In the course of their assignments abroad, CIA officers cultivate contacts that serve not just intelligence objectives but also private gain – a practice that can extend into retirement. Former agents turn into consultants for foreign governments and intelligence agencies, sometimes going as far as peddling secrets from the very heart of the CIA at Langley.
A federal court in Virginia, home to CIA headquarters, has adjudicated the case of former senior officer Dale Brett Bendler, accused of unlawfully removing and passing classified materials to foreign nationals. Bendler pleaded guilty, admitting, among other charges, to accepting hundreds of thousands of dollars in exchange for CIA secrets.
During his more than three-decade CIA tenure, Bendler operated under diplomatic cover in numerous countries: as second secretary in the political section of the U.S. embassies in Madrid (1989-91) and Lima (1991-93); first secretary at the U.S. embassies in Luanda (political section, 1993-95) and Paris (economic section, 1998-2000); and finally as political counselor at the U.S. embassy in Brussels (2005-2008).
By the time of his postings in Paris and Brussels, Bendler was leading CIA stations. His espionage career, however, started on the ground in the late 1980s, with involvement in arms control inspections monitoring compliance with U.S.-USSR weapons reduction agreements on Ukrainian territory.
Dale Bendler ended his official career as a intelligence officer in 2014 but stayed on at Langley as a hired contractor. Simultaneously, he embarked on covert lobbying for foreign clients he knew from his active field days. He would mine the CIA’s electronic databases, revealing to his clients sought-after information, including American-documented evidence of corruption within foreign governments and the ties of certain foreigners to terrorism financing.