All language subtitles for Inside the CIA Secrets and Spies - S01E06 - Marti Peterson - From CIA Wife To CIA Spy

I arrived in Moscow in November of 1975
during the Cold War.

The Soviet Union was the main
intelligence target of the U .S., and so

a big job.

The danger of getting identified as a
CIA officer

would be devastating.

After I was arrested, the Soviets wrote
this about me.

A chiseled, almost ideal, medium -sized
figure. She was actually, if not

beautiful, then very, very pretty.

And very smart, too.

And Martha loved to drink.

In general, if she was not a drunk, then
she was amenable.

And if not a slut...

than a very free -spirited woman.

It

was

obviously very complimentary to me.

I'm not sure about the drinking. I don't
know when they would have seen that.

I never knew my mom was a spy. I never
had a clue.

She led a normal life.

She just was really busy.

And if you were to tell me today that...
How do I put this?

If she hadn't told me back then and she
just let the lie go... Not the lie, but

the secret. I should call it a secret.
It's not a lie.

If she had let it go to today, I still
would have never suspected it.

during the Cold War, working for CIA.

I knew it was a very dangerous time in
history, and you're taking the ultimate

risk. But that was just going to be a
fact of my life.

It was a very exciting life.

I am Marty Peterson. I worked for the
CIA for 32 years.

People are always surprised because I
look like someone's grandmother at this

point, and I tell them people who work
for CIA, you know, look like

eventually. You know.

Servicing the CIA is not easy. You're
living a double life, but you are

You are fortunate that everybody has the
opportunity to serve our country this

way.

My name is James Olson.

I served undercover in the CIA during
the Cold War when the United States and

the Soviet Union were building up their
capabilities and about to destroy the

other many times over.

At the time, I really wanted to make a
mark of some kind for the world.

The Soviet Union was a very, very
powerful adversary, so we had to bring

-game.

Being considered for a case officer
position was not the norm for a woman.

You have to think about the fact that
women weren't even expected to work.

My name is Tracy Walder. I'm one of the
few women who served on both the

operations side of the CIA and the FBI.

Women couldn't even have their own
credit cards until the 70s. Women

special agents of the FBI until 1972.

They said.

Well, we would love to hire you. We have
several jobs as secretaries. And I said

I would like to be interviewed for the
officer program.

I found out about a man working with CIA
who was looking for someone to go

to Madrid.

And it became very clear that he was
looking for a Girl Friday, a little roll

the hay as well. I didn't go.

CIA is patriarchal. The reason was,
well, women eventually will get married

have babies. What good are they? I
didn't want to be a secretary. I had

skills.

They saw that I had potential, and
eventually I was hired as a career

trainee.

And the CIA, the bread and butter of
intelligence, is the overseas agent, the

source.

the foreigner who has access to
information that our country needs for

security, who knows what their plans
are.

And so we were so hungry during the Cold
War for Russian sources that getting a

Foreign Service officer anywhere was
going to be valuable for us.

At the end of 1974, we had recruited
this great source down in Bogota,

Alexander Ogorodnik, codenamed Frygon, a
foreign ministry officer for the Soviet

Union. He probably had some disaffection
from the Soviet Union. He lived in the

West, so he saw the difference. He saw
what a democratic society could look

like. And he was about ready to go back
to Moscow.

But getting that information from Trigon
to us was going to be a major challenge

because all of our people in Moscow were
under constant KGB surveillance.

We had to get somebody free of KGB
surveillance.

We said to ourselves, we know that the
KGB does not use women

for high -risk operational jobs.

They probably assume that we don't
either.

I got a call one day from a wonderful
man, and he offered a job in

Moscow as a case officer.

We had the perfect candidate sitting
right there.

That was momentous for us. And we said,
all right, let's do it. I had no

experience. I was fresh out of training.

I mean, Moscow was the main target of U
.S. intelligence. So I knew that this

was big time.

I just hoped that I could do the job.

