March 5, 2005 by s.z.

Franklin.  Larry Franklin.

Here's part of Joel Mowbray's Townhall column entitled "Not spies after all—how the Washington Post got it wrong" (it's from April 12, 2005):

Stories on Larry Franklin, dual loyalties, and espionage for Israel look more far-fetched with each passing day.

[...]

Clearly, the Post was wrong about impending arrest and prosecution.  And the fact that he is still at work could—and to average readers, probably would—be taken as a sign that there is not overwhelming evidence of espionage and that he is not considered a particularly grievous threat to national security.

Back in September, Lowry claimed that the matter involved nothing "beyond mishandling of classified document."  And then last month Joel claimed that even that case was apparently dead in the water.

So, let's see what's in the news today.  Why here's an intriguing-sounding SF Chronicle story: FBI: Pentagon Analyst Passed Secret Info.  Let's read the first couple of paragraphs:

A four-year investigation into whether Israel improperly obtained U.S. secrets produced its first criminal charge with the arrest of a Pentagon analyst. Authorities are trying to determine whether any classified information reached Israel.

Larry Franklin was charged Wednesday with providing top-secret information about potential attacks against U.S. forces in Iraq to two executives of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the influential pro-Israel lobbying group.

Oooh, Joel, if only you had waited another month, you wouldn't look like such a dummy now.  Heck, it was a 4-year investigation  -- why be in such a hurry to say that the feds had nothing on Franklin?  (Probably so that Joel could claim that the Wash Post was being fed information by anti-Bush careerists at the State Dept and the CIA, and was using the Franklin case to smear White House neocons.  See, Joel really hates those damned CIA and State Dept careerists!)

Anyway, while it's true that no White House neocons have been charged (or even implicated) in Franklin's case, it's also true that some of them have gotten pretty cozy with AIPAC.

Here's the NY Times (Analyst Charged With Disclosing Military Secrets):

The inquiry has cast a cloud over the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which employed the two men who are said to have received the classified information from Mr. Franklin. The group, also known as Aipac, has close ties to senior policymakers in the Bush administration, among them Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who is expected to appear later this month at the group's annual meeting.

The investigation has proven awkward as well for a group of conservative Republicans, who held high-level civilian jobs at the Pentagon during President Bush's first term and the buildup toward the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and who were also close to Aipac.

They were led by Paul D. Wolfowitz, the former deputy defense secretary who has been named president of the World Bank. Mr. Franklin once worked in the office of one of Mr. Wolfowitz's allies, Douglas J. Feith, the under secretary for policy at the Pentagon, who has also said he is leaving the administration later this year.

Laura Rozen and Jason Vest's very informative Nov. 2004 American Prospect article about the Franklin case includes the info that Morris Amitay, a former executive director of AIPAC, was a business partner to both Feith and Richard Perle, and co-founded the Coalition for Democracy in Iran with Michael Ledeen (you know, the guy who apparently helped Feith's group interface with Chalabi).  Per the National Review column he wrote defending  Franklin, Ledeen considers Franklin a "pal."  So, lots of ties between the Bush White House and AIPAC. 

Plus, AIPAC is pretty influential -- it's considered to be the most important organization affecting America's relationship with Israel, and has helped to pass more than 100-pro-Israel legislative initiatives, and has procured nearly $3 billing in aid for Israel's security, per the Washington Times piece Analyst accused of leaking defense data.

So, a lot of people in the White House (and in Israel ) are going to be unhappy if AIPAC is found to have been involved in passing U.S. classified information to Israel. 

But Franklin hasn't been charged with espionage, only with verbally providing information from a Top Secret/SCI document (info about possible attacks against U.S. troops by Iranian-backed groups in Iraq) to unauthorized people (the U.S. citizens /AIPAC officials Steven Rosen and Keith Weisman) during lunch at an Arlington restaurant.  Reportedly the FBI is investigating claims the two officials transferred the info to an Israeli diplomat later that day. 

The complaint reportedly says nothing about Franklin giving the officials any documents, just states that Franklin gave them information from the Top Secret document.   (Well, the Moonie Times reports that  "The affidavit said that during a June 30, 2004, voluntary interview with FBI agents, Mr. Franklin admitted giving the classified document to the two unidentified persons with whom he had lunch. "  However, other papers, to include The NY Times and the Chicago Tribune make a point of saying that Franklin is only accused of relying info from the document -- so, I tend to think that the Moonie Times misread the complaint.  Kids, reading IS fundamental.) 

Anyway, the lack of mention of any documents being passed in interesting, because Joel Mowbray (and others) have made authoritative claims about Franklin passing a Secret document to the AIPAC officials: 

According to someone with intimate knowledge of the draft presidential directive that low-level Pentagon Iran analyst Larry Franklin allegedly leaked to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the document contained no sources and no methods.  It had no sensitive material of any kind.  It was nothing more than a policy paper—just a few pages that resembled an opinion-editorial—advocating tougher diplomacy, not war, in dealing with Iran.

Was passing this Secret document to the AIPAC guys such a "nothing" offense that DOJ doesn't want to even bother with it, or could it be that it's the Administration that doesn't want them to talk about it?  I don't know.  But here's more info on the document from the American Prospect piece:

The classified document that Franklin allegedly passed to AIPAC concerned a controversial proposal by Pentagon hard-liners to destabilize Iran. The latest iteration of the national-security presidential directive was drafted by a Pentagon civilian and avid neocon, Michael Rubin, who hoped it would be adopted as official policy by the Bush administration. But in mid-June, Bush’s national-security advisers canceled consideration of the draft, partly in response to resistance from some at the State Department and the National Security Council, according to a recent memo written by Rubin and obtained by The American Prospect. No doubt also contributing to the administration’s decision was the swelling insurgency and chaos of postwar Iraq.

