John Daniel

The SIS determined the profiles were probably written by Dr Such and handed on to the KGB as information that could be used for recruitment. We debated whether or not to give you these names. They are, as far as we know, entirely innocent people who happened to be in senior public service roles at the time Such was working for the Soviets. So there is perhaps no sense in dragging them into this.

But on the other hand, this is how many of the big stories in our nation's history evolve. Bit by bit, we learn more. And with the addition of each chapter, a more detailed picture emerges.

His sympathies, therefore, have to be kept very quiet, and he himself is very careful at expressing his left-wing views. However, he is most sympathetic to the Soviet Union. The twist is that, for whatever reason, Bill Such was found not guilty in court. And as a result, the case is still considered a grey area, even by those who have been in the seat of power presiding over the intelligence agencies.

At the time, it was an enormous schism in New Zealand society. Left and right people lined up and said, reds under the beds, or you guys are guilty. I mean, it was a time of real danger, I think, and we're seeing it a little bit again now. I mean, do you hear an echo there? Is there a danger in terms of the intelligence services not being able to be trusted by the New Zealand population?

When you set such great store on secrecy, when it's built deep into the roots of the culture, any exposure is going to feel dangerous.

But as it turned out, his fears and the fears of the SIS around these secret identities being revealed were never realised. Everyone forgot about Mr S and Mr T and Mr X and we just got on with our jobs. And so in 1979, four years on from the such trial, even after having been publicly outed, Kit Bennett is able to go into a secret role.

determined that I didn't want a little silver fern added to it. This is the famous CIA memorial wall in the entrance to the main old building there with rows of stars, each one representing an individual CIA officer who died on active duty.

More than 20,000 people work there across a whole range of jobs, everything from IT to management. Yeah, you have a lot of analysts. It's a particularity of CIA in terms of Western intelligence to have so many people sifting through information they get from the field, cross-cutting that with local media and so on. You also have the case officers, many if not most of whom will be attached to embassies.

And we talk about CIA officers when we mean people who actually work for the agency, don't we? The agents are the people who get recruited, most often foreigners prepared to pass on secrets. That's right. When it comes to the people we often think of in terms of CIA, the deep cover operatives, they're really a very small percentage. The numbers are not publicly available. They've been estimated differently at different times, anywhere from 70 to perhaps a couple of hundred.

to get the knock list. Holy mother of God. The knock list. Yeah, this is the central MacGuffin in the story. Someone has stolen the list of CIA officers operating under non-official cover. And then Tom Cruise, as Ethan Hunt, has to steal it again for some reason. I'd be surprised if all those identities were really compiled into quite such a convenient target. But it does make for some high stakes. He's stolen.

It's in the open! Anyway, as you've probably guessed by now, when Kit Bennett goes to Langley, joins the CIA as an exchange officer and starts his training, he isn't going to be an analyst or an IT guy or hang around in the office. Kit Bennett is going to become a NOC.

Original music by Anthony Tonin, graphic design by Oliver Wall. For RNZ, sound production and final mix was by Mark Chesterman. Production coordinator was Brianna Euretich-Greek. Thanks to Steve Burridge, Ali Marsden, Jeremy Ansell and William Saunders. Thanks to Megan Whelan and thanks also to Susan Baldacci.

The visual director at RNZ was Cole Easton Farrelly and our camera operator was Jess Charlton. Thanks also to Sarah Gaitanos for the article about Bill Such that appears on rnz.co.nz. Thanks also to CNN, TVNZ, BBC, the ABC, Universal and Paramount. To read more about the documents and articles we've mentioned, you can go to rnz.co.nz forward slash the agency and you can see the links in the show notes.