AIPAC espionage scandal
Encyclopedia
The Lawrence Franklin espionage scandal (also known as the AIPAC espionage scandal) refers to Lawrence Franklin's scandal of passing classified documents regarding United States policy towards Iran
to Israel
through American Israel Public Affairs Committee
(AIPAC). Franklin, a former United States Department of Defense
employee, pled guilty to several espionage-related charges and was sentenced in January 2006 to nearly 13 years of prison which was later reduced to ten months house arrest
. Two former AIPAC employees were also indicted, but the case was dismissed.
While prosecutors said several 2009 court rulings would have made it almost impossible to obtain a guilty verdict and forced disclosure of large amounts of classified information, defense lawyers and some legal experts said the government was wrong in the first place for trying to criminalize the kind of information horse-trading that long has occurred in Washington. Critics of the case charged that the government was trying to criminalize the routine give and take in Washington. Steve J. Rosen
, AIPAC's then-policy director, said he met with senior government officials all the time.
broke a story about an FBI
investigation into a possible spy in the U.S. Department of Defense working for Israel. The story reported that the FBI had uncovered a spy working as a policy analyst under Under Secretary of Defense for Policy
Douglas Feith
and then-Deputy Secretary of Defense
Paul Wolfowitz
. He was later identified as Lawrence Franklin, who had previously served as an attaché at the U.S. embassy in Israel and was one of two mid-level Pentagon
officials in the Office of the Secretary of Defense
responsible for Iran
policy in the office's Northern Gulf directorate.
Franklin has pled guilty to passing on a classified presidential directive
, and other sensitive documents pertaining to U.S. deliberations on foreign policy regarding Iran to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee
, who in turn provided the information to Israel. FBI sources have indicated that the year-long investigation was actively underway when the CBS News story broke.
According to FBI surveillance
tapes, Franklin relayed top-secret information to Rosen and Keith Weissman, a senior Iran analyst with AIPAC, while at the Tivoli Restaurant in Arlington, Virginia. On 27 August, the FBI raided Rosen's office, copying his personal computer's hard drive.
According to The New York Times
, Lawrence Franklin was one of two U.S. officials who held meetings with Iranian dissidents, including Paris-based arms dealer Manucher Ghorbanifar
, a key figure in the Iran-Contra affair
. These Pentagon-approved meetings were brokered by neoconservative
Michael Ledeen
of the American Enterprise Institute
, who had also played a part in Iran-Contra, and is said to have taken place in Paris in June 2003. The Jerusalem Post reported that the purpose of the meetings was to "undermine a pending deal that the White House had been negotiating with the Iranian government", specifically, an exchange of high-ranking al-Qaeda
members in Iranian custody in return for a stop to U.S. support of the anti-Iranian Mujahideen al-Khalq fighters in Iraq.broken link The Post article dated the beginning of the FBI investigation to this secret meeting, which the public first learned about in August 2003.
Franklin had previously been assigned to a unit tasked with the Pentagon's Iraq
policy, raising concern that he might have been used to influence the war on Iraq, although Pentagon officials have maintained that he was in no position to influence policy. (see also Office of Special Plans
)
On August 30, 2004, Israeli officials admitted that Franklin had met repeatedly with Naor Gilon
, head of the political department at the Israeli Embassy in Washington and a specialist on Iran's nuclear programs, but point out that this was completely appropriate activity for the two Iran specialists. A Newsweek
report indicates that Gilon was under FBI surveillance and that Franklin only became a target after these meetings.
It has been suggested that Franklin's motivations may have been ideological or personal, rather than financial. An unnamed U.S. intelligence official told Newsweek: "for whatever reason, the guy hates Iran [the Iranian government] passionately."
Franklin's security clearance was revoked, although he was not fired, merely demoted. The FBI investigation continued until May 5 when he was arrested and charged with giving away top-secret information
The indictment revealed that the investigation had been going on since 1999, and suggested that other individuals at AIPAC, the Defense Department and the Israeli embassy had been involved as well. The indictment also alleged that Kenneth Pollack
, a National Security Council
staffer during the Clinton
administration (and director of research at the Brookings Institution's Saban Center for Middle East Policy
) provided information to former AIPAC employees Steve J. Rosen and Keith Weissman.
