As a guest of BFMTV, journalist and historian Rémi Kauffer talks about the possible presence of American “moles” in Russia. He believes that Vladimir Putin “will try to expose them”.
The war in Ukraine has highlighted the important role that spies can play during a conflict, especially to get information from the enemy camp. And since February 24, a fear puts all employees in Russia on the alert: is there a “mole” in any of the services?
Because on the American side, the White House often highlights the quality of the information provided by its agencies, including the CIA. Guest on BFMTV, Rémi Kauffer, historian and journalist specializing in intelligence services and secret services, “Putin must believe that there is a mole in his entourage.”
“It has to do with the logic of his regime, which is fundamentally paranoid,” explains the journalist. “There must be a mole, because the Americans warned of the enemy’s intentions (the course of the invasion of Ukraine, editor’s note), which is the most difficult thing.”
“What is certain is that the Americans have been watching what is happening in Russia for a long time”
Putin “will try to expose them,” Rémi Kauffer predicts. “It happened once before in Stalin’s day, in the late 1930s, when there was bound to be a mole from MI6, the British secret service.”
The use of information (…) by Americans, who “communicate a lot”, represents “a fairly new type of warfare”, says Jérôme Poirot, former assistant to the National Intelligence Coordination, on the set of BFMTV. “
“It’s about making public information that is normally classified,” he said. Jérôme Poirot points in particular to the capacities of the NSA: “It is certain that the Americans have observed what is happening in Russia for a long time (…) and have shown that they were often one step ahead.”
“There have been moles in the past,” recalls Ulysse Gosset, international political columnist at BFMTV. “But in reality, most of the information Americans get comes from the use of satellites in Russia and Belarus,” he says angrily.