Glossary of Terms

ADIC

(pronounced "ay-dick".) Assistant Director. There are ten publicly known Assistant Directors of the FBI.. 

The Agency

The CIA. Also, "the Company", "Intelligence", and "penny-loafers." Rarely refers to the NSA.

Agent

1. An employee of the FBI. (The corresponding term in the CIA and NSA is 'officer'.) 2. In intelligence, someone besides an intelligence officer who provides intelligence.

Asset

Any human or technical resource.

Backstop

In-depth cover stories. For example, if someone is investigating an agent, and goes to their fictional place of business, and the agency has put a false business with false employees there, they are said to have 'run up against the backstop'.

Balloon

To leave the office for the afternoon, to leave the office early.

Betty Bureau

A female employee "married to the Bureau", generally support staff, but occasionally applied to an agent.

Blowback

When propaganda in another country is picked up by domestic news services and spread as truth in this country. For example, if the CIA spreads rumors that the President of Honduras is about to be overwhelmingly voted out, and the New York Times prints it as a news story, that's "blowback."

Bluebooks

National Intelligence Estimates, bound in blue covers, generally address a specific topic. They are of varying security classifications.

Bogie

In counterintelligence, a visitor to an official establishment whose identity is not known. Also, 'stray'.

Brick Agent

A field agent, also called a "street agent".

Bubird

A Bureau airplane or helicopter.

Bucar

(pronounced "Boo-car"). Bureau vehicle. Also "Buc" ("boo-see") and "Busteed" ("boo-steed"). One of the "Three B's". See below.

The Bureau

The FBI. Few agents refer to it any other way when speaking to other agents.

'BZ'

Hallucinogen approximately ten times the strength of LSD, used in experiments on US soldiers by the CIA.

Case Agent

The agent in charge of a particular case. Generally only assigned to high-profile or extremely wide-ranging cases.

Case Death

When a case fails for mysterious reasons, leads going nowhere, etc.

CI

Criminal Investigation. (pronounced "see-eye") A division of the Bureau.

COMINT

Communications Intelligence

CONUS

Continental United States

Cousins

British intelligence slang for the CIA.

Customers

In the intelligence world, policymakers and elected officials.

Creds

Short for credentials. See "roast beef".

Dry Cleaning

Attempting to detect surveillance.

ELINT

Electronic Intelligence.

The Farm

The CIA training facility near Williamsburg, VA, operated under the guise of Camp Peary. Also, a private intelligence training facility outside Atlanta, Georgia, operated mostly by former federal intelligence officers.

FCI

Foreign Counterintelligence. A slight misnomer, but plain "CI" means Criminal Investigation, so no change has been made. (pronounced "eff-see-eye")

Feebie

In the intelligence community, a FBI agent. Often abbreviated to "feeb."

The Firm

MI-6, the British foreign intelligence service.

Flutter

To use a polygraph examination with extremely stressful and/or personal questions and/or accusations in intelligence personnel testing.

40 Committee

An interdepartmental committee which sets the secret foreign policy agenda for the United States, including the action of the CIA.

Four-bagger

Internal discipline standard for the Bureau: censure, transfer, suspension and probation.

The Game

Intelligence work.

HBO

High Bureau Official. Informal term.

Honey Trap

Sexual blackmail.

Hush Puppy

In intelligence, a silenced automatic pistol whose action has been altered to prevent it from ejecting an empty shell after firing. In more general gun parlance, a weapon expressly designed to work with a silencer.

The Institute

The Mossad, the Israeli intelligence service.

KMA

Short for "kiss my ass", active agents who have passed the retirement age.

Knuckle Dragger

Military personnel assigned to intelligence work.

Legend

A cover story, including documentation.

Linear Drawer Foot

The amount of paper it takes to fill a one-foot-long file drawer completely. Example: A House Armed Services Committee in 1969 discovered that there were 517 linear drawer feet of unalayzed intelligence regarding Southeast Asia on file with various US intelligence agencies.

Mahogany Row

The high-security area of the J. Edgar Hoover building in Washington DC. An elaborate security process must be done to enter the area: top secret documents are viewed there, and the FCI program often operates from the area. 

Make

To recognize someone. As in "I've been made." or "I've made the subject."

NID

National Intelligence Daily, an UMBRA TOP SECRET document that summarizes the main intelligence items of the previous day. About 200 copies are printed.

Ninja

A SWAT team member in full gear.

Notional

In intelligence, ficticious.

OPR

Office of Professional Responsibility. The FBI internal inspection body, which investigates the activities of the Bureau. 

Parole

A prearranged verbal exchange by which intelligence personnel identify each other. What is in layman's terms, 'sign and countersign'.

PHOTINT

Photographic Intelligence.

RADINT

Radar Intelligence.

Rent-A-Goon

Informal term for agents from other field offices temporarily assigned to an investigation. Not derogatory, believe it or not.

Resident Agency

A smaller satellite of a field office, employing anywhere from one to twenty agents. Agents assigned to Resident Agencies are called "RA"s (like the Agency itself,) or "Resident Agents". See "SARA"

Roast Beef

Credentials, or, to show credentials, as in "I roast beefed the subject." There is, of course, a story behind this term.

SAC

Special Agent in Charge, pronounsed "ess-ay-cee". 

SARA

Special Affairs Resident Agent. Pronounced "Sair-uh".

Sheep-Dip

To be sheep-dipped is to resign an overt military post for reasons of covert operations with the understanding that you would be returned to overt military duty after the operation is concluded. Sometimes, arrangements are made so that time spent on the covert operation counts towards pension and retirement time.

Soap

Sodium pentothal. Rarely used to refer to other interrogation drugs.

Soundman

Agent who places electronic surveillance equipment.

Split-Tails

Term for female agents. Also "skirts" (no joke) and, a term originating in California, "breast-Feds".

The Three B's

The three things most likely to get an FBI agent in trouble: booze, broads and Bucars. (See "Bucar")

Too-Hard Box

A mythical box between "In" and "Out" for impossible cases. Assistant Director Levy of Special Affairs supposedly has one.

UACB

Unless Advised to the Contrary by the Bureau.

Unsub

The unknown subject of an investigation.

Wise Men

National Intelligence Officers, a small group of senior intelligence officials who prepare "blue books" of varying security levels for policymakers from intelligence sources.