i say always keep them running. all the time running, run. run. run, yasmine, run like the wind. the fbi arrested ten people for allegedly spying for russia for up to a decade. >> most of them spent decades blending in with american society. >> a long term fbi investigation. >> ten suspected sleeper spies. >> they just seemed like a nice quiet family. >> their whole goal was to disappear. literally disappear into a community and not be recognized for who they are. this is a different world. this is the world of those who are involved in trying to be able to hurt our country.

every american who watches this is going to ask the question, who can i trust? >> as a former fbi agent and chairman of the house intelligence committee, i had oversight of all 16 of our nation's intelligence agencies. my name is mike rogers. i had access to classified information gathered by our operatives, people who risked everything for the united states and our families. you don't know their faces or their names. you don't know the real stories from the people who lived the fear and the pressure until now. >> 1960. that's the year our technical experts thought russia would finally be able to develop a bomb. 1949 is when they had their bomb. credit russian espionage agents.

aided by national traitors. >> spying is something that's been with us throughout history. it's been particularly true with the russians, going back to the soviet union and the cold war. they had their spies, we had our spies. and the reality is that russia remains an adversary of the united states. they aren't the superpower confrontation that the soviet union was all about. but they represent the direct opposite in terms of our values. they're engaged in aggression around the world. >> russian air strikes are intensifying in what the rebels call a scorched earth policy. >> look at the strength of russia. look at this innocent people being killed. >> and with putin, we're involved in a new chapter of the cold war. >> cnn has just learned that there is renewed confidence that

russia is in fact behind the cyber break-ins. >> the role of intelligence needs to evolve. it's no longer, where are the plans for the invasion of the tanks through europe. it's, how does one country get a leg up on another. >> the active measures taken by the government of vladimir putin to influence and to potentially manipulate american public opinion for the purpose of discrediting individual public figures, sewing chaos and division in our to ticks, sewing legitimacy about the outcomes of our elections. >> for a country that wants to be a superpower again, intelligence can be the most important kind of power. >> so that's why it is important for the united states to be aware of what they're up to, so that we can anticipate their actions and take steps to protect our country. there are various ways the russians develop effective spies.

they deploy people to this country under a diplomatic passport. a russian diplomat or diplomats, for that matter, come into our country and are located at the various embassies. some of them are spies. >> aren't all diplomats spies? >> no. the diplomatic service of any country, including the diplomatic service of the united states, serves an important function. it's for countries to be able to communicate and interact with each other. however, some of them are spying. >> but even russians who were located at the various embassies that are involved in spying, it's pretty obvious that they're already suspect. the united states is fully aware of who they are. so if i want to penetrate another country, the best cover for a spy is the ability to blend in and just be another

citizen. >> an illegal. the agents who quietly blend into the societies of other nations and lead seemingly normal lives while secretly carrying out orders passed to them from moscow. >> the term "illegal" is an intelligence term of art that refers to somebody who is here not under -- with any kind of diplomatic status, that is here not in true name. >> they are career intelligence professionals. they are given advanced training in tradecraft, clandestine activities. then they ultimately spend years serving abroad in order to become someone they're not. >> these are teachers, travel agents. they're in real estate. they're going to rotary clubs. your first reaction is, this is just an ordinary joe. >> they can live unnoticed in the shadows, with a specific purpose. they spot and assess people with access to information. they start a relationship with them.

they learn what kind of person they are, what their interests are, what their vulnerabilities are. >> all to gain access to classified information, political, academic, financial, from friends, employers, co-workers. >> they can ultimately provide some very important intelligence to the russians. >> and if you want to know what an illegal agent looks like, step out of your house and look at your neighbors to your right and look at your neighbors to your left. and that's what they look like. that's what makes illegals such a dangerous intelligence tool. >> in the early 2000s, the fbi became aware of a group of illegals who had formed deep cover lives in american society. >> this illegals network included four couples operating throughout the united states. >> that was significant because

to find one would be a career maker. to find multiple illegals? stunning. >> how did you learn about them? >> unfortunately, that remains classified. but i can tell you that any foreign government that spends resources to insert an entire network of trained intelligence officers here, that's a threat that we take seriously. at any time, the illegals could meet that person with access to information and a vulnerability that could allow the russians the opportunity that they were looking for. some of them were in place in the financial industry. and some of them were at colleges and universities across the united states. >> that gives them access. this gives a rare glimpse into the world of counter intelligence. we conduct investigations like this every day. >> but rarely does it get publicity because of the secret enclave that we work in.