Finally, we had the person who had great
access going back to Moscow, and we can

handle him with Marty Peterson.

I flew from Florida to Moscow. The
flight landed and I was instantly

paranoid.

I thought they knew who I was.

And it was frightening.

The KGB was vicious.

It was cruel.

It routinely engaged in assassinations,
torture.

They were a brutal foreign service.

My name is Alexander Vasiliev. I am ex
-KGB intelligence officer.

If you don't want to be executed, don't
become a spy for the CIA.

The punishment is obvious.

It's death.

We were trained to believe that we were
at war against the CIA, against the U

.S. administration.

And the KGB surveillance was the best of
the best.

We are watching you.

To most people in the embassy, both my
American colleagues and Soviets who

worked in the first floor, I was doing a
low -level job and then would go up

to the CIA station at noon and at the
end of the day.

Our hope was that the KGB would overlook
her and that they would then not

surveil her.

And we told Marty, we want you to be
portraying yourself as frivolous.

you know move around town in fact he
developed the nickname of party marty

comfortable sometimes with being
underestimated can actually be sort of

quiet skill that you have that really
works out in your fever

my first job was to determine

whether i had surveillance

In the beginning, I thought, well, I
just wasn't seeing it. I also invited

secretaries with me to take trips around
town.

And I had reason to turn around and look
with other people with me, and nobody

seemed to be following me.

I would go into the station, of course,
and say, I didn't see any surveillance.

And the men...

Doubted the fact that I could actually
spot surveillance. There were some old

male chauvinist curmudgeons back at CIA
headquarters that said, she's just not

safe because it's there.

We didn't know for sure if Marty was
being followed.

KGB was using a certain type of radio
transmission among their surveillance

teams.

What was discovered was we can intercept
those communications.

I'm Robert Wallace. I was director of
the Office of Technical Service and the

director of science and technology.

In Moscow, that technology was
absolutely critical for the operation

to be accomplished.

They gave me a receiver, the SR -100.

Our agents would be able to hear now the
communications of surveillance teams

who were tracking them.

So if we made a move on the street, we
could hear that in our ear.

So when the men went out, they could
hear.

When I went out, this is what I heard.

There was no one following me, ever.

Marty was our ace in the hole.

I had a way to operate in Moscow that
everyone else didn't.

Marty became the handler for Trigon, and
that was historic.

For the first time ever, we were handing
a source inside Moscow.

And also, this was the first time we'd
ever used a woman.

in an advanced operational role, a high
-risk, dangerous operation.

It was life and death what she was
doing.

I had been in Moscow about two and a
half months.

We needed to know what was going on in
the Kremlin.

The White House was relying on us
because it was so important that we

our policymakers with good inside
information on the Soviet Union.

I knew there were a lot of risks, but
this wasn't the first time that I

for myself in a dangerous place.

My first week at college.

I met my husband, John Peterson, and he
made the choice in 1967

to go into the Army to enlist.

He became a Green Beret in 1969.

To me, of course, that was going off to
sure death.

You know, that's how we thought about
Vietnam.

But he survived.

And then he told me he had applied for
CIA.

I was shocked. I was.

I didn't know anything about CIA.

John said, I got my notice of my first
assignment.

It's Paxe Laos, and you can come along.

I said, yes, absolutely.

This was an adventure we were going to
take on.

That's John in Paxe after we got there,
and he's getting ready to get on a plane

to put his troops into the field.

His business was war.

I worked in the office. He worked in the
field.

John and I always looked at life as
partners.

I was part of his team.

It was him and me.

Often when I would be coming home from
work, I would hear a big explosion.

It made a metal taste come to your
mouth. That is tremendous fright.

So it became right up front and very
personal that there was danger there.

I had been out on the street so much and
had logged many hours and never had

surveillance.

Because she could slip away and was not
followed.

We sent Marty out to do what we call
dead drops.

A dead drop is classic CIA tradecraft.

