Inside the Ring

Damage assessment

Congress has been asked to conduct a damage assessment of the intelligence compromise caused by former Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) analyst Ronald N. Montaperto, who pleaded guilty last month to illegally retaining classified information and who told investigators he passed secrets to China.

“I am deeply concerned about the damage that has been done by Ronald N. Montaperto to our country’s formulation and implementation of foreign policy related to the People’s Republic of China [PRC],” said Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, California Republican and chairman of the House International Relations oversight and investigations subcommittee.

Mr. Rohrabacher stated in a letter to David M. Walker, the chief of the Government Accountability Office (GAO), that the agency should check policy documents that were “prepared and influenced” by Montaperto and that affected U.S. policy toward China.

The July 6 letter also asked GAO to investigate propaganda themes Montaperto supported throughout his career in speeches, scholarly work and conference roles.

Montaperto was a senior China analyst at DIA who came under suspicion of being a Chinese spy in 1991 but who continued to hold a security clearance at the National Defense University and U.S. Pacific Command until his dismissal in 2004.

“In addition, I need to know whether he was in a position of authority that enabled him to hire and/or fire employees whose views concerning the PRC differed from his,” Mr. Rohrabacher stated, noting that the review should include Montaperto’s role in analysis of Chinese intentions.

The report was requested “as soon as possible” in both classified and unclassified forms.

According to court papers, Montaperto admitted during a ruse by FBI and Naval Criminal Investigative Service agents that he passed top-secret information to Chinese military intelligence officer Yu Zenghe.

Friends of Montaperto in the U.S. intelligence and policy communities have sought to defend the former analyst and have criticized the FBI. One of the supporters, Lonnie Henley, deputy national intelligence officer for East Asia, recently defended Montaperto in an e-mail and as a result has come under scrutiny by the office of Director of National Intelligence John D. Negroponte.

New counterspy chief

Director of National Intelligence (DNI) John D. Negroponte is expected in the next few days to name a new national counterintelligence executive, the government’s most senior counterspy, and neither of the two candidates has counterintelligence experience, we are told.

The leading candidate is said to be Mike Pritchard, a former U.S. Secret Service agent who is now a security specialist with Hunt Oil Co. in Texas. Another candidate is Howard J. Krongard, the State Department’s inspector general.

A DNI spokesman said yesterday that no decision on the appointment has been made. Neither candidate could be reached for comment.

The counterintelligence post has been vacant since the resignation of Michelle Van Cleave in January. Miss Van Cleave left after her independent post was folded into the new Office of Director of National Intelligence. The office has sought to downgrade the counterintelligence function from that of an independent strategic capability of countering foreign spies and their activities to one that is more limited to supporting U.S. foreign intelligence collection.

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