Aerial view of the Central Intelligence Company headquarters a while between 1990 and 2006. Images within the Carol M. Highsmith Archive, Library of Congress, Prints and Images Division. Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Final spring, a good friend of a good friend visited my workplace and invited me to Langley to talk to Invisible Ink, the CIA’s artistic writing group.
I requested Vivian (not her actual title) what she needed me to speak about.
She mentioned that the subject of the discuss was fully as much as me.
I requested what stage the writers within the group had been.
She mentioned the group had writers of all ranges.
I requested what the talking price was.
She mentioned that so far as she knew, there was no talking price.
I dwelled just a little on this level.
She confirmed that there was no talking price.
When a company has, say, financed the overthrow of the federal government of Guatemala, you’d assume there could be a talking price. However I used to be advised that, in lieu of fee, the writing group would take me out to lunch within the government eating room afterward. I might even have my image taken in entrance of the CIA seal, and I may put up that image wherever I needed.
“So my go to wouldn’t be labeled?”
Vivian confirmed that I may inform anybody I needed. “Simply don’t inform them my title—or I’ll should kill you. Simply kidding!”
As I thought of the invitation, I saved questioning why I’d been invited. I don’t write about CIA-adjacent subjects, nor am I profitable sufficient a novelist that individuals outdoors a small circle—one which I doubt consists of U.S. intelligence companies—know my title. So the invite was a little bit of a thriller. This was the second-most widespread query that got here up once I advised author pals about it, topped solely by: “No talking price?” At first, I puzzled whether or not the gig was a part of a recruitment technique. Nevertheless it doesn’t take an enormous intelligence equipment to know that I’m not intelligence materials, not least as a result of I’m an expert author.
Subsequent I puzzled if my go to could possibly be used as soft-diplomacy propaganda. Look how innocent we’re! We let writers come to our headquarters and pose for footage. The CIA had veered into any such literary boosterism earlier than—supporting, for instance, the founding of the very journal for which I’m penning this piece. So it wasn’t out of the query. In 2021, I had turned down an invite from the federal government of Saudi Arabia for an all-expenses-paid journey to a writers’ retreat at al-‘Ulā, as I didn’t need to be part of their arts and tradition whitewashing. However ultimately, I couldn’t consider a means that I’d be a helpful propaganda device for the CIA—until they anticipated me penning this essay (during which case, kudos CIA)—and so I mentioned sure.
***
On the agreed-upon morning a couple of weeks later, I left my condominium in D.C. and drove into the haze of Canadian wildfire smoke that was floating over the town. By the point I turned off the George Washington Parkway on the George Bush Heart for Intelligence exit, and on to a restricted utilization street, I used to be already nervous. I’m the form of one that weighs and measures my suitcases earlier than flying, lest I be scolded on the airport, and I don’t like driving down roads with indicators like EMPLOYEES ONLY and WILL BE ARRESTED.
On the gate intercom, I gave my title and social safety quantity—Vivian had gathered this info and extra forward of time, over a sequence of telephone calls, every from a distinct telephone quantity—and a police officer gave me a customer’s badge that was to be displayed on my individual always. He warned me that I used to be to be escorted always.
I met Vivian in lots between the primary gate and the second gate, the place her automotive was the one one parked. She gave me one other badge that appeared an identical to the primary. I left my telephone in my automotive as instructed, and we received into Vivian’s automotive and drove to the second gate. That was when issues began not going as deliberate.
4 agitated cops blocked our means.
“He can’t go away his automotive right here!” they yelled when Vivian rolled down her window.
“However I cleared this forward of time,” Vivian mentioned.
“He can’t go away his automotive right here. It’s a safety threat.”
“However how am I purported to escort him if we will’t drive collectively?”
“Ma’am,” one among them mentioned, “I simply do parking.”
It turned out that, like in lots of bureaucracies, the person components that made up the CIA had been siloed, and there was no level in arguing about logical contradictions.
Vivian gave up and drove me again to my automotive, clearly confused. I advised her it wasn’t a giant deal—I might simply comply with her.
The issue, she mentioned, was that we wouldn’t have the ability to park in the identical lot. And I needed to be escorted always. And worker parking on the CIA was a large number. “It’ll take me eternally simply to stroll to you.”
She resolved that she would merely park in VIP customer parking with me, and if she received a ticket, she received a ticket. “Simply comply with me.”