On May 3, 2005, the FBI filed criminal charges against Franklin. The complaint alleges that, at a June 26, 2003 lunch, Franklin disclosed classified national defense information related to potential attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq to two unnamed individuals. According to contemporary media reports, the two individuals were Steve J. Rosen
and Keith Weissman, who were employed by AIPAC at the time. The complaint also alleged that Franklin disclosed classified information to "a foreign official and members of the media", and that a search of Franklin's home found approximately 83 classified documents.
Franklin appeared in court on May 4, 2005. He was released on $100,000 bond. Franklin's lawyer said he would plead not guilty.
On August 4, a federal grand jury
indicted
Franklin on five charges of violating the Espionage Act of 1917
http://news.findlaw.com/nytimes/docs/dod/usfrnklin80205ind.pdf:
Rosen was further charged with one count each of the first two, and Weissman with one count of the first charge.
According to the Washington Post, "A lawyer familiar with the AIPAC case said administration officials 'want[ed] this case as a precedent so they can have it in their arsenal' and added: 'This as a weapon that can be turned against the media.'"
He did indeed plead guilty to the three conspiracy counts on October 5, explaining that he had shared his frustrations over U.S. Iran policy with the other two defendants regularly in 2002 and later passed documents he knew were classified to them in the hope they could get them to employees of the National Security Council who might be able to help force a harder line. He also asked Rosen for help getting him a job at the NSC; Rosen told him, "I'll see what I can do," claimed Franklin.
He also passed other classified information along to an Israeli official concerning weapons testing and military activities in Iraq and other Middle Eastern countries. In return, he said, the Israeli official told him far more. Franklin stated that he knew some of the documents he passed along could be used to the detriment of U.S. national security interests.
On January 20, 2006, Judge T.S. Ellis, III sentenced Franklin to 12 years and 7 months in prison and a $10,000 fine for passing classified information to a pro-Israel lobby group and an Israeli diplomat but Franklin was to remain free pending his cooperation with prosecutors in the cases against Rosen and Weissman.
In August, he denied Weissman and Rosen's motion to dismiss their indictment on the grounds that the government could still prosecute and punish those who retransmitted classified information regardless of whether they had a security clearance or not, an interpretation of the Espionage Act that could have wide-reaching implications if it were allowed to become legal precedent.
The problem for the government came in a pre-trial ruling in August 2006, when trial judge T.S. Ellis III interpreted that line to mean that prosecutors had to show that U.S. interests were harmed, and not just that Rosen and Weissman relayed secrets to a foreign power: Israel. Relaying secrets to friends of the United States, Ellis suggested, was not in and of itself criminal. For a crime to be committed, he said, the accused must have sought both benefit to another nation as well as harm to the United States. Ellis issued legal rulings that set a high bar for the prosecutors, including a requirement to prove that Rosen and Weissman knowingly meant to harm the United States or aid another country.http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/content/item/aipac_decision_a_victory_--_with_qualifiers/8172
In May 2009, federal prosecutors dropped the charges against Rosen and Weissman citing that restrictions the judge had placed on the case made a conviction unlikely. On June 11, prosecutors asked Judge Ellis to reduce Franklin's sentence to eight years for his cooperation. Judge Ellis said the dropping of the case against Rosen and Weissman was a "significant" factor in the sentencing of Franklin and sentenced him to ten months house arrest along with 100 hours of community service. Ellis said Franklin's community service should consist of "speaking to young people about the importance of public officials obeying the law".http://www.sott.net/articles/show/186731-Strange-Law-Sentence-of-10-months-of-community-confinement-for-Spying-
On December 1, 2004 FBI agents raided the offices of AIPAC and seized computer equipment and files of Howard Kohr, the Executive Director, Richard Fishman, Managing Director, Renee Rothstein, Communication Director and Raphael Danziger. Research Director. According to an article published in the Washington Post eight days later, all were suspected of being cut-out
s, agents who picked up information from Franklin and passed it on to Israel. The FBI did not bring charges against any of them.
