CIA & KGB Gadgets On Display 136
ricst writes "Been postponing that visit to the Reagan Presidential library? Well, delay no more, because they are hosting an exhibit of some formerly secret CIA and KGB gadgets. reports, "For the first time, the public is getting a large scale view of the CIA's and KGB's real-life James Bond gadgets, from a replica of the Russians' deadly poison-dart umbrella to some of the Amercians' most ingeniously concealed cameras." The last 200 years of history of technology is reflected in these spy devices that go back to the Revolutionary War."
MGB Gadgets? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:MGB Gadgets? (Score:1)
You mean, like this? [mgbexperience.com]
Lucas: Prince of Darkness! (Score:2)
Re:MGB Gadgets? (Score:1)
This begs for someone to make a joke connecting this and the oft-repeated analogy about proprietary software being like a car with the hood welded shut, but it's too early on a Monday morning for me to do it justice. Any takers?
Re:MGB Gadgets? (Score:1)
CIA has thier own museum. (Score:5, Interesting)
http://www.cia.gov/cia/information/artifacts/ [cia.gov]
Re:CIA has thier own museum. (Score:4, Informative)
http://www.nsa.gov/museum/index.html [nsa.gov]
Re:CIA has thier own museum. (Score:1)
When I went last spring, the enigma machine had a couple burnt out lights. I didn't get to see how my name would have been encrypted. :-(
Re:CIA has thier own museum. (Score:1)
That was my experience, too. It was about last spring when I went, too. I thought that maybe I should have volunteered to rewire the thing with some white LEDs. After all, I did have a security clearance
Re:CIA has thier own museum. (Score:1, Funny)
Museum... What museum?!? (Score:1)
CIA modified full text !!! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:CIA modified full text !!! (Score:1)
Given our recent (publicized) track record?
Microdot (Score:3, Funny)
Wow, and here I was thinking that Hoffman didn't invent LSD until 1943.
Re:Microdot (OT) (Score:1)
After he started on his way home by bicycle the stuff started to kick in. Must have been one helluva bike ride through Basel.
The Albert Hofmann Foundation [hofmann.org] has more interesting stuff about the inventor of LSD (who to the best of my knowledge is still very much alive).
Re:Microdot (OT) (Score:1)
Re:Microdot (OT) (Score:2, Informative)
hofmann [matrixmasters.com]
Re:Microdot (OT) (Score:1)
Dr. Albert Hofmann, Abbie Hoffman, and bears oh my!
Re:Microdot (OT) (Score:1)
Ah, so that explains why Internet Cable Companies are 'Tripping'...must be part of DOCIS/DOSIS compliance...
.
The question is GIMME NOW! (Score:1)
Everyone knows that things like the internet, GPS and even caller ID would not have been developed without a certain amount of pushing of the technology spectre by those organizations in their race to outdo each other.
NSA museum (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:NSA museum (Score:1)
/August.
WHERES THE CAT ??? (Score:2)
Oh, I forgot, after all those millions, frankenkitty got squashed....
This ought to be called the obsurdity display, How mush of these toys actually produced results ?
What about all the mind control devices the CIA and KGB played with in the 50's and 60's ?
WHAT ?? Theyre still using them?!?
......I forgot what I was going to say.....
Re:WHERES THE CAT ??? (Score:1)
"The tail was used as an antenna. They made a monstrosity. They tested him and tested him. They found he would walk off the job when he got hungry, so they put another wire in to override that."
(Death by taxi came afterward)
Re:WHERES THE CAT ??? (Score:1)
Funny KGB Joke (Score:5, Funny)
Place and time: somewhere in the Soviet Union in 1930s.
The phone rings at KGB headquarters.
"Hello?"
"Hello, is this KGB?"
"Yes. What do you want?"
"I'm calling to report my neighbor Yankel Rabinovitz as an enemy of the
State. He is hiding undeclared diamonds in his firewood."
"This will be noted."
Next day, the KGB goons come over to Rabinovitz's house. They search the shed where the firewood is kept, break every piece of wood, find no diamonds, swear at Yankel Rabinovitz and leave.
The phone rings at Rabinovitz's house.
"Hello, Yankel! Did the KGB come?"
"Yes."
"Did they chop your firewood?"
"Yes, they did."
"Okay, now its your turn to call. I need my vegetable patch plowed."
Re:Funny KGB Joke (Score:2, Funny)
Sub Captain: Hello, you! We require jumbo savings!
Salesman well come right this way...
a bunch of stuff shown, the Russian crew is back on the sub
Sub Captain: Plotchnik, where Plotchnik?
cut back to the store where a russian sailor is attempting to kiss the hand of a woman
Plotchnik: Fifty watts per channel, babycakes.
Woman yanks her hand away and leaves
Re:Funny KGB Joke (Score:1)
Shoot, had Alan Arkin in it but I can't remember any other details.