Was Michael Rubin Joel Mowbray's source with "intimate knowledge" of the document?  Well, per the Prospect, Rubin wrote a memo in which he blamed all the leaks about the case on "bureaucratic rivalries" and anti-Semitism.  "Rubin’s memo showed up in a similar form almost a month later in the op-ed pages of The Washington Times under the byline of National Reviewstaffer Joel Mowbray," says the Prospect.  So, yeah, I think he was.

Anyway, back to the charges against Franklin.  The documents allege that Franklin passed other classified information to a "foreign official."  An source told the Chicago Tribune that this was an Israeli official.  The Washington Times says that on another occasion, the FBI observed an AIPAC official having lunch with Naor Gilon, a political adviser at the Israeli Embassy in D.C. -- the two men were then joined by Franklin.  The Philly Inquirer reports that, "The Israeli government has acknowledged that Franklin met with a diplomat from its embassy in Washington, Naor Gilon." 

So, maybe Gilon is the mystery official (an official whom Israel says never got any secrets, of course.) 

Franklin is also alleged to have passed information to members of the media (maybe HE blew Valerie Plame's cover to Novak}.  Plus, when his house was searched, agents found 83 classified documents at his home.

The fair and balanced NY Sun say, "To us this sounds more like Sandy Berger or John Deutch than it does, say, Jonathan Pollard" -- you know, like stuff done by DEMOCRATS.  The paper ends by basically saying that the liberal media should go to jail, not Franklin. Frankin faces up to ten years in prison (but even if found guilty of all the charges so far, would probably do only a year or so, IMHO).  The media doesn't face any jail time (except for Judith Miller and the guy from Time, of course).

But what is AIPAC's role in all of this?  Well, AIPAC let the FBI look at their computers, and claims they are cooperating fully with the Bureau.  Rosen and Weissman were placed on leave in January, and were quietly fired last month  

And the Chicago Tribune reports that:

AIPAC declined to make any official comment, instead pointing reporters to someone who agreed to speak about the allegations only on the condition that he be identified as a "source close to AIPAC."

That man said, "AIPAC has been advised by the government that it is not a target of the investigation."

But he would not say whether that notification came before or after Rosen and Weissman were dismissed.

And Steven Rosen's lawyer told the media that  "Steve Rosen never solicited, received or passed on any classified documents from Larry Franklin, and Mister Franklin will never be able to say otherwise."  (Which is what lawyers say.)  Weissman's lawyer hasn't made a statement to the media.  There is no word about whether Naor Gilon has a lawyer, or if Gilon is even still in the country.

Anyway, Israel is also claiming that is completely innocent too, and would never spy on its good friend, the U.S.

From the Chronicle: 

Jerusalem, Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom said his country was not involved.

"Israel does not carry on any activity in the United States which could harm, God forbid, its closest ally," Shalom told Israel's Channel One TV.

Uzi Arad, a former senior official from the Mossad spy agency, acknowledged this week that he was questioned about his connections to Franklin by FBI agents who "wanted to clear up a number of questions." Arad said he met Franklin twice and received an academic paper from him.

Um, if this account is correct, then former Mossad officer Arad as much as admitted that he was trying to recruit Franklin.  (Getting an asset you're developing to provide you with unclassified material is one of the basic steps they teach you in case officer school -- it's a way to get the asset comfortable with the idea of giving you documents.)

However, it may not be correct.  Per Forward, it was Arad who gave Franklin the academic paper.

During the hour-long interview, he said, the FBI agents brought up the name of an American Jewish Committee official, Eran Lerman, who is a former senior official in Israeli military intelligence.

Arad said the FBI agents asked him, among other things, why he had sent to Franklin, less than a year ago, a research paper by Lerman on ways to re-energize America's relationship with Israel.

[...]

Arad said that his strategic policy institute had commissioned Lerman to write the paper. He said that he did not remember sending the article to Franklin but that the FBI investigators showed him a letter that accompanied the article, carrying his signature. Arad said he explained to the investigators that this was a mechanized signature on an information package sent en masse to a mailing list of several hundred former participants in the Interdisciplinary Center's annual strategic-affairs conference, commonly known as the Herzliya Conference.

Well, it true, that sounds a lot less damning. Just normal case officer schmoozing. 

However, the Jerusalem Post says that it was actually Franklin who was the wily spy master, and that he set up Rosen and Weissman at the behest of the FBI.   Why?  Oh, just to cause trouble for Israel, I guess.

Anyway, what can we take from all of this?

First, that even though we may be Israel's "closest ally," it doesn't stop them from spying on us.  Or us on them.  You just try to be discreet about it. And this case could be a nightmare for a lot of people.  The allegations that our friend Israel got classified info from one of our citizens is bad enough.  But if it is true that the case is part of a larger inquiry about attempts by Israel (or its supporters) to covertly influence America's policy on the middle east, then this could be really damaging to some polical careers in both countries. Or it could just be made to quietly go away.  We'll see, I guess.

Second, we see that right after an event, you have to read about 10 newspapers to get all the available info, and even then, there will be a lot of contradictions and unanswered questions.

And third, that while SW Asia is probably wrong when it claims that Michael Ledeen is "one of the top Mossad agents in the US," you never can tell.

3:45:45 AM