There has been at least one other case of Israeli espionage in the United States before the AIPAC scandal. Jonathan Pollard
, an Israeli spy who worked in the Naval Anti-Terrorist Alert Center, pleaded guilty to espionage and was sentenced to life in prison in 1987. The incident had a significantly detrimental impact on U.S.-Israeli relations. Israeli officials have stated that the Israeli government terminated all espionage activities in the United States after the Pollard affair.
Some believe that Israel's credibility with regard to Franklin is tainted by their insistence in the Pollard case that he likewise was not a spy, a position they maintained for 13 years before admitting, in 1998, that Pollard indeed had been a spy for Israel. Others think the damage that Israel sustained over the Pollard affair makes it unlikely that the country would again jeopardize its relationship with the United States through espionage, and note that the U.S. government has neither registered a protest with the Israelis nor accused its officials of wrongdoing in the AIPAC affair.
, Douglas Feith
used Larry Franklin for sensitive projects involving foreign citizen contacts, overseas http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Senate_Intelligence_Committee_stalling_prewar_intelligence_1202.html.
suggests that the Franklin story is part of a larger investigation into transfer of sensitive military and dual-use technologies to Israel, including powerful case-management software. A concern is that Israeli companies have then re-sold sensitive U.S.-derived technology to potential U.S. strategic rivals such as Russia and China, and possibly on the black market where it can potentially be obtained by terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda
.
In his article, however, Lobe offers no references or citations to support his claims. In addition, none of the charges filed in the Franklin case involved technology transfer of any kind. Furthermore, the supposedly powerful "case management software" Lobe refers to in his article (known as PROMIS), has been a staple of various conspiracy theories for many years, none of which have ever panned out. Lobe's claims must therefore be viewed as suspect.
felt
"the government was right to drop its espionage case ... not because we think spying for Israel should be subjected to a different standard than spying for other countries, and not because the political ramifications of a conviction were potentially unpleasant. But this was the first prosecution under the Espionage Act of suspects who weren't government employees. ... The fact that Rosen and Weissman are private citizens makes an important distinction. When the judge ruled that the government can punish those outside of the government for the unauthorized receipt and deliberate retransmission of information relating to the national defense,' we couldn't help but take notice."http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-aipac7-2009may07,0,7256238.story
"They knew very well that I spoke to the Embassy of Israel, it was no great surprise to them, they also spoke to the embassy," he said. "We would have a triangle, three-way conversation. It was nothing special. It was normal. But these people were talking as if we were a nest of spies, that we were doing something against America."
In the interview at his home, Rosen charged that Lawrence Franklin was railroaded into pleading guilty, by threats to harm his family by cutting off his pension. He said federal prosecutors used the same type of tactics against him.
"They wanted to destroy me. They forced AIPAC to fire me. They forced AIPAC to cut off my attorneys' fees," he said. "They tried to isolate me, to put me in a situation of desperation where I would have to plead guilty to something I did not do. This happens all the time." Rosen and Weissman may sue the government to recover legal costs, which are estimated at more than $10 million.
United States-Iran relations
Political relations between Iran and the United States began in the mid-to-late 19th century. Initially, while Iran was very wary of British and Russian colonial interests during the Great Game, the United States was seen as a more trustworthy Western power, and the Americans Arthur Millspaugh and...
to Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
through American Israel Public Affairs Committee
American Israel Public Affairs Committee
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee is a lobbying group that advocates pro-Israel policies to the Congress and Executive Branch of the United States...
(AIPAC). Franklin, a former United States Department of Defense
United States Department of Defense
The United States Department of Defense is the U.S...
employee, pled guilty to several espionage-related charges and was sentenced in January 2006 to nearly 13 years of prison which was later reduced to ten months house arrest
House arrest
In justice and law, house arrest is a measure by which a person is confined by the authorities to his or her residence. Travel is usually restricted, if allowed at all...
. Two former AIPAC employees were also indicted, but the case was dismissed.
