The CIA spotter professor
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The CIA spotter professor is John Kiriakou's account of his own recruitment, and of the talent-spotting system that made it possible.

The approach

Kiriakou joined the CIA at twenty-five, straight out of graduate school. He had a bachelor's degree in Middle Eastern studies and was working on a master's degree in legislative affairs when one of his professors, who liked his writing style, asked him to stay after class one day.

The professor, it turned out, was actually undercover as a professor, working as what used to be called a CIA spotter, looking for graduate students who would fit into the agency's culture. He recruited Kiriakou into the CIA directly out of graduate school.

The system

Told that other former officers describe the same route in, Kiriakou confirmed that it used to be quite common, and more than common. Until 1992 or 1993, with the passage of the Equal Employment Opportunity Act, being spotted was pretty much the only real way to get into the CIA: one had to be noticed.

He compares it to the Hollywood myth of being discovered at a drugstore soda fountain, and says there used to be senior CIA officers under cover at important universities all around the country. He counts himself lucky to have had one as his graduate school adviser.

No prior intention

Asked whether the languages he was studying meant he had been aiming at the agency, Kiriakou said no. He expected to end up on Capitol Hill, or perhaps to take the foreign service exam; he knew he wanted to work in foreign affairs doing something, but had not really given the CIA any thought until they approached him.

The practice he describes here is the older, in-house version of the arrangement he has criticised in its modern form, where retired officers take scholar-in-residence posts that function as recruitment funnels.

See also

- The scholar-in-residence pipeline
- CIA feeder schools
- Recruiting foreign students
