All those mistaken identities, disguises, cross-dressers in Shakespeare reflected the shifting social classes and personal mobility of early modern England. “Who’s there?” as “Hamlet” opens. Some scholar must have written that, and I’ll not bother to footnote, but instead wonder whether something similar does not underlie the contemporary preoccupation with spying. Of course, the “second oldest” profession is not new. Sun Tzu was a big fan. So maybe our sense that there are secrets to be discovered, and our current preoccupation with the people who ferret and guard such information, are historically ordinary. But the question is worth a pause. Perhaps every era gets the spies it deserves?
From here, things at least superficially seemed more straightforward during the Cold War. Especially in the early stages, one might have thought that some secret, presumably technological, would be materially decisive in the ideological struggle. On reflection, it is not so clear how that was supposed to work – you have a thermonuclear device, therefore you are right about History? – but there was a reasonable fear that the battle of ideas would again become a battle of bodies, and technological prowess helps if you are trying to destroy cities and the like. However strategically or tactically reasonably, a great deal of effort was spent spying, and then on thwarting the other side’s spies. Espionage gave rise to counterespionage gave rise to . . . By the time the Cold War ended, for what seemed to be altogether different reasons, it wasn’t clear that spying had meant all that much in the scheme of things, despite its convenience for punishing political enemies. Le Carre ruefully concluded that the energies, the money, the lives, had been pretty much wasted. More joyously, in the Mad Magazine of my childhood, the White Spy and the Black Spy endlessly battled each other, to no effect. “Spy vs Spy” was the brainchild of Antonio Prohias, a Cuban, which seems right.
Surely the relatively recent omnipresence of computing devices that communicate contributes to the sense of a struggle, mostly covert, over information. Our computers spy upon us; our homes spy upon us; our phones spy upon us; some vibrators even relay user preferences to their manufacturers. Really. No doubt the information is anonymized and there is no need to worry. But it’s not nice that the largest companies on the planet make their money harvesting, managing, and reselling information, rather than, say, making things. The big book here is Shoshana Zuboff’s The Age of Surveillance Capitalism. A friend of mine actually read it, and I’m assured you know all you need to from the title, and from your last conversation with “Alexa” or “Siri” or some other digital assistant with a female cosmopolitan name. I want a digital assistant named, oh, Beria. But I digress.
The link between computing and spying goes much deeper, I think. It is not just Turing, Bletchley Park, and codebreaking, or even Turing, homosexuality, and code-switching. The idea of medium independence, of computing itself, implies that that which you see is not really what matters, is not untrue but isn’t the key truth, either. Computing is always here but potentially elsewhere. Not just the visual simulacrum, the code itself, both is and isn’t “real” in a very “real” (???) sense. But that’s another essay, maybe for another day.
For years members of my family circle have [joked] that I am a spy, more precisely, an assassin. “Happy Birthday! Hope you are warm in the [list of cold weather conflicts].” A morning text is greeted with “Early asset gets the mole!” That sort of thing. It is completely untrue, and I’m appalled, as a policy matter, but – guilty pleasure – it is sort of fun, a way to josh with the kin.
Maybe this started because I travel, and don’t do anything they would call work. An occasional seminar is not like going to an office, not like meeting with hordes of kids every morning, five days a week, 8 or 9 hours a day. I sit around, fly off somewhere, “give a talk,” and fly back. And “honoraria” appear in my bank account. Something else must be going on, they say. I protest that my life is an open book, they can read it. They say that is the perfect cover. Admittedly, many spies have been academics. My circle is unimpressed with the papers, the lecture notes, that I share. What the hell does that mean? Who would pay for that?
This line of humor is easy to maintain in part because of our cultural familiarity with the figure of the spy/assassin. It is a bit odd. Killers would seem serious. And sometimes, depending on one’s sensibilities, entertainment intended to be light crosses some sort of interpretive line and gains weight, reads as death. Mostly, however, we blithely consume representations of carnage. Of course, folks in other times and places have bloodthirsty entertainments, but ubiquity hardly explains why, for them or for us. For us at least, the easy answer is a kind of envy for the freedom, the prowess: who would not want to have a license and the capacity to kill, without consequences and justifiably? Are our lives that superficial, that devoid of sympathy, so banal that we will sell our souls for a thrill? It’s easy to glamorize, and maybe we proles are an easy mark, but still . . .
