00:00:02
Next, Robert Hansen, a career FBI agent,
00:00:07
a man above suspicion. Robert Hansen is
00:00:10
the most devilishly clever spy in the
00:00:13
history of the United States. For more
00:00:15
than a decade, the FBI knew there was a
00:00:18
traitor in their midst, a mole. But they
00:00:20
never questioned Hansen. He probably
00:00:23
enjoyed knowing while he sat in meetings
00:00:25
with his colleagues at the FBI that he
00:00:28
was actually working for the other side
00:00:30
at the same time they were all together
00:00:32
looking for agents of the other side.
00:00:34
Before he was caught, Hansen sold
00:00:36
American secrets for cash and diamonds.
00:00:39
I don't think it was the money at all
00:00:41
for Hansen. I think it was the thrill of
00:00:43
being a triple agent, if you will. Bob
00:00:46
Hansen became Darth Vader without the
00:00:48
mask. He was the most powerful counter
00:00:51
inelligence official in the US
00:00:52
government. Next, Robert Hansen, the
00:00:56
unlikely spy.
00:01:00
[Music]
00:01:05
[Music]
00:01:30
Sunday, February 18th, 2001, in Great
00:01:33
Falls, Virginia, just outside of
00:01:35
Washington, Robert Hansen attends
00:01:38
Catholic Mass at St. Catherine of
00:01:40
Sienna. His wife Bonnie and his six
00:01:43
children are with him. Also attending
00:01:46
mass is his boss, FBI Director Louie
00:01:49
Free, also with his wife and family.
00:01:52
Outside, a team of Free Special agents
00:01:55
were on a mission. David Vise, the
00:01:58
author of the book The Bureau and the
00:02:01
Mole, tells the story of that moment
00:02:03
based on FBI accounts. Hansen and his
00:02:06
family sit on the left side of the
00:02:08
church. Free and his family sit on the
00:02:10
right side of the church. Father
00:02:11
Franklin Martin McAfee is speaking and
00:02:13
Hansen feels as though the father is
00:02:15
speaking directly to him. Are you a
00:02:18
sinner? Father McAfee asked. God still
00:02:22
loves you. Have you ever lied to
00:02:24
someone? Of course you have. God still
00:02:27
loves you. Have you betrayed someone?
00:02:31
God still loves you. Hansen internalizes
00:02:33
these words. He feels as though Father
00:02:36
McAfei's message is coming directly to
00:02:40
him and for him.
00:02:43
David Major was Hansen's boss at the
00:02:45
FBI. He was also one of his friends. But
00:02:50
on this day, Major had no idea Hansen
00:02:53
had become a target. Most likely the FBI
00:02:56
had actually surveiled him up to the
00:02:58
church because by this time the FBI
00:03:00
would be very closely monitoring him,
00:03:03
probably technologically surveilling him
00:03:06
um as well by putting a beacon in his
00:03:08
car and those sort of things. He returns
00:03:10
home with his family.
00:03:14
There is Jack Hoser, his best friend.
00:03:17
He hands Jack a copy of his favorite
00:03:20
book. It was tattered. It was worn. Bob
00:03:23
Hansen passes to Jack Horshower this
00:03:26
book called A Man Called Thursday, which
00:03:28
is a story about treason and espionage,
00:03:30
which is a very telling story. And he
00:03:32
looks at Jack and he says,
00:03:35
"Things are not always the way they
00:03:38
seem.
00:03:40
Things are not always the way they
00:03:42
seem."
00:03:44
Hansen drives his friend to National
00:03:46
Airport, says goodbye, and heads back
00:03:49
into town, not realizing that he is
00:03:52
being tailed by an FBI van. Hansen
00:03:55
drives to a park in Northern Virginia,
00:03:57
only minutes from his home. He had
00:03:59
parked his car up around the corner. He
00:04:02
had walked into the woods. Taking his
00:04:04
last steps as a free man, he pulls a
00:04:06
black, hefty garbage bag out of the
00:04:08
trunk of his car. He walks to a foot
00:04:10
bridge in the park. places that black
00:04:13
bag underneath the bridge. He turns and
00:04:16
he begins to walk out of the park.
00:04:21
He then walks out of the site and is
00:04:23
walking up to his car when he was
00:04:24
approached by the FBI agency. A group of
00:04:26
FBI agents descend upon him. They throw
00:04:29
handcuffs on him. "Freeze!" they shout.
00:04:31
"Freeze!"
00:04:33
Robert Hansen asked a question that
00:04:36
haunts the FBI to this day. He asked
00:04:39
them, "What took you so long?"
00:04:45
The FBI did not make public their arrest
00:04:48
of Hansen for nearly 48 hours. There
00:04:51
would be no perp walk for the press.
00:04:54
Hansen had spied for the Russians under
00:04:56
their noses. One of their own had
00:04:59
betrayed them. Still, officially, the
00:05:02
government put a positive spin on the
00:05:04
story. Sunday, the FBI successfully
00:05:07
concluded
00:05:09
an investigation to end a very serious
00:05:12
breach in the security of the United
00:05:14
States. The arrest of Robert Hansen for
00:05:18
espionage is especially difficult
00:05:20
because the person who was investigated,
00:05:23
arrested, and charged is one of our own.
00:05:30
The next day and for years to come,
00:05:33
people wondered who was this spy, Robert
00:05:36
Hansen.
