Spies Against Armageddon (39 page)

Ben-Ami recalled: “He looked at me, said nothing, and then started crying.” Klingberg, choking back tears, asked Ben-Ami to call in the other interrogator—who played the role of “the good cop”—because the spy was finally willing to provide a confession.

During his trial, Klingberg argued that Shin Bet extracted his confession by illegitimate means, in return for a promise of leniency or outright release. “But it was my word against theirs,” the spy had to acknowledge. “The judges believed them, of course—not me.”

Klingberg wrote in his memoirs that he had confessed only because he was shown photographs of his daughter in Paris: a hint, as he took it, that Israeli intelligence knew everything about her and could easily harm her at any moment.

At the time, Klingberg said, he felt suicidal. There was intense pressure from his wife Wanda—who was permitted to visit—not to reveal anything. “It is true that my wife did not like the fact that I had talked in the interrogation, but she is not the reason that I tried to kill myself,” Klingberg said in Paris. “I tried to commit suicide twice. The first time was even before I made a confession. That was after four days of interrogation. I tried to stick something metallic into the power outlet in the room and electrocute myself. But it didn’t work.”

The second time was after he confessed. “I swallowed medicine. I asked my wife to bring me my blood thinner pills. But to say that she tried to get me to commit suicide? Absolutely not. The decision was mine. I saw that it was all over, and I didn’t want my family to suffer because of me.” His attempt at an overdose failed.

Wanda Yashinskaya did, in fact, have strong reasons to be worried when her husband started talking to the Shin Bet. After she died in 1990 and her cremated remains were placed in a cemetery in Paris, Klingberg revealed that his wife had been his partner in espionage.

While she held her own job at the top-secret Biological Institute, Wanda provided the GRU with bacteria and virus samples and some other formulas and secrets. Confirmation of the deceptive duo’s partnership raised the suspicion that the Soviet Union planted both of them in Israel at the very start.

Klingberg was found guilty of treason and espionage, and he was sentenced to 20 years in prison. The entire process—arrest, interrogation, indictment, court hearings, and the verdict—took place in total secrecy. Not a word about him or the charges appeared in the mostly hyperactive and free Israel press.

Even in prison, he was given a cover identity: a prisoner ostensibly named Avraham Greenberg, in order to prevent leakage of the case to the public at home and abroad.

The censorship was heavy and strict. Journalists who took an interest in the case were immediately visited by Shin Bet agents and warned to publish nothing about it.

As for Klingberg’s agreement never to use his real name, even inside the prison walls, he explained after his release: “I was threatened with worse prison conditions and the loss of rights, especially visiting rights. It was made clear to my wife and daughter that if they revealed the fact of my arrest, they would not be allowed to visit me. Thus, they were forced to tell anyone who asked—friends, mainly—that I was hospitalized in a Swiss sanatorium.”

The
Rashomon
of varied stories about Klingberg from various angles included not only when and where he had started working for the Soviets. The vexatious narrative extended to why: the scientific spy’s primary motive.

Shin Bet and Malmab interrogators reached the surprising conclusion that the main reason was blackmail. According to their narrative, Klingberg was not actually a fully qualified medical doctor. He did not finish his studies in Poland because of the war. In the 1950s, to get a pay raise at the Institute, he was asked to provide a certificate or diploma to show that he had completed his medical training and exams.

He approached the Soviet embassy in Tel Aviv for help in obtaining a diploma from the University of Minsk as evidence of his studies there. Intelligence officers at the embassy apparently discovered the truth, but they did arrange to forge a diploma for Klingberg—and, in return, they compelled him to work for them. As with most efforts to seduce and induce people to sell out their country, once they begin they are trapped.

Klingberg, however, rejected this explanation. To him, honor was more important than gold, and the thought of being unqualified angered him. “I am a certified medical doctor,” he insisted with a force that belied his almost nine decades. “I completed my studies. I wasn’t pressured. I agreed to work for the Soviet Union because they saved my life. And out of belief in the cause of Communism. I wanted to help them to balance their inferior knowledge against the Americans and the West during the Cold War.”

One truth is shared by both sides. Shin Bet agreed that Klingberg was not spying out of greed and was not paid for his services. The professional assessment of the damage done, however, is grave. Shin Bet and defense officials believe that Klingberg helped the enemies of the state by handing over biological and chemical secrets: an important, though never discussed, factor in Israel’s ultimate lines of defense. Israeli intelligence assumes that the Russians relayed all the information to their Arab partners, in various deals and intelligence exchanges.