>> this is the first time where we've been able to tell our story, tell the story of this investigation. titanium and carbon fiber.y features steel, raw elements made exhilarating by lexus. ♪ experience uncompromising performance at the lexus golden opportunity sales event before it ends. choose from the is turbo es 350 or nx turbo for $299 a month for 36 months if you lease now. experience amazing at your lexus dealer.

[music playing] across the country, we walk. carrying flowers that signify why we want to end alzheimer's disease. but what if, one day, there was a white flower for alzheimer's first survivor? what if there were millions of them? join us for the alzheimer's association walk to end alzheimer's. register today at alz.org/walk.

ccourtship now. even though courtship has become less strict, we remain strict as ever when it comes to our standards. made with premium cuts of 100% kosher beef. hebrew national. we remain strict.

my abwill i have pain andating made daibloating today?ing game. my doctor recommended ibgard to manage my ibs. take control. ask your doctor about nonprescription ibgard. >> in the early towels, the fbi became aware of russian intelligence officers who are formed deep cover lives in american society, known as illegals. these agents were deployed in order to become american, to gain trust of people, in order to spy for their country and against the united states. >> the illegal is in place looking for an opportunity.

it's the long game. you never know when they'll be in the right place at the right time. it was our goal to identify them, monitor and ultimately neutralize their operations. >> we had many field offices working these cases. they included seattle, chicago, washington, new york, boston. i was assigned to the new york office in 2005. our squad was responsible for the new york area. couples. the one thing to understand is that if one of these cases went down, it had the potential to affect all the rest of them. >> so it was imperative that we kept all the field offices connected to each other. todd and myself, our job was to set kind of a national level strategy so that each field office understood the trends, what was happening with one couple was pertinent to another couple. >> in 2003, i became an agent, graduated from the academy, and was assigned to the boston field office. we had a front row seat to the

svr's most highly valued and most vet program. >> we had identified richard and cynthia murphy were living in new jersey. doesn't heed field living in massachusetts, juan lazaro and vickie pelaez. in each and every case, the fbi used all of the tools in its toolbox to learn as much as they can about their residents, their habits. physical surveillance including clandestine searches was conducted. >> we started covert entries into the residents. the goal was to find any evidence of tradecraft and figure out exactly how they were communicating with moscow center. >> but that is a very high risk operation, and that's the point at which the most things can go wrong for us. >> we had to be very careful not to upset traps when we went into places. foreign intelligence officers will do certain things like

vacuuming a rug as they back out of the door so they can see if anybody came in or not. >> so it was a major, major point in the investigation when we would do that, because so much was at stake for us. >> we saw a lot of things with these couples. during the searches, we found invisible ink.sthings with these couples. during the searches, we found invisible inithings with these couples. during the searches, we found invisible inmthings with these couples. during the searches, we found invisible inthese couples. during the searches, we found invisible ink. they had specially treated paper and shortwave radios. >> these were materials they were the using to communicate back with the svr, the headquarters of which was referred to as "center." >> what kind of information were they sending? >> the invisible writing and the short wave broadcasts were essentially unbreakable. we couldn't see into their communication system. at certain times we did have a microphone in the house. >> so we were always monitoring what they might be doing in their routine lives, how they talked to their children, how they talked to each other. >> many of their children were not aware of the fact that their

parents were spies. >> they really had assumed these notional identities, and that's who they were day in and day out. >> in fact, the murphys at home, you never heard them use russian. so they kept to their legend even when they thought they were by themselves. >> what is a legend? >> backstory. it's their persona, their identity, and everything that goes along with it, all of which is fake. >> legend building takes place over the course of years. >> russia has whole offices devoted to doing this. some of the identities are completely fictitious, like the murphys. in the case of the boston couple, heathfield, they are we call a dead double. someone identified a deceased canadian infant, and they sealed that identity and built an identity around it using original documents that they request from canadian authorities who don't know who they're sending them to.