00:05:41
Investigators trying to understand why
00:05:44
this man turned on his country went to a
00:05:46
Chicago suburban neighborhood called
00:05:48
Norwood Park, where Hansen was born and
00:05:51
raised. This is not the place you'd
00:05:53
think the greatest spy in American
00:05:54
history would ever start. We went out
00:05:57
there and looked at the house and it's
00:05:59
very very you know middle class lower
00:06:01
middle class house in Norwood. You know
00:06:03
it's a union bluecollar police firemen
00:06:07
kind of community wave the flag kind of
00:06:10
place. That was the roots that Bob grew
00:06:12
up with. Hansen's dad was on the police
00:06:14
department and he was a high ranking
00:06:15
police officer. It would seem to me that
00:06:18
when you when you're raised in a cop
00:06:19
family you you it rubs off. you've got
00:06:23
some immunity from all kinds of people
00:06:25
looking at you because even as a kid,
00:06:28
the kids would say, "Hey, my my dad's a
00:06:29
cop." All of a sudden, you leave him
00:06:31
alone. The roots of one of the most
00:06:33
important people in the Bob Hansen case
00:06:35
start in this high school. If you were
00:06:37
to look at his yearbook, there's one
00:06:39
picture of Bob Hansen, and there's very
00:06:41
few things said about Bob. He was kind
00:06:43
of a gray guy. He was not a a dater of
00:06:46
lots of different women. He was seen as
00:06:48
sort of a shadow guy, not in any
00:06:50
particular click. But his best friend,
00:06:52
Jack Horshower, who's taller, better
00:06:54
looking, more of a ladies man, became
00:06:56
his best friend.
00:07:00
Eventually, Hansen will expose the dark
00:07:03
side of his life to horser. It starts
00:07:06
with his father, Howard Hansen, who was
00:07:08
openly critical. He thought his son was
00:07:11
a wimp, and he was going to make his son
00:07:13
a man, and he was, as a result of doing
00:07:16
that, turns out that he was very, very
00:07:18
hard on Bob. uh very critical of him,
00:07:21
thought he was a loser. Howard Hansen
00:07:24
had decided his son was going to be a
00:07:26
dentist. While attending dental school,
00:07:29
Hansen meets his future wife, Bonnie.
00:07:32
She is a naturally beautiful woman.
00:07:34
Hansen's father didn't understand what
00:07:36
she saw in his son. He actually said to
00:07:40
Bob Henson's uh wife um when before they
00:07:44
got married when they announced their
00:07:45
engagement, "Why do you want to marry my
00:07:49
uh son? He's a loser." Now, can you
00:07:51
imagine what that would make you feel?
00:07:53
That's what your father said about you.
00:07:56
Hansen defies his father and joins the
00:07:59
Chicago Police Department. He never
00:08:01
walks a beat, however. He is assigned to
00:08:04
a special squad where he meets another
00:08:06
Chicago cop, Ernie Rizzo. I saw Hansen
00:08:10
when I was a cop and he was assigned to
00:08:12
C5. Um C5 was an elite Chicago unit that
00:08:16
was to uh root out corrupt cops,
00:08:19
politicians. It was the elite of the
00:08:22
elite. Hansen went straight out of the
00:08:24
academy in the C5. I would imagine with
00:08:27
some pull from his father. Hansen was a
00:08:30
mystery guy. If I had to to give an
00:08:32
impression of Hansen, it would be a guy
00:08:34
who you never want to put anything past.
00:08:37
Uh, quiet guys scare me. Hansen was a
00:08:41
scary guy.
00:08:43
Bob and Bonnie Hansen were devout
00:08:45
Catholics. They would join Opus Day, a
00:08:49
fundamentalist Catholic group. Many
00:08:51
police officers joined Opus Day, even
00:08:54
Louis Free, Hansen's soon-to-be FBI
00:08:57
leader. he became a true believer
00:09:01
whether it was opus day which is really
00:09:03
kind of an extreme form of Catholicism
00:09:06
extreme adherence to it. It requires a
00:09:09
certain kind of personality uh to want
00:09:11
to u basically torture your own body
00:09:16
sacrifice your own body in achieving
00:09:19
some kind of religious objective. He was
00:09:21
a virilent anti-communist. He would say
00:09:23
that the Soviet Union will fail because
00:09:25
it's run by godless communists and mean
00:09:27
it. This was a man who I would never
00:09:30
gone to have a drink with. I would never
00:09:31
have asked him to go to a strip club
00:09:33
with. I mean, he wasn't a guy guy. What
00:09:35
was interesting is he had this dark side
00:09:37
of him where he almost was addicted to
00:09:40
betrayal. I think Hansen was all for
00:09:43
Hansen. You know, most cops are a bunch
00:09:46
of guys getting together. That's, you
00:09:47
know, a brother thing. That wasn't
00:09:49
Hansen. Hansen was his own one-man
00:09:51
situation. He uh he didn't pal up or
00:09:54
party up to anybody.
00:09:58
Hansen rejected the Chicago PD. He
00:10:02
turned in his Windy City badge for an
00:10:04
FBI jacket. After a short stay in Gary,
00:10:08
Indiana, he is transferred to New York
00:10:10
City. At the time, the FBI headquarters
00:10:14
was located on the Upper East Side of
00:10:16
Manhattan, a short distance from the UN
00:10:19
and close to the Soviet mission to the
00:10:21
UN.
00:10:24
Coming up, Hansen walks into a nest of
00:10:27
spies looking to sell secrets.
00:10:30
[Music]
00:10:38
New York City, East 67th Street, 1981.
00:10:43
The Russian mission to the United
00:10:45
Nations, across the street from an NYPD
00:10:48
precinct and two blocks from FBI offices
00:10:52
where Robert Hansen was assigned to
00:10:54
monitor the comingings and goings at the
00:10:56
Russian mission known as the Nest of
00:10:59
Spies.
