A Personal Perspective on Ion Mihai Pacepa Commentary A man walked into the American Embassy in West Germany in late July, 1978. He said he was a senior officer in an Eastern European Intelligence Service and wanted to defect to the United States. Would he be accepted? The CIA people needed his name. If he identified himself, he said he could never return home. He walked outside and pondered his future. Finally, he went back in and told them he was Lieutenant General Ion Mihai Pacepa, Acting Director of the Romanian Foreign Intelligence Service, the DIE. Few were familiar with his name, and no one knew what he looked like. It was a poser.