US couple spied for Cuba for 30 years...

[Jack]

WASHINGTON — Walter Kendall Myers spent more than two decades deep in the bureaucracy of the U.S. State Department until this week, when federal authorities accused him of a life of intrigue and espionage as a clandestine agent for one of the U.S.'s longtime antagonists: the communist government of Cuba.
The 72-year-old retired State Department employee — who'd enjoyed top secret security clearance — and his wife, Gwendolyn Steingraber Myers, 71, appeared in federal court Friday, charged with serving as illegal agents for Cuba for nearly 30 years and conspiring to deliver classified information to its government. They pled not guilty.
According to documents unsealed Friday in Washington, Myers, a former Europe analyst for the State Department, and his wife, a bank employee, agreed in 1979 to deliver U.S. secrets to Cuba.
Federal authorities called the couple's spying for Havana "incredibly serious.''
Investigators allege that Myers — at the behest of the Cuban Intelligence Service_ landed a job at the State Department, gained sensitive clearance and traveled with his wife to Mexico, the Caribbean, Central and South America and New York to meet with Cuban agents.
He told an undercover FBI source he was so successful that he received "lots of medals'' from the Cuban government, and that he and wife enjoyed a rare private meeting in 1995 with then-President Fidel Castro.
The couple agreed as recently as April to supply information on the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago, the Justice Department said.
The Myers were arrested Thursday by the FBI and made an initial appearances Friday in U.S. District Court in Washington.
The arrest comes as President Barack Obama has sought to improve relations with Havana.
Critics moved swiftly to raise caution flags. Florida Republican Sen. Mel Martinez called on the administration to halt "any further diplomatic outreach to the regime,'' including the resumption of planned migration talks, "until the U.S. Congress has a full accounting of the damage these individuals have caused to our national security.''
The Center for a Free Cuba, advocates for dissidents on the island, called on the House of Representatives and Senate intelligence committees to hold hearings on Cuban intelligence operations in the U.S.
The State Department said the arrests are the result of a three-year investigation. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has ordered a "comprehensive damage assessment'' to determine what information may have been divulged to Cuba.
Court documents portray a couple who relished their work and missed visiting with Cuban intelligence agents when they stopped traveling in 2006 after worries that Myers' boss at the State Department had "put him on a watch list.''
They proclaimed "great admiration'' for Ana Belen Montes, a senior intelligence analyst who worked for the Defense Intelligence Agency and was arrested for spying for
Cuba in 2001. Montes, Gwendolyn said in the records, "was not paranoid enough.''
Montes is serving a 25-year prison term.
Gwendolyn Myers — known by the Cubans as Agent 123 and Agent E-634 — told investigators that her favorite way to pass information along was to swap shopping carts in grocery stores because it was "easy enough to do.''
She told them she wouldn't use her own computer to send messages. Kendall Myers said the couple would "go to Internet cafes.''
The criminal complaint said that Kendall Myers — dubbed Agent 202 — began working for the State Department in 1977 as a lecturer at the agency's Foreign Service Institute. The government alleges a Cuban official visited him and his wife when they were briefly living in South Dakota after traveling to Cuba in 1978, and they agreed "to serve as clandestine agents of the Cuban government.'' They returned to Washington, and Myers resumed working at the State Department.
The complaint alleges that the Cuban Intelligence Service directed Myers to get a job at either the State Department or the CIA, and Myers later told the FBI source he preferred State because "you had to be a good liar to pass (the polygraph test at CIA)."
The complaint said that Myers did apply for a position with the CIA, but began working for the State Department in 1982. By 1985, he had moved up to a position with top secret security clearance. It was later increased further.
The indictment says that in 2007 alone — the year Myers retired from the State Department as a senior analyst — had viewed more than 200 intelligence reports related to Cuba. Of those reports, the affidavit alleges, most were classified "and marked Secret or Top Secret.''
In court records, the Justice Department said that Myers "expresses a strong affinity towards Cuba and its revolutionary goals and a negative sentiment toward 'American imperialism,''' in a diary he wrote about his 1978 trip to Cuba.
"Fidel has lifted the Cuban people out of the degrading and oppressive conditions which characterized per-revolutionary Cuba,'' an alleged excerpt from his diary reads. "He is certainly one of the great political leaders of our time.''
The affidavit alleges that Cuba often "communicated with its clandestine agents in the U.S. through encrypted radio messages from Cuba on shortwave radio'' and that the Myers had "an operable shortwave radio in their apartment of the same make used by Ana Belen Montes.''
The Myers could face as many as 20 years in prison on at least one charge.
The indictment also seeks the return of $1.7 million Kendall Myers earned at the State Department and $174,867 in retirement money.