Klingberg, for his part, showed no remorse. “I do not regret anything I did, even though I am not proud of what I did,” he said. “If I were approached today, I would certainly not agree to work for the Russians. But I did it because I felt it was the right thing to do. Why? Because of the Cold War. I wanted the two blocs in the Cold War to be at the same level, out of a desire for a more balanced world.”

It is the same kind of argument that American and, especially British, traitors recited to their interrogators and prosecutors over the years after being caught spying for Russia.

The Klingberg case, partially and unintentionally, helped to lift the cloud of secrecy that shrouded the biological institute for half a century. After his release was made public, it was suddenly no longer a taboo in the Israeli media to talk about the place. This was regrettable, in the eyes of the Nes Tziona directors and the security officials at the Ministry of Defense.

In the new spirit of uncovering some truths, it was revealed in 2009 that the head of the Institute—Dr. Avigdor Shafferman, who ruled the facility with an iron fist—had used Israeli soldiers as guinea pigs to develop a possible anthrax vaccine of doubtful value.

A French newsletter reported that, in return for sharing test results from the vaccine, the Pentagon and the United States Army financed a $200 million project enabling the Institute to build a pharmaceutical production line that apparently was not needed.

It would take Shin Bet a few years to recover from the Klingberg case—clearly a major defeat at the hands of the Soviets. Israel’s intelligence community also had to repair the damage done to its reputation in the eyes of American espionage counterparts.

The Israelis found solace in “Golf Ball,” the code name they gave to one of the most imaginative counter-intelligence operations in the history of Shin Bet.

It began by pure chance, and noticing an unmatched pair of socks on Alexander Lomov’s feet was a key part of the unexpected opportunity.

Lomov was a non-Jewish Russian who arrived in Israel with his wife Alexi in the spring of 1986 to assume the title of administrator at the “Red” Russian Church. He would manage a collection of properties, as well as a few dozen priests and nuns, practically owned by the Soviet government—as opposed to the “White” Russian Church that remained loyal to the czar deposed in 1917 and would never cooperate with the Reds.

Lomov’s religious managerial role was merely a cover, for he was in fact a professional intelligence officer employed by the overseas directorate of the KGB. Alexi was his radio operator, fully trained in encryption and code books. After the Six-Day War of June 1967, when the Soviets broke diplomatic relations with Israel, the Russian Church became the headquarters for KGB spying in the Jewish state.

Shin Bet, as a matter of routine, mounted around-the-clock surveillance of the administrators. It did not take long to discover that the Lomovs—who lived in the Red Church’s famous Russian Compound in Jerusalem—were not in love with each other.

Marital strife signaled opportunity for Shin Bet officers, who prided themselves on noticing even the most minute detail. Lomov’s socks often did not match, and this suggested stress or a drinking problem. The Israelis started imagining various techniques of taking advantage of the undercover Russian: situations that might involve blackmail or other psychological pressure.

Continued surveillance confirmed that Lomov was often drunk and occasionally beat his wife. Shin Bet more intensively worked on ways of inserting some leverage between them, hoping that Alexi would betray him and become a mole for the Israelis.

It was noticed that she often shopped in a certain Jerusalem supermarket. One day, at that store, Alexi met and chatted with another Russian-speaking woman, who was a very good listener. Alexi started dishing all of her ugly family secrets. One thing led to another, and the new “friend” introduced Alexi to a circle of friends. One of them was a young, handsome fellow who started to romance the loveless and desperate Alexi.

He happened to be a subcontractor for Shin Bet. He was not a full-time employee, but someone who could be hired for the purpose of political seduction.

This was an almost classical “honey trap,” as the technique is known in the spy trade. It usually, however, involved the use of females to trap males. In recent years, the gender gap has narrowed rapidly—and all sorts of combinations of males and females have been effective.

Before long, the Israeli lover boy offered Alexi a deal. He said he had a friend who could help her start a new life in America. All she would have to do was meet them, and tell them everything she knew about espionage and politics. Alexi agreed.

She met Shin Bet operatives, who struck an explicit deal with her. She would provide all the code books for KGB communications at the Jerusalem “station,” and in return she would be given a new identity and settled in the United States.