Eee-mehr-gen-see... everrryone to get frrrrom strrreet!
Re:Funny KGB Joke (Score:1)
IMDB is your friend.
Re:Funny KGB Joke (Score:1)
Re:Funny KGB Joke (Score:1)
CIA One Liner (Score:1)
Another Secret Services Joke (Score:4, Funny)
"Oh they're all taxi drivers now," he said, "it was the obvious solution."
"Why is that?" I asked.
"Simple," he said, "you just give them your name--and they know where you live."
Death of a Businessman (Score:2, Funny)
Korzhakov, that Berezovsky had asked him to have rival business baron Vladimir Gusinsky eliminated in 1994.--Reuters, Nov. 19
(Boris Berezovsky is pacing back and forth in front of Boris Yeltsin's desk in the Kremlin. Yeltsin is busy writing)
Berezovsky: Boris Nikolayevich, you must do something!
Yeltsin: (without looking up) I am doing something, Boris, I'm working with documents.
Berezovsky: (looking at paper in front of Yeltsin) You're doing a crossword puzzle!
Yeltsin: I am TRYING to do a crossword puzzle. I'd be making much more progress if you weren't distracting me with your whining and complaining about people trying to kill you.
Berezovsky: (outraged) People? People trying to kill me Boris Nikolayevich? It's the KGB trying to kill me! The KGB!
Yeltsin: How can the KGB be trying to kill you when there is no KGB? There's the FSB...the "toothless shadow of a former Russian intelligence organization." Five across.
Berezovsky: Toothless? It may be toothless but it's still armed Boris Nikolayevich - and the FSB is trying to kill me!
Yeltsin: That's about the best guarantee of long life you could have.
Berezovsky: That's easy for you to say, Boris Nikolayevich, but for me it is a source of constant worry!
Yeltsin: (still concentrating on puzzle) Boris, if you found out that the mafia was trying to kill you, then I would say go ahead and worry, but the FSB? Who goes to the FSB when they want someone killed? Do you go to the FSB when you want someone killed?
Berezovsky: No, but
Yeltsin: Oh, I was speaking purely hypothetically, of course. So what would you do if you wanted someone killed?
Berezovsky: (with an air of giving the question serious consideration) Well, let's see. I guess I'd send them somewhere dangerous. Like Chechnya. Or Miami.
Yeltsin: Assuming you can't send them anywhere. Assuming you have to do the job here in Moscow. What would you do then?
Berezovsky: Well, I might - and this is purely hypothetical of course - I might stand behind him in a crowd in Red Square and yell "So YOU'RE the one who got us into this financial mess!"
Yeltsin: Hmm, clever, but not altogether reliable.
Berezovsky: (warming to his theme) Or I could replace his briefcase with one of those nuclear suitcase bombs Lebed is always on about.
Yeltsin: In which case, you'd wipe out most of the region. A bit excessive, I'd say.
Berezovsky: Yes, I suppose - okay, how about this? I send him to the next Communist Party convention in a "Lenin Sucks" t-shirt.
Yeltsin: Yes, that would probably do it. But you notice, you haven't once said, "I'd go to the FSB and ask them to knock him off," have you?
Berezovsky: No.
Yeltsin: So are you ready to admit that you've overreacted to the idea that the FSB is trying to kill you?
Berezovsky: Well...maybe...
Yeltsin: Good, then all's well. Give my regards to your family.
Berezovsky: (leaving) I will. Good-bye Boris Nikolayevich.
Yeltsin: (returning to puzzle) Four down - "one who is easily duped, a sucker." B-E-R-E-Z-O-V-S-K-Y...
Cia Knock Knock Joke (Score:1)
"Knock, knock who?"
"CIA."
"CIA who?"
"We ask the questions."
Re:Funny KGB Joke (Score:1)
Re:Funny KGB Joke (Score:2)
Who's there?
Ghestapo.
Ghestapo who?
VEE ASK DE QUESTIONS HERE
What did the german clock maker say to the broken clock?
Vee have vays of making you tock
Thank you.
Re:Funny KGB Joke (Score:1)
Re:Funny KGB Joke (Score:1)
CIA article (Score:2, Informative)
CIA article [chttp] with some pictures of older and/or pre-CIA stuff.
Re:CIA article (Score:1)
Re:CIA article (Score:2, Interesting)
Perhaps the deadliest gadget of all: (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Perhaps the deadliest gadget of all: (Score:1)
Re:Perhaps the deadliest gadget of all: (Score:2, Funny)
"Liberator" pistols... (Score:3, Informative)
From the early days of the CIA's predecessor, the Office of Strategic Services, there are tire spikes, bombs and "liberator pistols." The latter were mass produced for $1.72 each and dropped to resistance fighters during World War II.
