January/February 1997
By Si Wakesberg
Si Wakesberg is New York bureau chief for Scrap.
Since the breakup of the Soviet Union, we commodity writers have been able to analyze to some extent the flow of copper and aluminum out of Russia to Western consuming points. While the available statistics still leave something to be desired, at least we have access to some figures.
In the dark days of the Cold War, when President Reagan called the Soviet Union an “evil empire” and James Bond movies and John Le Carre’s novels portrayed Russians as dyed-in-the-wool villains and spies, securing information about the movement of Russian copper or aluminum was as difficult as getting data on nuclear activity. Everything was hidden behind the Iron Curtain.
And it was during those very Cold War days that I had a spy adventure of my own.
I was writing newsletters on metal markets and got the eccentric notion to write a newsletter on the copper situation in the Soviet Union. If I could secure the right information, it would be a scoop! But how to get authentic data?
I recalled that I had met a reporter from Tass, the Soviet news agency, at a meeting and had, in fact, sent him some material on recycling. He owed me a favor. Upon digging out his card, I telephoned and asked whether he knew anyone in New York I could interview on the Soviet copper situation.
“I have just the man for you,” said the reporter after a moment’s reflection. “He works for Amtorg, the Soviet commercial and business agency in New York, and he is very knowledgeable about copper. He’s the man you should contact.”
It sounded like just what I wanted. So I jotted down the man’s name and address and promptly sent him a letter requesting an interview. It was February, a light snow was falling in Central Park, and the annual Copper Club dinner would soon be attracting hordes of copper executives to the Waldorf.
Months passed.
The leaves had begun to fall in early October when my phone rang. A guttural voice with an unmistakable Russian accent was at the other end. “Hullo! You want talk to me?”
It was, of course, the Amtorg copper expert answering my letter—eight months later. “Yes,” I answered. “OK,” he replied, “where we meet?” Since there was some picketing going on at Soviet consulates and offices, I asked him to meet me at my office.
In walked a rather young-looking man in his mid-forties, well-dressed (perhaps even overdressed), a typical Russian bureaucrat type. “Where we eat?” he asked immediately. On my sparse budget, I could not entertain him at La Côte Basque, so we dined instead at a nice local restaurant, where this supposed Russian copper expert downed three martinis in short order. A bit apprehensive lest the gin completely paralyze him before I had a chance to ask questions, I began to query him about the Soviet copper market.
I asked if Russian production was up-to-snuff? Did the Soviet Union produce sufficient surplus copper to export to the West in exchange for dollars? If so, how much copper was available for export? Did the country have an active copper scrap industry and was equipment available for this industry? Was transportation for copper and scrap in as bad a shape as I had heard? To my dismay, I quickly learned that, despite being an economist, Mr. X knew almost nothing about copper that hadn’t appeared in the Wall Street Journal, of which he was apparently an avid reader. I realized too late that this guy was a phony. Meanwhile, he was guzzling a couple more drinks (surprisingly not vodka). So we ended up talking about other things—China, for example, which at that time was very much on the outs with the Soviet Union. Other things, but not copper. The lunch ended amiably with him slapping me on the back and stating, “You good guy. We have lunch soon again.”
It was three months later, a raw cold day in January, when two FBI agents showed up at my workplace. The well-spoken men in pinstripes identified themselves and asked me politely if we could talk somewhere in private. Innocent me! I thought they had come to check on someone else and needed my opinion.
Sheltered in the privacy of my office, one of the agents quickly came to the point. “We would like to know all about your lunch with Mr. X last October,” he said, holding a small memo pad.
I listened in astonishment. “How did you know I had lunch with Mr. X?” The agent smiled. “Well, that wasn’t difficult, sir. Mr. X phoned you from his office, didn’t he? And his office, as it happens, is,” he hesitated, “wired.”
“Ah!” I said aloud, but inwardly I was thinking I had become a character in a spy novel. “And do you bug every Russian in New York?” I asked incredulously.
The second agent shook his head. “No. Only this one happens to be more than he appears. You see, sir, he’s a political agent, a well-known political agent, and one we’ve been keeping an eye on for some time.” He smiled depreciatingly. “And the trail led to you, sir.”
Worse and worse, I thought. It occurred to me that, for a political agent, Mr. X was certainly careless and drank a lot of martinis, a habit obviously already known to the FBI. “I thought he was a copper expert,” I replied, showing them my original letter to Amtorg and explaining my reason for meeting him.
The two FBI men guffawed. “Copper expert!” one of them said. “He isn’t even an economist, and he certainly doesn’t know a damn thing about copper. Look, if you wanted to know about the Soviet copper market, you should have contacted the CIA. The agency has metal experts on its staff, including an expert on copper who, I’m sure, knows all about the Soviet copper market.”
The things you learn about copper. Who would have thought the way to research the Soviet copper industry was via the CIA?
The agents had a few more questions. Then, evidently satisfied that my links to spies were nonexistent and were, in fact, innocently amusing, they shook my hand politely and left.
As for me, I never wrote that article about Soviet copper. But I did learn that the copper market—already an exciting arena—can sometimes even be the stuff of spy novels. •
Since the breakup of the Soviet Union, we commodity writers have been able to analyze to some extent the flow of copper and aluminum out of Russia to Western consuming points. While the available statistics still leave something to be desired, at least we have access to some figures.