CONGRESSMAN REBUKES AIDE FOR CIA 'LEAK'

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP84-00499R001000100010-4
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: December 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 21, 2000
• Sequence Number: 10
• Publication Date: March 23, 1972
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved For R ase 2001/03/06 : CIA-RDP84-0009R001000100010-4
BRIDCtFORT, CONN.
TELEGRAM
M - 12,425
MAR 2 3 1912
Congressman Rebukes
Aide for CIA `Leak'
William S. Moorhead said cials have said publicly that 1,-
Wednesday a. White House aide 717 of their people can use the
may have leaked a Central In- top-secret stamp. The CIA, re-
telligence Agency secret while quired by law to keep the ex-
briefing newsmen about new tent of its operations secret,
document - classifying proce- would not tell the subcommittee
dures. publicly "how many of their op-
Reporters fell for a "White eratives have `top secret' ' au-
House sales pitch which was ei- thority," he added.`
ther an outright lie, an exercise "Has David Young leaked
.in pure stupidity or a dan- this important government se-
?gerous breach of security," the cret? By subtracting 1,717 State
.Pennsylvania Democrat said. and Defense Department offi-
Moorhead, chairman of the cials with `top secret' authority
House government information from the 5,100 listed by Mr.
subcommittee, made his re- Young, a clever foreign agent
marks to a professional group can deduce that there are neear-
o.f public information officers ly 3,400 top-level operatives at
for the federal government. the CIA, he said.
White House aide David There was no immediate;
Young told reporters at a comment from the White
March 8 briefing that the Presi- House.
dent's executive order on cias- Moorhead said "I'm sure that
sifying documents would reduce Mr. Young has not breached se-
the number of persons who can curity. He is a very security-
:classify national security infor- -minded person. I think he is
matfon. engaging in the White House
'He said that 5,1 persons public relations to sell
` now can classify information p program
Flop secret' in the State Depart- its new classification system. I
merit, the Defense Department do know that it is a PR pro.
'and the Central Intelligence gram, pure and simple, and not
Agency, and he said that nun- an. exercise in government in-
ber would be reduced to 1,860 formation," Moorhead said.
under the new order," Moor- "This is a clear fact because
head said. no public information officers
"Either Mr. Young is in er- of the federal government were
ror-intentionally or unintentio- asked to comment on the draft
nally-or he had disclosed a of the new classification order.
fact that the rest of the govern- It was, in fact, written by clas-
ment security apparatus takes sifiers, for classifiers, and will
great pains to protect," only perpetuate the security
Moorhead said. Iclassification management bu-.
In reply to subcommittee reaucracy without. dealing with
;questions, Moorhead said, State the real problems of the system
' and Defense Department offi- as a whole,". Moorhead. said.. _I
Approved For Release 2001/03/06 : CIA-RDP84-00499R001000100010-4
 Approved For Release 2001/03/06 : CIA-RDP84-0049ER001000100010-4
Miiiivc.AP0LIS
`
MINN
BAR 2'199
:24?,275-
674,302
Two years ago, the Senate' Foreign
lelations Committee learned that
American foreirn-aid funds were
be2.11` i.1sed to l5ay to the Ccllti ,I
Intelligence Agency's niiiitary opei.l
'lions in Laus. A few months later, Dr.
John Han;la.i-!,, administrator of the
Agency for International Develop-
-inent, told an interviewer, "I have to
admit that this is true." After rep eat-
. ed. protests from senators over the
use of. AID funds by the CIA, how-
--'ever, I-lannah. wrote to Sen. Edward
Kennedy that "effective at the be-
-gin!ling of fiscal year 1972, all of the
AID financing with which you have
been concerned will be terminated."
But it wasn't. According to a report
by the General Accounting Oi ice,
the congressional investi gating body,
nearly half of the U.S. funds appro-
priated to help civilian victims of the
war in Laos are still being; diverted to
the CIA's secret guerrilla army in that
country. The report,. a sumthary of
which was--made public by Kennedy
`iatuniav, showed t' pt about .S2.5
r,L.Ilion in p) nlic-health funds admin-
istered by AID are being diverted
cm'? year. v(.`rcover, cr.) gressional
souices indicated that another ac-
counting-office report, expected later
this month, will disclose that AID's'_
refu gee-assistance programs in Laos :
have also been diverted to military'
uses by the CIA..