While prosecutors said several 2009 court rulings would have made it almost impossible to obtain a guilty verdict and forced disclosure of large amounts of classified information, defense lawyers and some legal experts said the government was wrong in the first place for trying to criminalize the kind of information horse-trading that long has occurred in Washington. Critics of the case charged that the government was trying to criminalize the routine give and take in Washington. Steve J. Rosen
Steve J. Rosen
Steven J. Rosen served for 23 years as one of the top officials of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee . He is regarded as an influential and controversial figure in the "pro-Israel movement", often singled out in writings critical of AIPAC...
, AIPAC's then-policy director, said he met with senior government officials all the time.
Background
On August 27, 2004, CBS NewsCBS News
CBS News is the news division of American television and radio network CBS. The current chairman is Jeff Fager who is also the executive producer of 60 Minutes, while the current president of CBS News is David Rhodes. CBS News' flagship program is the CBS Evening News, hosted by the network's main...
broke a story about an FBI
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
investigation into a possible spy in the U.S. Department of Defense working for Israel. The story reported that the FBI had uncovered a spy working as a policy analyst under Under Secretary of Defense for Policy
Under Secretary of Defense for Policy
The Under Secretary of Defense for Policy is a high level civilian official in the United States Department of Defense. The Under Secretary of Defense for Policy is the principal staff assistant and adviser to both the Secretary of Defense and the Deputy Secretary of Defense for all matters...
Douglas Feith
Douglas Feith
Douglas J. Feith served as the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy for United States President George W. Bush from July 2001 until August 2005. His official responsibilities included the formulation of defense planning guidance and forces policy, United States Department of Defense relations...
and then-Deputy Secretary of Defense
United States Deputy Secretary of Defense
The Deputy Secretary of Defense is the second-highest ranking official in the Department of Defense of the United States of America. The Deputy Secretary of Defense is appointed by the President, with the advice and consent of the Senate...
Paul Wolfowitz
Paul Wolfowitz
Paul Dundes Wolfowitz is a former United States Ambassador to Indonesia, U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense, President of the World Bank, and former dean of the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University...
. He was later identified as Lawrence Franklin, who had previously served as an attaché at the U.S. embassy in Israel and was one of two mid-level Pentagon
The Pentagon
The Pentagon is the headquarters of the United States Department of Defense, located in Arlington County, Virginia. As a symbol of the U.S. military, "the Pentagon" is often used metonymically to refer to the Department of Defense rather than the building itself.Designed by the American architect...
officials in the Office of the Secretary of Defense
Office of the Secretary of Defense
The Office of the Secretary of Defense is a headquarters-level staff of the Department of Defense of the United States of America. It is the principal civilian staff element of the Secretary of Defense, and it assists the Secretary in carrying out authority, direction and control of the Department...
responsible for Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
policy in the office's Northern Gulf directorate.
Franklin has pled guilty to passing on a classified presidential directive
Presidential directive
Presidential Directives, better known as Presidential Decision Directives or PDD are a form of an executive order issued by the President of the United States with the advice and consent of the National Security Council...
, and other sensitive documents pertaining to U.S. deliberations on foreign policy regarding Iran to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee
American Israel Public Affairs Committee
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee is a lobbying group that advocates pro-Israel policies to the Congress and Executive Branch of the United States...
, who in turn provided the information to Israel. FBI sources have indicated that the year-long investigation was actively underway when the CBS News story broke.
According to FBI surveillance
Surveillance
Surveillance is the monitoring of the behavior, activities, or other changing information, usually of people. It is sometimes done in a surreptitious manner...
tapes, Franklin relayed top-secret information to Rosen and Keith Weissman, a senior Iran analyst with AIPAC, while at the Tivoli Restaurant in Arlington, Virginia. On 27 August, the FBI raided Rosen's office, copying his personal computer's hard drive.
According to The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, Lawrence Franklin was one of two U.S. officials who held meetings with Iranian dissidents, including Paris-based arms dealer Manucher Ghorbanifar
Manucher Ghorbanifar
Manucher Ghorbanifar is an expatriate Iranian arms dealer. He is best known as a middleman in the Iran-Contra Affair during the Ronald Reagan presidency. He re-emerged in American politics during the lead-up to the 2003 invasion of Iraq during the first term of President George W...
