Leaks
posted at 10:01 pm on June 23, 2006 by Bryan
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At least this leaker got caught:
A former Defense Intelligence Agency analyst has pleaded guilty to illegally holding classified documents and admitted in a plea agreement to passing “top secret” information to Chinese intelligence officials.
These days, Chinese intelligence officials don’t have to conduct deals with slime. They just have to read the New York Times, and they’ll learn all they need to know.
Ronald N. Montaperto, the former analyst who held a security clearance as a China specialist at a U.S. Pacific Command research center until 2004, pleaded guilty to one count of unlawful retention of national defense information, according to court papers and law officials familiar with the case, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
“Montaperto admitted to verbally providing [Chinese military] attaches a considerable amount of information that was useful to them, including classified information,” according to a statement of facts submitted in the case.
Verbally? He had a conversation with them, and faces charges after admitting it? Boy, must he feel stupid now for pleading guilty and for talking directly to Chinese officials. All he had to do was talk to reporters, and he’d be in the clear. And China would still probably have learned all it wanted to know.
Note how long it took to catch this turncoat:
Montaperto, 66, joined the DIA in 1981 and eight years later sought a post at the CIA that eventually led to suspicions he was a spy for China. An investigation of his links to Chinese intelligence in 1991 was dropped for lack of evidence.
He had been part of a DIA program involving authorized contacts with Chinese embassy officials. However, the statement said Montaperto failed to report his contacts, as required by security rules.
After leaving DIA, Montaperto continued in government at the National Defense University and then became the dean of the Pacific Command think tank until his dismissal in 2004.
He first aroused suspicions in 1989, was investigated in 1991 and escaped that dragnet. Do we have 17 years to wait to catch the traitors who keep leaking to the Times?
I doubt it. If they keep leaking at the pace they’re leaking at right now, and if the Times keeps blabbing everything it can get its paws on, we don’t have that long. New York or some other US city will be a radioactive crater by then.
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Or board U.S. warships conducting naval exercises in the Pacific.
Does everyone have to lose their mind at the same time, or can they at least take turns?
RD on June 23, 2006 at 11:37 PM
Good point, though I suspect that letting them watch those exercises was a none too subtle reminder that the ChiComs can talk big, but can they really put an armada at sea that has any chance of dealing with what we have?
Er, at least I hope that’s why there were Chinese officers watching those exercises from our ships.
Bryan on June 23, 2006 at 11:40 PM
But he’s been doing it for over a decade!!! Too bad we didn’t get him a long time ago.
Warner Todd Huston on June 24, 2006 at 1:36 AM
I sincerely hope not.
The reason for these leaks, clearly, is animus against George W. Bush.
The way to stop it is to put the leakers to the MSM in prison, as well as those media editors, publishers, and reporters who insist on printing classified information as part of their “gotcha” game against Bush.
It is not in the public interest to place American lives in danger, and Keller is lying when he says it is.
In fact, I consider the disclosure of classified information that costs Americans their lives to be treason, as in “adhering to [our] enemies, giving them aid and comfort.”
I have long held the belief that treason, partisan anger born of unhappiness that your candidate lost an election, is the worst form of treason possible — worse than treason for economic gain and treason based upon an individual’s ideology.
I no longer question the loyalty of the leakers and the editors, publishers, and reporters in question.
I know exactly where they stand — they want Al Qaeda to win.
georgej on June 24, 2006 at 3:38 AM
Liberals, by their own deliberate actions, will eventually force the government to prosecute certain media and the accompanying leakers, thereby bringing to fruition their long touted pseudo-mantra that Bush is attempting to bypass the Constitution and “destroy” civil rights.
They’re pushing the envelope hoping Bush choose’s to prosecute. The only winning hand Bush has is if he can provide direct evidence of harm done as a result of publishing classifed national security information.
Since I’m not the President, I would choose to gather up all the leakers and publishers and ship them off to Iraq or Afghanistan where their al Qaeda hosts would show their appreciation by cutting their heads off quickly instead of slowly and painfully.
darwin on June 24, 2006 at 11:31 AM
Ya’ll are wrong..wrong…wrong…!
Don’t you see? Leaking classified information is protected by the U.S. Constitution where it says “Love thy enemy.”
No..wait a min…..!
Kokonut on June 24, 2006 at 4:02 PM
These leaks need to be closed. Permanently. The leaker’s should be tried for treason, if guilty, taken out and hung immediately. The President needs to take this seriously and make it known there is a full scale investigation under way. Hire the same people who found the spot on Monica’s dress.
Wade on June 24, 2006 at 7:11 PM
Persecuting the news paper really canno solve the problem. The leaker is the problem.
If no newspaper wanna print their story, they could send the story to Al Jezerra or BBC!
Therefore we must get the leaker!
easy87us on June 24, 2006 at 10:05 PM
The NY Times is doing it again. Read it an weep.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/25/world/middleeast/25military.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all&oref=slogin
Remember that Kevin Nealon SNL skit I cited yesterday?
It is hard to imagine what could be more damaging then TELLING THE ENEMY OUR PLANS!!
As I wrote in the other thread, unless MANAGEMENT and the REPORTERS involved at the NY Times go to jail, this stuff will continue. Sulzberger and Keller fully intend to insure that the USA loses the war on terror.
georgej on June 25, 2006 at 9:38 AM
Wade – I’m with you on rooting out the leakers and hanging every one of the bas***ds.
The problem is that this administration has shown no real desire to dig these traitors out and punish them accordingly. This also goes for the illegal immigration problem. They arrest a few illegals just for show and then immediately free them with only a promise that they will show up later for a court trial. End of story. This is disgraceful. What about the woman they fired from the CIA recently for leaking info to one of the treasonous newspapers. Why hasn’t she been jailed and charged with treason? I’ll answer my own question – because the are not going to charge her. She walks because nobody has the guts to bring her to trial. This must end. These people will never stop leaking until the government shows that they will not stand for this any longer. Let’s set an example with at least one of these traitors and see if the rest want to keep leaking.
God bless America!!
OBX Pete on June 25, 2006 at 11:56 AM
Postscript to my comments – NO PLEA BARGAINING!
OBX Pete on June 25, 2006 at 11:59 AM
We have a dilemma here. The DOJ may be running into a hell of negative pubilicity from the MSM is they prosecute NY Times.
But by hauling NY Times to the court we could sqeeze out the leaker.
After serious thought ( with at least two beers),
I am all for it. Prosecute NY Times.
easy87us on June 25, 2006 at 2:20 PM
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