FBI Burying Doc Showing US Officials Stole Nuclear Secrets?

BoingBoing is reporting that the FBI may be burying the existence of a document that proves US officials stole nuclear secrets for eventual sale to Pakistan and Saudi Arabia. "One of the documents relating to the case was marked 203A-WF-210023. Last week, however, the FBI responded to a freedom of information request for a file of exactly the same number by claiming that it did not exist. But The Sunday Times has obtained a document signed by an FBI official showing the existence of the file. Edmonds believes the crucial file is being deliberately covered up by the FBI because its contents are explosive. She accuses the agency of an 'outright lie.'"

Comments

Gee...

[Black Parrot]

Government agency lies; news at 11.

Re:Gee...

[Captain Splendid]

How is that news?

Because for some reason, you Americans still seem to think the appropriate reaction is to ask for a little lube and not much else.

Re:Gee...

[GroeFaZ]

Right, and as we all know, there is no difference between "I did not have sex with this woman, Monica Lewinkski" and "No, this document that might prove if officials from our government are involved in trading nuclear weapon technology secrets with the country the 9/11 hijackers were from does not exist", the latter of which chosen because it happened within everyone's attention span, or so I hope. Nope, lies are lies, and now back to whatever is on TV right now.

Re:Gee...

[Leftist Troll]

You got the analogy wrong. Democrats want lube, Republicans like it bareback and dry. A little tearing builds character.

Re: Gee...

[wellingj]

In regards to the "How is that news" comment: This is down right shameful. Regardless if we expect it or not, we should know what they are lying about and why.

I would recommend the opposite of careful skepticism. Anger shown about even the slightest hint of any secrecy in government will let the government know that we won't stand for that kind of BS anymore. Or would you rather put your head in the ground and know that the government lies and that you or no one else cares to hold them accountable? Yea that will go along way to reducing the amount of lying. Let's just ignore it and hope they don't do it again. Seems like a great idea.

Re:Gee...

[ushering05401]

The fact that it is not a surprise is what makes it so heinous.

The initial reaction of outrage that a populace has after finding out something rotten about their gov is one of the strongest tools of a citizenry to police their representatives. See, if there is this sudden burst of emotional outcry politicians have to get all hands on deck to control the situation... not knowing how far or deep the populace is willing to pursue the issue they must fear the worst. Knowing the populace is acting on emotions causes those who want to keep their power to make wide sweeping and highly visible adjustments to the system to calm the emotional response.

Once that initial outrage is gone, the citizenry are reduced to working through channels controlled by the very people who are acting against their best interests.

Just a thought.

Re:Gee...

[belmolis]

I'm thinking that perhaps the claim is not that the governments of Turkey and Israel are involved, which, in the case of Israel at least, is implausible, but that the criminals involved are Turkish and Israeli nationals. It isn't clear which is meant, but this is a lot more plausible.

Re:Gee...

[Anonymous Coward]

My favorite joke of the post-Foley, Craig, (and about 100 others) era:

Q: How many Republicans can you fit in the closet?

A: Almost all of them!

Re:Gee...

[Hatta]

I know, it's sad when we can look at the Kenyan political system and wish ours worked as well. At least when elections are stolen there, the people give a shit.

Re:Gee...

[baldass_newbie]

Obligatory:
"We're dicks! We're reckless, arrogant, stupid dicks. And the Film Actors Guild are pussies. And Kim Jong Il is an asshole. Pussies don't like dicks, because pussies get fucked by dicks. But dicks also fuck assholes: assholes that just want to shit on everything. Pussies may think they can deal with assholes their way. But the only thing that can fuck an asshole is a dick, with some balls. The problem with dicks is: they fuck too much or fuck when it isn't appropriate - and it takes a pussy to show them that. But sometimes, pussies can be so full of shit that they become assholes themselves... because pussies are an inch and half away from ass holes. I don't know much about this crazy, crazy world, but I do know this: If you don't let us fuck this asshole, we're going to have our dicks and pussies all covered in shit!" - Gary Johnston, Team America: World Police

Instead of the BoingBoing snippet ...

[Daniel Dvorkin]

... try the original Times article..

The BoingBoing writeup is so irritatingly fragmentary it's hard to tell what it's even saying. Which is a good description of BoingBoing in general, actually.

