![]() In the 2010 film Salt, a CIA officer goes on the run when accused of being a sleeper agent by a Russian defector.In the British comedy-drama Sleepers (TV series), two Russian agents have integrated so well into their lives as British citizens, that when receive their activation signal, they go on the run.The 1997 book Captain Underpants has elementary schoolers George and Harold hypnotize their school's principal, so when he hears anybody snap their fingers, he takes on the persona of the titular Captain Underpants.The 1978 book Eye of the Needle by Ken Follett and 1981 film of the same name both show how a sleeper agent, Henry Faber ( Donald Sutherland), operates in his target country.In the 1977 film Telefon, Russian agents believe they are ordinary Americans until their memories are unlocked with a special activation phrase.In The Manchurian Candidate (the novel and its film adaptations), some Americans are captured by Soviet intelligence forces, given posthypnotic commands, and returned to their lives in the U.S.They are brainwashed, hypnotized, or otherwise conditioned to be unaware of their secret mission until activated. In fictional portrayals, sleeper agents are sometimes unaware that they are sleepers. This common use is directly related to and results from repeated instances of real-life "sleeper agents" participating in spying, espionage, sedition, treason, and assassinations. Sleeper agents are popular plot devices in fiction, particularly in espionage fiction and science fiction. The Russian General Directorate for special programs, or GUSP in Russian transliteration (Главное управление специальных программ, ГУСП), still recruits candidates among students and talented scientists to use them as sleeper agents or as legal employees in police and intelligence bodies in Russia. An ongoing, multiyear investigation culminated in June 2010 with the filing of charges and the arrest of 10 suspects in the US and another in Cyprus. The Illegals Program is a network of sleeper spies planted in the US by the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service.Barsky quickly confessed after being arrested and became a useful source of information about spy techniques. He was located by US authorities in 1994 and then arrested in 1997. He was an active sleeper agent between 19. Jack Barsky was planted as a sleeper agent in the United States by the Soviet KGB.If the sponsor government and its policies change after the sleeper has been inserted, the sleeper may be found to have been planted in the wrong target. That is valuable to the sponsor, as the sleeper's language and other skills can be those of a native, thus less likely to trigger domestic suspicion.Ĭhoosing and inserting sleeper agents has often been difficult, as whether the target will be appropriate some years in the future is uncertain. Sleeper agents who have been discovered have often been natives of the target country who moved elsewhere in early life and were co-opted (perhaps for ideological or ethnic reasons) before returning to the target country. In such cases, the sleeper agent may be successful enough to become what is sometimes termed an " agent of influence". In a sense, the best sleeper agents are those who do not need to be paid by the sponsor, as they are able to earn enough money to finance themselves, averting any possibly traceable payments from abroad. Counterespionage agencies in the target country cannot, in practice, closely watch all those who may possibly have been recruited some time before. The agent acquires jobs and identities, ideally ones that will prove useful in the future, and attempts to blend into everyday life as a normal citizen. The agent does nothing to communicate with the sponsor or any existing agents or to obtain information beyond what is in public sources. In espionage, a sleeper agent is one who has infiltrated the target country and has "gone to sleep", sometimes for many years. ![]() ( August 2023) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message) Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources.
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