I received in my automotive and adopted her to the gate. I watched from behind the wheel as she drove as much as the gate, talked to one of many cops, and drove off previous the gate at a great clip, very a lot not being adopted by me.
I pulled as much as the gate, and an aggressive police officer questioned me about why I had two badges.
“Didn’t it appear unusual to you to get a second badge once you’d simply received your first one?”
“I’ve by no means been right here earlier than,” I mentioned. “All the pieces appears unusual to me.”
A unique cop advised him to provide it a relaxation, handed me a 3rd badge, and requested if I wanted instructions to VIP parking. I’ve a horrible sense of path—I as soon as received misplaced at Costco for therefore lengthy that they needed to name my mother over the PA; I used to be fifteen—and Google Maps isn’t a lot use at Langley.
The good cop mentioned that I wanted to show proper and comply with the street till the sixth left. There I might see a line of squad vehicles and a gate, the place my badge would swipe me in.
“When you see a helicopter, you’ve gone too far,” he mentioned. “Simply loop again round. Don’t make a U-turn.”
Once I later advised Vivian concerning the imply cop and the good one, she mentioned, “They’re at all times doing that good cop–unhealthy cop factor.”
“For parking?”
“For every thing!”
I discovered the VIP parking on my first strive. I held my badge out to the scanner. The gate rose! I drove in. And drove. And drove. And drove. In circles, as a result of all of the areas within the small VIP lot had been taken. I couldn’t go away the car parking zone—I wasn’t purported to be unescorted wherever on campus, however not less than in customer parking my presence was considerably explainable—so I saved circling the lot, accumulating sweat. Lastly, somebody left. I parked, received out, took a breath of ashy air, and puzzled what to do subsequent. I used to be relieved to see Vivian’s automotive caught on the VIP gate, negotiating with the voice on the intercom.
“They received’t let me into VIP parking,” she defined as I received into her automotive. “They mentioned it’s a safety threat.”
We turned again onto the primary street and drove for a bit. After which, after a bend, there appeared an abundance of parked vehicles. Automobiles upon vehicles upon vehicles. I’d by no means seen a car parking zone this huge, outdoors {of professional} sporting occasions. The quadrants had been labeled by shade, the rows by letter; we weaved via row after row of Virginia plates, from Blue D all the best way as much as Purple V with out discovering a spot.
I requested Vivian how many individuals labored on the CIA.
“Possibly two million?” She smiled and confessed that she had no concept, though I used to be made to know that she had been on the CIA, and within the writing group, for quite a few years.
As we snaked via line after line of vehicles, Vivian advised me that when you labored right here and needed to keep away from a twenty-minute stroll out of your automotive, you needed to be on the workplace by 7 a.m. I puzzled if this was intentional—a solution to encourage lengthy hours, just like the tech corporations that provide workers free dinners within the cafeterias that don’t open till 6:30 p.m. Or if it was the results of growth necessitated by the post-9/11 surveillance state and the recognition of telephones that document our each motion. As Kerry Howley notes in Bottoms Up and the Satan Laughs: A Journey By way of the Deep State, we’ve got created and saved extra knowledge within the twenty-first century than in the remainder of human historical past mixed. If the federal government desires to seek out coherent tales in all that knowledge, I assumed as I seemed on the vastness of the lot, somebody has to comb via it.
At first, we couldn’t discover the convention room. Like me, Vivian wasn’t allowed to convey her telephone into the primary constructing, however even when she had, I don’t know who she would’ve known as for instructions. CIA officers typically don’t know their coworkers’ final names. (The Starbucks at Langley is the one Starbucks the place baristas aren’t allowed to ask to your title.) So I’m with out images or notes, however strolling via the primary constructing at Langley, is, in my reminiscence, like strolling via an airport terminal in a serious metropolis, crossed with a hospital, crossed with an American mall, crossed with an Japanese European college. It’s huge and gleaming and chilly and brutal, suddenly. There was a corridor of presidential portraits with notes from commanders in chief to the Secret Service, all of them written in elegant fountain pen, aside from Donald Trump’s, which was written in Sharpie and mentioned “I’M SO PROUD OF YOU!”
We lastly discovered the convention room, via a aspect door within the CIA Museum. It was unclear who this museum was for, however it was not a foul museum, filled with objects of curiosity: items of the Berlin Wall, tie-clip cameras, Soviet bugging gadgets, et cetera displayed in glass instances. Six folks had been seated on the convention desk contained in the convention room, which was windowless and had a giant CIA seal on the wall.