once you have the birth certificates, then you can get a driver's license. you can start getting passports an, credit history, college degrees and after living in canada for several year, they came to the u.s. as canadian citizens on their canadian passports. got a student visa and then a business visa. they establishes a foot hold in the u.s. to get citizenship in the united states and they're ready to rock 'n' roll at that point. >> part of the legend building process is obtaining a mate. >> before they are ever deployed, russia sets them up as couples. so it would be like me going to quantico and being partnered up with another fbi agent to become married and go live in another country under assumed names. >> it requires serious commitment. >> do they love each other? >> i think so. >> they're humans just like us. and they are subject to the same trials and tribulations that life brings on. >> in the murphys' case, they had their arguments. we would listen to them interact.

she would be busy at work and she would call home and ask him, can you pick up the children from the play date? and he would mutter something about being busy, you know, i'm vacuuming or something, and then, you know, we would hear, he's watching "the sopranos." so to everybody watching them, and even to us who monitored them every day for years, they did seem very, very normal. >> no government makes that type of investment unless they see a real benefit for their intelligence arsenal that they want to maintain. in the course of the investigation, we saw several transfers of cash, lots of cash, to keep them operating. >> in 2004, it came to the fbi's attention that an illegal traveler operating under an assumed name, christopher metzos, was in the united states. >> we believe christopher metzos operated from the russian federation and was dispatched

for several months at a time to the u.s. in order to supply money and tradecraft materials to the illegals operating in the united states. >> how did the fbi become aware of christopher metzos? >> that remains classified. >> mr. metzos was being tasked to meet with a russian diplomat. >> the fbi was waiting for him. may 16th, 2004, on the stairs of the forest hill station on long island railroad, an metsos moving up the stairs conducts what's called a brush pass with a russian diplomats. identical bags are exchanged. and now the money has, in essence, gone black. it's moved from official russian diplomatic channels into the intelligence world. later that same day, christopher metzos, now in position of what we believe to be a quarter million dollars, meets richard murphy, passes him almost half the cash to sustain his

operations. and then gps shows that metzos' car traveled approximately 80 miles north of new york city to a small rest stop in new york. metsos buries the final portion of the money at the base of a hole underneath an inverted brown bottle. agents in new york set up cameras to monitor that drop. that camera became a whole new case, separate code name. we didn't know how long it would be there. >> but we had to be ready to document that whenever it happened. >> the whole role of intelligence agencies is to be ahead of the game and not to be surprised. if you are surprised, then the chances are that you failed to do your job.

with the travelocity customer first guarantee... your only worry... will be navigating the local traffic.

get help with hotels, free twenty-four-hour flight changes, and our price match guarantee. travelocity.® wander wisely.™ peobut they're different.ind it's nice to remove artificial ingredients. kind never had to. we choose real ingredients like almonds, peanuts and a drizzle of dark chocolate. give kind a try. ♪

who knew that phones would starentertaining us,ng? getting us back on track

and finding us dates. phones really have changed. so why hasn't the way we pay for them? introducing xfinity mobile. you only pay for data and can easily switch between pay per gig and unlimited. no one else lets you do that. see how much you can save when you choose by the gig or unlimited. call or go to xfinitymobile.com. xfinity mobile. it's a new kind of network, designed to save you money. in may of 2004, christopher metsos buried a large amount of cash at a rest stop in new york, specifically to support the u.s.-based illegals. >> these were deep cover agents who were here to spy on the u.s. and to benefit russia. >> we had installed a camera pointing straight down at that site so the that if anybody came to disturb it it, we would have

