The Cold War The Cia Versus The Kgb - 1781 Words

Lauren Mason Chris Kidder Lessons in Vietnam and International Relations 29 May 2015 Espionage During the Cold War: The CIA versus the KGB The year was 2007. The fall of the Soviet Union occurred about sixteen years prior, and according to all international governments and news sources, the Cold War was over. The hostility between two superpowers had thawed, but upon closer inspection, this was not true. Based on counterintelligence acquired by the CIA, the Russian spy population in the United States had reached Cold War levels. Three years later, in 2010, a ring of ten Russian sleeper agents were discovered to be living normal lives in the northeastern part of the United States. However, these people were deceiving their friends†¦show more content†¦Communist and Soviet allied nations such as Cuba reported to the KGB, or the Committee for State Security of the Soviet Union. While its main job as a militant commission was to maintain the integrity of the nation it represented, its actions as an intelligence agency were quite sinister. The KGB was respo nsible for keeping the Soviet Bloc intact and crushed rebellions such as the Hungarian Revolution in 1956 and the Prague Spring of Czechoslovakia in 1968. There have also been suspicions that they carried out countless assassinations both within and out of the Soviet Union. Its initial formation occurred in 1954 after the dissolution of its predecessor, the MGB, and the current Soviet leader wanted it to spread public support for his country and purge anybody who supported a different leader. Later on, it was involved with operations in Afghanistan, Bangladesh and India. While it was not regarded as a major organization within the government, it had special privileges that allowed it to act autonomously without much control from outside influence. It is estimated that almost one million Soviets worked for the KGB during its existence and to this day it is difficult to find information on the organization due to classification. When it came to espionage operations, the organization quickly became a thorn in the United States’ side even