Men of Mystery

Operation Spy

Washington D.C.'s Spy Museum has an appeal that spans generations

By Peter Golkin

Call it the irony of spycraft. The last thing a real secret agent would wear to prowl the landmarks and alleys of Washington D.C. is a sweatshirt emblazoned with the letters "CIA." But pieced together through a web of pulp novels, dimly lit matinees and sporadic headlines, it's no secret to thousands of teens and adults: Spies are a special breed and Washington is their natural habitat.

Such thinking made spywear a must-have look, and now inspires the city's archetype 21st-century museum attraction.

The International Spy Museum (ISM) has done some pretty sharp intelligence work here. In just five years, it's become one of the most alluring stops on the Washington tourist trail, drawing more than 3 million people since its opening-despite a healthy $16 admission fee in a city known for gobs of free culture. Many of the folks in charge are veterans of the spook trade. They know how to capture an audience, which builds at the sidewalk rope line well before doors open, followed by waves of reinforcements throughout the day.

The museum itself is a master of disguises. Its home is camouflaged, a high-tech complex hidden behind the quaint Victorian facades of five 19th century buildings in Washington's rejuvenated Penn Quarter. Like its architecture, the museum's appeal spans generations.

The heart of its success is the largest collection of genuine espionage gear ever placed on public display. Whether you're seven or 70, it's hard to look away from a KGB lipstick pistol and its potential kiss of death. The same holds true for the poison gas gun, the buttonhole camera, the "rectal tool kit" and the exploding coal used by American agents to derail enemy trains and sabotage factories during World War II.

Along with less-lethal but still essential tools—encryption machines and listening devices—there is an unprecedented selection of once-secret documents, like George Washington's handwritten order launching a New York spy ring during the Revolution.

Shoe with concealed transmitter. USSR, KGB issue, 1960s.

A natural energy between hardware and history plays throughout the galleries. Artifacts lead to video commentary from real intelligence officers; computer simulations blend seamlessly with exhibit designs evoking pre-microchip eras. The ISM thrives in telling the richly detailed "secret history of history."

It's up to the visitor to decide how deep to go. Signs in the lobby suggest allotting two hours for the full Spy Museum experience, but that's a risky assessment. There's an angle on espionage for everyone. Young provocateurs will gravitate toward the museum's crawl-through air ducts, listening stations and time-lapse lessons on disguise. Their chaperones will pause to consider such unlikely intelligence players as catcher Moe Berg and kitchen legend Julia Child.

Such truths may be stranger than fiction, but the ISM makes room for both and doesn't cover up the differences. A re-creation of James Bond's tricked-out Aston Martin DB5 from "Goldfinger" celebrates the world's most famous secret agent and the spy explosion set off by his creator, Ian Fleming, half a century ago. The flickering images of the pop-culture spy—007, the Avengers, the Man from UNCLE, I-Spy, Maxwell Smart, Austin Powers, even the charming tin toy arsenal inspired by J. Edgar Hoover's G-Men-complement but never upstage the museum's real-life, real-stakes discussions.

Stolen atomic secrets, and unfettered turncoats like Aldrich Ames and Robert Hanssen, receive the deadly serious treatment they deserve. At one point, visitors find themselves in an austere room dedicated to the Cold War's balance of terror. Sudden flashes back-light images, including those of Einstein and the Rosenbergs, followed by an ominous, pulsating countdown in English and Russian that gives pause even to those born after the Berlin Wall came down.

As the tour concludes, the intelligence game of the 21st century is presented as high-definition mystery, in a video program dubbed "Ground Truth." No museum could keep up with the shadowy events of today, let alone put them in proper context. But like all vibrant institutions, the ISM has left room for growth.

And espionage is a growth industry. According to the museum, $5 billion worth of serious consumer spy gadgetry is sold worldwide every year. The exhaustive 5,000-square-foot museum store moves its share of directional microphones and night-vision goggles, along with a compelling cache of books, DVDs, collectables, toys and apparel.

Want the folks at home to know you've returned from Washington with your own tales of intrigue? Try the t-shirt that puts you a few steps ahead on the irony curve: "International Spy Museum—I Was Never There."

Peter Golkin lives and works in Virginia. Like Ian Fleming, he once worked as a journalist for Reuters.

Operation Spy

Visitors to the ISM's permanent exhibition are invited to adopt a "cover" and maintain it at interactive stations throughout the galleries. For those who wish to take contemporary role-playing to a higher level, the museum recently launched a more concentrated, immersive experience.

Requiring a separate admission fee, Operation Spy offers an hour of on-your-feet, split-second decision-making. The premise is that you're an American intelligence officer seeking a missing nuclear device in the fictional nation of Khandar. Among the tests and turns offered up through live action, video and special effects: cracking a safe, administering a polygraph test to a suspect agent, performing electronic surveillance and penetrating a high-security compound. The adventure is said to be "based on actual cases drawn from intelligence files."

The ISM offers solid alibis for a return visit. Themed tours of Washington, lectures, films, book-signings and summer camps fill the museum's calendar of public events—and they're not all kid stuff. One recent "Spy School Workshop" was a primer on body language presented by a pair of genuine government interrogators. The ticket price included the added punctuation of beer, wine and hors d'oeuvres. Other recent talks have covered the intelligence world's use of conspiracy theories, a new take on the murder of Leon Trotsky, and former CIA director James Woolsey's reflections on the agency at age 60.