Shin Bet had indeed been in touch already with the CIA, which agreed to accept the female radio operator into a “rehabilitation” program in America. Alexi proved to be a gold mine. The code books she supplied helped the Israeli and Western intelligence communities intercept Russian intelligence messages in many countries: to expose a few more spy networks, and to reconstruct some of the past activities of the Soviet Union.

This defection had a happy ending. Alexi left her husband a note in their home: “I am in the company of good friends. If you want to repair our relations and to have a new beginning with me, please call this number in the next 24 hours.”

Shin Bet officers did not believe that Alexander Lomov would do it. But he did. He dialed the number, and he joined his wife. The couple was debriefed by Shin Bet for a week and then flown to the United States for further questioning by the CIA and the start of a new life. When last seen by the Israelis, the Lomovs were getting along better.

For Shin Bet, there was a measure of revenge against the Soviets for decades of high-level espionage by Marcus Klingberg. In addition, the Lomov affair brought relations between the CIA and Israeli intelligence to a new zenith of cooperation and trust.

Chapter Seventeen

Ambiguity and Monopoly

The director of the Mossad, Yitzhak Hofi, arrived in Paris in early April 1979, traveling under a bogus name and wearing a disguise. The espionage agency often consulted and used Israelis who worked in theaters as experts on changing a person’s appearance. An addition as simple as a glued-on beard, a wig, or eyeglasses could make someone look completely different.

Unlike routine visits, in which the head of a foreign security service has a formal liaison session or a courtesy call on a host country to share information, Hofi’s unheralded stay in Paris was hidden from France’s security services.

Hofi was there on official but unacknowledged business. He was following the Mossad and military traditions that put the top commander in the field: at the front, overseeing a dangerous operation. His proximity can help when there is a need for uninterrupted communication and an instant decision.

A psychological factor is even more important. The message the Mossad chief conveys to his people is: I am with you, and the entire organization is behind you 100 percent.

Hofi was described by a longtime senior operative in the Mossad as a man “of steel and infinite patience” and “a born commander,” yet in the early hours of April 6 he was nervously waiting inside the Israeli embassy for some news.

Then, the coded message arrived: “Mission accomplished.” Hofi flashed a big smile and headed back to Israel immediately.

Five-hundred miles to the south, his Kidon boys had just successfully completed their latest act of stealth. In the pre-dawn hours, an explosion in a warehouse at La Seyne sur Mer, an industrial part of the port of Toulon, severely damaged two cores of a nuclear reactor.

These cores had been nearly ready to be loaded onto a ship headed for Iraq. They were to be installed in a nuclear facility that Saddam Hussein was constructing just south of his capital, Baghdad. The reactor, which he called Tammuz—the name of a Babylonian deity in ancient Iraq—was known to the French as Osirak.

Iraq’s nuclear program was of great concern to Israel. Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Defense Minister Shimon Peres, in 1974 to 1977, kept warning about it. They used secret and open diplomacy, trying to persuade France, Italy, Brazil, and other countries to stop helping Saddam fulfill his megalomaniacal dreams of having weapons of mass destruction.

Israel asked the United States to exercise any influence it might have, and in consultations Israeli intelligence found that its basic assessment of the Iraqi program matched the CIA’s view. They differed only about the date by which Saddam would be capable of building nuclear bombs.

The situation foreshadowed what Israel and the United States would face 35 years later, when debating how to confront the nuclear program of Iraq’s neighbor, Iran.

When Menachem Begin and his Likud party won the 1977 election and formed Israel’s first right-wing government, Israeli politics had a sensational change of orientation. Yet the country’s efforts on the Iraq issue continued as before. Begin and his foreign minister, Moshe Dayan, repeatedly tried to persuade France’s leaders that it was irresponsible and immoral to allow a menace such as Saddam to have a nuclear reactor.

Israel’s new leaders stepped up their diplomatic campaign—but they also had something else in mind.

Officially, the 40-megawatt reactor was supposed to be for scientific research purposes. But it was clear, certainly to Israeli leaders, that Saddam wanted his new toy for a variety of reasons: to establish hegemony over the region; to threaten his arch-enemy, Iran; and to dominate the other oil-exporting nations of the Middle East. Posing a nuclear threat to Israel would be part of that formula.