[RedStarOverChina]

:(

[Comrade B]

The US can be proud that they have done such an excellent job at stopping these young and dangerous spies before they leaked any valuable information, however the sentencing seems a little to relaxed, they should be hanged!
sarcasm above

[Saorsa]

High five for Cuba

[JimmyJazz]

High five for Cuba

No, this is serious business. They might have stolen some of our valuable medical secrets, which could eventually make it into the hands of dirt poor children in Africa or Latin America.

[Guerrilla22]

After the recent OAS vote, this almost seems too convient. Apparently Fidel thinks so as well.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090607/ap_on_re_la_am_ca/cb_cuba_castro_spies

[teenagebricks]

Fidel is quite right, what better way to discredit poor island country than arresting a couple of would be "spies". Ridiculous, the FBI can suck Miami's dick.

[Marx22]

And how many spies does the US have in Cuba?

[Sugar Hill Kevis]

And how many spies does the US have in Cuba?

But it's necessary so the US can keep tabs on Cuban aggression. Afterall, they are, the greatest threat to international society... or was that the Panthers?

[Wanted Man]

And how many spies does the US have in Cuba?
They're called "dissidents". You can write a letter to them at Amnesty to show your sympathy.

[Sasha]

oh yeah, like every dissident is on the payroll of the CIA.
Your idiot simplistics aren't helping anyone.

[Yazman]

But it's necessary so the US can keep tabs on Cuban aggression. Afterall, they are, the greatest threat to international society... or was that the Panthers?

This is ridiculous. Sorry dude but the US hasn't said anything like this for decades. They have been quite open towards Cuba with a lot of officials backing down from the official stance. They might view Cuba as a threat of some sort but they don't view them as "the greatest threat to international society", thats just fucking ridiculous and stupid to say even if if was sarcasm. Clearly there are other organisations/movements/nation-states which they view as far bigger threats than Cuba.

[Wanted Man]

oh yeah, like every dissident is on the payroll of the CIA.
Your idiot simplistics aren't helping anyone.
You're the idiot here. The "prisoners of conscience" in Cuba were convicted for receiving money from the US Special Interests Section.

[Andropov]

So were they actually spies or just CIA fabrications?
Or perhaps they were indeed spies but that the CIA had prior knowledge to their activities and were waiting for a suitable time to use their inevitable political currency in bringing to a hault on any softening of the embargo on Cuba?

[IrishWorker]

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

“Could he have done anything for them [Sinn Fein and the IRA]? Maybe.” (http://sluggerotoole.com/index.php/weblog/comments/could-he-have-done-anything-for-them-sinn-fein-and-the-ira-maybe/)