Despite administration assurances to
the contrary, then, the CIA still has
its hand in the non-military foreign-"
till. Thr e explanations for that,
in possible. One is that AID's ad-
nlinisti cator didn't know what was
going on in his own agency. Anctler
is that he deliberately misled the
Senate. 1'he third is that the adnii.n-
istr.:tion, ,after Hannah's letter .vas
wricten, decided to resume the financ-'
ing of CIA military activities with
AID funds, but didn't bother telling.
the Senate about it. In any case, some
Approved For Release 2001/03/06 : CIA-RDP84-00499R001000100010-4
TRIBUNI
 Approved For Release 2001/
R
,MkW- 9QR001000100010-4
ar penniless'
s
says
_Dy S. W1
By GUY RAIS
JARS MAUREEN BINGHAM, 35, wife of. the
j~~ Portsmouth Naval officer jailed for 21, years for
selling secrets to the Russians, said yesterday she was
" penniless," and had debts of #1,000. She would be
applying for social security to keep herself and her,
four children. .
As Mrs Bingham continued " resting " in the country,
two senior detectives who investigated the case of Sub-Lt
Bingham, met representatives of the Director of Public
P
-
rose
Yard.
The detectives, Det. Chief
Insp. John Chilcott, CID head
at Havant, Hants., and Det.
Chief Insp, Norman Hughes, of
the Special, Branch, are investi-
gating the role which Mrs Bing-
ham claims to have played in
the case.
After her husband: was . sen-
tenced at Winchester Crown'
Court on-Monday, Mrs Bingham
said in statements to the Press
and on television that she had
gone to the Russian Embassy in
London to offer her husband's
services as a spy, adding: "I
shall never know why I was not
charged as well. It was all my
fault."
Mrs Bingham repeated yes-
terday that she would welcome
police investigations into her
role, but detectives. have no
plans as yet to, interview her..
"Not gtf'ilty " plea
She said: " I want to prove
that my husband passed noth-
ing of value to the Russians.
If I go to prison as a result I
will accept my sentence, al-
though I will not plead guilty
as he did.
" Neither my husband nor I
have done anything to merit the
savage sentence he received.
I want to make public every-
thing I know."
Mrs Bingham said as well as
debts of #1,000 she had heavy
hire purchase commitments for
furniture.
"Since my husband was jailed
his naval pay has stopped and
there is nothing coming in. I
have already seen a welfare
officer, who told me I w?ni:ld be
eligible for social security."
Mrs Bingham said she and
her husband had got into debt
during the eight months he was
on an oflicers' training course.
"At that time he "was receiv-
ing #25 a week as a petty offi-
cer. But he had to keep up
appearances in the mess and
his bills were about #30 a
month.
" I had to dress up to attend
social engagements. We could
not stay in our married quar-
ters after he was commissioned
and we had to borrow #2,000 for
a house deposit and other costs.
" My h'usband's spay increased
to #50 a week, but he was pay-
ing #36 a month mortgage and
hire purchase commitments of
#25 a week."
She' said after they began
working for the Russians more
money came in and they decided
to chanze their house as it was
too small.
"We moved into a detached
]rouse which cost #8,000, getting
another loan from the bank. We
made about #900 profit on the
sale of the first house, but it
was swallowed up in costs we
incurred in the move. The mort-
gage also increased to #58 a
month."
Selling home
Mrs Bingham said she planned
to sell the house and hoped any
profit would pay off her debts
and enable herself and the
children to move to a smaller
home " and start afresh."
Asked if she had a reply to
criticism made of her conduct,
Mrs Bingham said: "Toll those
who criticise to wait and see the
outcome. Everyone is saying
that David passed secrels to the
Russians, which is not true."