Re:Instead of the BoingBoing snippet ...

[tm2b]

While that's true, the fraudulent response to the FOIA request is itself a notable issue.

Somebody needs to go to jail for that - the ability of citizens to keep tabs on their government is too critical to the functioning of our democracy for us to just shrug when that ability is circumvented.

Re:Instead of the BoingBoing snippet ...

[mjbkinx]

Not clear to me from either article how exactly the Times knows that this file does in fact exist? Is it from a document from that same whistleblower.

"But The Sunday Times has obtained a document signed by an FBI official showing the existence of the file."

If the Times claims they have that document, I tend to believe it. Owned by Murdoch or not, it's still one of the most respectable newspapers in the world -- and in this case, that they print it despite being owned by NewsCorp even adds some extra credibility to the story. :)

More attention

[xannik]

Maybe if CNN or another major news outlet picked this up it would gain the attention it deserves.

Re:More attention

[smittyoneeach]

Then again, maybe it is getting exactly the attention it deserves.
It's kind of hard to tell at this point whether the allegations of the existence of a file by a whistleblower amount to Watergate or Haditha.
If we swapped the media for the government, could we tell the difference on either end?

Re:More attention

[Manchot]

Keep in mind that Watergate didn't happen overnight. It's easy to forget (especially if you're like me and was born in 1986), but it unfolded over the period of a couple years, with legal battles to obtain documents and all. Mark Felt (a.k.a. Deep Throat) didn't just go to Woodward and Bernstein out of the blue: he did so after the story had already gained a lot of traction. It was a cumulative effect, and what started as a small story eventually led to the resignation of a president.

*Shudders with fear*

[naturalog]

If you think this is scary, try to imagine all the things that we don't know about.

Double standards...

[Philotechnia]

When a corporation operates with this kind of lack of transparency, it's called Enron. Why do accept this kind of behavior from our government?

Each American citizen has an investment in government, predicated on that whole "By the people" schtick that a few goofballs advanced. Why can't we see that a bunch of bureaucrats are causing this investment to depreciate more rapidly than the dollar?

Re:Double standards...

[Philotechnia]

I'm going to guess that we have a fundamental disagreement on what constitutes the best interests of national security.

I would imagine that a great many of those items classified as "matters of national security" are items that would damage the bureaucratic class, and would more or less do no harm to the security of the American people. Or, perhaps this abuse, if it exists, actually harms the people, by failing to show us what government truly is, and by keeping us ignorant and placated. After all, the bureaucratic class is damaged only by our indignation at its existence, no?

The specifications of advanced military technological research (i.e. the Manhatten Project), and the identities of covert operatives are the only two things off the top of my head that justify being classified. Note that this does NOT include the amounts spent on or general focus of military research, nor the purpose and spending on covert operations. I want to know what my government is doing, even in these areas, ESPECIALLY in these areas, because it is here that the greatest potential for abuse lies, in my opinion.

Re:Double standards...

[azrider]

The words "matter of national security" should carry a bit of weight.

This would be the case if the phrase (and it's cousin - Executive Privilege) were not used so frequently and so obviously to hide illegal/unethical actions on the part of members of the current (and former) administrations.

Re:Double standards...

[Philotechnia]

Well then, label our American democratic project a hypocracy and let's get on with it.

I'm not willing to be so cynical. I believe in the enlightened ideals upon which this country was built. I believe in the virtuous nature of a democratic-style government. I believe in the goodness of my fellow man, and in our capacity to come together and strive for something greater. Fundamentally, I believe in our ability to own our government, and make it work for us.

And I also believe we have a lot of work to do to get there.

The frontline battle is to get people to believe, to eschew a cynicism that does nothing but maintain the power of the status quo, and feel the sense of empowerment that our founding fathers intended us to have as citizens. To stop looking to government for answers and quick-fixes, but instead to participate in government to help seek common understanding and reach a social consensus on how to deal with harsh realities. To get people to believe that all races, genders, and generations are capable of this participation, and yet, recognizing that this is a skill, to mentor and train those who would seek further involvement.