00:11:01
The rents and the living expenses in New
00:11:03
York were uh stupendously higher than
00:11:06
Gary, Indiana. Hansen is given access to
00:11:09
sensitive information for the first time
00:11:11
and he's feeling some financial
00:11:14
pressure. He had a young growing family
00:11:16
and a wife and he needed money. They
00:11:20
bought a house in Scarsdale,
00:11:22
which is an upscale suburb of New York,
00:11:24
and the house was over his head
00:11:26
financially, and the uh credit card
00:11:29
bills were mounting up and and he was he
00:11:33
was in trouble. So, one day he did
00:11:36
something unlike his his later uh
00:11:39
activities where he was very cautious.
00:11:41
As far as I know, he walked right into
00:11:43
the office of the Soviet Trade Company
00:11:46
on 753rd Avenue known as AMTOR and
00:11:50
volunteered his services. One Russian
00:11:52
who knows his way around the mission at
00:11:54
67th Street is Ole Kugan, a former KGB
00:11:58
agent. Kugan's colleagues in Moscow
00:12:02
informed him that someone with access to
00:12:04
American secrets was offering them for
00:12:07
sale. Kugan in an exclusive interview
00:12:10
recalls that moment in 1981. Hansen had
00:12:15
access to the national security issues.
00:12:18
He had access to some of the most
00:12:20
sensitive secrets of the United States
00:12:22
government. The information he provided
00:12:24
was so valuable from the very beginning
00:12:28
that we had no just other opinions. He
00:12:32
was a genuine one. At that time, we all
00:12:36
already had someone in the United States
00:12:38
CIA, Rick Ames.
00:12:41
We immediately realized that that man's
00:12:45
access to truly secret information was
00:12:50
perhaps even far better than that of
00:12:52
Rick Hayes. Hansen had just walked into
00:12:55
the Russian office. He caught their
00:12:57
security people by surprise. No one got
00:13:00
a picture of him. And when he demanded
00:13:02
payment, he had it delivered in cash to
00:13:05
a post office box with his identity
00:13:08
hidden.
00:13:09
Author David Weise, who penned the story
00:13:12
of Hansen's life in the book Spy, says
00:13:15
Hansen's information led to the death of
00:13:17
a high-ranking Soviet double agent. He
00:13:20
gave them the identity of uh a Soviet uh
00:13:24
officer who military officer who was
00:13:27
cenamed top hat by the FBI and was an
00:13:30
important very important source for
00:13:32
American intelligence for something like
00:13:34
20 years.
00:13:36
Well, for that and some other material
00:13:37
that he turned over a list of uh of KGB
00:13:41
or GRU personnel in New York that were
00:13:44
known to the FBI, he received a total of
00:13:46
$30,000.
00:13:49
Hansen may have been shrewd in his
00:13:51
dealings with the Russians, but he was
00:13:53
careless with the payoff. Bonnie Hansen
00:13:56
one night walks in on her husband in New
00:13:58
York and he hurriedly covers up some
00:14:01
papers. She thinks he's writing a love
00:14:03
letter to another woman. She says, "What
00:14:06
are you doing?" He says, "I'm tricking
00:14:09
the Russians." She said, "What do you
00:14:11
mean?" He said, 'Well,
00:14:14
I've sold information
00:14:17
to the Russian military intelligence,
00:14:20
but it's completely worthless
00:14:22
information,
00:14:24
and I've done it to trick the Russians
00:14:26
and fool them. They've paid me thousands
00:14:28
of dollars.
00:14:30
Bonnie becomes distraught
00:14:34
because she's fears that he may not be
00:14:37
telling the truth.
00:14:39
She worries that his career could be
00:14:40
over, that their family life could blow
00:14:43
apart. And so her reaction, her
00:14:45
immediate reaction was, "We've got to go
00:14:48
see a priest." Hansen confesses to his
00:14:50
pastor in a car by the Russian mission.
00:14:53
The priest tells him to give the money
00:14:55
to charity and never spy again. Hansen
00:14:58
was surprised by the priest's advice.
00:15:00
There is no evidence he ever gave the
00:15:02
money to charity, but he did stop spying
00:15:06
for a while. Unlike most spies, he had
00:15:08
the self-control
00:15:10
to stop. That occurred in 1981, and he
00:15:14
didn't spy again until 1985. In the
00:15:18
spring of 1985,
00:15:20
Hansen is transferred to FBI
00:15:22
headquarters in Washington. He moves his
00:15:25
family to an upscale Virginia
00:15:26
neighborhood to impress his wife. When
00:15:30
he finds he cannot afford the home on
00:15:31
his salary, Hansen decides to resume his
00:15:35
spying for money. only this time he
00:15:38
works out a scheme based on spycraft.
00:15:42
He dropped a letter in a mailbox from
00:15:45
Prince George's County outside of
00:15:46
Washington. The letter was addressed to
00:15:49
a Russian Victor Chakashin.
00:15:52
Now Victor Chashen was a very important
00:15:56
KGB agent in Washington. It was his job
00:15:59
to recruit Americans. And so Hansen knew
00:16:02
that if he offered him his services to
00:16:04
Tracen, it was the top guy. This would
00:16:08
that would get their attention and it
00:16:09
did. That was the beginning. It was
00:16:11
serendipity for the KGB. He fell into
00:16:14
their lap. He uh took the initiative as
00:16:18
you know. But from the point of view of
00:16:20
getting a spy in the US intelligence
00:16:25
community, they could not have done
00:16:27
better than to get Hansen because Hansen
00:16:30
was the keeper of the counter espionage
00:16:33
secrets. He was in the inner sanctum. He
00:16:36
was on top of all of the FBI's counter
00:16:40
inelligence operations, particularly
00:16:42
against the Soviets. So from the Soviet
00:16:44
point of view, he was someone who could
00:16:46
protect them and protect their
00:16:49
operations in Washington and in the
00:16:51
United States because he knew what the
00:16:54
counter espionage techniques were. David
00:16:56
Major sat next to Hansen at FBI
00:16:59
headquarters. He says Hansen never
00:17:02
volunteered to work field cases, never
00:17:05
indicated in any way that he liked
00:17:07
adventure or courted danger.
