Hello and I'm taking you

I'm Katie Wittaker and I'm taking you back to July

1977 when a real-life spy story came to a head in the USSR. I've been speaking to Marty Peterson

who at the height of the Cold War worked for the Central American Intelligence Agency,

the CIA. She was their first female case officer.

Marty Peterson had been working undercover in Russia for almost two years when she was caught

red-handed as she tried to carry out a dead drop on a Moscow railway bridge.

The site itself was located in a small niche in one of the towers. It was a piece of

asphalt looking rock that I put inside that niche. I then turned around and I came down the stairs.

And it was at that moment I saw those three men walking across the street towards me. The man in the middle motioned to the other two

men to fan out. And as they came towards me, the two men grabbed me by my arms. I kicked out at the man in front of me. I then began to say very

loudly that I was an American. They had to call the embassy. They could not hold me. but they put me into the van and took me towards

the center of Moscow and we approached Lubyanka where the KGB had headquarters, which was the most notorious prison of Stalin's era.

The Soviet Foreign Ministry expressed outrage at this clear sign of American spying.

Although it wasn't for another year that the Soviet News Agency

Isvestia published news of the case.

It is obvious that US Secret Services are conducting destabilising

activities on Soviet territory using diplomatic agencies including the

U.S. Embassy as a cover.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is voicing its resolute protest against these activities

and declares Martha Peterson persona non-grata. By that time Marty Peterson was long gone. She was lucky.

After just four hours of interrogation she'd been sent home to the USA.

...