Reminded that the Attorney-
General had said in court that
the secrets Bingham had passed
were "almost beyond price,"
and that the Judge had told
Bingham it was a " monstrous
betrayal of his country's
secrets," Mrs Ttinghani said:
"I still maintain that neither
Approved For Relea i A vCPA,DP84-00499 R001000100010-4
e o e ussuans.
 sApproved For Release 2001%5' 34yg#W- B49SR001000100010-4
SPIES IN THE NAVY
THERE IS PUBLIC CONCERN, and a degree of bafflement,
about several aspects of the case of Sub-Lieut BINGHAM,
the 31-year-old naval officer who was sentenced on Monday
to 21 years' imprisonment for selling secrets to the Russians.
The court was told that one document he gave them was
" almost beyond price." Apparently, though details on
this were vague, it contained operational and tactical
instructions to the Fleet in case of war. The first question
in the public mind, therefore, is how so junior an officer
came to be in unsupervised possession of such material.
He is also said to have passed information about sonar
and nuclear depth charges. Russian espionage has always
concentrated heavily on the Royal Navy, because anti-
submarine techniques would be crucial in any major
conflict. Just how effective is the system for controlling
secret documents at H M S Vernon, where BINGHAM
attended an anti-submarine warfare course?
The Bingham case further suggests that any security
and anti-espionage system which bases itself on automatic-
ally being beware of certain categories of persons-
homosexuals, members of extreme political parties, and so
on-can easily prove worthless. BINGHAM apparently just
did it for the money to help pay off his mortgage. Beyond
being in debt, he fitted into no obviously suspect " category "
-rather the contrary. Perhaps the Services should pay
more attention to the financial status of junior officers-
at least if they, handle secrets. Another puzzling feature
is the role of Mrs BINGHAM. Yesterday's announcement
that the Director of Public Prosecutions has asked the
police to make immediate inquiries into her role, following
her statements to the Press and on television, adds to the
mystification. Had not such inquiries already been made?
What did they yield, and why should new ones now be
needed? Parliament and public need to be given some
answers to their misgivings.
Approved For Release 2001/03/06 : CIA-RDP84-00499R001000100010-4
 Approved For Rele se 2001IDt31O : 9-DR001000100010-4
9 MARCH 1972
PE1 r KOYSKY
SECRETS
DEMAND
By RICHARD BEESTON
in Washington
A REPUBLICAN presi-
dential candidate filed
a suit against, the.,Penta-
gon yesterday to force pub-
aication of the Penkovsky
i " special collection " Papers
which he claimed related to i
current Russian plans in
case of nuclear war against
America.
The move coincided with an
announcement by President
Nixon yesterday ordering the de-
classification of large quantities
of secret documents, but not
specifically referring to the
Penkovsky Papers.
Mr John Ashbrook, an Ohio
member of the House of Repre-
sentatives, said the papers con-
tained Soviet top-secret doc-
trine for nuclear war, and long-
range strategic plans which the
American people had a right to
know about.
The papers were provided to
British intelligence - which
passed them on to Washington
-by a Russian intelligence
officer, Col Oleg Penkovsky, who
was reported to have been exe-
cuted by the Russians in 1963.
Mr Ashbrook, a conservative,
said that those papers which
accurately predicted the Soviet
nuclear build-up had been pub-
lished, but not the "spell
collection " dealing with specific
Soviet strategic intentions against
America.
But Mr Aslbrook contended
that the only purpose served by
continued secrecy "is to keep
the American people from know-
ing what the men in the Kremlin
have known for all these 10
years. It is the right of, the
American people to know, and
to know just how the Nixon
Administration plans to protect
them."
Many abuses
In his statement from the
White House yesterday Mr
Nixon promised to "lift the veil
of secrecy which now enshrouds
altogether too many papers."
The secret classification of docu-
ments did "not meet the stand-
ard of an open and democratic
society."
The "many abuses" of the
security system would no longer
be tolerated. Classification fre-
quently served to conceal
bureaucratic mistakes.
Highest classification
Ile released a copy of a letter
from Mr Lawrence Ealgleburger,
Deputy Assistant Secretary of i
Defence, acknowledging that the
" special collection." contained
material of the "highest classi-
fication, extremely relevant to
current Soviet strategic doctrine
and war plans."
Mr Eagleburger said that in
all likelihood Russia was still
trying to determine which of
'their secrets Penkovsky had
given away. It would not be in
America's interest to assist
Them.
Approved 'For Release 2001/03/06 : CIA-RDP84-00499R001000100010-4