00:17:10
Major says Hansen sat at his desk
00:17:13
content as an agent analyst. Nothing
00:17:16
suggested he was leading a double life.
00:17:19
Bob Hansen never really was a
00:17:22
fullfledged FBI counter inelligence
00:17:25
street agent. He never met a Russian in
00:17:27
his entire life. He never was
00:17:29
undercover. He never ran a double agent
00:17:31
case. He never ran an espionage case.
00:17:33
But what he did do is he sat in judgment
00:17:36
on other people in the FBI that
00:17:39
conducted counter intelligence. And he
00:17:41
did that on the fourth floor FBI
00:17:42
headquarters. In fact, that's when the
00:17:44
intelligence division is located. What
00:17:47
made Hansen so valuable to the Russians
00:17:50
was that he sat where the counter
00:17:52
intelligence files were kept.
00:17:55
My office when I was his boss was right
00:17:57
down in the corner here or right over
00:17:59
here. And Bob Hansen was just down the
00:18:01
hall back in this area when he was the
00:18:05
deputy chief of the Soviet analytical
00:18:07
section. And that gave him access to
00:18:10
almost everything. In fact, of all the
00:18:13
people in the world that would know what
00:18:16
the FBI knew about the KGB, Bob Hansen
00:18:19
was probably one of 15 people during the
00:18:22
period of 19 um 87 to 1990 that
00:18:26
literally knew everything. And that's
00:18:28
when he was sitting in uh this actually
00:18:30
cubicle at FBI headquarters.
00:18:34
Coming up, how Robert Hansen stole
00:18:37
secrets from under the noses of his
00:18:39
colleagues at FBI headquarters. So he
00:18:42
was perfectly placed to know everything
00:18:45
we knew about the KGB and what the FBI
00:18:48
was doing against the KGB. That made him
00:18:52
almost the perfect spy.
00:18:55
[Music]
00:19:03
Winter 1985 at FBI headquarters in
00:19:06
Washington. Robert Hansen resumes his
00:19:09
traitorous activities. It begins with a
00:19:12
letter written to the Russian chief of
00:19:14
counter intelligence in Washington.
00:19:17
He hides that letter inside a large
00:19:19
envelope he sends to another Russian, a
00:19:22
clerk. He knows the FBI is not likely to
00:19:25
intercept a letter written to a clerk.
00:19:28
It is a simple trick, the kind of trick
00:19:30
Hansen will perfect over the next two
00:19:33
decades. That envelope had information
00:19:36
in it of considerable value.
00:19:40
For example, Robert Hansen chose a man
00:19:43
in Moscow station he knew could go to
00:19:45
the very top of the KGB so that no one
00:19:47
else in Washington and for that matter
00:19:49
no one up the ladder would know that he
00:19:51
had provided the information. Author
00:19:53
Robert Vise has seen the federal
00:19:55
documents that detail Hansen's spycraft.
00:19:59
In those documents, the Soviet spy chief
00:20:02
contacted by Hansen is identified as
00:20:04
Victor Chashen. Chashian was the number
00:20:08
two ranking Russian official in
00:20:10
Washington. He was the go-to guy if you
00:20:14
wanted to be a spy. He sent that big
00:20:17
envelope to a lower ranking official.
00:20:20
That individual opened the envelope,
00:20:22
found another envelope inside. On the
00:20:24
envelope, Hansen had written, "Do not
00:20:27
open. Deliver immediately to Victor
00:20:29
Chashin." And that's exactly what
00:20:32
happened. That envelope went immediately
00:20:34
to Trashion. That information went
00:20:36
immediately
00:20:38
to the top of the KGB and Chashian knew
00:20:41
immediately that Hansen was the real
00:20:43
deal. So clearly he enjoyed the hunt and
00:20:47
he enjoyed the hunt within the hunt
00:20:49
because at the same time he was supposed
00:20:51
to be hunting out Soviet spies. He was
00:20:54
actually a Soviet spy. So he had a war
00:20:56
within a war going. And that was a
00:20:58
battle of wits that he probably enjoyed
00:21:00
immensely. and he probably enjoyed
00:21:02
knowing while he sat in meetings with
00:21:04
his colleagues at the FBI that he was
00:21:07
actually working for the other side at
00:21:09
the same time they were all together
00:21:11
looking for agents of the other side. So
00:21:14
right from the start Hansen spycraft was
00:21:17
brilliant. He didn't screw around. He
00:21:19
provided them with information that was
00:21:21
verifiable. He requested cash and he
00:21:24
made it clear in that very first letter
00:21:27
that he would never meet them face to
00:21:29
face. that he had to be anonymous. He
00:21:32
used an alias
00:21:34
typically in his correspondence. He
00:21:36
never used his name Robert Hansen. Most
00:21:38
of the time he referred to himself by
00:21:41
the name Raone Garcia.
