When you consider these things in retrospect, they seem faintly absurd. As an aside, I recently saw that film "Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy" and apart from the fact that the world of espionage (especially during the cold war) is as faintly absurd as the Berlin Wall, the film itself is an astonishingly dull event, not worthy of any of the accolades which its been given. For those who haven't seen it, the double agent is played by Colin Firth and I tell you this secret in the certain knowledge that you will not give a damn who the traitor was, or why he did whatever it was he did (and I've already forgotten what that was, as it was clearly a matter of supreme irrelevance for me, the film and humanity in general).