The Foreign Service Journal, January-February 2022

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2022 41 liked and admired by all, if viewed as perhaps “too nice” by some of his ambassadorial colleagues. But even being too nice appar- ently had its limits. Ambassador Stoessel reportedly threatened to resign if his staff were not also briefed. He filed a formal pro- test with the Soviets and briefed his staff in short order. Stoessel departed post that September, to be replaced by Ambassador Malcolm Toon in January 1977. What Was the Purpose of Moscow Signal? One theory was that the microwaves were being used by the Soviets to activate the numerous listening devices they had emplaced in the building prior to American occupancy. This theory was described in detail by Eric Haseltine in The Spy in Moscow Station (2019), which recounted the efforts of National Security Administration Officer Charles Gandy to get to the bottom of the microwave issue in the late 1970s. His conclu- sions, which are still highly controversial and were based on a technical survey done at Embassy Moscow in 1978, were that the Soviets were using microwaves (Moscow Unidentified Techni- cal Signals, or MUTS) to activate passive bugs in the walls of the embassy that were much more advanced than the “Thing” (the Theremin device) that had been found in Spaso House. In addition, Gandy believed that MUTS were being used to read voices off windows by “RF imposition” and could be used to intercept electronic signals and voices reflected off electronic devices in unprotected areas by a technique known as RF flooding. Gandy also pioneered efforts to uncover the bugged IBM Selectric typewriters in Moscow and Leningrad (Project GUNMAN). There was another leading theory, as well. Many believed that the microwaves were a jamming signal designed to foil our own electronic devices. However, as the Soviets themselves provided this explanation, it was naturally suspect; and the true answer to this question remains in the classified realm. Embassy Reaction The worst fear of embassy staffers was that the microwaves, whatever their purpose, might have some as-yet-unknown health effects. This seemed to be borne out over the years by the finding, in the early 1970s, that an unusual number of people were departing post with elevated white blood cell counts. It also came out that, anecdotally at least, there seemed to be a larger number of cancer cases, and especially leukemia, among former embassy staff than would appear to be normal. Also, in the months following Ambassador Stoessel’s briefing, a State Department doctor reported that several members of the embassy staff displayed symptoms that were nonspecific but had been reported frequently in patients chronically exposed to nonionizing radiation. Symptoms included severe headaches, inability to concentrate and fatigue. All in all, many people in Moscow were agitated and offended by what appeared to be efforts to sweep the whole controversy under the rug. Moscow staffers tended to be a little overwrought in any case, due to the unique pressures of work and life in Moscow, and the efforts of the State Department to assuage their concerns were viewed with extreme suspicion. The clincher for many of them was the unusual incidence of illness on the part of American ambassadors stationed in Moscow. In an article in The New Yorker on Dec. 20, 1976 (“A Reporter at Large, Microwaves–II”), Paul Brodeur reported th at not only had two recent American ambassadors to Moscow died of cancer (Llewellyn “Tommy” Thompson and Charles “Chip” Bohlen), but then-Ambassador Walter Stoessel was suffering from a severe blood disorder (Ambassador Stoessel eventually died of leukemia in 1986). To most Moscow staffers, it just seemed like too much of a coincidence. In the wake of the revelations about Moscow Signal, many U.S. embassy employees filed lawsuits against the U.S. govern- ment. In response, the State Department funded a study by the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health, part of the group that had been secretly studying Moscow Signal all along and had already concluded that microwaves were not harmful. The study, released in November 1978, found no Built in 1913, Spaso House is the residence of the U.S. ambassador to Moscow. U.S.EMBASSYMOSCOW