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21 September 2010




Well Colonel, there are several issues here.
One has to do with the moratorium on Israeli construction in the disputed territories. Will an extension of three months affect the likelihood of an agreement between Israel and The Palestinians. I would argue that no, it would not. OK.
The rest is refried beans.

Russ Wagenfeld

Pat wrote
"Many of those documents had nothing to do with the Middle East. They were about the USSR, China and the Warsaw Pact. Why did they want these? For "trading material" with the subject countries."

At the time, we also thought the motive for the Soviet Bloc documents was to gather info on Soviet weapon systems that might be provided to Arab states.

Here is a somewhat related story. While my friend Richard Dudley was was working in NESA, he related the story of the Israelis returning a US provided missile which they had disassembled (presumably) to reverse engineer with a request that we put it back together....


Please elaborate on the "a very doubtful admiral in naval intelligence was responsible" comment.

What happened to the "doubtful" admiral?

P.S. I agree Phil about execution.

Robert C.

Dan, I have a lot of concerns about "diveded loyalties" of Americans in positions of power (ie DoD, State) who also hold Israeli citizenship. How does that make me an anti-semite?

Robert C.

Roy G

Lysander, I would say there is quid pro quo involved, for Avigdor Lieberman and his fellow travelers. After all, Israel traded Pollard's secrets to the USSR in exchange for allowing Russian Jews to emigrate to Israel.

Patrick Lang


You wish to believe that the Israelis wee not selling us out in this matter? pl

Patrick Lang


He retired comfortably. pl


Pollard really has been fetishized by some elements... IMRA often runs Pollard-related articles e.g. see links below.

Most of this seems way over the top to me, but if these folks truly believe this stuff, then it's not particularly surprising that they take any/every opportunity to tie his release to whatever is currently going on.

The article by his wife re his interactions with the ex Chief Rabbi of Israel is pretty strange. Supposedly he (the Chief Rabbi) said that "Jonathan’s release is the key to the redemption of all of Am Yisrael" and "Jonathan’s release is also the key to the release of all of Israel’s captives and MIAs. Once Jonathan is out, all the captives are all out! Once they are all out, we are all in Geula!"





They could also be motivated by the cynical reasons you outline. That doesn't diminish the imperative they feel to protect and retrieve their own. Even if it's just the remains.

Jonathan Polland was an American citizen when he was caught and tried. He was one of ours. It was treason.

Israel tossed him an Israeli passport after he got to jail.

Pollard's remains belong here. He should have been executed for what he did. Treason merits the death penalty.

Russ Wagenfeld

Hi Pat,
In my view, he should have received the death penalty as a traitor who sold us out. Seeking information on Soviet weapons was one of the Israeli motives that occurred to us at the time. That the fact he is rotting in jail seems to bother the Israelis is a good thing and perhaps a minor deterrent against future such activities.

Russ Wagenfeld

I too wonder about who the admiral was?


Netanyahu visited Pollard in jail.

I read Seymour Hersh's story on Pollard: THE TRAITOR - The case against Jonathan Pollard. He describes some of the damage Pollard caused in detail.

Patrick Lang


Come now. You know the name. pl


Robert C

I wouldn't worry too much about it. Remember what former Israeli MK Shulamit Aloni said regarding the 'anti-semite/holocaust card', that it was a trick used by Israel and its supporters every-time against anyone who would dare to question Israel and its supporters' horrendous actions (i.e. Pollard spying, ongoing Israeli espionage against the U.S., Israeli mistreatment of the Palestinians that can be compared to the Waffen SS's treatment of European Jews, Israeli continual theft of Palestinian land, Israeli IDF murders of Palestinian children and old women, Israeli IDF rapes of young Palestinian girls, IDF murder of an unarmed 19yr old American kid on a Gaza aid flotilla ship, etc.) . Don't forget that Israel and its supporters cry foul against any Jew who dares to criticize Israeli behavior, they're labeled as 'self-hating'.

William R. Cumming

Like the Liberty incident my guess is Pollard is just an acheing tooth the Israelis would like removed from the history books.

Kim Viner

FWIW having worked with Pollard at the Naval Ocean Surveillance Intelligence Center and having read nearly every well researched work on his case, I can say with confidence that not only the Admiral was at fault. His continued access to classified material after the first time his clearances were yanked was a major debacle for Naval Intelligence and reflects horribly on many in his (then) chain of command. His ability to steal the vast amount of materials he did also clearly showed what a joke physical security was at the time. Thankfully, no President has allowed him to go free.



There are those who call Jonathan Pollard a 'terrorist' versus a spy. And based on their rationale, I have to agree with them.

Pollard's treasonous espionage against U.S. on behalf of the terror state known as Israel, our nation hasn't been given the picture of just how 'terrorist' Pollard and his actions were.

Estimates of figures of deaths directly attributed to Pollard’s spying are at between 110 and 120 American assets and up to 1600 American assets that were foreign nationals. There are those that say (an I agree with them) that Pollard should face 110 murder counts for his American victims alone.

Israel's espionage actions through Pollard was an attack not only on our U.S. but the NATO infrastructure as a whole, in that Pollard's espionage actions would result in a successful nuclear first strike by the then Soviet Union. Many Israeli military and intelligence personas acted as Pollard's accomplices in this regard. They also should face U.S. murder (and espionage) charges. Israel willingly acted as a espionage go-between on behalf of the former Soviet Union.