Somehow, I don't think I'd want to brag about poorly designed, cheap guns that were dropped in large quantities to anyone claiming to be a "resistance fighter," which many times turned out to be a German intelligence operative. Or maybe they were hoping that the Germans would try to use them...
But one device CIA officials say they never had was a version of the KGB's deadly umbrella that was used by an unknown assailant to kill Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov in London in 1978. A model of the umbrella is part of the display.
Death lasers, early death from too much sleep, Unix configurations, deadly umbrellas... I realize that Valentines day was just a few days ago, and a certain someone is entering into a particularly serious contract, but there's really only so much death you need on the front page...
Re:"Liberator" pistols... (Score:4, Informative)
The germans already had (way better) guns. This was someting like a single-shot, non-reloadable pretty concealable .45. The idea was for the wannabe resistance fighter to kill a german soldier with it and take his gun. From what I understand the plan worked fairly well.
Re:"Liberator" pistols... (Score:1)
Re:"Liberator" pistols... (Score:1)
Facts about the Liberator:
.45 caliber round
single-shot, breech loading pistol
hollow handle stored extra ammunition
front sight only - designed strictly for close range, gun to head combat
One more thing: Who would care how cheaply the gun was made, or how much capacity it had, or how effective it was at close range if the thing was pointed at your head and your military career was about to end?
All in all, it was a successful program.
Goverment Intelligence = oxymoron (Score:3, Insightful)
And These are people who were suspicious of the Russians to begin with? jeeze.....
The obvious irony... (Score:5, Funny)
A large wooden gift from your rivals?
And you accept it at face value and bring it into your fortress?
And it just happens to have a secret compartment with an electronic spy hidden in it?
Hello?
Weren't diplomats supposed to have gone to Ivy Schools where they teach all that literature in dead languages?
Re:The obvious irony... (Score:2, Interesting)
e.g. IIRC the embassy in the USSR (having been built by soviets, using soviet materials) was bugged *so* badly, deeply, and ingeniously that the US was forced to build several extra floors (using US labor and materials) on top of the original.
Re:The obvious irony... (Score:2, Interesting)
That second time, it was a large metal seal. Of course, this time it was dutyfully searched for electronic listening devices, but none were found. The design was much more ingenious this time: the seal itself was the listening device. It would act as a giant microphone's membrane and vibrate along the sound waves. In order to listen in, the Russians would send an RF beam in its general direction, and the seal's vibrations would modulate the signal and reflect it back (remember: it was made of metal), carrying all conversations that happened near the seal.
Re:The obvious irony... (Score:2)
Yeah, unfortunately, a) the Russians unhelpfully refuse to speak Ancient Greek, and b) the Ivy League has become home to lazy, blow-dried hair idiots, the ultimate in PHBs whose only merit is being litter from the loins of previous graduates. I mean, Gore got worse grades than Bush for cryin' out loud, yet they both graduated.
The days of Wild Bill Donovan are long behind us.
Bah. (waving paw)
Re:The obvious irony... (Score:2, Offtopic)
Another person who swallowed YAMM(Yet Another Media Mischaracterization).
Ask yourself, if Gore got worse grades than Bush, than how did Gore graduate cum laude and Bush did not?
Re:The obvious irony... (Score:2)
Re:The obvious irony... (Score:1)
Hey, fuck you, buddy. Some of us (I would even say most) got here on our own merit, and are working damn hard to stay here. Maybe the business schools graduate PHB's, but you weren't talking about Wharton, were you?
I don't appreciate getting a bunch of uninformed crap just because of where I chose to go to school.
Respectfully yours,
Zach Keane '03, Dartmouth College
Re:Goverment Intelligence = oxymoron (Score:1)
CUT TO ARTHUR and COMPANY watching from the bushes. The main gate of the castle opens a little and the CHIEF TAUNTER's head sticks out, then another Froggie head, then another. They mutter to each other in French, look rather pleased, then rush out and start to pull the giant rabbit in.
CUT BACK TO ARTHUR and COMPANY behind some bushes watching.
ARTHUR
Now what happens?
BEDEVERE
Well now, Launcelot, Galahad, and I wait until nightfall and then leap out of the rabbit and take the French by surprise, not only by surprise but totally unarmed!
ARTHUR
Who... Who breaks out?
BEDEVERE
Er... We... Launcelot, Galahad, and I... Er... leap out of the rabbit and...
LAUNCELOT covers his eyes.
BEDEVERE
Look, if we were to build a large wooden badger...
Theremin and the 'Great Seal Bug' (Score:2, Informative)
The bug that was found in that seal was invented by none other than Leon Theremin, inventor of the instrument of the same name.
There's an excellent biography available about Theremin by Albert Glinsky called "Theremin: Ether Music and Espionage" - there's a review here. [popmatters.com] (No affiliate link here, just a review.)
