Americans should not be fooled for a moment. This quiet war did not end with the collapse of Soviet communism in 1991. As we have seen with the Hanssen case, the Russians still spy. The Chinese spy. The French spy.
Nations try to keep secrets.
Other nations seek them out for their own advantage and gain. The question of how well the United States plays the spy game is in serious doubt. The United States spends an enormous amount of money spying. U.S. intelligence today is a large, multibillion-dollar agglomeration of government agencies with little central management and a lot of bureaucratic lethargy. Its leadership is shared between professional spies, political appointees and the military.