, a key figure in the Iran-Contra affair
Iran-Contra Affair
The Iran–Contra affair , also referred to as Irangate, Contragate or Iran-Contra-Gate, was a political scandal in the United States that came to light in November 1986. During the Reagan administration, senior Reagan administration officials and President Reagan secretly facilitated the sale of...
. These Pentagon-approved meetings were brokered by neoconservative
Neoconservatism
Neoconservatism in the United States is a branch of American conservatism. Since 2001, neoconservatism has been associated with democracy promotion, that is with assisting movements for democracy, in some cases by economic sanctions or military action....
Michael Ledeen
Michael Ledeen
Michael Arthur Ledeen is an American specialist on foreign policy. His research areas have included state sponsors of terrorism, Iran, the Middle East, Europe , U.S.-China relations, intelligence, and Africa and is a leading neoconservative...
of the American Enterprise Institute
American Enterprise Institute
The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research is a conservative think tank founded in 1943. Its stated mission is "to defend the principles and improve the institutions of American freedom and democratic capitalism—limited government, private enterprise, individual liberty and...
, who had also played a part in Iran-Contra, and is said to have taken place in Paris in June 2003. The Jerusalem Post reported that the purpose of the meetings was to "undermine a pending deal that the White House had been negotiating with the Iranian government", specifically, an exchange of high-ranking al-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda is a global broad-based militant Islamist terrorist organization founded by Osama bin Laden sometime between August 1988 and late 1989. It operates as a network comprising both a multinational, stateless army and a radical Sunni Muslim movement calling for global Jihad...
members in Iranian custody in return for a stop to U.S. support of the anti-Iranian Mujahideen al-Khalq fighters in Iraq.broken link The Post article dated the beginning of the FBI investigation to this secret meeting, which the public first learned about in August 2003.
Franklin had previously been assigned to a unit tasked with the Pentagon's Iraq
Iraq
Iraq ; officially the Republic of Iraq is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert....
policy, raising concern that he might have been used to influence the war on Iraq, although Pentagon officials have maintained that he was in no position to influence policy. (see also Office of Special Plans
Office of Special Plans
The Office of Special Plans , which existed from September 2002 to June 2003, was a Pentagon unit created by Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, and headed by Feith, as charged by then-United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, to supply senior George W. Bush administration officials with...
)
On August 30, 2004, Israeli officials admitted that Franklin had met repeatedly with Naor Gilon
Naor Gilon
Naor Gilon is the current Minister-Counselor for Political Affairs at the Embassy of Israel in Washington, D.C.He was the subject of FBI investigations into the Lawrence Franklin espionage scandal, which involved the leaking of classified information by an employee at the United States Department...
, head of the political department at the Israeli Embassy in Washington and a specialist on Iran's nuclear programs, but point out that this was completely appropriate activity for the two Iran specialists. A Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
report indicates that Gilon was under FBI surveillance and that Franklin only became a target after these meetings.
It has been suggested that Franklin's motivations may have been ideological or personal, rather than financial. An unnamed U.S. intelligence official told Newsweek: "for whatever reason, the guy hates Iran [the Iranian government] passionately."
Franklin's security clearance was revoked, although he was not fired, merely demoted. The FBI investigation continued until May 5 when he was arrested and charged with giving away top-secret information
The indictment revealed that the investigation had been going on since 1999, and suggested that other individuals at AIPAC, the Defense Department and the Israeli embassy had been involved as well. The indictment also alleged that Kenneth Pollack
Kenneth Pollack
Kenneth Michael Pollack, PhD , is a noted former CIA intelligence analyst and expert on Middle East politics and military affairs. He has served on the National Security Council staff and has written several articles and books on international relations.Pollack obtained a BA from Yale University,...