This was an especially emotive topic for Prime Minister Begin, who—more than any other Israeli leader—was obsessed by the Holocaust. He often spoke about Jewish history, anti-Semitism, and the murder of six million Jews in Europe. For Begin, it was always as though it had just happened yesterday—and must never happen again.

He ordered Hofi to increase the Mossad’s collection efforts aimed at Iraq’s progressing nuclear program, but at the same time to prepare plans of action. Aman used its research and technological departments to assess Iraq’s intentions and capabilities, while the Mossad worked at learning everything it could about the construction of the reactor.

The Mossad recruited agents among the foreign, mainly French, workers who were involved in the project in Baghdad. Operatives made efforts to learn all they could from scientists involved with the Iraqis. Occasionally, Caesarea operatives would terrorize them—and European companies involved—to pressure them into quitting the program.

In 1979, when Begin realized that the intimidation campaign and diplomacy were failing and the French government would not back out from its long-term, lucrative deal with Iraq, he ordered Hofi to shift gears and step up sabotage planning.

Begin’s conviction was that Israel had to do everything in its power to stop the Iraqi program. He approved the Mossad’s plan to bomb the reactor cores in the French harbor, an attack meant to cause substantial delay in Iraq’s plans—and, hopefully, to make the French think again.

Caesarea operatives collected everything they could learn about the planned delivery of the cores from La Seyne sur Mer: when they would leave the factory, how they would be trucked to the port, at what time the transfers would take place, and where they would be held before the ship sailed. The point of maximum vulnerability seemed to be the warehouse near the piers, and the best time to strike appeared to be over the weekend—when very few people would be around to notice interlopers or to be injured by a blast. There also would be fewer guards than on a weekday.

Caesarea smuggled a large quantity of explosives into France, and then Kidon teams planted five bombs all around the two reactor cores. The blasts that followed caused severe damage to the cores.

A few hours later, another Mossad unit went into action. This was the psychological warfare department, which composed a press release on behalf of the nonexistent French Ecological Group, claiming credit for the bombing at the harbor to express its opposition to nuclear power. News agencies and TV stations duly reported the claim.

Diverting attention from Israel did not last long. It seemed obvious to the international media that the notorious Mossad was behind the blasts. It was barely believable that unknown amateurs could penetrate the perimeter, evade the guards, use the exact amount of explosives needed to crack the cores without collateral damage, and not leave any fingerprints or other evidence. And Israel, after all its public and private complaints about Iraq, certainly had a motive.

Successful as it was, the sabotage in the south of France did not change the reality much. France still refused to cancel the contracts and offered Iraq replacement cores. Saddam Hussein was not deterred, either, and his engineers and scientists continued building Osirak.

Menachem Begin and his cabinet also realized, to their disappointment, that little or nothing had been accomplished. Back at Square One, Begin was as determined as ever to stop Saddam’s push for nuclear might.

In mid-1980, he ordered the intelligence community and the Israel Defense Forces to come up with a military option: a strike that would be more likely to derail Iraq’s plans.

Several scenarios were produced and discussed. These included using agents—or Israeli special operations soldiers—to plant bombs at the reactor site. But in the middle of Iraq? That was dismissed as too risky, especially when operatives would have to carry a large amount of explosives with them.

Sayeret Matkal commandos had managed many deep incursions into Arab countries, but had never done something as big as this would entail—perhaps hundreds of soldiers, hundreds of miles away, near an enemy capital.

Israeli leaders were left with only one option: an air option. That was not bad at all, as Israel’s air force was always considered the long arm of Israeli defense.

A bureaucratic process was put into motion. First, Begin had to persuade his cabinet colleagues that sending the air force to attack Tammuz/Osirak—its longest bombing mission ever—would be doable and its ramifications limited. After long deliberations, he got the majority he needed.

Simultaneously, instructions were passed from Begin, via the defense minister, to the IDF chief of staff and the air force: Start preparing for a secret mission, which was not revealed or fully defined to them. The pilots selected did not know where, when, and how they would be flying. As they practiced bombing runs from various angles, they did not know what the target was.

Aman analysts had begun in 1979 to accumulate all possible information about the Iraqi reactor: how it was built, and what spot on the structure would be most vulnerable. Intelligence exchanges with counterparts in a few other countries produced a lot of data about the building and also about anti-aircraft guns, missiles, and radar around the reactor.

