June 8, 2009: In Germany, an Iranian born Canadian citizen was convicted to smuggling ballistic missile components to Iran, and was sentenced to three years in prison. The Germans aren't releasing many details, because the smuggler had long been one of their prime spies in Iran. The spy, code named Sinbad, worked for German intelligence for over a decade, and was paid more than $1.4 million for the information is delivered. In that time, the Germans received lots of good (later verified) data on Iranian weapons projects via Sinbad.

The Germans apparently believe that Sinbad was really their spy, and simply got into the smuggling because the money was too good to resist. Other Western intel officials believe Sinbad was actually working for Iranian intelligence, and was simply feeding the Germans what they wanted to see. But the Germans are taking no chances, and are shipping Sinbad off to a third country to serve his sentence in secret. Apparently, the Germans believe that if they don't protect Sinbad from the wrath of Iranian counter-intelligence (which, in the past, has killed Iranians it caught spying for the West), they will have a harder time in the future recruiting others to spy inside Iran.

Sinbad's smuggling activities explain how Sinbad was able to get access to such useful documents and photos of Iranian weapons projects. Sinbad had always told his German handlers that he simply had a lot of good contacts inside Iran.