The minimum age of an illegal clearly cannot be less than twenty-seven to twenty-nine, but usually he is older, on average about forty. This age suits the GRU very well for a number of reasons. A man of forty has a balanced, conservative approach to life. The stormy passions of youth have disappeared and he is less inclined to take ill-considered decisions, especially if he ever suffers the dilemma of whether to continue working or to go to the police. His children are sufficiently old to be able to live without their parents in the complete care of the GRU, but not old enough to live independently, and so they are ideal hostages. And in the event of mobilisation in the target country, he may well be able to avoid being called up for the army which would mean the breaking-off of relations and an end to his active working life.

On his arrival at his objective, the illegal sets about basic legalisation. He has been provided with good papers by the best forgers of the GRU on genuine blank passports. At the same time he is extremely vulnerable if he is not registered with the police or the tax departments. Any check may give him away and for this reason he endeavours to change jobs and places of work often to get his name onto as many company lists as he can and to acquire character references signed by real people. The ideal solution is for him to obtain new documentation from the police department under some pretext or another. Often he will marry another agent (who may already be his wife); she will then be given a genuine passport, and he will 'lose' his false one to have it replaced with a real one on the production of his wife's genuine document. The acquisition of a driving licence, credit cards, membership documents of clubs and associations are a vital element in 'legalising' the status of an illegal.

A vital role in the lives of illegals is played by cover stories, in other words concocted life stories. The basic or ground cover story is created on the basis of real events in the life of the illegal, only changing a few details. He keeps the date of his birth but of course changes the place of his birth. The dates of birth of his parents and relatives are also accurately recorded, usually along with the professions of his parents, dates of weddings and other details. The illegal is thus not telling an out-and-out lie but only a half-truth. He will not bat an eyelid when he tells you that his father served all his life in the army. The only thing is that he will not tell you in which army he served.

There is also the emergency cover story, which is the last line of defence of the illegal on having been arrested by the police. As its name suggests, this cover story is only to be used as a last resort when the illegal perceives that the police no longer believe his basic cover story. Designed to be used only when the illegal is in the hands of the police department, it is concocted in such a way that the details it gives should be impossible to check. For example, one illegal was arrested by the police while he was trying to obtain a new driving licence because a mistake had been found in his old one. He was subjected to questioning, as a result of which his basic cover story was found to be inaccurate. Then he went over to his emergency cover story and informed the police that he was a Polish criminal who had escaped from prison and bought a passport on the black market. During this time the GRU, not having received from the illegal his routine communications, informed the Polish authorities about the 'criminal'. The Poles published photographs of the criminal and applied to a number of countries for his extradition. However strange it may seem, the police believed the story and handed him over to the Polish Consul. It would have been easy to break the emergency cover story, if the police had only thought to invite a real Polish immigrant for a ten-minute chat with his supposed fellow countryman. Of course he would not have known more than ten words of the language. But for the police it was sufficient that he spoke their language and did not object to being handed over to the Polish Consul.

No less important than the cover story is the cover or the place of work and the type of employment which the illegal takes up in his life overseas. Soviet propaganda paints a grave picture of the intelligence officer playing the role of a colonel in the enemy general staff. But this is pure disinformation. Such a cover is unacceptable to an illegal for a number of reasons. Firstly, he must keep himself away from counter-intelligence and the police. He must be a grey, inconspicuous 'man in the street' such as millions would hurry past without noticing. Any officer on any Western general staff is continuously under scrutiny. Secondly, he must be professional in his field. In the general staff he would be exposed almost immediately. Thirdly, for such a cover his legalisation would have to be unacceptably protracted. He would certainly be asked about the military schools and academies where he is supposed to have been, the regiments in which he has served, and his acquaintances among the officers and staff. Fourthly, an illegal needs plenty of time and opportunity to meet whoever he wants to meet. If a colonel on the general staff consorted with prostitutes, homosexuals, stockbrokers, atomic submarine workers and bootblacks - all those multifarious people he needs to cultivate - he would be exposed within forty-eight hours. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the requirements of the GRU change with great rapidity. Today they are interested in documents from a certain department of the general staff and tomorrow from another. But our illegal is working in yet another department and all his attempts to have talks with officers of the first two departments have been met with a blank wall or cold suspicion. No, the kind of cover offered by such a role is neither feasible nor a great deal of use.

