Purloined Papers?

By ADAM ZAGORIN WASHINGTON

It was the first week of February, and the U.S.S. Independence was steaming into the Persian Gulf bearing its complement of attack aircraft to begin the bombing of Iraq. In Washington, the U.S. national-security apparatus continued its countdown to armed conflict. The prospects for war largely depended on sensitive diplomatic negotiations centered on the U.N. Inside knowledge of those secret discussions could give an adversary or even an ally an edge over Washington, as the White House struggled to prevent countries like France and Russia from letting Saddam Hussein off the hook.

In the middle of this escalating crisis, a man described by a source as wearing a brown tweed jacket walked into the heavily guarded seventh-floor offices of the State Department's executive secretary, who manages the flow of paper among the department's top officials and especially what goes to and from Secretary of State Madeleine Albright. According to a version of events supplied exclusively to TIME by a State Department employee and confirmed by other officials, the man proceeded to open, in full view of two secretaries, a zippered pouch containing some of the highest-level intelligence secrets of the U.S. Government.

What happened next has Washington's top diplomats and spy hunters both anxious and embarrassed: the mystery man, thought to be a U.S. official, methodically rifled the pouch, placed most of its contents in his briefcase and walked out. No alarms sounded; no one tried to stop him. But his unexplained presence worried secretaries, who alerted their superiors.

What was taken from the pouch, which is a little smaller than an attache case, is still the subject of speculation because officials are not sure what it contained to begin with. Normally such a pouch is stuffed with what is known in national-security parlance as Sensitive Compartmented Information, which is intended for only the most senior officials. It typically might include a highly classified briefing book from the State Department's Intelligence and Research Bureau, analyzing developments around the world. (In this case the mystery visitor left the briefing book behind.) The pouch could also have contained the daily digest of National Security Agency intercepts gathered by ultrasecret satellites and listening devices. These often bear the special code-word classification UMBRA, a category beyond TOP SECRET, reserved for the most sensitive electronic intelligence. Most riveting would have been pages of NSA intercepts dealing with Iraq. Typically, the NSA targets not only hostile countries but also U.S. allies.

Whoever took the papers certainly knew his way around. To gain access to Albright's suite, the perpetrator had to have a State Department identification card and either pass by a security guard or use a special magnetic swipe card to enter the secure area. He also had to contend with video-surveillance cameras, which have apparently furnished few clues about his identity.

Security agents mobilized to interview staff members around Albright's office and, according to a source, presented employees with photographs of likely suspects. The FBI subjected an officer to extensive lie-detector tests and conducted a search of his home. A source told TIME that the FBI asked a State Department official about a brown tweed jacket, which was never found. FBI agents found no evidence linking the diplomat they questioned with wrongdoing, and he is back at his State Department desk.

To figure out the pouch's contents, the FBI is engaged in the laborious task of reconstructing the "chain of possession" surrounding the documents: who had access to them, when and for how long? Investigators told TIME they have not formally excluded other possibilities--that, for example, a secret-documents clerk innocently botched the document logs or misplaced the material and is now afraid to admit it. Or perhaps the papers were hidden by a disgruntled foreign-service officer. The FBI is moving aggressively on all fronts. Until the facts show otherwise, agents must assume the worst--that the material was stolen to be handed over to a foreign power. A full-scale, top-priority, FBI field investigation is under way.

Even if the explanation for the loss is benign, law-enforcement officials are distraught because State's security procedures were so easily circumvented. A department spokesman says that until the investigation is complete, "lurid speculation as to the nature of any documents which may or may not have been compromised is premature." But U.S. diplomats must wonder whether a tweedy colleague is walking the halls and preparing to strike again.

--With reporting by J.F.O. McAllister and Elaine Shannon/Washington

With reporting by J.F.O. McAllister and Elaine Shannon/Washington