video of it. >> it's a long game. signif fant events occurred only a couple of times a year. >> we couldn't allow ourselves to become complacent. we knew what they were going to do yesterday but not tomorrow or next week. >> one of the big events occurred in june of 2006 when michael zottoli transferred from washington state to new york and unearthed the drop that christopher metsos had filled two years before. zottoli now has a sith amount of cash to fund his living expenses in the united states and continue his intelligence work. >> after that, we spent a lot of time watching. >> the question we get frequently is what are we waiting for? we weren't waiting for anything in particular. we just couldn't break the covert communication that the illegals were using to communicate with their handlers in moscow. >> one of the challenges in is trying to stay current with whatever technology that they're using at the time to talk to

center. >> the murphys had a box that we used to call tradecraft box, essentially a shoe box with all of their gear in it. and that made it very convenient for us. we would go there on the entries and find their notes and find their disks within this trade craft box. >> we copied anything that we thought would be of intelligence value. photographs were made of documents, files. any type of computer or electronic equipment was copied so that it could be reviewed in greater detail later. >> the murphys had been in the united states since the '90s. it was so long that the spycraft evolved from very early forms of covert communications all the way up to stenography. >> it was a system that we saw developed in the mid towels and it uses special encryption software to digitally encrypt text that's converted into a color paragraph that is then put on a web page online. and it's there for anyone to see. so you and i could go on a web

page and look at a web page with sten nothingraphy on it and not realize it. it's virtually unbreakable unless you had the key. >> one of the major breaks came when the new york field office began to piece together information from their physical searches which they had conducted in 2005. >> looking at that computer with steg an nothingraphy on it, there was a password which was 27 characters long for security. >> in reviewing the information notebooks, they found a strange system of numbers and letters which they believed to be computer keystrokes. through trial and error, they repeatedly entered these characters and ultimately entered what was the 27-digit password. so if your company i.t. guy tells you don't write down your password, that's why. >> for us, that was a game changer. once we got our own version of

their system, we could run a parallel version and read the same things they were reading. >> now we had context. now we had transparency. for the first time, rather than looking from the outside in, we had an opportunity to really understand what they were doing from the inside out. >> moscow would often send them specific tasking to go after certain pieces of information, either current event developments, presidential races, things at different agencies. >> it included people that could have access to information. >> we saw svr center in moscow directing him to gather information on personal habits, family, hobbies, any biodata he might gather. we were constantly looking to see who he is in touch with, who what is the status of that relationship because he's going to meet someone that is going to be the keys to the kingdom and

that will make the 15 years worthwhile. >> in 2006 we learned from the canadian secret intelligence service that they intended imminently to arrest paul to arrest an illegal operating as a xan by the name of paul hempel. >> after the arrest of paul hempel, the russian government became concerned about the u.s. government's ability to ferret out false canadian documentation. in the case of christopher metsos, that documentation was used to support his travels throughout the united states. so the svr stopped sending it. >> that meant the svr had to find new ways of funding the u.s.-based illegals. in monitoring richard murphy's communications, it became clear that the svr was going to task a credential dd russian diplomat to meet with murphy. >> he was sent a message via the steg nothingraphy to meet with

murphy. >> they sent a communication. >> who was the russian diplomat? >> i can't say. >> the exchange happened midpoint on the stairs. the russian diplomat removes a small satchel from the bag and places the bag into murphy's open backpack. in that bag, we assess there had been approximately $300,000 in u.s. currency. >> the theory of the illegals' program is that they have no connection to the russian government. when richard murphy conducted a brush pass with a russian government official, that tied him to the russian government. it was a big break in the case, because that gave probable cause should we ultimately interdict the illegals' network. >> one interesting note we saw in a later message, and we always suspected this, would be that the russian intelligence services would be monitoring that area to see if they could spot any fbi. and we saw in a message that basically a kudos to richard murphy, that we were looking and we didn't see anything, which we all high fived ourselves because they didn't spot us. >> there's an old phrase about intelligence and espionage, it's a wilderness of mirrors, you go

