Washington ? The CIA, looking to double its ranks of clandestine operatives, recently graduated the largest class of new officers in the agency’s history, officials said.

They are, on average, 29 years old. One-third are women. About 12 percent are ethnic minorities. Three-quarters speak a foreign language with considerable fluency and 70 percent had never worked for the government or military, according to agency recruiting officials.

These rookie spies number in the scores, but the CIA says providing a more specific total will give other countries and groups too much information.

Some recruits gave up more lucrative jobs in the private sector, and one took a pay cut of close to $100,000, agency officials said. Their starting salaries are between $45,000 and $60,000 a year.

They are members of the first class enrolled after the Sept. 11 attacks. These men and women have completed background checks and training at the “Farm” — the officially unacknowledged site outside Williamsburg, Va., where recruits are taught the craft of intelligence work.

They graduated in June; many are assuming fake identities and heading overseas. Their job will be to steal secrets.

It is difficult work, says Steven Aftergood, a longtime observer of the CIA with the Federation of American Scientists.

“Basically, what you’re trying to do … is to persuade the other fellow to betray his country, to commit a crime, and to run the risk of severe penalty,” Aftergood said.

With the fight against terrorism and new interest in tracking weapons proliferation, the CIA is flush with new money and jobs to fill. But it takes a certain kind of mind to be a spy, agency officials said.

“Intelligence problems don’t tend to have sharp edges. They’re fuzzy, and they’re gray. That’s where we work,” said Bob Rebelo, the CIA’s chief of human resources.

Beyond the basics, the CIA always is in need of people proficient in foreign languages. The congressional inquiry into the Sept. 11 attacks concluded the U.S. intelligence community had a critical shortfall of linguists.

“If you walked into this room with 100 native Arabic speakers, I’d give them all offers this afternoon, if they had the other qualifications we need,” Rebelo said. “Same with Chinese. Same with Persian. Same with Urdu. Same with Pashto.”

Interest in working for the CIA rose after the Sept. 11 attacks. Between October 2001 and October 2002, the agency received 170,000 resumes, Rebelo said. An additional 100,000 have arrived since.