00:21:44
[Music]
00:21:45
Hansen established so-called dead drops,
00:21:49
secret locations in Washington Parks
00:21:51
where he would drop off the secrets and
00:21:53
the Russians would pick them up and drop
00:21:56
off the cash. He would pack the secrets
00:21:58
in black garbage bags and leave white
00:22:01
tape on trees to let the Russians know
00:22:03
when the goods had been delivered. The
00:22:05
Russians would clear the site,
00:22:08
pick up the documents,
00:22:10
signal to Hansen that the money was
00:22:13
there waiting for him, and he would
00:22:16
return,
00:22:18
pick up the cash undetected. He could
00:22:20
say to his wife and kids,
00:22:23
"I'm going to the grocery store down the
00:22:25
street. I know we need milk. What else
00:22:28
do we need?
00:22:30
Nobody suspected anything. He made it
00:22:32
clear to the Russians that he wouldn't
00:22:35
journey far.
00:22:37
No one ever thinks to look in somebody's
00:22:40
backyard because no one spies five
00:22:44
minutes from their home. He lived right
00:22:46
here on White Cedar Road. He selected a
00:22:49
dead drop which he could see from his
00:22:51
back porch. Now people say that doesn't
00:22:54
make a lot of sense. Actually, it's
00:22:55
brilliant because Bob Hansen knows that
00:22:58
the only way the FBI would know that
00:23:00
this bridge could be used by the KGB,
00:23:03
the FBI would stake it out. And to stake
00:23:06
it out, where would they use? They would
00:23:07
look at everybody who lives in the
00:23:09
neighborhood and they would say, "Oh,
00:23:11
look, this particular house right across
00:23:13
the street can actually see the dead
00:23:16
drop." And that was Bob Hansen's house.
00:23:18
And he knows the FBI would come to him.
00:23:20
He set up his own trip wire. He knew
00:23:23
that the FBI got onto the case, they
00:23:26
would come and tell him about it and he
00:23:28
would be able to preempt it or go quiet
00:23:31
or not fill the dead drop. Now, can you
00:23:33
imagine what we in the United States
00:23:36
would do if we left cash under a bridge
00:23:39
for someone? We would hide behind a
00:23:41
tree. We would want to take his picture.
00:23:44
We would have someone tailing him. We
00:23:46
could never ever avoid our sense of
00:23:51
curiosity and place it aside. But the
00:23:54
Russians, they are different. The
00:23:57
Russians care more about the value of
00:23:59
the information than they did about the
00:24:01
identity of this Ramon Garcia. And so
00:24:04
they resisted the normal temptation to
00:24:08
try to figure out who he was because
00:24:10
they knew Anson had made very clear he
00:24:13
was going to be in charge. he was going
00:24:15
to be in control and if he ever saw them
00:24:19
not playing by his rules, the flow of
00:24:22
information would stop and the game
00:24:24
would be over. Hansen worked in in a way
00:24:27
that was traditional to Soviet espionage
00:24:30
methods uh and to CIA methodologies in
00:24:33
the Soviet Union. For more than 17
00:24:37
years, Hansen hid his spying from his
00:24:39
supervisors. During that period, both
00:24:42
the CIA and FBI knew that several
00:24:44
American traders were selling secrets.
00:24:47
Hansen was never suspected.
00:24:51
From Budapest to Moscow and around the
00:24:53
world capitals, teams of counter
00:24:56
intelligence agents looked for spies.
00:25:02
Word was circulating in the intelligence
00:25:04
community that a dangerous leak was
00:25:07
threatening America.
00:25:10
Well, they formed a Molehunt team.
00:25:12
Obviously, they they knew they had lost
00:25:14
the two agents that, as it turned out,
00:25:16
Hansen had betrayed who were working.
00:25:18
They were KGB agents in Washington,
00:25:20
working for the FBI. They called back to
00:25:22
Moscow and they were executed.
00:25:25
Hansen kept filling the black bags with
00:25:27
secrets.
00:25:29
He'd received nearly $600,000 in cash.
00:25:33
He then turned over what was referred to
00:25:35
as the family jewels, our most important
00:25:38
secrets. Robert Hansen provided
00:25:40
information which covered issues related
00:25:44
to the United States internal security.
00:25:47
I mean related to the survival of the
00:25:50
United States. Investigators who've
00:25:52
studied Hansen don't believe he gave
00:25:55
away America's most important secrets
00:25:57
for money alone. Hansen's life as a
00:26:01
suburban family man and good Catholic
00:26:04
pald in comparison to the life he
00:26:06
fantasized.
00:26:08
He was spying during the mid80s and 90s
00:26:11
when a fictional London secret agent by
00:26:14
the name of Bond. James Bond was
00:26:17
thrilling audiences around the world.
00:26:20
If you carry a double O number, it means
00:26:22
you're licensed to kill, not get killed.
00:26:26
He was always the guy off to the side,
00:26:28
but there was also this excitement, you
00:26:30
know, here he is doing something really
00:26:32
exciting, spying for the Russians. So,
00:26:35
there was this other element as well,
00:26:38
aside from the money and his father and
00:26:40
sense of being an outsider of of James
00:26:43
Bond. And he carried a machine gun in
00:26:46
his car trunk, for example. And one of
00:26:49
his friends knew him, called him as a
00:26:51
joke, machine gun Bob. Of course, if
00:26:54
machine gun Bob Hansen was really going
00:26:57
to play James Bond, then he needed to
00:26:59
add some key elements to his suburban
00:27:02
life.
00:27:04
He needed to travel to exotic locations.
00:27:07
And most of all, he needed to be in the
00:27:10
company of beautiful women. Well, I'll
00:27:12
tell you something, Colony. You're one
00:27:14
of the most beautiful girls I've ever
00:27:16
seen.
