OO Woods, Secret Agent Traitor Spy!

The spy is on the right

The movie Breach is based on the true story of Robert Hanssen, the most egregious spy in American history. When he's finally caught in the film, FBI Agent Plesac understandably has some questions for Hanssen:

PLESAC
Even if all you give them is why you
did it... it buys you some goodwill.
(no reply)
That’s what [another caught spy] Ames did, at first anyway,
just gave up the why.

HANSSEN

Must not’ve taken long. All Ames
cared about was the money.

PLESAC
Why else would he have done it?

In other words: Why the fuck have you been betraying your
country for 22 years? Hanssen almost smiles. Almost.

HANSSEN
Oh, it’s not so hard to guess, is it?
Considering the human ego?
(Plesac waits)
Imagine sitting in a room with a
bunch of your colleagues, everybody
trying to find a mole. And all the
while, it’s you they're looking for.
That must be... very satisfying,
wouldn’t you think?

Or maybe he considered himself a
patriot. Maybe he saw it as his duty
to show us how lax our security was.
Maybe he--

Hanssen stops himself. Something just hit him:

HANSSEN (CONT’D)

Aw, what good does speculating do? He
spied. The why doesn’t mean a thing,
does it?

PLESAC

No. I guess it doesn’t.

A spy comes in from the cold

So what causes the human soul to live a double life? It's a fascinating question. Take Tiger's case. Wilt Chamberlain claimed to have boinked 20,000 women. Only the boldest of hypocrites calls shame on him for that. But then, Wilt was straight up honest about it and never married. Tiger, however, is a full fledged spy. He had his own network of women set up, he was constantly recruiting new members and mastered the art of the double-sided lifestyle for years. This was no mean operation he had going on!

He even had his agents (women) separated by cut-outs, each knowing nothing of the other. Brilliant! I would love to know the full extant of the mechanics he employed to keep the entire operation steaming forward without a hint to the outside world - and apparently not even his wife. Truly, Tiger should be recruited by the CIA for his logistical prowess alone. (I guess they could employ his other prowess as well)

The secret agent spy life holds a spellbinding effect on certain souls and a mysterious glory to others. Uber rich oilman Clint Murchison had an appetite for women that rivaled Tigers. However, after he divorced, it wasn't nearly as much fun having affairs that no longer needed to be clandestine and his desire declined accordingly. It's the desire to feel we're getting away with something, we're somehow smarter than everyone else.

Bond captures the mythology

Novelist spymaster John Le Carre has made it a point to delve into the spy mentality, alleging a person becomes a spy because of a secretive nature - not the other way around. His famous "Tinker, Tailor, Solder, Spy" novel tells of a mole in the British Secret Service and shows the desire for treason as kind of a lust, the thrill of sneaking into the cookie jar and not getting caught. It's a form of power that drives the lives of many men. Of course, it's all an illusion like any form of "power".

To my detriment, I was a spy in a previous life. It is said I ushered in the modern age of spying, turning it into a profession. Certainly I was a professional liar and took it to levels not seen before but I was also a freelancer who made his own rules and that was key to my success. It takes a keen understanding of both people and life to be a successful spy - to know where all the lines are drawn - but to work within a framework of others is to limit yourself to their lesser understanding of a given situation. That's just suicide. No way I'd be part of an organization.

So the best spies are the ones that make their own rules. Certainly Tiger did. And a lot of hostility towards him will come from that, little minds that sheepishly follow rules who need to claim that as a virtue. "How dare he!" they say, never really quite stating what their outrage is. I don't really get people getting on their high horse about this deception when we are all guilty of that to a degree. On the other hand, I completely do not think it should be swept under the rug in the name of "privacy". All things must come to light, it's the natural order.

Even the spy wonders who he is. Perfect!

Le Carre's opus to the traitor spy was called "A Perfect Spy", the story of a fractured soul from his childhood to his suicide. Magnus had lived for his father, never reaching the point where he lived for himself. Still, he went on with his life in marriage and family and career as an intelligence agent, but he had to give air to his inner lie. He fed information to both sides almost from the beginning and couldn't face it when the inevitable happened.

Certainly with a father like Tiger's we can see a similar fractured soul and his need to give life to his true self outside his father's expectations. It's in the lying he shamed himself. The scale of the lying was monumental and his ability to survive it will be determined by how much he comes clean. I begrudge Tiger nothing nor do I pity him. He made his own bed. But as to why he did this, well, only he knows for sure. Now he spies on himself.