The Daily Telegraph’s report (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/5498569/Accused-Cuba-spy-sought-to-be-US-envoy-to-Northern-Ireland.html) that retired US State Department analyst, Kendall Myers (http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/06/08/clinton.security.review/) - charged, along his wife Gwendolyn, with conspiracy (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/10/AR2009061001529.html), being agents of a foreign government (http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2009/0608/1224248285842.html) [Cuba] and wire fraud - was a rival to Mitchell Reiss’ appointment (http://sluggerotoole.com/index.php/weblog/comments/the-lack-of-transparency-was-far-from-surprising/) as Northern Ireland envoy in 2003 raises a number of ‘what if?’ (http://sluggerotoole.com/index.php/weblog/comments/considerable-emphasis-on-the-role-of-mitchell-reiss/) questions about Reiss’ “liberal intervention”. (http://sluggerotoole.com/index.php/weblog/comments/but-one-hopes-for-the-sake-of-the-people-of-northern-ireland/) [Cuckoo, cuckoo (http://sluggerotoole.com/index.php/weblog/comments/in-the-land-of-the-cuckoo/) - Ed] [Adds Toby Harden blogs his report (http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/toby_harnden/blog/2009/06/11/kendall_myers_alleged_spy_for_cuba_the_irish_conne ction)]. From the Telegraph report (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/5498569/Accused-Cuba-spy-sought-to-be-US-envoy-to-Northern-Ireland.html)

Mitchell Reiss, whom President George W. Bush was appointed as envoy to Northern Ireland by in 2003 in preference to Mr Myers, said: “Could he have done anything for them [Sinn Fein and the IRA]? Maybe.” Just as likely, he added, was that Mr Myers wanted promotion to gain access to intelligence that might not have related to Cuba. “The Cubans could then sell it around the world.
“It could have been valuable for a lot of people the Cubans were going business with. It would have had a financial value, there could have been other strategic interests Cuba wanted to pursue and this was the currency involved.” Mr Reiss confirmed that he had been told that Mr Myers had sought the envoy job.
http://sluggerotoole.com/index.php/weblog/comments/could-he-have-done-anything-for-them-sinn-fein-and-the-ira-maybe/

[Asoka89]

You're the idiot here. The "prisoners of conscience" in Cuba were convicted for receiving money from the US Special Interests Section.

Okay you git, so if the left totally abandons those that resist totalitarians, we're ceding the ground to the neoliberals and other democratic capitalist forces. But your a "Marxist-Leninist right". Nice fucking grammer.

[BIG BROTHER]

I wonder how many Cuban spies are on the U.S.? It was kinda cool they met Castro. Sucks that they were caught though :( although to be honest I'm surprised that they didn't just kidnap them and put them a secret prison camp.

[Wanted Man]

Okay you git, so if the left totally abandons those that resist totalitarians, we're ceding the ground to the neoliberals and other democratic capitalist forces. But your a "Marxist-Leninist right". Nice fucking grammer.
Sorry mate. Of course, I should have realised that working for the CIA and the Miami mafia to sabotage a country and overthrow its revolutionary government, is just a human right. After all, they're resisting totalitarians... I like this Marxist analysis. Nice fucking grammer.

Speaking of which, I'm not sure what "fucking grammer" has to do with it. Republican Senator Elijah "fucking" Grammer? Grammer, Indiana, a small town in the US? A common misspelling of grammar (i.e. "lern sum fukkin grammer and speeling looser")? You're not making any sense.

[Asoka89]

"Marxist-Leninist" = that's the bad grammar

And your simplistic analysis of the resistance both within and outside Cuba to the Castro clique is absurd. Your repeating common myths. Sure there is a large right-wing and terrorist element to the resistance, but since democratic left forces abandoned the struggle within Cuba, what form do you think the opposition is going to take?

[вор в законе]

They are heroes.

[Kwisatz Haderach]

Yes, they are heroes, and much braver than most of us. I hope the Cuban government does something to help them escape from the US.

[mykittyhasaboner]

Here we go again:rolleyes: Nothing heroic about spying for one state capitalism against another state capitalism... This rhetoric has been done to death here and I'm tired of it.

Of course! Cuba is a state-capitalist government!

....and the rightist-gusano terrorists and CIA who carry out violent attacks against the government and people of Cuba are fighting for freedom and democracy!


On a serious note, I wouldn't necessarily call spying for the Cuban government "heroic" but its definitely commendable as it is in the interests of working people everywhere. Of course you think all of this is simply rhetoric, but a Cuban spy in the US government might have (probably did) benefit the sovereignty and defense of Cuba from the US. I think it's justified as Cuba's ventures into aiding many third world countries, as well as it's own people in liberating themselves from American imperialism have benefited the lives of workers; and a spy in the government of the leading imperialist country certainly had helped.

