The Wall Street Journal
How Cuba Recruits Spies to Penetrate Inner Circles of the U.S. Government
Story by Brett Forrest • 1w •
MIAMI—Manuel Rocha was on alert, zigzagging through Miami’s Brickell district, en route to a clandestine meeting—at a church.
The retired U.S. ambassador was fearful of being tailed. But “a message for you from your friends in Havana” was waiting, promised a text from the man who had requested the covert encounter, according to a federal criminal complaint.
The urbane and self-assured Rocha failed to detect counterintelligence agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation who were watching and following.
The FBI arrested Rocha in December, and U.S. prosecutors allege he secretly pushed Cuba’s agenda for more than 40 years as he advanced through top posts at the State Department, National Security Council and the U.S. military’s Southern Command. Rocha told a federal judge last month that he intends to plead guilty to being an agent of Cuba.
Attorney General Merrick Garland called the Rocha case one of the “highest-reaching and longest-lasting infiltrations of the U.S. government by a foreign agent” of any country.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/how-cuba-recruits-spies-to-penetrate-inner-circles-of-the-u-s-government/ar-BB1jZWr5