I realize this is a utopian vision, to a great extent, and as such, I don't necessarily have my sights focused on an endpoint. Rather, this ongoing process of self-improvement, or the potential for this process, is what makes America great. We are a people that founded itself in the pursuit of something greater, and while our demise has often been proclaimed, wave after wave of generation has risen up to renew this pursuit. My vision is not for the endpoint, the realization of some grand society, but simply that this process that forms the strength of country not die out completely! And oh, how some in power would love to see this end...

To quote one of my favorite movies - I find your lack of faith disturbing. I understand cynicism, I see how people become frustrated with government, but I believe there's a better way.


Is Mr. Obama taking applications for speechwriters? :)

Re:Double standards...

[AeroIllini]

When you make everything illegal, no one obeys you.

When you make everything secret, no one trusts you.

Re:Double standards...

[Master of Transhuman]

I believe the case of faked documents you are referring to was not directed at Iraq but at Iran and is not related to the FBI case document under discussion in the Times article.

The CIA recruited a Russian scientist to deliver faked nuclear design documents to Iran. Most of the documents were genuine, but there were flaws in the design.

The problem was that the Russian scientist quickly identified the flaws and realized that not only would the Iranian scientists see them quickly, too, destroying the idea that they were legitimate, but that the rest of the design would be valuable to the Iranians. He pointed this out to his CIA handler, who dismissed the concerns as not important.

So the Russian, before delivering the designs to his Iranian connection at the IAEA, added notes to them pointing out the flaws in an effort to make the documents more believable. He did this without the knowledge of his handler, apparently.

It is clear from this that the intent as explained to the Russian of trying to fool the Iranians into building a flawed design was ITSELF a cover story. The real purpose was simply to get the plans into Iranian hands, thus justifying the concept that Iran had a nuclear weapons program (for which there is zero evidence other than a laptop the providence of which no one can ascertain, and which is very likely a forgery along the lines of the Niger documents.)

The document under discussion is totally different. An anonymous letter sent to The Liberty Coalition, a DC-based transpartisan civil and human rights watchdog organization. A subsequent Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, asking for information referring to that case number, resulted in a denial from the FBI that such a case exists. The letter referred to the FBI case document. The FBI case document, the contents of which Edmonds knows, was described by her as follows:

"The case in question, she told The BRAD BLOG, careful to avoid categorical defiance of her gag order, "concerns 1996 to 2002 information, targeting Turkish counter-intelligence, and it involves U.S. officials both appointed and elected."

What Edmonds has alleged, based on what she knows from documents she translated at the FBI, is that Marc Grossman, a State Department employee, tipped off the nuclear black marketers that Valerie Plame's organization was in fact a CIA operation. The anonymous letter which is referred to above also made this claim,

The document in question is an FBI case file, not a CIA operation. So it is not the same as the Iranian false flag operation.

Edmonds has made it clear that there is no "national security" involved in this situation. What is involved is the intent to protect certain elected and appointed government officials from charges of treason, which at the same time would embarrass several national governments such as Turkey, Israel, and others.

counting down the days until

[zappepcs]

She is labeled an International Terrorist, since they can't out her husband as a spy

10... 9... 8...

Art of War Chapter 13

[techpawn]

7. Hence the use of spies, of whom there are five classes: (1) Local spies; (2) inward spies; (3) converted spies; (4) doomed spies; (5) surviving spies.
8. When these five kinds of spy are all at work, none can discover the secret system. This is called "divine manipulation of the threads." It is the sovereign's most precious faculty.
9. Having local spies means employing the services of the inhabitants of a district.
10. Having inward spies, making use of officials of the enemy.
11. Having converted spies, getting hold of the enemy's spies and using them for our own purposes.
12. Having doomed spies, doing certain things openly for purposes of deception, and allowing our spies to know of them and report them to the enemy.
13. Surviving spies, finally, are those who bring back news from the enemy's camp.
14. Hence it is that which none in the whole army are more intimate relations to be maintained than with spies. None should be more liberally rewarded. In no other business should greater secrecy be preserved.

Oh yeah, we're so stupid that we're going to let some reporter just find this filing we're trying to hide... NOTHING TO SEE HERE!
The Art of war has been around since 5 BC, misinformation has been around longer than that...

arrgghhh

[revlayle]

Edmonds believes the crucial file is being deliberately covered up by the FBI because its contents are explosive.

