Defections from the East to the West were hardly limited to LeCarre novels. But they were limited to some extent for the reason LeCarre makes clear. We never shot Philby's wife.

First, Agee never "defected" When he left the agency he published a lot of stuff - in Britain and then in the US - that would have required confirmation by the agency to prosecute him for revealing classified information. i.e. they would have to confirm the identities of the agents to successfully prosecute him.

second, there were more defectors from the East to the West than visa versa. If you count the number of people who relocated it would be laughably disproportionate. Not too many workers voluntarily stayed in the workers paradise. ( and I don't know about the bona fides of Penkovsky etc. Angleton was so crazy by then I couldn't imagine who had it right )

Besides Hansen and Ames and the Cambridge Spies( Kim Philby - who I sincerely hope is burning in the same special circle of hell as Hansen and Ames - Meridith, Burgess and Blunt ) defection to the East was never our major problem. Working in the West was just a much simpler environment for an intelligence officer than trying to penetrate a police state. Why bother inserting a mole when you can read about it the NY Times.

One of the ironies of being an agent in station is you are always looking to get someone else to betray their country. Granted, that is not the most savory of endeavors.

At one time in the US we had something of a 5th column in the American Communists who were themselves good people and couldn't believe Stalin wasn't ( Russian communists caught on more quickly ). But there was no similar 5th column in the Soviet Union.

Here you were brought in front of the House Unamerican Activities committee and then Hollywood wouldn't hire you. Over there you got a bullet in the basement of the Lubyanka.

>>But what Agee did was betrayal on a very personal level of a lot of people who did not deserve to be betrayed. Had he blown every Soviet and Cuban agent in the same sphere, perhaps an arguement could be made that he was just trying to clean up the game.
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>>In any case, i know a number of people who would probably violate their own embargo on travel to Cuba if it meant they'd have a chance to piss on his grave.
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>It's not a matter of how far did he go in his defection - had the roles been reversed (and how are we to know they never were?), wouldn't it be the same, just a different set of heads rolling, and a different bloc being betrayed, while the other bloc would be applauding the courageous freedom fighter? And a different set of tourists would be frustrated.
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>> But what he did came a lot closer to treason than whistle blowing. It didn't undo any evil - it just added to it.
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>Then kudos to the other side for having the power of persuasion. Note that he was at large in the UK for a number of years, publishing books. It's not that they were holding him in custody.
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>Funny though, that the symmetrical case never happened. Karla defected only in Le Carre's wet dream. Or is there one we know nothing about?