00:27:18
Next, Hansen and the Stripper. A real
00:27:21
life spies dangerous game with a fem
00:27:24
fatal
00:27:30
[Music]
00:27:34
in Washington. The strip clubs near FBI
00:27:38
headquarters are somewhat discreet.
00:27:41
Hansen would often spend afternoons and
00:27:44
nights in these spots while he told his
00:27:46
wife he was on special assignment.
00:27:49
Robert Hansen. He sees a woman dancing
00:27:52
on the stage and he is captivated by
00:27:54
her. He thinks she is a beautiful dancer
00:27:57
and he wants to get to know her. And so
00:27:59
he writes her a note, tells her that she
00:28:02
is the most beautiful dancer he's ever
00:28:04
seen. She's graceful.
00:28:07
And he sends it to the back so that
00:28:09
someone can give her the note and a few
00:28:11
dollars. And as he's walking out of
00:28:13
Joanna's 1819 club, this woman,
00:28:16
Priscilla Gaye,
00:28:18
once named Ohio stripper of the year,
00:28:21
catches up to Bob Hansen. She says to
00:28:23
him, "Thank you for that beautiful note
00:28:26
that you wrote me. It's the nicest thing
00:28:28
anyone has ever said to me."
00:28:31
And he says,
00:28:33
"I'll be back to see you here. You have
00:28:37
a grace and a beauty I've never
00:28:39
encountered before.
00:28:41
[Music]
00:28:43
He rolled through official Washington
00:28:45
like a big-time player, not an obscure
00:28:48
bureaucrat in the FBI. He moved around
00:28:51
Washington in an Italian raincoat,
00:28:54
flashing dark glasses, often in rented
00:28:56
limousines with his stripper friend
00:28:58
waiting inside the fancy car.
00:29:02
Hansen loved having someone to spend
00:29:04
time with like Priscilla Gaye.
00:29:07
They took trips, one to Manhattan and
00:29:10
eventually a wild fling in Hong Kong
00:29:13
where he showed her the sights and
00:29:15
bought her lavish presents.
00:29:19
He enjoyed going to Hong Kong with this
00:29:21
beautiful girl on his arm cuz she was
00:29:24
very pretty and um she had a great body
00:29:27
dancing in a strip club and they would
00:29:29
go to nightclubs in Hong Kong after his
00:29:31
work was over for the FBI and he would
00:29:34
always ask uh at the piano bar that the
00:29:38
that the pianist pay play uh as time
00:29:40
goes by. So, here's looking at you, kid.
00:29:43
You know, I mean, this was maybe a
00:29:46
little combination of uh of Shan Connory
00:29:48
and Humphrey Bogart and a little Walter
00:29:50
Mitti thrown in. There was a fantasy
00:29:52
life here as well as uh a real life.
00:29:56
Hansen started taking nude photos of his
00:29:59
wife Bonnie. He shared them with his
00:30:01
friend Jack Horshower, who was on duty
00:30:03
in the military.
00:30:05
Bonnie asked him, "Why? Why are you
00:30:07
doing this? What is this about?" "Oh,
00:30:10
you're so beautiful." He told her, "I
00:30:12
love you so much. This is just something
00:30:15
for us." Jack Hoser gets an envelope in
00:30:17
the mail from Bob Hansen, his childhood
00:30:19
buddy. He opens it up. He's shocked. He
00:30:22
finds naked photographs of Bonnie
00:30:24
inside. Jack says to Bob, "Bob, there
00:30:27
must be some mistake. I I have
00:30:29
photographs of your wife here in the
00:30:31
nude. What's going on? Must be a
00:30:33
mistake." Hansen says, "No, no, Jack.
00:30:36
You're a real man. You're serving our
00:30:38
country. You're making the ultimate
00:30:40
sacrifice by being in Vietnam. I want
00:30:42
you to share in the joy and the pleasure
00:30:45
of seeing just how beautiful Bonnie is.
00:30:48
Not only did he photograph Bonnie nude,
00:30:51
but he put a small video camera inside
00:30:53
their bedroom. Bob Hansen said to Jack,
00:30:56
"I have a special treat for you. I want
00:30:58
you to watch tonight." Hansen beamed
00:31:01
live sex scenes from his bedroom. He and
00:31:04
his wife via closed circuit video within
00:31:06
the house, sitting in the den of their
00:31:09
home, Jackho Shower, watched the nightly
00:31:12
sex scene. It didn't stop there. Hansen
00:31:15
and his pal Jack visited various
00:31:19
pornographic websites together,
00:31:22
including one that went by the name
00:31:23
myhotwife.com.
00:31:25
But Hansen did something even Jack
00:31:27
didn't know about. Robert Hansen
00:31:30
posted on the internet erotic stories
00:31:34
about himself and his wife Bonnie. Some
00:31:36
of them true, some of them imagined,
00:31:39
some of them fantasy, some of them
00:31:41
embellished.