Dead drop means leaving a package at a
certain area.

And in this case, our Russian diplomat,
Trigon, will come at a later time and

pick up that package.

These packages are concealed.

But inside that concealment is a cavity
for us to have whatever materials are

being transmitted through the dead drop.
It can be instructions, of course. It

can be money. It can be medicines. It
can be camera. Anything that the agent

needs to carry out is in her business.

Say just a very nice rock laying along
the side of the road someplace, but

inside is a major cavity that an agent
could use.

The tech person in the field is crucial.

There's no book telling them what.

to do. They're some of the most gifted
people in the world because they're

constantly thinking quickly and making
do with what's available to them.

One of the classics is a dead rat.

You have a nice little cavity.

Perhaps you want to put a small camera.
Not likely to be picked up by anybody

except the intended agent.

How do you prevent cat from grabbing it?
Treat it with a little Tabasco sauce

because cats hate Tabasco sauce.

Originally, Trigon had taken pictures of
documents with a 35 -millimeter camera,

but that was very risky, taking the
camera into the embassy. So we realized

he was a good candidate for this very
unique miniature camera hidden within a

fountain pen. And this was my first dead
drop.

We told him where it would be and how it
would be disguised, that it was

concealed in a Soviet cigarette pack.

He would take the top off, hold the pen
over a piece of paper with his elbows

up, and that was the right focal
distance, and then he would plunge this

down, and it would take a full -page
picture.

Dead drop deliveries always make you
nervous.

Usually, you would pitch the package out
of the car window.

The problem was we didn't know whether
the camera's mechanism would survive.

So at the last minute, the station
decided that I would deliver the package

foot.

I drove my car for two hours looking for
surveillance.

When I determined that I had no
surveillance, I went into the Soviet

system. I rode three stops. I got out
and changed to another subway line

and walked to the site where the package
was to be delivered to Trigon

that night.

My heart was going a million miles an
hour.

I was really...

alert and terrified all at the same
time.

As I approach the dead drop site, I
pause, take a Kleenex out of my bag and

my nose, and at the same time, I take
the package out of my purse.

And I spend an hour walking.

Trigon is supposed to come and pick up
my package.

But when I returned, I looked down, and
my package is still there.

And I'm horrified to see, several blocks
away, a man

in the shadows watching.

They caught me red -handed.

When I saw that man at a distance, my
huge concern was that that was a KGB

officer. I didn't want to be known as
the woman who got caught.

I didn't know who he was or why he was
there.

But I glanced back to see that man has
disappeared.

So I recovered the camera in the package
and went on my way back into the

subway. I go in the next morning and
report what has happened. After much

discussion, we realized that man in the
shadows was

probably trying on watching for a car.

And of course, he hasn't seen a car.

Ultimately, the next month, I was able
to deliver the camera in the pen to

Trigon.

I knew that I could put a package down
on foot and then leave

the area and then return and pick up
Trigon's package.

And what was crucial for us...

Trigon was assigned to the
communications center.

And that's where the cables came in from
Soviet ambassadors overseas reporting

back to Moscow of what they were doing,
what their policy recommendations were.

Trigon had access to that.

Over time, you get more confident, and
you realize the agent is going to be

there to pick up that dead drop. And
that mutual understanding gives you a

feeling.

And so we began to receive his
intelligence, and we learned he

is a very capable agent.

He became so adept at this. He had
access to frontline, high -level

on arms control, but also on foreign
policy in general. The intelligence that

was produced, thanks to Marty, was going
right to the president's desk.

One of the most pleasant surprises that
I have had has been the quality of work

done by the Central Intelligence Agency.

The intelligence was pouring in. One of
the major players... in U .S.-USSR

relations was the Soviet ambassador in
Washington, Anatoly Dobrynin.

I hope that relations between our
countries will develop.

And Kissinger was meeting regularly with
Dobrynin.

