Spy helped unmask 3 Cuban spy networks, U.S. officials say

"The CIA’s Latin America Division has run many spies in Cuba, but Rolando Sarraff Trujillo was in a class all his own.From his perch as a cryptographer in Cuba’s Directorate of Intelligence, Sarraff was able to provide information that repeatedly helped the U.S. intelligence community crack encoded messages the Communist government was sending via shortwave radio..."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/spy-helped-unmask-3-cuban

WASHINGTON — He was, in many ways, a perfect spy — a man so important to Cuba’s intelligence apparatus that the information he gave to the Central Intelligence Agency paid dividends long after Cuban authorities arrested him and threw him in prison for nearly two decades.

Rolando Sarraff Trujillo has now been released from prison and flown out of Cuba as part of the swap for three Cuban spies imprisoned in the United States that President Obama announced Wednesday.

 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/19/world/americas/cia-mole-now-out-of-prison-help

Yesterday, after more than 50 years, we began to change America's relationship with the people of Cuba.

Yesterday, after more than 50 years, we began to change America's relationship with the people of Cuba.

We are recognizing the struggle and sacrifice of the Cuban people, both in the U.S. and in Cuba, and ending an outdated approach that has failed to advance U.S. interests for decades. In doing so, we will begin to normalize relations between our two countries.

I was born in 1961, just over two years after Fidel Castro took power in Cuba, and just as the U.S. severed diplomatic relations with that country.

Our complicated relationship with this nation played out over the course of my lifetime -- against the backdrop of the Cold War, with our steadfast opposition to communism in the foreground. Year after year, an ideological and economic barrier hardened between us.

That previous approach failed to promote change, and it's failed to empower or engage the Cuban people. It's time to cut loose the shackles of the past and reach for a new and better future with this country.

I want you to know exactly what our new approach will mean.

First, I have instructed Secretary of State John Kerry to immediately begin discussions with Cuba to re-establish diplomatic relations that have been severed since 1961. Going forward, we will re-establish an embassy in Havana, and high-ranking officials will once again visit Cuba.

Second, I have also instructed Secretary Kerry to review Cuba's designation as a State Sponsor of Terrorism -- a review guided by the facts and the law. At a time when we are focused on threats from ISIL and al Qaeda, a nation that meets our conditions and renounces terrorism should not face such a sanction.

Third, we'll take steps to increase travel, commerce, and the flow of information to -- and from -- Cuba. These steps will make it easier for Americans to travel to Cuba. They will make it easier for Americans to conduct authorized trade with Cuba, including exports of food, medicine, and medical products to Cuba. And they will facilitate increased telecommunications connections between our two countries: American businesses will be able to sell goods that enable Cubans to communicate with the United States and other countries.

Learn more about the steps we're taking to change our policy.

These changes don't constitute a reward or a concession to Cuba. We are making them because it will spur change among the people of Cuba, and that is our main objective.

Change is hard -- especially so when we carry the heavy weight of history on our shoulders.

Our country is cutting that burden loose to reach for a better future.

Thank you,

President Barack Obama

Spying for Fidel: The Inside Story of Kendall and Gwen Myers By Toby Harnden

"Gazing out across the Chesapeake Bay from their sleek 37-foot yacht, Helene, in the summer of 2007, Kendall and Gwen Myers appeared to be blissfully carefree. They’d been together more than three decades, but they delighted in ensuring that their world was composed principally of each other"..."He later told Hector that “we really love your country” and “Fidel is wonderful, just wonderful.” Gwen ventured that Castro was the most “incredible statesman,” while Kendall said that “our idea is to sail home” to Cuba..."

http://www.washingtonian.com/articles/people/spying-for-fidel-the-inside-story-of-kendall-and-gwen-myers/

Numbers Stations: A Bad Day to be a Cuban Spy. By Chris Simmons

Numbers Stations: A Bad Day to be a Cuban Spy

by Chris Simmons

 http://cubaconfidential.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/swlingpost-spy-numbers-station.jpg?w=560

By Thomas, The SWLing Post

While band scanning last Sunday (September 8, 2014) I stumbled upon the Cuban numbers station HM01 on 11,530 kHz at 17:30 UTC.

It’s always intriguing to hear shortwave numbers stations, but I prefer those that stick to pure vocal number strings; HM01 has numbers with digital bursts between number sets, which is a more fatiguing listening experience.  Nonetheless, I kept it playing in the background as I tooled around the radio room Sunday afternoon, putting away supplies from my recent three week road trip.