More darkly, we are all constantly told that the news that we see are expressions of power held elsewhere. Who is in control? Shadowy cabals of central bankers, the Deep State, Q Anon, the World Economic Forum (“Davos”), the Bilderberg Group, Blackwater, the Koch Brothers, ISIL, the Wagner Group, various drug cartels, combinations of Silicon Valley lords, the Mainstream Media and the list goes on – even Israel/the Jews, because, you know. Everybody knows. Someone else has the secret, is in control, and so the context is conspiratorial. Spying, dark struggles, inhere in this imagination of our politics.
More darkly still, violence as an expression of existential rage has been on my mind of late. But I’m not sure our infatuation with spies has much to do with that, and at any rate, those thoughts are for another outing.
Ironically enough, in Deploying Ourselves: Islamist Violence and the Responsible Projection of US Force I argued that the US reliance on remote and covert uses of force came at an enormous political cost. In particular, the decision to decouple intelligence from the discipline of military spending (the independent CIA) had been a terrible mistake, that undermined the enlightened liberal internationalism for which the US had struggled. Roughly speaking, spying was counterproductive. You may judge for yourself whether my argument has been buttressed by events of the last dozen years. “Nobody would suspect somebody who wants to abolish the CIA. It’s so smart.”
Some years back, in the wake of the GFC and while the US was still hunting Osama bin Laden, the State Department “sponsored” a speaking tour of Pakistan (everybody knew what that meant) on which I talked about economic development. Classic public diplomacy; nobody believed me. For that matter, nobody bought the book. Who puts what they think in books? A couple of times I was impolitely called a spy. More usually, people would forcefully insist that I relay their message to my handlers. “When you get back, you tell them [‘Obama’ once!] __________.” I was flattered that somebody thought somebody important was listening to me. In secret. Right.
Sadly (hilariously), as a writer, I struggle mightily to express what I know, or at least think. I have truths I cannot share, try as I might, secrets due to my own failings.
Getting a ride back to my hotel, after a fine breakfast with a colleague whom I had not seen in years, since the days of the financial crisis:
“Weren’t you doing a lot of international travel, back then?”
I mumbled a response, something along the lines of when the times get crazy, the crazy go pro.
“You know, I always thought you were a spook. I had a colleague, I was sure he was a spook. I thought you were one, too.”
And then, in the voice that West Coasters use when urging someone to confess gender identity, he said, “You know, it’s ok, if you’re a spook.”
In an instant, my hand already on the little knife, I decided to let him live. “No, of course not, that’s really funny,” I said, I hoped nonchalantly. “My family jokes about that all the time.”
Just kidding.
* * *
A new podcast, Episode 12: Getting Through Security Part II, is out. I’m really happy with this text. If you do podcasts, please give it a listen.
This audio file will eventually be integrated into a (modestly priced!) audiobook of Maguire & Westbrook, Getting Through Security: Counterterrorism, Bureaucracy, and a Sense of the Modern. We reacquired the audio rights from Routledge, but getting the audio done is taking the usual, time and effort. (Incidentally, the picture on the webpage was taken from the State Island Ferry, which still offers incredible views for free. The absence, of course, is the World Trade Center.)
* * *
Intermittent Signal is free, and most of the work to which I link is also free. I’m trying to connect, not make money here. Not that I’m against making money, baby needs shoes.
The good folks at Substack often let me know that they want me to monetize my content, because their business model is based on a modest cut of the subscription fees. Since I have no subscription fees, I simply pay them, but there is little upside in that. So California. That said, I like Substack more than Medium — more on that another time.
More interestingly, some readers have expressed a desire to donate, in fine gift economy style. The content of free and paid subscriptions is the exact same, as Mauss would have appreciated, it’s about social standing. Anyway, if you wish, you may join as either a free subscriber or a fee-paying subscriber by hitting the button below. If you are already a free subscriber, you can switch to fee-paid. Any money raised will be used to defray the costs of making, promoting, and distributing my work.
* * *
Finally, for something into the cold in a very different way, Pronghorns in Winter. This is the largest herd I have ever seen. They were almost on the road as I passed at some 80 mph, but they are wary, and had moved off by the time I managed to stop, turn around and get out, even if only with a phone. Enjoy!
I coincidentally read this while watching a James Bond movie last night. One of the great ones with Sean Connery. Jet packs, karate chops, the works. The juxtaposition was kinda fun. Struck me that if I squint just right, maybe you've got some Sean Connery in you. That would explain the whole spy thing, wouldn't it?
Less writer, maybe, than artist . . . . But I do love the spy label! Embrace it, as needed. And be well.