Posted on 03/20/2009 9:27:35 AM PDT by nickcarraway
During the Cold War, the Stasi - East Germany's secret police - sent "Romeo" spies to the West.
They seduced secretaries working in Bonn and tricked them into handing over secrets.
More than 30 of the women were later prosecuted for spying.
Now a former senior Stasi officer has told BBC News the women should be pardoned.
One of those targeted by the Stasi more than 30 years ago is Gabriele Kliem, who still suffers the consequences.
"It's like an invisible amputation of the soul," she says.
"I am totally alone, I don't have any family, I don't have any friends."
Now in her 60s, she lives in a village in the Netherlands with her 11 dogs. But in 1977, she was a translator at the US embassy in Bonn, West Germany.
She met a man called Frank Dietzel, whom she describes as looking like Robert Redford. She fell in love instantly.
He told her he worked for an international peace group and after several months together he asked to see some documents from her work.
"He said that he didn't read it himself, but that he would pass it on to his institute to preserve worldwide peace," she said.
She never suspected him; she said she loved him too much to think he would do any thing bad.
'False flag' project
Ms Kliem's Stasi file, obtained after an application to the authorities in Berlin, shows that she was watched for two years before Frank approached her.
She handed over information for six years, including training plans for tanks and guns.
But the file also shows the Stasi was using her as part of a "false flag" project, meaning that she believed she was giving the information to a western agency.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
She betrayed her country during a time of existential struggle for some commie dong, but now it’s all OK? Why wasn’t she shot?
That this happens speaks of the tendency of management to treat secretarial,janitorial,security,and other support staff as though those persons were another office machine.
That secretary or other overlooked staffer is just as human as anyone else.
Why wasn’t she executed?
Pardoned? Why? It isn’t as if anyone in her position wasn’t told repeatedly that it was illegal to steal classified information. She got a suspended sentence. I’d say that she was a lot luckier than people who ended up betrayed and killed. It wasn’t a game.
"I am totally alone, I don't have any family, I don't have any friends."
Now in her 60s, she lives in a village in the Netherlands with her 11 dogs.
Had she been a translator for the Soviet embassy in Berlin and passed secrets to the West Germans, she would have been dead since 1977. Perhaps she would have preferred that to her "amputation of the soul."
Mr. niteowl77
Well he did look like Robert Redford. Equivalent for a woman as torture for a man.
Maybe it was Robert Redford.
The Soviet Union had The Sparrow School. They would read the Classified Ads in Gay newspapers looking for congressmen stupid enough to put ads in them looking for love. Isn’t that right Barney?
LOL. Could be, he certainly is a leftist.
People steal classified data and pass it onto a froeign agent. They are caught and instead of being thrown in jail or executed, are given suspended sentences. And they are COMPLAINING about their treatment?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.