00:31:43
Hansen's sexual fantasies went
00:31:45
undetected at the bureau. A massive spy
00:31:48
hunt was underway, but his colleagues
00:31:51
were not looking at him. He would sit in
00:31:53
a meeting with us and we would talk
00:31:55
about catching spies. And in his mind,
00:31:58
he has to know he's the most powerful
00:32:01
man in the room. Even though he's
00:32:02
sitting as a wall sitter, he would never
00:32:05
sit at the desk. He would never be a
00:32:07
leader. But in essence, he was the
00:32:08
ultimate leader. Clearly, he deceived
00:32:10
everyone around him. He deceived his
00:32:12
wife and his family. Worst of all, not
00:32:15
to speak of his colleagues, but you
00:32:18
know, he may have deceived himself. and
00:32:20
he's he may have been his own ultimate
00:32:22
victim because again when you're a true
00:32:25
believer what you're doing you believe
00:32:27
in absolutely no matter what it is and
00:32:30
you find reasons to justify it and you
00:32:32
have to do that to retain your sanity
00:32:36
but Hansen would ultimately make a
00:32:38
mistake a little mistake which would
00:32:40
lead the FBI mole hunters to him
00:32:46
coming up how the feds finally stopped
00:32:49
Hansen and
00:32:58
[Music]
00:33:02
spring 2000. At the Russian mission to
00:33:05
the United Nations, their security
00:33:07
cameras were keenly watching the FBI
00:33:09
agents in the neighborhood. from Eastern
00:33:12
European listening posts. Rumors were
00:33:14
spreading that a former Russian KGB
00:33:17
agent was in New York City looking to
00:33:19
sell a file about the mole code name
00:33:22
Ramon Garcia or in reality the Hansen
00:33:26
file that he said he could help the FBI
00:33:30
more than they realized because he not
00:33:33
only had some information of value, he
00:33:36
had the actual file on the mole. When
00:33:40
they heard that, I mean, their eyes just
00:33:43
popped out of their head. They had to
00:33:44
have that file no matter what it cost.
00:33:47
So, the negotiations began and the
00:33:50
Russian was in no hurry to reach any
00:33:52
kind of a deal. He asked for a lot of
00:33:55
money and the FBI named a lower figure.
00:33:58
Eventually, they settled on $7 million.
00:34:02
But there was one catch. The man did not
00:34:05
have the file with him.
00:34:07
It was still in Moscow, not at KGB
00:34:10
headquarters, but nonetheless in Moscow.
00:34:13
He couldn't go back into the secret KGB
00:34:17
headquarters near Moscow and get a file
00:34:20
out. He was retired past armed guards. I
00:34:23
mean, he's not Tom Cruz, right? He's not
00:34:25
going to be able to do a Mission
00:34:26
Impossible. So, they asked him, you
00:34:28
know, how could you possibly have access
00:34:30
to this file? And he said, I took it
00:34:32
with me. I took it with me and I hid it.
00:34:35
and I'm the only one who knows where it
00:34:37
is. News of the potential breakthrough
00:34:39
was passed on to the CIA. Hansen, still
00:34:43
operating at FBI headquarters, was
00:34:45
unaware he was in danger of being
00:34:47
discovered. The defective provided uh
00:34:50
the entire file, which included some of
00:34:52
the garbage bags that Hansen had wrapped
00:34:55
some of his secret information in and
00:34:57
put in the dead drop. It included all
00:34:59
the correspondence between Hansen and
00:35:01
the Russians over many years. It
00:35:03
included some uh CDs that Hansen, being
00:35:07
very technical,
00:35:08
um sort of a computer geek, had turned
00:35:11
over to the Russians. It included uh the
00:35:15
names that he had copied down before he
00:35:18
took the file of all the documents that
00:35:22
Hansen had turned over because the
00:35:25
Russian figured he didn't need to pull
00:35:26
out all the actual documents. The
00:35:28
Americans would have the documents.
00:35:30
These were copies and all he needed was
00:35:32
to identify them. The file also included
00:35:35
an audio tape, a recording of a phone
00:35:38
conversation between the mole and the
00:35:40
KGB. Inside an FBI office in Washington,
00:35:44
a small group of senior officials
00:35:46
gathered to listen. It was hauntingly
00:35:48
familiar. Well, of course it was. And at
00:35:51
first, they didn't know who it was. So
00:35:53
they went back to the file and they
00:35:55
started looking at it and they found a
00:35:57
couple of phrases in the correspondence
00:36:00
that Hansen had sent to the KGB and
00:36:02
there was a phrase in there quoting
00:36:04
General Patton which they realized they
00:36:08
had heard that phrase before and the
00:36:10
phrase was supposedly from Patton's
00:36:13
famous speech to the troops just before
00:36:15
D-Day in in World War II in which he
00:36:18
referred to let's get this thing over
00:36:20
with the Germans so we can go after the
00:36:22
purple pissing Japanese.
00:36:24
Well, that's not that's an unusual
00:36:26
phrase. So, they listened to the tape
00:36:28
again and they all said, "Of course,
00:36:31
it's Bob Hansen."
00:36:33
The FBI men were stunned. The mole was
00:36:37
one of their own, one they never
00:36:39
suspected.
00:36:41
Hansen had made the mistake of leaving a
00:36:43
fingerprint and a voice print for the
00:36:45
FBI to discover. Armed with this
00:36:48
evidence, they set a trap for Hansen.
00:36:51
Hansen at that time was stationed in the
00:36:52
State Department for the FBI. They
00:36:54
wanted him back at headquarters so they
00:36:56
could put a video camera on him in his
00:36:58
office in the ceiling, unknown to him,
00:37:01
and keep an eye on him. And they watched
00:37:05
him and for a couple of months and at
00:37:07
one point they saw him actually going by
00:37:11
a dead drop and checking out the signs
00:37:14
to signals to see, you know. So they
00:37:16
they realized that not only did they
00:37:18
have the right person, which they knew
00:37:20
by then, but that he was still active,
00:37:21
which they didn't know at that point.
00:37:26
Then a forensics team came up with
00:37:28
Hansen's fingerprints lifted from a
00:37:31
black bag, the trash bag he'd used for
00:37:33
the secrets he had turned over to the
00:37:35
Russians. No one knows why he didn't
00:37:38
wear gloves, nor why the Russians kept
00:37:40
the bag. But now the FBI had its case
00:37:44
and moved against their target. I just
00:37:47
doubled over. I remember distinctly
00:37:50
hearing Robert Philip Hansen can't be my
00:37:53
Bob because I didn't know his name was
00:37:55
Philip and it was denial. I mean it was
00:37:56
just like hearing your son had died. To
00:37:59
think that Bob Hansen had been arrested
00:38:02
for espionage. Coming up after the
00:38:05
arrest, sober thoughts about a man who
00:38:08
deceived his wife, his family, and his
00:38:11
nation.