As for state-capitalism, your artificial application of this label to both the US and Cuba shows you have no concrete grasp of this "state-capitalism", because the systems of government, and the ownership of the means of production are fundamentally different between the two countries.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

"The accusation states that the couple received many awards, but at the same time acknowledges that they never sought money nor personal benefits.

"I for one can confirm that, as a matter of principle, we have never tortured anyone nor have we paid anyone to obtain any type of information. Those who, in one way or another, have helped to protect the lives of Cuban citizens against terrorist plots and conspiracies to assassinate their leaders, out of the many perpetrated by several US administrations, did so as the moral imperative of their own consciousness and, in my opinion, deserve all the honors in the world." - Fidel Castro

http://www.granma.cu/ingles/2009/junio/lun8/Reflections-8june.html

[gorillafuck]

Here we go again:rolleyes: Nothing heroic about spying for one state capitalism against another state capitalism... This rhetoric has been done to death here and I'm tired of it.
Wait, they're both state-capitalist?

What the fuck is state capitalism, then?

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

What the fuck is state capitalism, then?

Any state that is not organized according to the wishes of whatever sect the person throwing the term around belongs too.

[gorillafuck]

Why are you getting angry and flustered:confused:
I'm not angry and flustered, I'm just confused as to how they can both be state capitalist while at the same time having two quite different economic systems.

I just curse a lot so I can appear angry when I'm not:lol:

Edit: I don't adhere to a specific Communist doctrine other than Communism.

I am Lenin-ish, though.

[Kwisatz Haderach]

I've actually expereinced some other member in chat suggesting those who criticize the current Venezuela and Cuban states should be shot since we are "traitors". So, I was just worried.:tt2:
Criticizing them is one thing. I criticize them too, and I do not believe they are socialist (especially Venezuela).

But suggesting that they are equivalent to the United States government is another thing entirely. Not only is it just plain false, because their economic systems are extremely different (so whatever Cuba is, the US is not that), but it's also a great tactical error. We can't treat every non-socialist state in the world as equally bad. Some are obviously better than others.

[Niccolò Rossi]

As for state-capitalism, your artificial application of this label to both the US and Cuba shows you have no concrete grasp of this "state-capitalism", because the systems of government, and the ownership of the means of production are fundamentally different between the two countries.

I think the fact that you find the term 'state capitalism' as being inapplicable to the US (or any other nation state) shows you have a completely superficial understanding of what state capitalism is.


What the fuck is state capitalism, then?

I would agree with socialist that there is not need to swearing (you can ask and discuss these things in fraternal manner).

Socialist makes important points about the role played by the state in the US national economy and it's imperialist interests. However, I don't think the wiki quote gives a sufficiently good overview, far from it.

I think the following might give a better overview of what state capitalism is and what it means (sorry for the long quote):

"Thus some general remarks are necessary to make clear what we mean by state capitalism. For us:

state capitalism is not an economy policy that governments can adopt or abandon at will, but a historic new form of capitalism itself that all countries have adopted in the decadent phase of this economic system. Since 1914 in a world torn apart by perennial economic rivalries, barbaric imperialist confrontation and the spectre of revolution, the dominant class has rallied behind the national state as the last guarantor against the disintegrating tendencies of the economic crisis and the main defender of the national imperialist interest in the world arena.



the core characteristic of state capitalism is the tendency by the state to concentrate in itself all the life of society. Economically it is manifested by the tendency for the state to take direct control of the production and distribution of goods, politically by the concentration of political power in the hands of an omnipotent permanent bureaucracy that presides over all aspects of the life of society. Political dissent is suppressed, particularly that of the working class -its former permanent organizations, parties and unions have been integrated into the state- but also even within the dominant class itself.



state capitalism can take several forms depending on historical specificities of the country or conjunctural circumstances. It appeared for the first time during World War I when every government of the warring adversaries saw fit to take control of the productive apparatus and focus all of society’s energy on the war effort. However, state capitalism is not limited to periods of open warfare or open economic crisis such as FDR’s "New Deal", etc. The now defunct ‘socialist" regimes of Russia and Eastern Europe, and "communist" China and Cuba today, represent in reality nothing more than a particular type of state capitalism. The same goes for the Nazi and Fascist regimes and the overt military dictatorships that have on-and-off existed in much of the third world countries. And likewise for the so-called western democracies of today, their ideological loyalty to the "free market economy" and "political freedom" notwithstanding.



