Cuban spies infiltrating the U.S. government

To promote a nonviolent transition to a Cuba that respects human rights, political and economic freedoms, and the rule of law.

 

Learn how Cuban spies infiltrating the U.S. government remain a real and present danger to America tonight at 7pm on Sixty Minutes on CBS

Ana Belen Montes mugshot and Manuel Rocha on FBI surveillance video

CBS's 60 Minutes tonight on their 56th season finale at 7:00pm will air a segment titled "Cuban Spycraft":  

"For decades, prolific Cuban spies working in the U.S. government, serving in high-profile positions with top security clearances, have evaded American intelligence officials. This Sunday, Cecilia Vega reports on two undercover agents." 

Peter J. Lapp retired as an FBI special agent after 22 years of investigating or leading counterintelligence investigations involving Cuba, Russia, and China. He is the author of Queen of Cuba: An FBI Agent's Insider Account of the Spy Who Evaded Detection for 17 Years and an excerpt of his interview with 60 Minutes is available on YouTube.

Cecilia Vega: The story of two American citizens with top security clearances, and how they spied on behalf of Cuba which bartered and sold America's secrets to enemies around the world. 

Cecilia Vega: Do you think there are other Ana Montes's in the government right now?

Peter Lapp: Oh, absolutely, absolutely

Cecilia Vega: That's chilling

Peter Lapp: There is no doubt that the Cubans are penetrating our government with individuals who are loyal to them, and not to us.

There are other Ana Montes's and Manuel Rocha's working inside the U.S. government for the communist dictatorship in Cuba, and they seek to do harm.

What harm have they done?

Some have questioned what concrete harm Manuel Rocha has done to others beyond the U.S. government, but an official review is underway that will take years to determine the full extent of the damage done, but other Cuban spies offer some ideas that are looked at in an OpEd published in the Miami Herald online on May 14, 2024.

In his 2023 book, Castro’s Nemesis, Chris Simmons,a career Counterintelligence Officer with the U.S. Army and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), describes how his colleague in the DIA Reg Brown conducted a counterintelligence assessment that the “Castro regime still trafficked drugs” and that this involved the “organized and sustained involvement by many of Fidel’s highest ranking officials.” The assessment was sent to other DIA analysts for a “routine review” in early June 1989, and Reg Brown received a positive response, but was shocked  when CNN reported “Cuba’s arrest of 14 officials for drug trafficking” in mid June 1989. Eventually a total of 33 were jailed, executed or committed suicide.

Simmons wrote, “Reg was suspicious at the coincidence. The timing of the internal release of his assessment and Havana’s crackdown were eerily close. Additionally, most Cuban officials named in his assessment were among the thirty-three executed, imprisoned, fired, or who committed suicide.”

Ana Belen Montes, and a second unidentified spy were working for Havana in the DIA at the time.

The 1989 Ochoa Trial was an effort by Cuban officials to cover up their drug trafficking by executing Major General Arnaldo Ochoa, and Colonel Antonio de la Guardia, Major Amado Bruno Padron, and Captain Jorge Martinez of the Ministry of the Interior (MININT) following a political show trial. Without being alerted by agent(s) that penetrated the DIA, Reg Brown's assessment would have had more serious repercussions for Havana, and Washington would have been less likely to share narcotics trafficking intelligence with their Cuban counterparts.

Havana had successfully whitewashed its decades-long, and ongoing, track record of drug trafficking. It is fair to say that the communist dictatorship in Cuba should be called the "Havana Cartel".

 

 

The number of Americans dying of cocaine overdoses has grown exponentially since 1999 when Washington and Havana intensified their joint counternarcotics efforts. It is reminiscent of similar efforts with Panamanian strongman Manuel Noriega in the 1980s.

How did Havana achieve these intelligence wins over the United States?

Mary O'Grady offers a possible answer in the conclusion of her column published on Monday in The Wall Street Journal on "how Cuba fuels the campus protests."  The present round of protests in the United States have produced anti-Semitic tropes and attacks. Communist Cuba has a history of this on both fronts.

In a 2014 unclassified report, “Cuban Intelligence Targeting of Academia,” the FBI said that schools, colleges, universities and research institutes are “a fertile environment” for foreign intelligence. “The Cuban intelligence services,” it added, “are known to actively target the U.S. academic world for the purposes of recruiting agents, in order to both obtain useful information and conduct influence activities.”

The Castro dictatorship has used the Venceremos Brigades as a talent pool for new spies, and for the more violent, for new terrorists, such as some of the members of the Weather Underground.

Manuel Rocha was recruited by Cuban intelligence officers  in 1973 when he was fresh out of Yale University, and Ana Belen Montes was recruited while still a graduate student at John Hopkins University.

How many future spies are being identified by the Castro regime's Directorate of Intelligence in 2024, and how many future domestic terrorists?

Be sure to catch 60 Minutes tonight on CBS and their installment on "Cuban Spycraft".

 

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