, a National Security Council
United States National Security Council
The White House National Security Council in the United States is the principal forum used by the President of the United States for considering national security and foreign policy matters with his senior national security advisors and Cabinet officials and is part of the Executive Office of the...
staffer during the Clinton
Bill Clinton
William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...
administration (and director of research at the Brookings Institution's Saban Center for Middle East Policy
Saban Center for Middle East Policy
The Saban Center for Middle East Policy is a center within the Brookings Institution focused on the United States' involvement in the Middle East...
) provided information to former AIPAC employees Steve J. Rosen and Keith Weissman.
Criminal charges
See main article: United States v. Franklin, Rosen, and WeissmanUnited States v. Franklin, Rosen, and Weissman
United States v. Franklin, Rosen, and Weissman was a 2000s era court case in the United States. The government prosecuted one government employee and two lobbyists for allegedly disclosing national defense information to persons 'not entitled' to have it, a crime under the Espionage Act of 1917...
On May 3, 2005, the FBI filed criminal charges against Franklin. The complaint alleges that, at a June 26, 2003 lunch, Franklin disclosed classified national defense information related to potential attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq to two unnamed individuals. According to contemporary media reports, the two individuals were Steve J. Rosen
Steve J. Rosen
Steven J. Rosen served for 23 years as one of the top officials of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee . He is regarded as an influential and controversial figure in the "pro-Israel movement", often singled out in writings critical of AIPAC...
and Keith Weissman, who were employed by AIPAC at the time. The complaint also alleged that Franklin disclosed classified information to "a foreign official and members of the media", and that a search of Franklin's home found approximately 83 classified documents.
Franklin appeared in court on May 4, 2005. He was released on $100,000 bond. Franklin's lawyer said he would plead not guilty.
On August 4, a federal grand jury
Grand jury
A grand jury is a type of jury that determines whether a criminal indictment will issue. Currently, only the United States retains grand juries, although some other common law jurisdictions formerly employed them, and most other jurisdictions employ some other type of preliminary hearing...
indicted
Indictment
An indictment , in the common-law legal system, is a formal accusation that a person has committed a crime. In jurisdictions that maintain the concept of felonies, the serious criminal offence is a felony; jurisdictions that lack the concept of felonies often use that of an indictable offence—an...
Franklin on five charges of violating the Espionage Act of 1917
Espionage Act of 1917
The Espionage Act of 1917 is a United States federal law passed on June 15, 1917, shortly after the U.S. entry into World War I. It has been amended numerous times over the years. It was originally found in Title 50 of the U.S. Code but is now found under Title 18, Crime...
http://news.findlaw.com/nytimes/docs/dod/usfrnklin80205ind.pdf:
- One count of conspiracyConspiracy (crime)In the criminal law, a conspiracy is an agreement between two or more persons to break the law at some time in the future, and, in some cases, with at least one overt act in furtherance of that agreement...
to communicate national defense information to people not entitled to receive it. (18 USC 793 (d), (e) and (g)) - Three counts of communicating national defense information to people not entitled to receive it. (18 USC 793)
- One count of conspiring to communicate national defense information to an agent of a foreign government. (50 US 783, 18 USC 731)
Rosen was further charged with one count each of the first two, and Weissman with one count of the first charge.
According to the Washington Post, "A lawyer familiar with the AIPAC case said administration officials 'want[ed] this case as a precedent so they can have it in their arsenal' and added: 'This as a weapon that can be turned against the media.'"
Guilty plea
On September 30, the Washington Post reported that Franklin was negotiating an agreement with prosecutors and would plead guilty to at least the conspiracy charges at a court hearing the following week, after which he would continue his cooperation with prosecutors.He did indeed plead guilty to the three conspiracy counts on October 5, explaining that he had shared his frustrations over U.S. Iran policy with the other two defendants regularly in 2002 and later passed documents he knew were classified to them in the hope they could get them to employees of the National Security Council who might be able to help force a harder line. He also asked Rosen for help getting him a job at the NSC; Rosen told him, "I'll see what I can do," claimed Franklin.