State capitalism is neither progressive, nor a solution to the crisis of the system. On the contrary state capitalism is itself an expression of the crisis of the system, a manifestation of the fact that capitalism’s relations of production have become too narrow for the existing productive capacities of society. The economic policies of the state, when they are not a simple tool for the mobilization of all the resources of society for imperialist war, have as a goal to keep capitalism afloat by way of cheating the economic laws of this system. This is the explanation behind the government apparently absurd policy of saving at all cost enterprises that are deemed "too big to fail" forgetting capitalism own economic principle of "survival of the fittest."" (The Economic Crisis: State Capitalism Is Running Out of Room for Manoeuvre, ICC, Internationalism no. 149 (http://en.internationalism.org/inter/149/state-capitalism))

In short, state capitalism is not merely an organisational form of national capital chosen or rejected at will. It is the mode of existence of capital in it's era of decadence.

P.S. Yes, this is off topic from the main line of the thread. Mods can split it if they feel the need to. Though I won't be continuing the discussion on this matter here (if that means anything).

[Niccolò Rossi]

We can't treat every non-socialist state in the world as equally bad. Some are obviously better than others.

This has nothing to do with hailing government spies as 'heroes'

On the last sentence here, I don't think Socialist's reply addresses the issue with this statement properly. I don't want to go into this (it's been gone over many times as of late it seems). What I will say is that, no, some are obviously not better than others. 'Better' is itself a vague and silly term to be using here.

EDIT: NHIA is correct. Post edited to reflect that.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

The accused aren't "military spies".. even allegedly.

[Wanted Man]

"Marxist-Leninist" = that's the bad grammar

And your simplistic analysis of the resistance both within and outside Cuba to the Castro clique is absurd. Your repeating common myths.
Well then, grammar boy, let's see some facts. Because so far, all we've heard is confused rants.

I know from people who've been to Cuba that at every level of society, people are critical of things that go on, after all, nothing is perfect. So what of these people, are they imprisoned? No, they get to air their views quite freely. The "dissident" clique of 2003, however, were convicted for quite different reasons, exactly the ones that were named here.


Sure there is a large right-wing and terrorist element to the resistance, but since democratic left forces abandoned the struggle within Cuba, what form do you think the opposition is going to take?Well, this pretty much proves my point (a good case against confused ranting). You admit yourself that "the opposition" is composed of the right (more accurately, the far right, not your average garden variety right, but hardcore mafia and possibly fascist).

The democratic left forces, of course, have supported the Cuban revolution for 50 years, still going strong. :cool:

[Asoka89]

Right, and I'm closer to your side--- lending critical support than the other ultra-leftist side and I apologize for taking the conversation in the wrong direction before.

That being said, basically Cuba for all it's progressive achievement is a society with the same alienation of labor we have in the capitalist world, it has shortages, inefficencies, documented corruption, etc etc.

Most of all despite the revolutionary achievements, right now it is an CONSERVATIVE society, not a revolutionary one. What I mean is that the ruling elites of Cuba push the idea that the revolutionary already achieved socialism and since there is no freedom of expression in Cuba what you have here is a depoliticized society. What's the point of independent expressions of class power if the worker's already run the state? Of course the problem is they don't have enough power and control, not nearly enough. Principled leftists goal should be the POLITICIZATION of Cuban society, which puts us at odds with the Cuban government.

