U.S. INTELLIGENCE
Cuba's spy `walk-ins' target U.S., experts say
Two Cuba experts said spies sent by Cuba to the United States after 9/11
were part of a permanent intelligence program to mislead, misinform and
identify U.S. spies.
BY JUAN O. TAMAYO
jtamayo@ElNuevoHerald.com
WASHINGTON -- In the six months after the 9/11 attacks, up to 20 Cubans
walked into U.S. embassies around the world and offered information on
terrorism threats. Eventually, all were deemed to be Cuban intelligence
agents and collaborators, purveying fabricated information.
A White House official complained bitterly and publicly in 2002 that
Fidel Castro's agents had tried to send U.S. intelligence on ``wild
goose'' chases that could cost lives at a time when Washington was
reeling from the worst terrorism attacks in history.
But now two former U.S. government experts on Cuba have told El Nuevo
Herald that the post-9/11 ``walk-ins'' were part of a permanent Havana
intelligence program -- both before and long after 9/11 -- that sends
Cuban agents to U.S. embassies to mislead, misinform and identify U.S.
spies, perhaps even to penetrate U.S. intelligence.
``Many walk-ins were eventually identified as known/suspected [Cuban
agents]. The problem was that U.S. intelligence was so starved for
information on Cuba -- and we had so few Cuba experts -- that walk-ins
were low risk, high payoff for the Cubans,'' said one former U.S.
intelligence community official.
``The Cubans periodically used walk-ins to continue to test U.S.
capabilities and reactions, but . . . later approaches were not as
frequent as we saw in the immediate wake of the Sept. 11 attacks,''
added a former top Bush administration official.
Both asked that their names not be published because they were not
authorized to speak on the topic.
In an average year, they said, Cuba sends about a dozen agents to walk
into U.S. embassies around the world, claim to be defectors with
important information and ask to speak with U.S. officials who can
understand the value of their revelations. But the number can spike up
to 20 to 25 at times of special importance, they added.
The year 2001 was certainly important. On Sept. 11, al Qaeda attacked
the United States. Ten days later, U.S. authorities arrested the
Pentagon's top Cuba analyst, Ana Belen Montes, on charges of spying for
Havana.
Over the next six months alone, 15 to 20 Cubans walked into U.S.
diplomatic missions and offered information heavily laced with
references to terrorism threats, one of the Cuba experts said. ``All
walk-ins in this group were eventually discredited,'' he added.
Most of the walk-ins took place in U.S. embassies in Latin America,
Europe and Asia, the former Bush administration official said.
GUARDED SECRET
The CIA and the FBI's counterintelligence sections suspected many of the
walk-ins were sent to penetrate U.S. intelligence in hopes of learning
exactly how Montes was uncovered -- to this day one of the closest-held
secrets in the case, one of the experts said.
``Their intelligence services had been taking a beating -- Montes in
2001, the five spies in Miami a couple of years earlier -- and we
believed they were desperate to find out how they were being spotted,''
he added.
But most of the walk-ins over the years appear to have been part of a
broader campaign: to make contact with U.S. intelligence agents,
identify them, keep them busy and pass on misinformation, the two
experts said. Any Cuban who walks into a U.S. embassy offering
information is usually first interviewed by a low-ranking State
Department official, the experts said. But if the information seems
promising the visitor is later debriefed by a CIA or Defense Department
official.
Most of the Cuban agents offer a broad range of information on topics
that Havana knows will interest U.S. intelligence -- Cuba's electronic
eavesdropping capabilities, chemical/biological warfare research,
perhaps discontent within the Cuban military or money laundering.
But their information is usually ``a mile wide and one inch deep'' --
with no significant details in any of the categories, one of the experts
said. CIA and military officials are nevertheless reluctant to ``throw
them back on the street'' because the information at first might seem
legitimate and ``out there [at the embassies] they don't have the
expertise to wave the BS flag.''
``Another part of a successful walk-in is that they are a major resource
drain, also known as a `time suck' '' because it takes time and effort
by the U.S. intelligence community to spot them as fakes and cut them
loose,'' the expert said.
LOW-COST METHOD
And all at a pretty low cost, he added. A Cuban with just 20 hours of
training can present a compelling enough offer of information to require
U.S. officials to spend 100 hours figuring out that the visitor is a fraud.
Cuba's use of walk-ins went on for years both before and after the al
Qaeda terror attacks, both experts said. But those in the immediate
aftermath of 9/11 specially angered Bush administration officials.
``The Castro regime has . . . attempted at least one `walk-in' a month
since Sept. 11 purporting to offer information about pending terrorist
attacks against the United States or other Western interests,'' Dan
Fisk, deputy assistant secretary of state for the Western Hemisphere,
said in a Sept. 17, 2002, speech in Washington.
``This is not harmless game-playing,'' Fisk added. ``It is a dangerous
and unjustifiable action that damages our ability to assess real
threats. . . . It could one day cost innocent people their lives.''
Cuba's spy `walk-ins' target U.S., experts say - Cuba - MiamiHerald.com
(18 October 2009)
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/cuba/v-fullstory/story/1289201.html
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