"The lack of any accent in the voice of the Atención station was explained in December by Jorge García Vázquez, a Cuban in Berlin who has been researching the links between Havana and the STASI, the former East Germany’ intelligence service. A Jan. 10 1977 letter in the STASI archives shows Cuban intelligence Maj. Eddy Herrera had requested the equipment for a numbers station, preloaded with the Spanish words for one through zero, Attention, Goodbye and Final, Garcia Vasquez reported.."

 http://stasi-minint.blogspot.de/2014/01/atencion-atencion-havana-moonlas.html

http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/02/16/3939953/cuban-spies-received-secret-messages.html

Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2014/02/16/3939953/cuban-spies-received-secret-messages.html#storylink=cpy

FBI: Cuban Intelligence, Spies and Influence Agents

FBI: Cuban Intelligence Aggressively Recruiting Leftist American Academics as Spies, Influence Agents

by Chris Simmons

By Bill Gertz, Washington Free Beacon

Cuba’s communist-led intelligence services are aggressively recruiting leftist American academics and university professors as spies and influence agents, according to an internal FBI report published this week.

Cuban intelligence services “have perfected the work of placing agents, that includes aggressively targeting U.S. universities under the assumption that a percentage of students will eventually move on to positions within the U.S. government that can provide access to information of use to the [Cuban intelligence service],” the five-page unclassified FBI report says. It notes that the Cubans “devote a significant amount of resources to targeting and exploiting U.S. academia.”

“Academia has been and remains a key target of foreign intelligence services, including the [Cuban intelligence service],” the report concludes.

https://www.phc.edu/intelligencer/entryway-to-espionage

 http://cubaconfidential.wordpress.com/2014/09/05/fbi-cuban-intelligence-aggressively-recruiting-leftist-american-academics-as-spies-influence-agents/

Former DGI Officer Identifies 17 Castro Spies

Former DGI Officer Identifies 17 Castro Spies by Chris Simmons

DGI officer and Ambassador, René Ceballo Prats

Cubans Involved In Peru-Based Espionage Operations During The 1970s & 1980s

Former Dirección General De Inteligencia (DGI) officer Enrique García Diaz served on the “Peru Desk” at DGI headquarters during this period. During an interview, he explained that three other officers also worked the “desk:” Eulalia Sardain (codenamed "Mayra"), René Ceballo Prats ("Ibrahim") and Ismael Cruz Arce ("Jose Luis"). Two additional DGI officers who worked with García Diaz on Peru issues were Juan Pedro Gonzalez ("Giraldo") and Jose Francisco Molina Mauri ("Ivan").

 http://cubaconfidential.wordpress.com/2014/08/24/former-dgi-officer-identifies-17-castro-spies/

The training of Cuban intelligence and counterintelligence officers in the techniques of the East German “counterintelligence state”

 "It is well known and documented that Soviet and East European communist intelligence services played key roles in training guerrilla cadres of all types, including those engaged in insurgent intelligence and CI work.These complex, multifaceted support efforts—carried out clandestinely in insurgent host countries and in the USSR, Eastern Europe, and third country camps and facilities as well—trained several generations of insurgents and terrorists in pertinent skills including those of intelligence and counterintelligence. This history is too extensive to be addressed here but needs to be considered as a backdrop in more focused assessments of current approaches. One example is worth noting, however, since it contributed so much to guerrilla approaches in a region of the world. The example is the role of the East German Ministry for State Security(Ministerium fur Staatssicherheit—MfR), more commonly known as the Stasi. Stasi training and support efforts covered a number of areas of the world. Its influence, however, was particularly strong in Cuba, where the Cuban Ministry of the Interior (MINIT) was charged with a broad spectrum of internal and external security functions and became in many respects a close Stasi analog. The nature of the close relationship had been asserted and partially documented for years in Western assessments. The training of Cuban intelligence and counterintelligence officers in the techniques of the East German “counterintelligence state” was evident in many ways. The demise of the German Democratic Republic in 1990 and consequent access to Stasi files confirmed and expanded the understanding of the relationship. Regarding guerrilla CI, this relationship is important because Cuban trainers played substantial roles in passing on their knowledge to Latin American and other insurgent groups. Cuban researcher Jorge Luís Vázquez, 33 ..." 

http://www.slideshare.net/CIARO/jsou-guerrilla-counterintelligence