Kissinger loved the Trigon reporting
because he would have the meeting with

Dobrynin, and then he could see how
Dobrynin was interpreting it back to

or misinterpreting it back to Moscow.

And a lot was going on. We were in the
middle of the SALT II negotiations.

We were trying to trade negotiations.

The Russians were deploying cruise
missiles. It was gold for us.

We'd never seen intelligence like that
before.

Over time, I felt such a connection with
Trigon, even though I have never met

him. He and I never exchanged a word.

But I had a feeling of we're in it
together.

We are a team.

And, of course, keeping him safe and
alive is the most important thing to me.

The relationship between officer and
asset is critical because the reality is

that you have someone's life in your
hands, period, the end, because they are

committing a crime.

They are committing a crime by giving
you.

information that they shouldn't be
giving you. In our country, that's

treason.

Trigon knew that if he were caught, that
his fate would be horrible. His fate

was sealed as soon as he fell into KGB's
hands.

KGB investigated all their citizens,
especially those who had been overseas.

He told us in his packages to us that he
had undergone a security check, and

each time he was deathly concerned
because they could uncover what he was

And that means torture and the bullet to
the back of the head.

Trigon was a traitor.

Traitors, all of them were executed.

If you think about the gravity of what
Trigon was doing in 1975 Russia, for

him to be willingly providing us with
information was a death sentence if that

information came out.

Trigon is under incredible stress.

If anyone went and searched his
apartment, it could be the end for him.

Then, end of April 1977,

we received a package from Trigon. And
when our tech opened the package, he

realized that there were some
differences in his photography.

Maybe in his stress, he had become
careless. He had become reckless.

The stress was causing him physical
problems.

He had stomach problems. He had
breathing problems.

Eventually, Trigon requests that he be
provided with a means to commit

suicide in the event that he is caught.

We didn't want to encourage a potential
asset to kill himself.

So we said no.

And only over time, with persistent
requests, we felt that it was a moral

responsibility to answer his request.

The CIA determined that the best
concealment device would be the same

pen that Trigon had the camera in. And
now...

that contained an ampule of poison in
the barrel where the ink was, and this

would cause instant death.

I was able to deliver the pen to Trigon.
I just hoped that he would never have

to use it.

On October 19th, John kissed me goodbye
and headed to work.

I worked all day.

I came home, and I was working in the
kitchen, and I heard the truck drive

our driveway, which had gravel.

It was kind of like our doorbell.

I went to the door, expecting John to be
there, and it was the chief of our

unit. I said, Bill, John didn't tell me
you were coming for dinner. And Bill

just looked at me.

He said, Oh, Marty.

And I realized in a second that
something had happened to John.

I was told his helicopter should have
taken off below the tree line,

but his pilot, for whatever reason,
lifted up too high, and the North

got a good angle.

There was a man in a second helicopter.

John was his very best friend.

So he tried to turn around and go back,
but there were too many enemy in the

area.

And that night, sitting there, he said,
Marty, I tried to get to him. I tried to

get him out, and it was impossible.

The next day, his soldiers, they kept...

Telling me for getting the body out, and
I thought, it's just a body.

He wasn't there.

I just knew that he wasn't coming home.

When I was offered a position in Moscow,
the agency said, we think that you are

the right person to go.

You have had difficult life experiences,
so we know you could withstand the

difficulties.

June 28, 1977, I went into this park
where

Trigana and I had exchanged packages
before.

I had a log with his new schedule and
resupply of the pen and cartridges.

I walked down the wooden path and put
the package at the base of the lamppost.

On the road, a small panel van.

I had never seen any car parked in that
park.

And it had its dome light on and the
windows were steamed over.

And I thought, either this is an ambush
or it's lover's lane.

And then...

All of a sudden, a man appeared in front
of me. We almost collided.

And I stepped off the side of the path.

I stood there for about 20 minutes.

And then I decided to cross the road.

The van was no longer there.

