CASTRO’S SPIES
CASTRO’S SPIES
“WASHINGTON — The Justice Department charged Friday that a former State Department analyst and his wife worked as spies for Cuba for nearly 30 years, using a short-wave radio to pass on secret diplomatic information to their Cuban handlers.”
“The case had been under investigation for three years but intensified two months ago, when an undercover agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, posing as a Cuban agent, approached Mr. Myers. That led to a series of meetings in which the Justice Department said that Mr. Myers and his wife made incriminating admissions about their decades-long work for Cuba.”
“David Kris, the assistant attorney general for national security at the Justice Department, called the Myerses’ activity for Cuba ‘incredibly serious.’” [The New York Times, June 6th 2009]
“Walter Kendall Myers, 72, and his wife Gwendolyn Steingraber Myers, 71, are accused of conspiracy to hand over classified information to Cuba, serving as an illegal agent for a foreign government and wire fraud, the Department of Justice said in a statement.”
“The Washington couple were arrested on Thursday after an undercover FBI sting operation having allegedly passed on secrets for decades to Washington’s Cold War foe via shortwave radio and in shopping carts.”
“If found guilty, Myers, known as Agent 202 by Cuban intelligence officials, and his wife, Agent 123, face a maximum of 20 years in prison.” [AFP, June 5th 2009]
“With a Top Secret/SCI security clearance, he had daily access to classified information and viewed more than 200 intelligence reports about Cuba, according to the affidavit.”
“According to court documents, the two were recruited in 1979 by a Cuban official who directed Kendall Myers to pursue a job at either the State Department or the CIA.”
“Myers worked part-time at the State Department since 1977 and joined full-time in 1985, eventually working his way up to a position of senior analyst specializing in intelligence analysis on European matters.” [Reuters, June 5th 2009]
“They had met regularly over the years with Cuban officials in third countries and made a secret trip, using fake names, to the Caribbean nation in 1995. They even spent an evening that year with Cuba’s then-president, Fidel Castro, they told the agent. They received “lots of medals” from the Cuban government, apparently for passing along secret information, the court papers allege.”
“Myers said he removed information from the State Department by memory or by taking notes. “I was always pretty careful,” he told the agent, according to the court papers. “I didn’t usually take documents out.” [The Washington Post, June 6th 2009]
“James Cason, who headed the U.S. interests section in Cuba from 2002 to 2005, said the case is serious because Myers had one of the highest clearances. “If you can get someone into the intelligence bureau, you can have access to everyone’s intelligence, not only ours but of allies. The question is, what did they [Cuba] do with it?” he said. “Did it stay with them, or was it given to other countries, as well?”" [The Washington Post, June 7th 2009]
Another Castro Spy…
“Ms. Montes, the chief Cuba analyst since 1992, was in a position to know ’90 percent of what we’re doing in Cuba on an intelligence front and everything we know about Cuba,’ said an official who follows Cuba. ‘It’s the crown jewels, if you will.’
Among those secrets was an intelligence-gathering operation known as a ‘special access program’ that was so secret that the F.B.I. withheld its details in the criminal complaint. In a message that the F.B.I. partly recovered from her home computer, Ms. Montes said she and one colleague were ‘the only ones in my office who know about the program,’ the complaint said.”
“Ms. Montes is the highest American official accused of spying for Cuba. The case could go far in explaining how efforts by the United States to penetrate Cuba’s tightly controlled society were thwarted in the last decade.” [The New York Times, September 23rd, 2001]
She had “access to documents from intelligence agencies other than the DIA, not only related to Cuba, and conceivably involving US antiterrorist tactics. The concern of the intelligence community is that the information she might have passed on to Havana might in turn have been transmitted to such Castro allies as Iraq, Iran, Syria, or Libya.” [Cristian Science Monitor, November 28th, 2001]
“The FBI affidavit said Montes, employed by the DIA since 1985 and currently the senior analyst on Cuban matters, received encrypted instructions by radio from her Cuban handlers and often responded with telephone calls she placed from pay phones in department stores and, on one occasion, at the National Zoo. Sometimes she also passed and received computer diskettes containing encrypted messages, the FBI said.”
“Montes also provided useful information to Cuba about a December 1996 war games exercise conducted by the Navy’s U.S. Atlantic Command, officials said. She observed the exercise herself and provided details about “contingency plans and specific targets” that were classified “secret,” the affidavit stated.” [Los Angeles Times, September 22nd 2001]
Red Wasp Network
“Five members of a 14-member espionage team called “La Red Avispa” — the Wasp Network — are on trial in a Miami federal courtroom following an exhaustive FBI investigation.”
“The Wasp Network engaged in a wide range of activities, including locating vulnerable points of entry into the state of Florida for the importation of arms and explosives, infiltration of the U.S. Southern Command, and the attempted subversion of anti-Communist organizations in the U.S.” [World Net Daily, January 9th 2001]
“Five others accused of being spies pleaded guilty and are expected to testify against their former comrades.”
“Their assignment: to “penetrate” or burrow into the community, including the Cuban American National Foundation and key military sites such as the Southern Command, which oversees U.S. military activities in Latin America and the Caribbean.” [The Miami Herald, December 25th 2001]
“None of the jurors is Cuban- American, so they probably would not be expected to know that the Directorate of Intelligence, or DI, is Cuba’s main foreign espionage agency.” [The Miami Herald, January 12th 2001]
Spies at Florida International University
“According to federal prosecutors, the Alvarezes — who were arrested Friday at their South Miami home — used the codenames “David” and “Deborah” to communicate with Cuba’s Directorate of Intelligence, the communist island nation’s espionage agency.”
“Prosecutors said the couple sent information via shortwave radio, using an encryption system furnished by their spymasters. They also allegedly carried messages to and from Cuba in secret briefcase compartments.”
“In statements that prosecutors said were tantamount to a confession, Alvarez reportedly acknowledged working for the Cubans since 1977, and his wife since 1982. They began their alleged spying activities separately, before they married in 1980, Assistant U.S. Atty. Brian K. Frazier said.” [The Los Angeles Times, January 10th 2006]
“Federal prosecutors allege that for nearly three decades, they used their cover as employees at a local university to spy on fellow Cuban exiles, transmitting that information to Havana. The indictment reads like a Cold War spy saga, complete with code names, encryption devices and secret meetings in third countries.” [National Public Radio, January 25th 2006]
