New York, Sep 14 (IANS) Russian spy Anna Chapman's secret weapon was sex and she "was expert at using her femininity" to seduce her prey, the spy's former lovers have revealed.

Chapman's departure from the US back to her home country as part of a spy-swap deal apparently left a few broken hearts in Manhattan -- but none of them seems to regret getting involved with the woman dubbed the "sexy spy".

According to the cbsnews.com., three men who had run-ins with the "femme fatale" spoke to Details magazine about the spy who entranced them and said that Chapman was adept at using her greatest weapon -- sex.

"She was an expert at using her femininity to get information," model Dennis Hirdt, who claims he never went past the flirtatious texting stage with Chapman, told the magazine.

"Little hand touches. Whispers. Maybe putting a hand on the cheek, or maybe 'by accident' lips rubbing against an earlobe."

Bill Staniford, the CEO of an online real estate company, said Chapman also had a way of entering a room that seemed to turn even the most focused businessman into a lovesick teenager.

"She knocked me out. There was something about her -- I think it might have been the red hair, or the way she walked, or her body. I was immediately like, 'My game's f****d. I can't focus on anything.' It's like 'mwah mwah mwah.' She kept on talking and I just kept on staring at her," said Staniford, a former marine who reportedly did intelligence work in Nicaragua, Columbia and Peru in the '90s.

Staniford, like many of her lovers, says that their relationship wasn't all business for the spy, according to Details.

"She might have been faking with the others but it was real with me."

Nonetheless, when Staniford saw the headlines about his redheaded beauty he had a moment of panic. However, he reassured himself that he had been careful, that she had not "knocked him out" that much.

He, though, does look like he was possibly targeted: one of the other female members of the spy ring, Cynthia Murphy, was his longtime accountant.

"I think she was a spy," he told the magazine. "However, I would bet you almost every single cent I own that she had no formal training in espionage and human intelligence."

"I feel bad for her. And I'm not exactly sure why. I just feel like she got used somehow," Staniford added.

The 28-year-old flame-haired girl was at the centre of the espionage ring busted in the US. She was deported to Russia in July this year as part of a swap deal held in Austria.