He also passed other classified information along to an Israeli official concerning weapons testing and military activities in Iraq and other Middle Eastern countries. In return, he said, the Israeli official told him far more. Franklin stated that he knew some of the documents he passed along could be used to the detriment of U.S. national security interests.
On January 20, 2006, Judge T.S. Ellis, III sentenced Franklin to 12 years and 7 months in prison and a $10,000 fine for passing classified information to a pro-Israel lobby group and an Israeli diplomat but Franklin was to remain free pending his cooperation with prosecutors in the cases against Rosen and Weissman.
In August, he denied Weissman and Rosen's motion to dismiss their indictment on the grounds that the government could still prosecute and punish those who retransmitted classified information regardless of whether they had a security clearance or not, an interpretation of the Espionage Act that could have wide-reaching implications if it were allowed to become legal precedent.
The problem for the government came in a pre-trial ruling in August 2006, when trial judge T.S. Ellis III interpreted that line to mean that prosecutors had to show that U.S. interests were harmed, and not just that Rosen and Weissman relayed secrets to a foreign power: Israel. Relaying secrets to friends of the United States, Ellis suggested, was not in and of itself criminal. For a crime to be committed, he said, the accused must have sought both benefit to another nation as well as harm to the United States. Ellis issued legal rulings that set a high bar for the prosecutors, including a requirement to prove that Rosen and Weissman knowingly meant to harm the United States or aid another country.http://www.jstandard.com/index.php/content/item/aipac_decision_a_victory_--_with_qualifiers/8172
In May 2009, federal prosecutors dropped the charges against Rosen and Weissman citing that restrictions the judge had placed on the case made a conviction unlikely. On June 11, prosecutors asked Judge Ellis to reduce Franklin's sentence to eight years for his cooperation. Judge Ellis said the dropping of the case against Rosen and Weissman was a "significant" factor in the sentencing of Franklin and sentenced him to ten months house arrest along with 100 hours of community service. Ellis said Franklin's community service should consist of "speaking to young people about the importance of public officials obeying the law".http://www.sott.net/articles/show/186731-Strange-Law-Sentence-of-10-months-of-community-confinement-for-Spying-
Franklin's account of events
In late 2009, Franklin wrote that his objective was "to halt the rush to war in Iraq - at least long enough to adopt a realistic policy toward an Iran bent on doing us ill", not "to leak secrets to a foreign government".Accusations denied by AIPAC and Israel
The spying charges have been denied by Israel as well as AIPAC. The Israeli Embassy in Washington called the charges "completely false and outrageous". AIPAC stated the allegations were "baseless and false".On December 1, 2004 FBI agents raided the offices of AIPAC and seized computer equipment and files of Howard Kohr, the Executive Director, Richard Fishman, Managing Director, Renee Rothstein, Communication Director and Raphael Danziger. Research Director. According to an article published in the Washington Post eight days later, all were suspected of being cut-out
Cut-out (espionage)
In espionage parlance, a cutout is a mutually trusted intermediary, method or channel of communication, facilitating the exchange of information between agents. Cutouts usually only know the source and destination of the information to be transmitted, but are unaware of the identities of any other...
s, agents who picked up information from Franklin and passed it on to Israel. The FBI did not bring charges against any of them.
There has been at least one other case of Israeli espionage in the United States before the AIPAC scandal. Jonathan Pollard
Jonathan Pollard
Jonathan Jay Pollard worked as a civilian intelligence analyst before being convicted of spying for Israel. He received a life sentence in 1987....
, an Israeli spy who worked in the Naval Anti-Terrorist Alert Center, pleaded guilty to espionage and was sentenced to life in prison in 1987. The incident had a significantly detrimental impact on U.S.-Israeli relations. Israeli officials have stated that the Israeli government terminated all espionage activities in the United States after the Pollard affair.
Some believe that Israel's credibility with regard to Franklin is tainted by their insistence in the Pollard case that he likewise was not a spy, a position they maintained for 13 years before admitting, in 1998, that Pollard indeed had been a spy for Israel. Others think the damage that Israel sustained over the Pollard affair makes it unlikely that the country would again jeopardize its relationship with the United States through espionage, and note that the U.S. government has neither registered a protest with the Israelis nor accused its officials of wrongdoing in the AIPAC affair.