PUNNED!

Re:arrgghhh

[Captain Sarcastic]

Would that make Edmonds a "pun"dit?

Re:It's a lie!

[jackpot777]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Read_my_lips:_no_new_taxes

Read my lips: no new taxes" is a now-famous phrase spoken by former American president and candidate George H. W. Bush at the 1988 Republican National Convention as he accepted the nomination on August 18. Written by speechwriter Peggy Noonan, the line was one of the most prominent soundbites from the speech. The pledge not to tax the American people further had been a consistent part of Bush's 1988 election platform, but its prominent inclusion in his speech cemented it in the public consciousness. The impact of the election promise was considerable, and many believe it helped Bush win the 1988 presidential election.

Once he became president, however, Bush was pressured by Democrats and some Republicans to raise taxes as a way to reduce the national budget deficit. Bush refused many times but was making no progress with a Senate and House that was controlled by Democrats. Bush later agreed to a compromise in which he worked with Congressional Democrats to raise several taxes as part of a 1990 budget agreement. This reversal caused great controversy, especially in the more conservative wing of the Republican Party. In the 1992 presidential election campaign, Pat Buchanan made extensive use of the phrase in his strong challenge to Bush in the Republican primaries. In the election itself, Democratic nominee Bill Clinton, running as a moderate, also pointed to the quotation as evidence of Bush's untrustworthiness, which contributed to Bush losing his bid for re-election.

All depends: if any political party, irrespective of the nation, actively campaigns on the platform that Government is a bad thing, of COURSE you're going to get bad government. It's the only truthful platform a lot of US politicians seem to have run on!

As for taxes? I saw the following online but can't find it on Google:

Warrantless wiretaps: illegal.

Phone companies profiting from the act: immoral.

Cutting the program because of unpaid bills: PRICELESS.

There are some things Governments can't buy. For everything else, there's taxes.

Retribution is on the way

[heroine]

Fortunately Iran stole nuclear secrets from US in time to fix the problems with US stealing nuclear secrets.

Other countries with nuclear secrets

[192939495969798999]

Why would we do that when it'd be much easier for Pakistan to buy secrets when we already more or less openly trade arms with them? i.e. we just finished a 20 billion dollar arms deal with Saudi Arabia... what can't 20 billion dollars worth of arms do that a nuke can do?

Pakistani nuclear head's comments in 2004

[br00tus]

From the New York Times:

Dr. Khan recounts how Western companies sold him whatever was desired. These were the same businesses, he says, that sold equipment to the nuclear enrichment facilities at Almelo, in the Netherlands, where Dr. Khan worked in the 1970's, and at Capenhurst, England:

While a lot of biased and unfounded propaganda is directed against us, the Western world never talked about their own hectic and persistent efforts to sell everything to us. When we bought inverters from Emerson, England, we found them to be less efficient than we wanted them to be. We asked Emerson to improve upon some parameters and we suggested the method .

At that time we received many letters and telexes and people chased us with figures and details of equipment they had sold to Almelo, Capenhurst, etc. They literally begged us to buy their equipment. We bought what we considered to be suitable for our plant and very often asked them to make changes and modifications according to our requirements.

US media will *not* touch this, probably ever

[Eternal Vigilance]

So it's up to the foreign press, in this case the Times Online. (Makes my head hurt that a Murdoch-owned outlet counts as the best source of investigative, or at least reportive, journalism.)

"The FBI has been accused of covering up a file detailing government dealings with a network stealing nuclear secrets" http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/article3216737.ece

Which was itself a follow-up to

"For sale: West's deadly nuclear secrets" http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article3137695.ece

Basically, the story was that Sibel Edmonds, an FBI translator listening to comm intercepts looking for Middle Eastern "terrorists," discovered evidence of a network of US, Israeli, Turkish and Pakistani nuclear weapons secrets trading. She's told the FBI - they fired her. She told Congress - they placed her under a gag order and threatened to jail her if she talked about it. She's even agreed to tell the story to any American media outlet (which means she's willing to go to jail so people can know), as long as the outlet agrees to tell the whole story, and not edit it to hide the truth. So far, all American sources have refused to cover the story.

