Are spys real

Answer 1

Absolutely, and spies are a huge problem which is why, in time of war, you're allowed to shoot them. There are three kinds of people doing intelligence work: officers, agents and spies. An intelligence officer is someone on our side performing intelligence work against the enemy. The people in our intelligence community are intelligence officers.

An intelligence agent is someone on the other side performing intelligence work against us. KGB employees were intelligence agents to us, and intelligence officers to the Soviets. (OTOH, to the Soviets a CIA officer was an intelligence agent.)

A spy is someone on our side performing intelligence work against us. Spies break down into two classes: spies and double agents. A double agent--which most "spies" are--is an intelligence officer who's collecting against...oh, say the North Koreans...while at the same time spying on us and reporting to the North Koreans. James Hall is a prime example of a doubled agent; while assigned to Field Station Berlin, he worked against the Soviets, but at the same time he was selling information on how we operated against the Soviets to them. He'll be in jail for the rest of his life. A pure spy is someone who's providing information to the enemy, but not collecting against them. The Rosenbergs were pure spies--they provided a lot of information to the Soviets on nuclear weapons development, but since they weren't intelligence officers they weren't collecting against the Soviets.

A fun story about an attempt to recruit a spy gone very, very wrong: in the 1960s the Soviets were building the Tupolev 144 supersonic transport, which was to be their answer to the Concorde. They weren't doing well on some things so tried espionage. One of the things they were having trouble with was tires, and they attempted to hire a maintenance worker at Paris Orly Airport to get them rubber debris from Concorde tires. The maintenance worker contacted French intelligence, who contacted scientists at the Michelin company, who made a batch of the worst rubber ever invented for the Soviets.

Answer 2

Please elaborate... but technically yes.

Answer 3

yes

Answer 4

yes