“Sorry we’re late!” Vivian introduced.
“Strip search?” one of many males joked.
“Parking,” I mentioned.
A collective groan. The goddamned parking.
I started by asking what folks had been writing. Surprisingly, not one of the CIA writers had been writing spy novels. They had been engaged on brief tales. Self-published dystopian sci-fi. A presidential biography. Upmarket fiction. A private weblog, which I used to be advised to take a look at if I ever needed a extremely good muffin recipe. The writing group was organized round what seemed like a listserv asserting periodic conferences to no matter members had been accessible that day. Solely about half the folks within the room appeared to know each other.
I talked just a little bit about writing beginnings and dealing via false begins. I learn the primary web page of my newest novel, defined why I’d set the primary scene within the U.S. when the remainder of the novel takes place in Ukraine, and went via all of the false begins I’d taken to get the place I used to be going. One officer raised their hand and requested about establishing voice in first versus third individual. One other requested about revision strategies. One other concerning the shift from writing alone to working with an editor. It was the least outstanding Q&A I’ve ever been part of.
I had just a little time to kill earlier than our lunch reservation—seating time within the government eating room was not versatile—so Vivian took me to the reward store.
Given that just about nobody’s allowed inside Langley and the individuals who work for the CIA aren’t purported to promote it, it was, like with the museum, a little bit of a thriller who the reward store was for. The cabinets had been stocked with T-shirts (Central Intelligence Company), mugs (Central Intelligence Company), and novelty barbecue sauce (High Secret Recipe!). There was additionally a Pleasure Month show (Central Intelligence Company in rainbow). I purchased a Pleasure Month pen for 4 {dollars}.
***
The eating room was lengthy and principally empty—apparently a safety factor—with white tablecloths and a protracted wall of home windows looking on the swampy greenery of northern Virginia. Or I used to be advised that it usually seemed out at greenery. Right now it seemed out at wildfire smoke. The menu was basically cafeteria meals—regular American fare. I ordered a burger with candy potato fries and a Coke from a businesslike waitress in a white gown shirt.
The CIA officer seated subsequent to me requested if I assumed it was value getting a literary agent. I mentioned sure, and he or she appeared skeptical.
“In my different work,” she defined, “I can get film folks hooked up.”
I nonetheless do not know what she meant.
Whereas we waited for our meals, the author of dystopian sci-fi confirmed that when you work for the CIA, legal professionals should vet something you publish. However they had been extra lenient than I might’ve guessed. She mentioned that one among her novels had helped change how the company considered fiction versus nonfiction. Whereas studying her novel, the legal professionals determined that simply because a personality in a novel says one thing doesn’t imply that the creator essentially agrees, so there must be extra leeway for CIA fiction writers. (Which suggests CIA legal professionals are extra nuanced literary critics than half of Goodreads.)
Clearly you possibly can’t share labeled info, I used to be advised. You possibly can’t violate the Hatch Act, exhibiting your political affiliation, and also you’re additionally not purported to violate the Washington Submit rule, which was: would the CIA be embarrassed if this had been in tomorrow’s Washington Submit? (This appeared trickiest to find out.)
One other officer talked about that, for the reason that CIA has folks doing issues overseas that could possibly be thought of doubtful, you needed to be delicate about that. I requested what they meant after they mentioned doubtful, which resulted in a change of matter. I requested in the event that they knew of any points with somebody attempting to publish one thing that they couldn’t get authorized. One of many older writers mentioned that she had heard of an officer who had tried to publish a memoir that mentioned his expertise of racism within the CIA and was advised he couldn’t till he retired.
After lunch—everybody paid on the register, in money, and Vivian paid for me—Vivian walked me out to my automotive.
“It was attention-grabbing to be taught what you all can and may’t write about,” I mentioned to Vivian. “I didn’t notice you had a lot freedom to write down about your jobs.”
We handed via the safety turnstile and walked over a large CIA seal, which I acknowledged from a number of motion pictures, painted on the marble flooring.
“The very last thing on the planet I’d need to write about is that this place,” Vivian mentioned on the door. “I can’t think about something extra boring.”
Johannes Lichtman’s debut novel, Such Good Work, was a Nationwide E book Basis 5 Underneath 35 honoree. His second novel, Calling Ukraine, is on the market in hardcover and will probably be revealed in paperback in April.