Interesting tidbit - the CIA front company, "Brester Jennings," for which Valerie Plame worked before she was outed by Cheney and company, had as its mission tracking nuclear weapons activity in the ME. Outing Plame meant the Brewster Jennings cover was completely blown, like a wiretap being discovered. Which means that Plame's outing, with its supposed rationale as payback for exposing Bush's lies about Iraq and uranium, may have been nothing more than a convenient two-fer with a great cover story, when the real goal was to take out CIA assets who were getting too close to something far more important.

Sibel Edmonds' web site is http://www.justacitizen.com/>here.

"I'd say what she has is far more explosive than the Pentagon Papers." - Daniel Ellsberg

Re:Why would they have to steal nuclear secrets?

[dreamchaser]

The assertation is not that the FBI stole the secrets. The story alledges that the FBI covered up evidence that "high ranking US government officials" did the deed.

Nothing to see here. Move along.

[PPH]

Its not like we haven't slipped a few nukes to some of our allies in the Middle East before.

Which party will be embarrassed if it comes out?

[dpbsmith]

Won't someone at least hint at who those officials were, so that I can start making my ideological prejudgments on the credibility of the allegations?

Re:Art of War Chapter III

[techpawn]

17. Thus we may know that there are five essentials for victory:
(1) He will win who knows when to fight and when not to fight.
(2) He will win who knows how to handle both superior and inferior forces.
(3) He will win whose army is animated by the same spirit throughout all its ranks.
(4) He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared.
(5) He will win who has military capacity and is not interfered with by the sovereign.
18. Hence the saying: If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.

I hate it when people only quote half of it, like "judge, not lest ye be judged"
It's funny that the way to LOSE a war according to the art of war is to have the army in a distant land and run the people into recession in order to fund that war (that you should be using the supplies from the fallen army/land to restock).

Numb From the Neck Up

[Doc Ruby]

Can I have some of whatever drugs or videogames you're on? Because they must be pretty good for you to be bored by revelations that the US government is covering up theft of nuke secrets to threats like Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.

What does impress you, news of maybe an alien invasion?

Not so different

[jmichaelg]

They're both examples of obstruction of justice.

  There are even huge bribes involving both parties - i.e., Marc Rich's $1 million 'gift' to Bill Clinton in exchange for a pardon.

Corruption is corruption regardless of which party is practicing it.

Why the gag order?

[Pros_n_Cons]

I read about this the other day on fox so although you didn't see it on CNN other news sites apparently did.
People on slashdot haven't mentioned yet the reason for the gag order apparently is cause they want to investigate the officials and see whats going on.
I know its a good knee jerk reaction to yell conspiracy but if you caught a spy in your midst wouldn't you want to counter intel back instead of just firing him and posting the paperwork? This whistle blower might have blown an investigation for all we know.

Re:Why the gag order?

[Master of Transhuman]

No, you've got it entirely backward.

Edmonds WAS the "investigation." She was translating documents that had been mis-translated before by FBI personnel who were apparently in the pay of those being investigated. When she brought this to the attention of her superiors, she was fired in retaliation. The FBI internal affairs investigation confirmed this.

The "investigations" you are referring to were ongoing and were being sabotaged inside the FBI itself. The people involved even tried to recruit Edmonds to continue the sabotage, which she refused to do. Once she was fired and went outside the FBI to Congress, the DoJ gagged her.

There is nothing here involving "national security". The gag order was intended to prevent her from revealing that, as she puts it, "senior elected US officials" are engaged in wholesale treason. She has provided information to several US Senators in a secure facility inside Congress. She testified before the 9/11 Commission - and her testimony was reduced to a footnote in the final report. She was promised by Henry Waxman that her case would be number one on his list when the Democrats came to power in January - since then, his office has refused her calls.

The reality is that what she knows is so dangerous to the stability of the US government that I'm surprised she's still breathing - although of course if she ended up dead, that would be pretty much a problem for these people, too, especially as you can imagine she has some sort of "dead man" trigger set up so that the info gets revealed anyway.

I, personally, think she SHOULD just dump it all on her Web site. In fact, after the Time Online article two weeks ago, she posted several pictures of certain officials on her Web site without comment. You are supposed to understand that these are the people involved.