The Mossad was still needed to provide updated information on developments at the Osirak complex, and the Israelis managed to recruit some of the Iraqi technicians being trained in France for reactor operations. That was a Mossad technique, which could be called a “travel-trap.” It might be hard to reach and recruit an Arab in his own country, but he is more vulnerable when he is enjoying the promiscuous environment of a Western country, something he lacks at home. He might be open to offers of entertainment, cash, and favors, or to threats of blackmail or violence.

The air force’s own intelligence unit focused on the best route to fly, how many planes were needed, what load of munitions would be required for maximum effective destruction, how best to avoid detection by friendly or enemy radars along the way, and what resistance the pilots might meet from Iraqi air defenses. Some knowledge came from Israeli advance reconnaissance flights, some of them intentionally skirting the borders of Jordan and Saudi Arabia to get those nations’ militaries accustomed to Israeli warplanes.

Planning to have the attack planes flying very low for most of the 90-minute journey to Baghdad, Israeli intelligence located and charted electricity and communication cables in several enemy countries—and that mission alone involved putting spies at risk, in every sense behind the lines.

The key element to prepare for the attack by combining the vast array of quantitative and qualitative data was the use of “operational research” by the air force. This is a field of applied mathematics that originated in Great Britain before World War II. It uses mathematical methods to compute the optimal use of limited resources. Israel’s operational research team, mostly young mathematicians, calculated that the best way to cause the maximum damage to the reactor would be by dropping heavy bombs—old-style and “stupid,” in defense parlance—rather than laser-guided “smart bombs.”

Planners in the air force examined the humiliating failure suffered by United States special forces in Iran in April 1980, when a mission to rescue diplomats held hostage ended in a collision on a desert airstrip, one airplane and seven helicopters lost, and eight American servicemen dead. The entire plan had been too complicated, as the Israelis saw it, and that strengthened their determination to make the air strike on Iraq’s reactor “a KISS operation,” as they dubbed it in English: “Keep it simple, stupid.”

There was also the issue of what day and time would be best for hitting the Iraqi reactor in terms of weather, natural light and glare, and work patterns at the facility. Again, Israel preferred to strike when a minimal number of employees would be present.

Still, a debate continued within Israeli intelligence and the military about the wisdom of such an attack. International reaction might be highly negative, and there was great concern that hitting Iraq would ruin the implementation of the Camp David peace accords with Egypt. Iraq might strike back at Israel. And even if the raid were successful, for how long would the Iraqi nuclear program be stopped?

These were the same questions Israel’s security establishment—decades later—would face when similar nuclear threats were detected in other Middle East countries.

The discussion about Osirak crossed the usual lines, as the positions held did not take the form of agency versus agency. Although the entire subject was cloaked in secrecy, the internal debate was relatively open: Mossad and Aman analysts were encouraged to express their views.

Some of the most senior intelligence officials opposed attacking Iraq at that time—including the Mossad director, Hofi, who preferred sabotage and diplomatic pressure. His deputy and future successor, Nahum Admoni, favored an attack. The same divisions were found in Aman, where the director—General Yehoshua Saguy—was against launching a strike, at least at that stage, while his deputies were generally in favor.

The only voice that really mattered was Menachem Begin’s. And he was intent on demolishing Iraq’s nuclear potential.

Preparing for the attack meant that more people were brought into the circle of knowledge, but not a word was leaked to the public.

Dates for an attack in 1981 were chosen at least three times, only to be postponed. Time was running out. The attack would have to be done, in the Israeli view, before the reactor would go “hot” by installing uranium rods. Showing concern for radioactive fallout, Begin said, “The children of Baghdad should not suffer.”

The cancellations were usually because of weather conditions, but once because there was a leak within political circles. The opposition leader, Shimon Peres, who considers himself one of the founding fathers of Israel’s nuclear arsenal and thus an expert on these topics, expressed his concern.

Peres had received information about the attack plan from Uzi Even, a member of the Israel Atomic Energy Commission who had worked at Dimona. Professor Even was also a member of a special task force, created by Aman’s technical department, to assess Iraq’s nuclear progress. His study concluded that the Osirak reactor would not be able to produce fissile material, suitable for bombs, for a very long time. Uzi Even breached his secrecy pledge and, without authorization, told what he knew to Peres.