Theremin was quite an inventor - Glinksy's book is a good read, managing to be interesting and informative in equal measures.
Go here [137.com] for more about Theremins, or here [bigbriar.com] to buy one.
micro dot? (Score:3, Interesting)
On a side note, where's the sharks with frickin' laser beams? They had Dr. Evil's ring, but not the sea bass? What gives?
Re:micro dot? (Score:1)
Re:micro dot? (Score:1)
/max
Any X10's? (Score:2, Funny)
Cheers,
Ian
Re:Any X10's? (Score:1)
Pop Culture imports (Score:2)
Re:Pop Culture imports (Score:1)
No poison umbrella (Score:3, Insightful)
Each employee probably knows his job section, the admin staff in his job section and nothing more. The canteens are seperated, the sections are seperated, even within sections the compartmentalization is such that one man can not have more knowledge than they need to complete their task.
So my point is that their may well be no poison umbrella, but anonymous officials tend to spout the current political masters party line and know as little (or as much) about various departments as is dictated by overall security protocol. Which is good because it protects both the individual (can't cough up in interrogation or sell what he doesn't know) and therefore organization as a whole.
Re:No poison umbrella (Score:1)
Like all good terrorist organisations.
Re:No poison umbrella (Score:1)
Re:No poison umbrella (Score:2)
Depens on where you are standing. If inside US, and dont really care about your rights, then i can see why this statement would be true. Anywhere else, or you do care, then they are defn not the good guys.
Re:No poison umbrella (Score:1)
I think you're starting to step into Cold War novels or Hollywood when you say that people only know "their part of the job" and not the whole. I think the CIA trusts their employees enough. I think one would work better with a fuller understanding of the task. Certainly the CIA did use this technique during sensitive Cold War operations, and definately the KGB as well, but I question whether it is commonly used today.
Re:No poison umbrella (Score:1)
Also I question a fuller understanding of the task, when I say minimum I mean the ammount needed to achieve a task with efficiency and due dilligence.
Maybe I'm coloured by the fact I'm a UK citizen, the degree of secrecy over here is pretty extreme and you're right things have gotten looser since the break up of the Soviet Union. However I think current events will rapidly send us in the opposite direction, but differently.
Re:No poison umbrella (Score:1)
You're right in your statment about knowledge of the device. I think I just took it farther than you intended.
Bomb Photo Caption (Score:2, Informative)
Anyone?
Re:Bomb Photo Caption (Score:1)
Re:Bomb Photo Caption (Score:2)
"Never blame on maliciousness that which can be explained away by stupidity." And trust me, there's more than enough stupidity in this world to go around.
Spy museum project (Score:1)
no umbrella of our own, huh ... (Score:2, Interesting)
AC
*yawn* (Score:1)
Re:*yawn* (Score:1)
Re:*yawn* (Score:1)
Re:*yawn* (Score:1)
It stands to reason that we have *more* than one 'binder' otherwise you're suggesting that our president is just doing without it for the sake of the exhibit....?
The more reasonable explaination is that the White House has numerous such 'binders' and is loaning out *one* of them for the duration of the exhibit.
Oh what a tangled web we weave... (Score:1)
Why the Ficticious Gadgets? (Score:1)
Re:Why the Ficticious Gadgets? (Score:2)
Evidently it is on loan from the White House because this President has no need for intelligence :D
which museum.. (Score:1)
KGB Gadgets? (Score:1)
I Would Visit This Exhibit... (Score:1)
...as long as John Cleese is nowhere within a 100 mile radius. Painful.
Why We Exist, an essay by the CIA (Score:1)
"The answer is quite simple, we exist to buy cool toys. Yes, like our brothers in the Defense Department, we invest billions of dollars each year, in really super cool gadgets like this remote control airplane. Except we call it a drone, because drone sounds much cooler than remote control airplane."
Josh
Re:Suitcase nuclear bomb (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Suitcase nuclear bomb (Score:1)
Yes, the suitcase nuke is one of the greatest developments of the Cold War. What's frightening about it though, is that the KGB was able to develop them, without the assistance of the Russian military. The KGB had a shocking amount of power and capabilities.
Re:Misspelled (Score:1)
Only slashdot readers would find this funny. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yeah, "haha" Reagan has alzheimers and can't even remember his wife or close friends. "Haha" they have to care for him everyday hoping for only the slightest bit of recognition while enduring the pain that he will never again know who they are.
Yep, this is something we should really poke fun at, since it's such a hilarious situation for everyone.
Re:Only slashdot readers would find this funny. (Score:1)
Re:Only slashdot readers would find this funny. (Score:1)
Re:Only slashdot readers would find this funny. (Score:1)
Re:Only slashdot readers would find this funny. (Score:1)
Select compassion in action.
Re:Slashdot Readers? (Score:1)
Re:low (Score:1, Troll)
Re:low (Score:1)