into that fun house hall of mirrors and all of a sudden you've got one side watching us, we're watching them watching us and no one is trying to get caught. >> years and years went by during the course of the investigation without compromise. but i don't know how many times you can roll those dice and not have a mistake made that will just end this thing. >> the pressure that weighed on all of us. ♪

if you could book a flight, then add a hotel, or car, or activity in one place and save, where would you go? ♪ expedia gives you the world in your hand, so you can see more of it. ♪ expedia. ♪ mom. ♪ ♪ where all the walls echo with laughter ♪ ♪ and every room has its own chapter ♪ you've carried on your family's tradition. let us help you prepare for your family's future. financial guidance while you're mastering life. from chase. so you can. problem is, you'reith neterrible with names.

there's pam, donny, comet and blitzen. wait, pretty sure those last two were reindeer. nice to see you, phabitha? is that even a real name? okay, this is the boss. you got this. anna!...yes! thank goodness for name tags. new clients? we've been there. and with breakfast on the run, we'll be there for you. book direct for a guaranteed discount. hampton by hilton.

june 6th, 2009. the fbi documented that richard murphy received money from the russian official. >> so that was a big break in the case, because that officially tied him to the russian federation. after the brush pass, half of that $300,000 was intended for richard murphy to deliver to michael zottoli. >> in september, michael zottoli and richard murphy met in brooklyn. it was supposed to be another brush pass. but as it turned out on that day, the two met on the corner and ended up sitting on a park bench and meeting for hours. >> as part of the illegals program, the illegals were not to have contact with each other. compromise of one could result in the compromise of all. so this was a pretty significant breach in protocol. >> what we think they were doing was just relating to each other. you know, when you look at how

this case developed, there were very short bursts of operational activity. you do two exciting things a year at best. and this was an opportunity for two illegals who had the same mission to come together and talk about it. >> aside from your handlers, you are the only one who knows who you actually are. for an opportunity to sit down with a fellow illegal and share stories on a park bench for more than an hour and a half must have been a pretty significant event in zottoli and murphy's life. >> you know, they have emotions. i always think it's important in these kinds of global affairs where we compete with adversaries around the world, that every once in a while we stop and think about the humanity involved, and the fact that they really are human beings who become weapons of both countries.

that's what they really are. >> after years and years of watching these people, we started to see a change. >> it became harder and harder to document fictitious people. the svr advanced and developed their tradecraft. and we started to see a new generation of illegals who could withstand the scrutiny of travel into and out of the united states with their own identities. >> anna chapman and mikhail semenko came to the united states utilizing their true names and their true documentation. what they didn't reveal was their affiliation with russian intelligence services. mikhail somenko arrived in the united states to attend seton hall university. >> somenko spoke five languages and was spotting and assessing people that had access to national defense information. >> anna chapman had married a

citizen of the united kingdom. she had obtained uk citizenship through that marriage and had maintained his name after her divorce. >> she was a real estate agent who was using contacts within manhattan. a lot of these were party-type contacts. so she spent a lot of time out, you know, at bars. she spent a lot of time out at parties. >> we all knew where this was headed, that at some point one of these agents would attempt to infiltrate the state department or the cia or the fbi or some sensitive agency in washington and locate there for the purpose of spying. >> we knew what they were doing. we knew what their mission was. it's one thing for us to believe that. it's another thing to see it in writing. >> what we needed was a specific tangible piece of proof that they were spying for the russian government. fortunately for us, in one of

