Full Release - IRmep

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Green told Th!! Nation. What's mort!, Green says, he believes the FBI considers Franklin
only a little fish useful to getting Rosen.
For,mer FBI attorney Harv~y Rishikof says that both theories, that this investigation is
a~out leaking, or that it is motivated by graver counter- intelligence concerns, could be
true. "They are not necessarily opposing theories,1I Rishikof told The Nation. IIIfyou are
worried about counterintelligence.issues, and counterintelligelwe issues are also related to
leak issues, so that individuals are using strategic leaks baSically for counterintelligence
purposes, you then'link up the two threads...If you were the government, the leaks then
become the method py which you are able to shut down what appears to be a
counterintelligence problem."
The full picture ofthe government's·case against Rosen will not emerge until an
i~dictment is handed down, assuming there even is one. It is not even clear how he
originally appeared on the FBI's radar screen. But ifprosecutors focus on Rosen's alleged
long-term cultivation ofexecutive branch sources, who might have improperly shared
with him privileged information about US national security deliberations, it's a twist on
what we"understand·as a typical spy story, because such behavior, at l~ast in its
unclassified form, is the very currency ofthe capital: Washington lobbyists cultivating
inside sources and trading information with them to influence policy.
Whether it was the FBI's intent~on or not, one result ofthe franklin!AlPAC investigation,
along with the jailing ofMiller in the Wilson investigation, has been the fortressing ofthe
executive branch; the danger is that this could enable t~e Bush Administration to shape
policies with even less consultation from the public and Congress.,