Pentagon statement: Franklin did not influence policy
According to a Pentagon statement, "the investigation involves a single individual at D.O.D. at the desk officer level, who was not in a position to have significant influence over U.S. policy." However, this characterization ignores evidence that while at the Office of Special PlansOffice of Special Plans
The Office of Special Plans , which existed from September 2002 to June 2003, was a Pentagon unit created by Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, and headed by Feith, as charged by then-United States Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, to supply senior George W. Bush administration officials with...
, Douglas Feith
Douglas Feith
Douglas J. Feith served as the Under Secretary of Defense for Policy for United States President George W. Bush from July 2001 until August 2005. His official responsibilities included the formulation of defense planning guidance and forces policy, United States Department of Defense relations...
used Larry Franklin for sensitive projects involving foreign citizen contacts, overseas http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Senate_Intelligence_Committee_stalling_prewar_intelligence_1202.html.
Concern about uncontrolled military technology transfers
Journalist Jim LobeJim Lobe
James R. Lobe is an American journalist and the Washington Bureau Chief of the international news agency Inter Press Service. He has also written for Foreign Policy In Focus, Oneworld.net, Alternet, TomPaine.com, Asia Times, and other internet news publications. Lobe is best known for his...
suggests that the Franklin story is part of a larger investigation into transfer of sensitive military and dual-use technologies to Israel, including powerful case-management software. A concern is that Israeli companies have then re-sold sensitive U.S.-derived technology to potential U.S. strategic rivals such as Russia and China, and possibly on the black market where it can potentially be obtained by terrorist groups such as al-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda
Al-Qaeda is a global broad-based militant Islamist terrorist organization founded by Osama bin Laden sometime between August 1988 and late 1989. It operates as a network comprising both a multinational, stateless army and a radical Sunni Muslim movement calling for global Jihad...
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In his article, however, Lobe offers no references or citations to support his claims. In addition, none of the charges filed in the Franklin case involved technology transfer of any kind. Furthermore, the supposedly powerful "case management software" Lobe refers to in his article (known as PROMIS), has been a staple of various conspiracy theories for many years, none of which have ever panned out. Lobe's claims must therefore be viewed as suspect.
Media reaction
The Los Angeles TimesLos Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
felt
"the government was right to drop its espionage case ... not because we think spying for Israel should be subjected to a different standard than spying for other countries, and not because the political ramifications of a conviction were potentially unpleasant. But this was the first prosecution under the Espionage Act of suspects who weren't government employees. ... The fact that Rosen and Weissman are private citizens makes an important distinction. When the judge ruled that the government can punish those outside of the government for the unauthorized receipt and deliberate retransmission of information relating to the national defense,' we couldn't help but take notice."http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/editorials/la-ed-aipac7-2009may07,0,7256238.story
Rosen interview
In a television interview broadcast in Israel, Rosen said "What it would have shown is that I did nothing wrong," he said. "Who did something wrong is the people who brought this case, not just that they were incorrect, but that the attitude they had about Jews, Israel, AIPAC, was completely false, and unfortunately, a lot of that nonsense is still out there.""They knew very well that I spoke to the Embassy of Israel, it was no great surprise to them, they also spoke to the embassy," he said. "We would have a triangle, three-way conversation. It was nothing special. It was normal. But these people were talking as if we were a nest of spies, that we were doing something against America."
In the interview at his home, Rosen charged that Lawrence Franklin was railroaded into pleading guilty, by threats to harm his family by cutting off his pension. He said federal prosecutors used the same type of tactics against him.
"They wanted to destroy me. They forced AIPAC to fire me. They forced AIPAC to cut off my attorneys' fees," he said. "They tried to isolate me, to put me in a situation of desperation where I would have to plead guilty to something I did not do. This happens all the time." Rosen and Weissman may sue the government to recover legal costs, which are estimated at more than $10 million.
External links
- Letting go of the AIPAC case Los Angeles TimesLos Angeles TimesThe Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
Editorial May 7, 2009