Ryan Fogle, the erstwhile Colgate frat bro turned alleged undercover CIA spy, is being kicked out of Russia after being caught trying to recruit a Russian intelligence official on Monday night while wearing the world’s least-convincing wig. Experts in the United States have a lot of doubts about this story: the bad wig, the spammy letter of recruitment, the compass (a compass??) that Fogle was supposedly carrying with him.
So it’s not clear how much of what has been presented as true is actually true. But one potential explanation for Fogle’s mission is that he was trying to get information on the Tsarnaev brothers. In a video of Fogle’s interrogation, released by the FSB, the man Fogle sought to recruit is identified as being “involved in fighting terrorism in the Northern Caucasus,” where the Tsarnaevs hail from and visited. The Kommersant newspaper suggests that the CIA wanted “personal contacts with anti-terror agents, given that the exchange of information in the form of question and answers between special services is not always quick and smooth.” It’s also possible this entire narrative is as phony as Fogle’s wig.
