[Cincinatus' Wife]

Bump!

[Cincinatus' Wife]

DIA fears Cuban mole aided Russia, China***Montes represented a departure from other recent spies, such as KGB mole Aldrich Hazen Ames, a CIA officer who spied for Moscow, and FBI turncoat Robert Hanssen. Montes passed secrets to Cuba because she was ideologically motivated to support the communist government in Havana. During her sentencing hearing in October, Montes said U.S. policy toward Cuba is "cruel and unfair" and that she felt "morally obligated" to spy for the communist regime. Montes was arrested in October 2001 and had been under surveillance for more than a year. She came under suspicion after counterspies detected "anomalies" in intelligence reports from overseas indicating U.S. intelligence information had been leaking out.

One unusual incident that led U.S. counterspies to Montes was her uninvited appearance at an interagency intelligence meeting. "Her presence there seemed unusual," the senior official said. A DIA analyst talked to FBI counterspies about the incident and the FBI eventually was able to zero in on Montes as the suspected source for information going to Cuba. Montes also had contacts with White House national security officials involved on issues regarding Cuba, an area where she would be able to influence U.S. policy toward the communist island, the senior official said.

The damage assessment of the case is also looking at some of the hundreds of reports produced by Montes during her 15 years at DIA to determine whether she supplied "disinformation." DIA analysis of Cuban issues for years has been described by agency officials as biased toward portraying Havana as nonthreatening to the United States.***