the intercepted messages, we learned exactly what the russians believed the whole purpose of this operation was. richard murphy had been involved in a dispute about expenses. >> because he was arguing that they own the house, they had purchased it, and the svr center was reminding them that your mission is to live there, this is part of that, we own the house. >> he was curtly reminded of exactly what it was he was supposed to focus on. you were sent to the usa for long term service trip. >> your education, bank accounts, car, house, et cetera. >> all of these serve one goal, fulfill your main mission. >> i.e., to search and develop ties in policy making circles in the u.s. >> and send intel to "c." >> what is "c"? >> "c" stands for center. i can't overstate how important

that was. >> it was like looking at a watch work for ten years and really understanding the evolution of the program, the purpose, what it was for, sort of how they built it, how they funded it, how it was structured, how they ran it. >> simultaneously, we saw several things start to develop and reach a crescendo where we felt it was the time to step in. >> one of the things that we learned was that moscow was directing the illegals, which included the special agent illegals, chapman and somenko, to migrate closer to policy making circles, specifically washington, d.c. and the longer that it ran, the more concern i got that there would be a compromise of this particular illegal network. >> sometimes you can do everything right and have some unforeseen circumstance, and all of a sudden, all that success,' a decade of stellar intelligence work, winds up being ashes in our mouth. and ultimately, the decision was

made, let's end it on our terms. what's going on here? um... i'm babysitting. that'll be $50 bucks. you said $30. yeah, well it was $30 before my fees, like the pizza-ordering fee and the dog-sitting fee... and the rummage through your closet fee. are those my heels? yeah! yeah, we're the same size...in shoes. with t-mobile taxes and fees are already included, so you get four lines of unlimited for just $40 bucks each. for a limited time save 300 dollars on the amazing iphone 7. it's about moving forward, not back.t. it's looking up, not down. it's being in motion. in body, in spirit, in the now. boost® high protein it's intelligent nutrition with 15 grams of protein and 26 vitamins and minerals. for when you need a little extra. boost® the number one high protein complete nutritional drink.

be up for it ssports trophies now. sports trophies have changed, our standards haven't. made with premium cuts of 100% kosher beef that every athlete will love. hebrew national. we remain strict. juswho own them,ople every business is different. but every one of those businesses will need legal help as they age and grow. whether it be help starting your business, vendor contracts or employment agreements. legalzoom's network of attorneys can help you every step of the way so you can focus on what you do. we'll handle the legal stuff that comes up along the way.

legalzoom. legal help is here. choicehotels.com. badda book. that's it?. he means book direct at choicehotels.com for the lowest price on our rooms guaranteed. plus earn free nights and instant rewards at check-in. yeah. like i said. book now at choicehotels.com

these make cleaning between myi love easy.sy. gum brand for healthy gums. soft picks, proxabrush cleaners, flossers. gum brand. this was a massive operation that went for over a decade. the cases were spectacular. but ultimately, we had watched

them long enough where we believed we had learned as much as we could possibly learn about their operations. >> one of the things that we learned was that moscow was directing the illegals to migrate closer to policy making circles, specifically washington, d.c. >> and the fbi came to our offices at langley, when i was director of the cia, and briefed me in terms of what these agents were up to. and that's when we focused on the prospect of going out and arresting them. >> and coming up with a plan that would not have a negative impact on bilateral relations. >> on the policy front, we were supposed to be getting closer to russia. president barack obama had come into office and it was part of his foreign policy initiatives to develop a rapprochement with the russian government. >> we can make extraordinary progress that will benefit the

people of both countries. >> so it was a very delicate political time, in this particular case suggesting that we interdict and potentially prosecute and jail ten russian government officials was unprecedented. so it required approvals at the highest levels of government. that resulted in a series of meetings in the situation room of the white house. >> were you nervous? >> it was one of the longer years in my career. >> the concern that was raised was, what is this going to mean in terms of this relationship that the united states was trying to develop with russia? and there were some who thought that it might blow up the relationship because we're suddenly arresting ten spies in our country. but when we talked about this at the national security council, we said, this is an old story. they've been spying on us, we've been spying on them. every once in a while we find their spies, every once in a while they find our spies. this is not going to be a big