Pollard and Israel's actions put American NORAD, SAC, and NATO pilots/aircrews and their missions at great risk.

What Pollard did was an act of blatant 'terrorism' against many innocents on behalf of a terrorist state. Pollard needs to be 'executed' for his multiple murders.


"The doubtful admiral."
Well, that's the real problem, isn't it?
Aldrich Ames, John Walker, Robert Hansson etc.
All have a common theme:
Grossly incompetent counterintelligence and security people/organizations.
And they all retire to live happily ever after.
And you people wonder why the average (non-public employee) citizen has so much loathing for government - guaranteed employment/benefits for the lazy and worthless.
Yeah, let's put our health care in the hands of these dimwits.


MRW, I knew all of that. It doesn't change what I wrote and it doesn't change how the gov't and people of Israel feel about Jews and those that help them. It doesn't matter if Pollard did more harm than good. It doesn't matter that he is driving a wedge between the reasonable goyim and Israel. They see him as somebody deserving of protection.

See Yad Vashem's Ave. of the Righteous Gentile. See the Magen David scouring bomb sites for bones and flesh.

I agree that he is a traitor and should rot in jail. I am against the death penalty but treason stretches my opinion.


If it is true that Israel traded Pollard's information for exit visa for Soviet Jews, then it seems to me that it's now "blowback" time in Israel. They got the likes of Avigdor Lieberman in return - a bunch of people whose extreme right-wing religio-nationalism is destroying Israel more surely than Iran ever could.


Perhaps now is a good time to send President Obama a copy of a letter once sent to President Clinton from now-deceased Navy Captain McGonagle: http://www.ussliberty.org/mcg2prez.pdf


I'm watching Press TV, with Phil Giraldi (by phone) talking about the Pollard situation with Stephen Lendman and designated hasberaista Charlie Wolf. Wolf is hilarious; Lendman sounds like a bit of a nutter - even when I agree with him.

A shame, actually, as Wolf's weak defense against Phil's points are masked by Lendman's nuttiness and Wolf's subsequent breathless gasbaggery.

Nice to hear Phil, at least.


I would love to watch that, do you have a URL to point me to? Any help to locate that program would be appreciated.

Adam L Silverman

Graywolf: let's be careful with our constructs shall we? Medicare, a government administered, single payer healthcare program, is the only such program in the US that spends over 90 cents of every dollar on health care. Those that are on it like it so much that many came out to townhall meetings over the past year or so to scream "keep your government out of my Medicare!". The medical system for active duty military personnel, as well as for veterans, both of which are socialized health care routinely poll with upwards of 70% satisfaction or higher. And they too spend the vast majority of every dollar on actual healthcare. The best for profit, private insurance in the US barely spends above 50 cents of every dollar on actual healthcare. And Medicare plus, a Bush 43 initiative passed by a Republican majority in both houses of Congress to prove that the private for profit insurance sector could do as good, if not better than regular government run Medicare, turned out to not be very cost effective spending, at best, barely more than 50 cents of every dollar on healthcare. So not only is there no real comparison here between government healthcare and the three operational security breakdowns you've identified, your attempt to pile on and beat up on healthcare is simply untrue and factually inaccurate. Facts are stubborn things. And yes I've left out Medicaid becuase the very nature of it's charge to provide care for the every I'll, folks that can't qualify for anything else in terms of insurance, means it's costs and outputs are different. This, however is the argument for putting everyone into the insurance pool, even if you're going to go with a private insurance based solution. If everyone is in the insurance pool, than the the risk is diffused by those who are healthy or whose health issues can be cheaply managed through monitoring and generic drugs. This is also the reason why every one in the pool plans should be allowed to negotiate with the drug companies on pricing; it's an economy of scale in regard to purchasing power. Right now pharmaceuticals in the US are an oligarchic command economy - there's no negotiating in the market place, or very limited negotiating. Now I've read all of The Wealth of Nations, not just the one sentence in a several thousand book about the invisible hand, and it is pretty clear that Adam Smith was opposed to this type of thing...


Adam L. Silverman,

Since you brought up Adam Smith, you might be interested in the following article from Counterpunch. It's a warning to Brazil to follow classic economic theory and avoid neoliberal ideology, which eventually leads to debt-slavery.

"The Washington Consensus applauds this pro-rentier policy. Its neoliberal ideology holds that the most efficient path to wealth is to shift economic planning out of the hands of government into those of bankers and money managers in charge of privatizing and financializing the economy. Almost without anyone noticing, this view is replacing the classical law of nations based on the idea of sovereignty over debt and financial policy, tariff and tax policy. Ideology itself has become an economic weapon. Indebted governments have been told since 1980 to sell off their public infrastructure to foreign investors. Extractive “tollbooth” charges (economic rent) replace moderate or subsidized public user fees, making economies less competitive and painting them even more into a debt corner as the surplus is transferred abroad, largely tax-free."


The arguement between private ownership of everything and government owning everything is absurd. We need to define what is best kept private and what should be owned in common by all citizens. If we don't figure it out soon and discard neoliberal ideologies, we will all be tied to the whipping post because both socialism and predatory capitalism are authoritarian.

We do need a third party and it is unfortunate the Tea Party has been taken over by the predators. Adam Smith understood the importance of government's role of building infrastructure and protecting the commons.

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