Much better for him to be an independent journalist like Richard Sorge, or an independent artist like Rudolph Abel, coming and going as he pleases. Today he is talking with the Prime Minister, tomorrow with prostitutes, the next day with professional killers and then with atomic weapon workers. If he doesn't want to work for three months, there is no problem. If he gets many thousands of dollars through the post, again no problem. It is part of his cover. There are better, of course. A garage owner, for example. He hires his staff and himself goes wherever he wants and for as long as he wants, or he stands at the window and takes the money. Thousands of people pass him every day -ballerinas and artists, senators and scientists - and colonels of the general staff. To one he gives money and instructions written in secret writing, from another he receives reports. For the basic task of the illegal is not himself to penetrate secret targets, but to recruit agents for this purpose. This is his raison d'etre.

An illegal residency is an intelligence organisation comprising a minimum of two illegals, usually the resident and a wireless operator, and a small number of agents (at least one) working for them. We already know that illegals themselves, without agents, are not able to obtain anything. Gradually, as a result of recruiting new agents, the residency may increase in size. More illegals may be sent out to the resident, one of whom may become his assistant. The GRU considers it counter-productive to have large residencies. Five illegals and eight to ten agents are considered the maximum, but usually the residencies are much smaller than this. In cases where the recruitment of new agents has gone well the GRU prudently divides the residency in two parts. Thereafter any contact between the two new residencies is of course forbidden, o that if one residency is discovered the other does not suffer.

The undercover residency is one of the basic forms of intelligence set-up for the GRU abroad. (It should be remembered that the undercover residency and the illegal residency are completely separate entities.) In every country where official Soviet representation exists there is a GRU undercover residency. It exists in parallel with, and is analogous to, the KGB undercover residency. Thus every overseas Soviet colony is invisibly divided into three organisations: the 'clean ones', that is the genuine diplomats and correspondents, and the representatives of external trade, civil airlines, the merchant navy, and Intourist, headed by the ambassador; the undercover residency of the GRU; and the undercover residency of the KGB.

Very often, the 'clean' personnel make no distinction between the KGB and the GRU and call them both dirty, 'savages', 'Vikings' or 'neighbours'. The more enlightened staff, like for example the ambassador, his senior diplomats and the more observant people, understand the difference between the two organisations, dividing them up as close neighbours (the KGB), who continually meddle in the day-to-day affairs of each person in the colony, and distant neighbours who take absolutely no interest at all in the day-to-day life of the Soviet colony (the GRU).

For the GRU undercover residency lives a secluded and isolated life. It contains significantly fewer employees than either of the other organisations. Normally in Soviet colonies up to 40 per cent of the people may be considered in the 'clean' category. (This of course does not prevent the majority of them, to a greater or lesser extent, from co-operation with both the KGB and the GRU; but they are not to be considered as professional intelligence officers.) Up to 40 or 45 per cent are officers of the KGB and only 15 to 20 per cent, in rare cases up to 25 per cent, are officers of the GRU. This does not however mean that the intelligence potential of the GRU apparatus is less than that of the KGB. The larger part of the KGB personnel is occupied with questions of security, that is with the collection of compromising material on Soviet people, 'clean' people including the ambassador, and their own colleagues in the KGB who have contact with foreigners and frequently with officers of the GRU. Only a small proportion, in optimum cases half of the KGB personnel, are working against foreigners. The GRU, on the other hand, directs its entire potential against foreigners. When one adds to this the unequalled financial power of the GRU, vastly in excess of that of the KGB, it becomes clear why the most outstanding operations of Soviet intelligence have been mounted not by the KGB but by the GRU.

The minimum number of staff for any GRU undercover residency is two the resident and a combined radio/cipher officer. Such a theoretical minimum exists also for the other organisations, the KGB and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Theoretically the Soviet colony in a very small country may consist of six people, three of whom, the ambassador and two residents, are diplomats, and the other three radio/cipher officers. Each of the three branches of the Soviet colony has its own enciphering machine and completely independent channel of communication with Moscow. Equally, each has its own boss in Moscow the Minister of Foreign Affairs, the chairman of the KGB or the head of the GRU. Supreme arbitration between them can only be carried out in the Central Committee, which in its turn has an interest in fanning the flames of discord between the three organisations. The Central Committee has the right to recall any ambassador or resident and this same Central Committee has to decide questions as to which slots, and how many, should be accorded to each of the three organisations. This is a difficult task, as the Committee must not offend the KGB on questions of security, on the shadowing of its own diplomats above all, nor must it offend the GRU, for without the acquisition of data on present-day technology the quality of the Soviet Army would remain static. Finally it must not offend the 'clean ones'. They also must have a sufficient complement to serve as a screen for the dark activities of the two residencies.