Without some sort of legal immunity, however, and given the Guantanamo situation, it obviously is a very great risk for her to just defy the ban without having enough public impact as a result that it would blunt any attempt to "disappear" her.

Kill the Messenger!

[HongPong]

Anyone on this thread should drop what they're doing and check out 'Kill the Messenger', a documentary produced for Canal+ Television by some French guys. They followed Sibel Edmonds around for a while and spelled out the basic scene here. Its an hour long on googlevideo:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1991080575212848283&q=kill+the+messenger&total=348&start=0&num=10&so=0&type=search&plindex=0

Also i have a special section on my website dedicated to the subject, tho the page is pretty half assed: http://www.hongpong.com/sibel_edmonds_9_11_the_turkish_spy_scandal

Essentially here is my understanding of what this weird scandal means:
Sibel edmonds was hired by the FBI shortly after 9/11 to digest the backlog of foreign-language wiretaps run by the counter intelligence division. However Sibel also could listen to English-language conversations recorded on those lines. Within three months she heard extensive conspiracies involving the American Turkish Council, which were being actively covered up by Melek Can Dickerson, who was working alongside Sibel in the translation unit.

However, there was also evidence that the FBI was tracking an international criminal network that includes the big name neocons (Feith and Perle among others) which was funnelling and covering for nuclear secrets pilfered from the national nuclear laboratories (ever notice their shitty security?) and routed to brokers in Pakistan, Turkey and Israel.

Additionally the Turks were caught by the FBI wiretaps doing cash/secret handoffs from the ATC to the State Department. Once 9/11 occurred, it seems that then-State Dept official Marc Grossman was helping get foreign spies who had foreknowledge of 9/11 out of the United States, after the FBI had become very interested in talking to these guys. The wiretaps and intelligence fragments finger real people - and Kill the Messenger details how Sibel was momentarily a famous 9/11 whistleblower because of this. 60 Minutes ran a special with very heavily edited footage and has never released the raw footage of the interview. (yes in fact even the highly controversial Israeli art student 9/11 conspiracy theory appears to fit here)

Finally, this criminal network was deeply opposed to the CIA's counter proliferation operations - attempting to block turkey and pakistan from getting more nuke bits. So therefore Scooter Libby fits in quite differently than widely known. He used to be a lawyer for billionaire israeli-american fugitive Marc Rich, the moneyman for arms trafficker Viktor Bout. These guys seem to roughly be part of this same network. There is apparently an FBI recorded conversation of Marc Grossman tipping off the Turks/and/or Pakis to Brewster Jennings' status as a covert front company. This was certainly treasonous!

Also there is an important revolving door dimension: lobbyists, retired generals, military industrial complex. Turkey is able to convert laundered drug money into funding for the military industrial purchases - its something like 25% of GDP.

this is all a great example of an orwellian cryptocracy getting tangled up in all the criminal evidence it observes. oops. kinda like the federal reserve logging all that drug money moving around.

i realize all of this sounds quite bottom-of-the-barrel everything and the kitchen sink kind of super conspiracy. But hey, it does in fact have odd threads that go back to the weirdest events of the Bush administration - and before. Sorry. I'm offering this stuff in good faith: there is just too much material to ignore.

Re:Possibly because of the Valerie Plame thing?

[Master of Transhuman]

It wasn't "inadvertent". That's the point.

Plame was never outed because of an attempt to use a charge of "nepotism" to discredit Joe Wilson. That cover story never made any sense. Who cares if the guy's wife was at the CIA and suggested him for the Niger investigation? It only barely made more sense if the concept was that the CIA was somehow deliberately sabotaging the Iraq war - which also never made any sense.

Plame was outed because her organization was investigating the nuclear black market including the A. Q. Khan network and its connections to Iran. That investigation would have inevitably led back to the people in the US State Department and the US nuclear agencies who were on the payroll of the black marketers. So Plame's operation had to be shut down.

Keep in mind that Scooter Libby was once Marc Rich's attorney - and Rich is supposed to be one of or the money man behind this operation. Exactly how deep Dick Cheney's involvement is unclear at this point, but there is no doubt that Marc Grossman at the State Department was involved in the outing, and it is likely that Libby got his information from him.