deal. both countries will continue their relationship. the president concurred that we ought to make this effort. >> and it was accepted that we would resolve this case through prosecution. >> we aimed to build a case that would be able to be presented in court. >> this was one of the biggest challenges. prosecution in counterintelligence almost never happens, because your best cases come from sources and methods that you want most to protect. so we needed a charge for which we could produce evidence that we were prepared to divulge to the u.s. public. >> starting in 2006, we had slowly started to compile folders of evidence that the subjects were in violation of the foreign agent registration act. upon arrival in the united states, they should have registered with the u.s. government that they are in fact russian officials here in the u.s. by neglecting to do so, they were in violation of u.s. law. >> we had a number of white

could lar fund charges, their bank accounts did, home mortgage, car loenz. each one of those is a separate count of wire fraud, branch fraud. each of those is like five years in prison so you had a big hammer. >> while all the rest of this was going on, we had to develop charges on anna chapman and mikhail somenko. >> they were different. they were here in true name. a number of the charges didn't apply to them. >> what we utilized in both cases was a false flag. a false flag is basically introducing someone to them who they believe to be a russian official and seeing if they will do something. >> so two independent fbi undercover operations were launched. >> in washington, somenko was being tasked to meet. they met on a park bench. he was handed cash and told to go put the money under a bridge. he puts it right under the bridge on video, leaves it there. he fell right for his false flag.

>> at the same time, in new york, ana chapman met with an undercover fbi agent who passed her a passport and told her to pass it along to somebody like her who needed to get out of the country. >> she leaves the meeting, and she panics. something came over her where she started realizing that something wasn't quite right. >> and we believe she was quickly processing that she may have come to the attention of the fbi. we were very concerned that if she sent a distress signal to the svr, they may in turn send an emergency signal to all of the illegals and we would lose them all. >> so the next morning she shows up at the 1st precinct in manhattan, and she reports that someone tried to get her to do something with a passport. it was very strange. >> at the time, president medvedev was at the g20 in canada. and we wanted to wait until he

was out of this hemisphere in order to effectuate the arrests because it would not be proper to have that done during an international economic event. >> investigators in new york were doing absolutely everything they could to stall anna chapman. >> so we sent two agents, to pretend they were detectives, and kept her there all day looking at mugshots, knowing she was never going to find the person because he was an fbi special agent working undercover. >> we were all a little nervous. nobody wanted to mess this up on the last day. >> the success or failure was really in the hands of the field level investigators. and we had one chance. >> we had been on 24-hour physical surveillance for a couple of weeks. everyone was kind of sitting in their cars in all the different field offices, just waiting for the go-ahead. >> this will define fbi counterintelligence in the eyes of the american people, in the eyes of congress, and more importantly, most importantly,

in the eyes of our adversary. and if we made it a success, we plant a flag not only for fbi counterintelligence, but the u.s. intelligence community of exactly what our capabilities are. but if we screwed this up, it would be a big problem. june 22nd one of his sons . >> june. >> if we miss the opportunity we wouldn't have an opportunity to catch everyone in the united states for months. even more importantly, beyond that night christopher metsos who we hadn't seen in the united states since 2016 was traveling. the fbi is in position to capture all of these illegals at once.

we waited until the russian president left the canadian airspace and then we moved on that sunday night. with the travelocity customer first guarantee... your only worry... will be that one... rogue... cloud. get help with hotels, free twenty-four-hour flight changes, and our price match guarantee. travelocity.® wander wisely.™ peobut they're different.ind it's nice to remove artificial ingredients. kind never had to.

we choose real ingredients like almonds, peanuts and a drizzle of dark chocolate. give kind a try. ♪ introducing the easiest way to get gillette blades noo text "blades" to gillette on demand text to reorder blades with gillette on demand... ...and get $3 off your first order fothere's a seriousy boomers virus out there that's been almost forgotten. it's hepatitis c. one in 30 boomers has hep c, yet most don't even know it. because it can hide in your body for years without symptoms, and it's not tested for in routine blood work. the cdc recommends all baby boomers get tested. if you have hep c, it can be cured.

