 August 2008) was a German lawyer active in East Germany at the time of the Cold War who had brokered some of the most famous swaps of spies or exchanges against ransom of political prisoners between the Sov ...


Notes


References


External links


Mole in CIA: Spy case nobody talks about


Bibliography

*
Ronald Kessler Ronald Borek Kessler (born Ronald Borek; December 31, 1943) is an American journalist and author of 21 non-fiction books about the White House, U.S. Secret Service, FBI, and CIA. Personal life Kessler was born in New York City to Dr. Ernest B ...
: ''The CIA At War: Inside The Secret Campaign Against Terror'', 2004, . * Ronald Kessler: ''The Bureau: The Secret History of the FBI'', 2003, . * Ronald Kessler: ''The FBI: Inside the World's Most Powerful Law Enforcement Agency'', 1994, . * Ronald Kessler: ''Inside the CIA'', 1994, . * Ronald Kessler: ''Escape from the CIA: How the CIA Won and Lost the Most Important KGB Spy Ever to Defect to the U.S.'', 1991, . * Ronald Kessler: ''The Spy In The Russian Club'', 1990, . * Ronald Kessler: ''Spy Vs Spy: Stalking Soviet Spies in America'', 1988, . {{DEFAULTSORT:Koecher, Karl 1934 births Living people Soviet spies against the United States Czechoslovak spies against the United States People of the Central Intelligence Agency Slovak Jews People of the StB Columbia University alumni Charles University alumni Former United States citizens