00:38:14
[Music]
00:38:18
The news of Robert Hansen's arrest
00:38:20
stunned official Washington. People
00:38:23
tried to make sense of the betrayal. Bob
00:38:25
Hansen was powerless, or at least he
00:38:28
thought he was in the FBI. But by
00:38:30
becoming a spy, he was the most powerful
00:38:33
counter inelligence official in the US
00:38:35
government because he could totally
00:38:38
control his relationship with the KGB.
00:38:41
He could make things happen in the FBI.
00:38:44
He clearly was someone who was obsessed.
00:38:47
He was obsessed with religion. Uh he he
00:38:49
was obsessed with a particular style of
00:38:52
living which he assumed was only the was
00:38:55
the only one that was worth living.
00:38:58
Robert Hansen was able to somehow be a
00:39:02
spy and be an FBI agent at the same time
00:39:05
for 20 years. He was able to be a loyal
00:39:07
husband and betray his wife for 20
00:39:10
years. So when he was in church praying,
00:39:12
he was a devout Catholic and he meant
00:39:14
every word of it. When he told his wife
00:39:16
that he loved her, he meant every word
00:39:18
of it. When he was with the stripper
00:39:22
Priscilla Gaye,
00:39:24
he enjoyed every minute of it.
00:39:27
And when he was committing espionage,
00:39:31
he wanted to be James Bond. And he was
00:39:34
better than Bond.
00:39:36
When confronted, Hansen admitted his
00:39:39
guilt and offered no explanation
00:39:41
publicly for his actions. He agreed to
00:39:44
cooperate in return for his wife's
00:39:46
protection. I think she turns out to be
00:39:49
a doormat for him. I mean, this is a
00:39:51
woman who did not appreciate nor
00:39:53
understand his uh access. They didn't
00:39:57
understand his real profession, the kind
00:39:59
of counter intelligence officer he was.
00:40:01
I mean, this is a woman who found him
00:40:03
spying in 79. And they chose to go to
00:40:07
talk to the priest and he says, "I won't
00:40:09
do it anymore." It was always behind the
00:40:11
scenes the great family secret that he
00:40:14
had done this. Turns out he did it again
00:40:16
starting in 1985. I think Hansen got
00:40:19
away uh with it because of the FBI
00:40:21
culture of not wanting to believe, you
00:40:23
know what, where there's smoke, there's
00:40:24
fire. Let's look at this guy. You have
00:40:26
to look at what he gave away. It was
00:40:28
very serious. Uh he gave away
00:40:31
information about our our assessment of
00:40:35
Soviet nuclear strength and their
00:40:37
assessment of how powerful our weapons
00:40:39
were. I mean this during the Cold War,
00:40:42
we all lived in a in a time of of fear
00:40:45
that there could be a nuclear
00:40:47
Armageddon. And he was giving away
00:40:48
information about that of great value.
00:40:51
and he was betraying human beings whose
00:40:54
lives were lost because of him. People
00:40:56
were shot because of him. So, you can't
00:40:59
feel very sorry for this guy. Hansen's
00:41:02
guilty plea avoided a public trial and
00:41:04
release of sensitive documents. He was
00:41:07
sentenced to life without parole. At
00:41:10
headquarters, the FBI chief hailed his
00:41:13
men for finding Hansen, but nobody in
00:41:16
counter intelligence was celebrating. It
00:41:18
had taken too long to catch him. too
00:41:21
much damage had been done and there was
00:41:23
a continuing fear that Hansen most
00:41:25
certainly would not be the last traitor.
00:41:29
It would be rather naive to believe that
00:41:32
this is the end of this story. Espionage
00:41:35
will never cease.
00:41:38
Even
00:41:39
though Russia and the United States
00:41:41
today are on fairly good terms, Russia
00:41:44
has its national interests. South Korea
00:41:46
has its national interest. Israel has.
00:41:48
Every nation has and the intelligence
00:41:51
services they operate
00:41:54
uh to provide their governments, their
00:41:57
societies with information which is
00:41:59
vital to their national security and
00:42:01
their national interests. Robert Hansen
00:42:04
is not the last one. Absolutely not.
00:42:06
David Major, Hansen's old boss and one
00:42:09
of those who thought they knew him best
00:42:11
had a final thought about the man he
00:42:13
misjudged.
00:42:15
It's an image he believes most people in
00:42:17
official Washington think of when
00:42:19
Hansen's name is mentioned. Bob Hansen
00:42:22
has been taken out of the world. Bob
00:42:24
Hansen lives in his cell 23 hours a day
00:42:27
with no social contact whatsoever. He
00:42:30
has four black and white television
00:42:33
shows to watch. He goes to the bathroom,
00:42:35
he sleeps, and he eats in that same
00:42:38
room. And he's taken out one hour a day
00:42:40
and put in a room by himself to
00:42:42
exercise. He's literally been taken out
00:42:45
of the world and he will be there until
00:42:47
he dies.
00:42:48
[Music]
00:42:54
[Music]
00:43:05
[Music]
00:43:11
[Music]
00:43:16
Hey,
00:43:22
[Music]
00:43:34
heat. Hey. Heat.
00:43:37
[Music]
00:43:42
Heat.
00:43:44
[Music]