for us it's time to get tested. ask your healthcare provider for the simple blood test. it's the only way to know for sure.

we waited until the russian president had left canadian air space and then we moved. >> everybody got the go sign. this is happening to ana chapman at the police precinct and in boston, in washington and yonkers, new york, all at the same time. we knocked on the door. they were having dinner. we told them they were under arrest. there was no drama, there was to shouting. we got all were them that we had been watching. there were no difficulties at all. >> there was no shock like what are you doing, what are you here? they just kind of looked like oh, today's the day. their 20-year odyssey came to an end pretty quickly. >> arrangements were made after the arrest for the children of the illegals. >> most of these children thought that they were u.s. citizens. this was home. and suddenly, their finding out that their parents are spies. from russia into it was critical to us that the children be cared for in a compassionate way. >> the fbi arrested nine illegals and one co-conspirator. donald heathfield, tracy foley, patricia mills, michael zatoli into richard and cynthia murphy. >> lawn lazzaro. >> the fbi arrested nine illegals and one co-conspirator.

donald heathfield, tracy foley, patricia mills, michael zatoli into richard and cynthia murphy. >> lawn lazzaro. >> ana chapman -- mig cale somenko. >> and vicky palias. >> an interspot warrant was filed which subsequently led to the arrest of christopher metsoss in cyprus. >> he was offered bail and fled shortly thereafter. he's still out there. >> this photo shows fbi agents in new jersey. two of the suspects live here apparently with their two young daughters. >> we had no idea. they just seem like a nice quiet family. >> this is just a throwback to sort of i spy and james bond. >> all of the couples were held within the various difference correctional facilities in boston, new york and washington. >> the question then became, would this be in the tradition

of spying an opportunity to trade. why not use them as chips in order to be able to get back some people who had actually been willing to put their live nz ot line to do their job of spying. it was an interesting opportunity for a director of the cia particularly somebody who kind of you know loved spy movies and was thinking about it. and i thought for god's sakes, i'm now in the middle of what would be a great movie about the effort to try to trade for spies. >> one of the biggest questions that we had was whether or not the russian federation would acknowledge that they are in fact russians. >> i got on the phone with my russian counterpart mikhail brad cov who was right out of central casting for a russian spy. i put him on the speakerphone and i said mikhail, i want you to know that we're aware that they're your people.

i looked around the room and our people waiting, you know, as to what is brad cov would say because there was this silence. and then frad cov said, yes, they are our people. and you could see all the jaws drop in the room and the fact that he was acknowledging that they were russian spies. >> that was very important because had he not it may have had a different judicial outcome meaning this may have gone to trial. >> i said look, we would like to work out an exchange. and he agreed to those next steps. >> the fbi had made arrangements so that all of the prisoners had been transferred to new york. >> and they were promptly told that they are they would be

returning to moscow, children were taken care of, transport to be reunited with their parents. >> the spy swap has been made. the biggest u.s./russian spy swap since the cold war. >> do you still watch them. >> laugh. >> do we still watch the illegals we've arrested? >> yeah. >> we are aware of them. >> this was a once in a career case. the calgary people working this case were unique. the ability to talk about it in the way we're talking about it now is incredibly unique. it's just unprecedented in my opinion. >> we consider it to be the cun of the greatest counter intelligence successes in our modern history and one of the largest, most compartment sensitive cases in fbi's history. >> for most people who are sitting at home and trying to think about what the hell this is all about. in many ways, this is about humanity in the 21st century. and what we do to try to make sure that somehow, we can protect our interests in a very complicated world and how we use ordinary human beings to do that job.

president clinton said today he's very please the with his first year in office not with how it is ending. >> whitewater is not going to go away. campaign is is heating up. >> applicati . >> political trouble for the president.