And there on the ground by the lamppost
was the log.

Trigon hadn't been there that night.

All my alarms went off. I knew there was
something wrong.

I realized this was not coincidence.

There is no such thing as coincidence in
espionage.

So I drove my car by the signal site the
next morning.

A signal site is a location where an
agent would come and make a mark.

When one of our case officers.

sees that mark, we know the dead drop
has been loaded.

The child crossing sign was the actual
signal site that we had described to

Trigon. I wasn't very close to it when I
could see the signal that he made.

It was like it had been stenciled. This
was bright red. It looked like an

artist had drawn it carefully so we
wouldn't miss it.

Trigon never made signals like this.

Even though we had all these red flags
that indicated there was a problem with

Trigon, we never aborted an operation.

When an agent's life was on the line, we
had to know whether he was okay or not.

I worked my day job. It was very
difficult to concentrate.

At 6 o 'clock, I went up to the station,
and my colleagues were all there.

They had the package packed.

It was a piece of asphalt, and it
contained all the elements that we knew

needed. The camera in the pen,
equipment, documents, rubles in low

denominations. Put it in my bag and
began a long surveillance detection

route.

I continued on to the river to where the
site was located on the top of a

railroad bridge.

I took the piece of asphalt out of my
purse and slid it into a narrow window.

I turned around and came back through
the tower.

and started down the stairs.

I was about the fourth step from the
bottom when these three men came at me

across the street.

A van came from underneath the bridge,
and the men

got out.

This was the moment that I was arrested
by the KGB.

I remember the moment so clearly.

I attached this receiver on my bra using
Velcro, which they had no idea about,

and they had a real problem getting it
undone because they didn't know you had

to pull it apart.

When they have their hands inside your
blouse, you know, it's pretty bad.

Yeah, pretty bad.

I realized at that moment, I did not
know what has happened to Trigon,

he's been held in a cell, brutally
tortured, or he is already

dead.

They took me to Lubyanka prison.

Russians suspected of being spies.

They were sent to Lubyanka prison, and
they were executed.

She was interrogated, and she was an
American. You know, America was an

the enemy number one.

I

knew to

take absolutely nothing.

The chief interrogator asked his
technical officer to open the package.

They began taking out all the equipment
and the documents in the package.

They got to the pen, and the chief
interrogator said,

don't touch it.

Lay it on the side. Nobody touch it.

And it was at that moment that I
realized.

He thought that pen had poison in it.

And I knew it was just a camera.

And the only reason he would be afraid
of that pen was if he

had been there and seen Trigon use it.

So I knew that something really awful
had happened to Trigon,

something he wouldn't survive.

We knew that if Marty was ambushed, that
Trigon was already dead or would

be dead soon. That was devastating.

I'll never forget that.

That was one of the lowest moments in my
CIA career.

The chief interrogator was so angry, I
thought something violent was going to

happen to me.

But after many hours... The chief
interrogator said to me, you may go.

Most people think that's odd that they
would let me go, but I had diplomatic

immunity.

When I arrived back at the embassy, I
went up to the CIA station, and as I

through the door, all my colleagues were
there waiting for me.

The chief, who had only newly arrived,
said to me, oh, I'm so glad you're back.

Blackboard in his office, he had
written, our little girl.

And I told him, I am nobody's little
girl.

Even though I knew Moscow better than
anyone ever would, I think he believed

that if a man had gone out, this
wouldn't have happened.

Soviet Union said that Martha Peterson,
an American vice consul, was expelled

from the Soviet Union last July as a
spy.

I left Moscow the next day and flew back
to Washington.

I came back to CIA headquarters and I
began working again in Washington.

But I had this thought in the back of my
head that it was something I had done

and that somehow I had made a mistake.

For the next seven years.

I kept myself busy.

I got married. I began a family.

And it was in 1984 when they finally
arrested the man who had caused

Trigon's death.