[SecondLife]

Most of all despite the revolutionary achievements, right now it is an CONSERVATIVE society, not a revolutionary one. What I mean is that the ruling elites of Cuba push the idea that the revolutionary already achieved socialism and since there is no freedom of expression in Cuba what you have here is a depoliticized society. What's the point of independent expressions of class power if the worker's already run the state? Of course the problem is they don't have enough power and control, not nearly enough. Principled leftists goal should be the POLITICIZATION of Cuban society, which puts us at odds with the Cuban government.

This isn't "workers power", but instead Infantile Disorder.

The term 'state capitalism' is still controversial. I suspect that in schools of capitalist countries basic temr state is perverted. Even childrens don't know what means state. In capitalist states state means rather like 'private owner' and it's really is it in capitalism. In capitalism state uses the same legislations as private sector. In socialism state means instead 'all people' and because in socialism don't exist classes, then 'all people' means also 'working class' - it's real workers power. Also 'planned economy' can't in any way associate with free market or capitalism.



In today's capitalism, as opposed to 19th century capitalism, most real production and innovation happens in the state sector in the US. Also the corporations cannot survive without state handouts. There has been no free market in the US in recent times at least.

You probably kidding. USA is much more 'free market' as example Europe.
In USA state have bad debts to China. I don't say this "handout". De'facto
this means that there don't exist at all such thing as state. If state gives money (and moreover with bad debts) for corporations instead of social sphere, then this isn't state but rather corruption or even monarchy.



It has always imposed free markets on clients/oppressed countries, while maintaining a state capitalist economy at home.

Are you interested about 'free market'? But then you are anarcho-capitalist, this is the way where neo-liberalism wants to go today.
Also, remember that there is only question of time when communes (I presume that you like independent communes) becomes corporations in 'free market' situation.

[Asoka89]

Socialist is WRONG about the nature of capitalist society and imperialism today, even though I agree with him on other points:

By the early 20th century, it was easy to conclude, as Lenin (and Rudolf Hilferding, in his classic Finance Capital) did, that industry was coming under the ownership of a handful of big banks, arranged in cartels often protected by price-fixing and high tariffs. Things didn't turn out that way. Now, giant firms are owned by thousands, even millions, of shareholders, and it's hard to point to a controlling force other than "the markets." And individual workplaces don't really count for much these days; the entire world is now an integrated workplace, a giant "social factory."

Global political power is also dispersed. Unlike 19th century imperialism, when Nation X owned Colony Y, today's hierarchy is harder to specify. There are few cases of outright ownership, and the boundaries between the First and Third Worlds are getting blurrier - literally in the case of the U.S. - Mexico border, but also in the sense of the movements of large numbers of migrants from South to North, and the proliferation of skyscrapers and McDonald's in the South.

Cartels and classic imperialism turned out to be blocks to capitalist development. Cartels inhibited competition, capitalism's disciplinarian, as well as technological innovation, jointly leading to inefficiency and stagnation; tariffs, currency regimes, and other instruments of colonial preferences blocked trade and capital flows, inhibiting the development of a single world market; and frequent imperial wars promoted physical and financial ruin that were obstacles to the accumulation of capital. By contrast, the age of Empire is one of deregulation and the promotion of trade and capital flows - all designed to encourage competition, technological innovation, and the integration of the world into a single market. Wars are reserved for "rogue states" that refuse to get with the program.

[Bandito]

They are heroes.
Do you think that they spyed because they believed that they contribute to the wold-wide revolution by doing that?
:D

[Asoka89]

There are many flaws with Negri's Empire... many serious flaws, I don't endorse it whole sale, but I do reject parts of Lenin's theory of imperialism.

[SecondLife]

I understand state as an instrument for class rule.

My god ! Who told you such terrible (really frustrating) stories about state? Is it capitalist propaganda? Go to for a change to some socialist state and look how normal people live without endless class struggle.
Don't you know about social insurance? If state is instrument for class rule, and ruling class is bourgeoisie, then who puts money into social insurance? Bourgeoisie? Right-wing? They have either you die or not.
Class can rule also without state, like in feudal system (before monarchy), they can just kill slaves who don't be obedient.