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Counterintelligence state


Counterintelligence state (sometimes also called intelligence state, securocracy or spookocracy) is a state where state security service penetrates and permeates all societal institutions including the military. The term has been applied by historians and political commentators to the former Soviet Union, the former German Democratic Republic, Iraq under Saddam Hussein, the United States, especially after the Global surveillance disclosures and post-Soviet Russia under Vladimir Putin.

According to a definition, "The counterintelligence state is characterized by the presence of a large, elite force acting as a watchdog of a security defined as broadly that the state must maintain an enormous vigilance and enforcement apparatus... This apparatus is not accountable to the public and enjoys immense police powers... Whether the civilian government is able to control the security bodies is an open question; indeed the civilian government is so penetrated by the apparatus that there is no clear distinction between the two."

There was a massive security apparatus in the Soviet Union to prevent any opposition, and "every facet of daily life fell into the KGB's domain."

Undercover staff of the KGB included three major categories:

The "active reserve" included KGB officers with a military rank who worked undercover. "Trusted contacts" were high placed civilians who collaborated with the KGB without signing any official working agreements, such as directors of personnel departments at various institutions, academics, deans, or writers and actors. Informers were citizens secretly recruited by the KGB, sometimes using forceful recruitment methods, such as blackmail. The precise number of people from various categories remains unknown, but one of the estimates was 11 million "informers" in the Soviet Union, or one out of every eighteen adult citizens.


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