A former employee of the CIA was
arrested in New York City today and

with spying for the government of
Czechoslovakia. He is identified as Carl

Kocher.

We learned from a source a CIA
translator had been working secretly

Czech intelligence and through Czech
intelligence back to the KGB.

Once the KGB knew that someone in the
Soviet embassy was being targeted by the

CIA, they began an investigation of all
those who had worked in the

Soviet embassy and returned to Moscow.

There's nothing more despicable to us
than someone who betrays us from within.

Karl Kocher, without any question, was
not only a traitor.

But he was a killer. He murdered Trigon
by giving the KGB that information.

After Carl Kocher's arrest, we learned
the details of what had happened to

Trigon.

He was in his apartment, and they were
watching him.

They saw him take out normal, everyday
things from the bookshelf. A flashlight.

some batteries but then they watched as
he opened the secret compartment

and took out pieces of paper they
realized he was

preparing for another drop they barged
through his door

they stripped him down and told him that
he should

confess

and he said, I will write a full
confession.

He saw his pen laying on the table. He
picked it up, and he began to write.

As he saw that they weren't watching
him, he put the pen in his mouth,

bit down, and immediately became
unconscious.

They tried to revive him.

But he died.

That was a week before I saw the van in
the woods.

Losing John and now Trigon, I was
horrified.

I was so sad.

I deal with grief head on. I acknowledge
what's happened.

I realize that Life goes on.

You have to continue on the path.

I'm affected by it, but I don't dwell on
it.

It's part of my own place.

intelligence service, including the
Russian intelligence service, you put

life at risk. And I wouldn't recommend
anyone to do that.

I felt so sad and yet so relieved to
know

that it wasn't something that I had
done.

I think it brings up a bigger issue.
It's not necessarily the case officers

are compromising the identity.

A lot of times our assets have been
discovered because of double agents and

mold. He had used that pen and that
poison as he had intended.

He avoided the torture, all the
brutality, and the bullet to

the back of the head.

After my husband John died, I got a call
from CIA headquarters that I had to

come sign some insurance papers.

I flew to Washington, and I was met by
very dear friends who were in Laos with

us. And they said to me, Marty, why
don't you consider joining the CIA and

a case officer like John would have
been?

I realized that maybe that was a plan.

I started work on July 3rd, and that was
John's birthday.

It was a very satisfying career, but it
was at a certain time when I realized

that I was going to have to tell my
children who I worked for.

I had given them a story.

Who is Marty Peterson to you?

That's my mom.

Me and my sister were off for the day of
school, and we get a phone call from my

mom. saying, hey, I need you to meet me
at this time.

And that's all she kind of left us with.

I drove them to headquarters, and we
went into the front lobby.

My mom showed her badge, and we just
rolled right on into the CIA.

I ended up just learning how mom's a
spy.

And we all started laughing, but it was
like a nervous laugh.

There is a memorial to all the CIA
officers who have been killed in the

of duty. And among them was the star for
John Peterson.

It was then that I told them about John
and all that he gave to our country.

And I told them about my long career and
how John was so

responsible for my...

And then she showed me his star, and she
just pointed straight to it and said,

that's John's, with absolute conviction
that that was his.

It still gives me goosebumps. I'm
literally sitting here with goosebumps

now just thinking about that wall.

But you never see anything to hint that
Mom ever worked at the CIA or that that

wall would ever mean anything to her.

I think she was relieved to give up that
secret finally to us and be able to

share that with us.

I'm literally coming to terms still
every single day with the life that she

versus the life that we knew.

Marty Peterson is an inspiration to all
of us. Marty became one of our trainers.

She was a role model.

She was a mentor.

If women want to pursue careers in these
industries, then they absolutely

should. And it's really because of
people like Marty and the women who came

before her.

that it's made it into a more mainstream
career for females.

Despite all the hard moments in my life,
the tragedy, the disappointment,

the fear, the concern that maybe I made
a bad mistake,

all of that, I would do it again.