"As long as they didn't kill me, I'll always have a day to wash away my grievances!"
In December 1999, at the age of 60, Li Wenhe secretly made a vow in his heart.
Wenhe Li, born in Taiwan in 1939, received a doctorate degree in mechanical engineering from Texas A&M University after several years of study in the United States in 1964. During that time, he became a U.S. citizen in 1974 and joined Los Alamos National Laboratory in 1978.
Since then, Wen Ho Lee's life trajectory has been smooth sailing, and he has become a well-known hydrodynamics expert with a good reputation in the industry. It wasn't until early 1999 that it was all broken.
One day in early March of that year, Wenhe Lee, who was working, inexplicably received a dismissal notice from the Department of Energy, citing him as "violating safety regulations." A few days later, the New York Times took the lead in reporting that a "Chinese spy" was suspected of leaking the secrets of a miniature nuclear warhead to China at the U.S. Department of Energy's National Research Institute in Los Alamos, New Mexico.
In April 1999, a Spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry quickly refuted the U.S. claim, a sensational "nuclear espionage case."
What Wen Ho Lee did not expect was that his doom was still ahead, and just when he was seeking legal ways to solve the problem at home to make the truth clear, the FBI also took action. In September, they arrested Mr. Lee and threw him in jail as a "nuclear spy," and soon Mr. Lee was indicted on 59 counts, including improper handling of weapons secrets.
Why the FBI arrested Wen Ho Lee, the initiator of this matter also has to talk about the US Department of Energy. In 1995, Notola Trulock, a counterintelligence director at the U.S. Department of Energy, received a report from a like-minded analysis group called KSAG, which said that China's nuclear weapons development has made rapid progress in recent years, but "China cannot complete the triple jump without relying on the strength of its own nuclear scientists alone, so there must be American technology here to cheer."
The report further analyzes that Wen Ho Lee is of Chinese descent, has traveled to China many times, has exchanges with Chinese scientists, and has "convenient conditions for accessing, downloading, and transferring top-secret intelligence," and it is entirely possible to "disclose the most cutting-edge nuclear weapons technology information of the United States to China."
Did Wen Ho Lee do anything as claimed in the allegations?
As a well-known hydrodynamicist, Wen Ho Lee's research requires attending academic conferences around the world. In 1986 and 1988, he traveled to Beijing with his wife to attend similar conferences and met with some Chinese scientists. But his substantive engagement with China was nothing more than that, the only two trips he had made to China, and it was a legitimate academic conference, and the reason was completely valid.
But in the FBI's view, this is real evidence, Wen Ho Lee went to China and communicated with Chinese scientists is a fact, and with the sensitivity of his identity, there is no problem in arresting him.
But don't forget, the correctness of the KSAG report is fully based on its first half, that is, "China cannot complete the triple jump without the strength of its own nuclear scientists alone, so there must be American technology here."
If this premise is not established, Li Wenhe's suspicions will be automatically cleared.
The facts are clear from a look at the development of nuclear technology in our country.
At 3 p.m. on October 16, 1964, New China successfully exploded the first atomic bomb at the Lop Nur Test Site in Xinjiang. Of the thousands of instruments that participated in the nuclear explosion test, more than 95% were domestically produced, and 97% of them accurately recorded the data and completed the test task excellently. China's first nuclear test surpassed the first of other nuclear powers, both economically and technologically.
In the fourth nuclear test on October 27, 1966, the Dongfeng-2 missile equipped with a nuclear warhead successfully exploded over the test bullseye 569 meters above, and it took only 2 years to complete the development path of combining atomic bombs and missiles, shocking the world.
From the atomic bomb test to the successful test explosion of the second generation of nuclear weapons hydrogen bomb, the United States lasted 7 years, the Soviet Union lasted 4 years, the United Kingdom lasted 5 years, France lasted 8 years, China successfully completed the hydrogen bomb principle test in December 1966, which lasted only 2 years and 2 months, and successfully tested and detonated before France, which studied for many years, and became the fourth country in the world to have a hydrogen bomb at the fastest development speed. Since then, after only 3 nuclear tests, a missile equipped with a hydrogen warhead has been made, which is once again the highest speed in the world.
The United States began to study in the late 1950s and proposed the concept of the neutron bomb, and it was not until the 1970s that the development work was completed. China began to develop neutron bombs in the late 1970s, and successfully tested them in September 1988, which lasted less than 10 years, becoming the fourth country to possess a neutron bomb after the United States, France and the Soviet Union. Since then, China has mastered the third generation of nuclear weapons technology, which is on the same level as the United States.
China's achievements have made some people in the United States extremely unhappy, they always fantasize out of nothing that China has stolen US nuclear technology, before Lee Wen-ho, some officials of the CIA and the FBI have repeatedly raised doubts, but this groundless suspicion has no evidence at all, few people echo and believe, and every time they can only be stopped.
Looking at the history of China's nuclear weapons development, it is not difficult to find that China's development speed and input-output efficiency far exceed those of the United States and some other nuclear powers.
Chinese's ingenuity has enabled china to master the cutting-edge technology of the third generation of nuclear weapons, and when China has mastered or is about to master the world's most advanced military technology, some people in the United States have vigorously slandered China for developing nuclear weapons by stealing American technology.
The Wen Ho Lee case is the product of this skepticism. In the FBI, Li Wenhe is of Chinese descent, has the opportunity to access confidential technology, and has traveled to China twice, these factors add up, is not the real hammer evidence of the spy, as for the details of the evidence, first of all, no matter how much, arrest him and then say.
Obviously, the basis for the investigation of Wen Ho Lee's case was not established in the first place, and the FBI went astray from the beginning.
Facts have proved that the FBI's ideas are both ignorant and stupid, Wen Ho Lee has been imprisoned for several months, the case has still not made any substantial progress, and the evidence for the arrest of Lee Wen Ho is still only at the level of conjecture, which is undoubtedly a great irony for the US judicial system.
The FBI had assigned two agents to work with prosecutors in the case to move the case forward and see how the two prosecutors who worked with them evaluated the two.
One of the prosecutors described it this way: "Working with him [Agent A] is like driving a dead donkey cart." Another prosecutor, recalling his own experience, said: "He [Agent B] was a piece of crap. ”
In any case, this case is more like metaphysics than a case investigation of the Eight Classics.
Of course, not everyone will be blinded by the FBI, and there have been some dispassionate reports in the newspapers, such as the Los Angeles Times, which commented on March 16 that the allegations of China stealing US nuclear technology are "absurd exaggerations" and that the so-called "China espionage case" is based on vigorously advocating the "China threat theory" and is "irrational" in the future.
So, why does the US side disregard the evidence and prefer to make such a false investigation?
The superficial reason is that, as mentioned above, the United States has always dreamed of China stealing U.S. nuclear technology out of thin air. And the deep-seated reasons are more worthy of deep consideration.
The two-faced style of Americans in human rights has long been known to the world, and the treatment of increasingly powerful China and the Chinese who have a hardened waist is even more with the psychology of "not my race, their hearts will be different", which is the essence of The Lee Wen Ho case.
Although Wen Ho Lee was born and raised in Taiwan, in the eyes of the United States, as long as he is Chinese, it does not make much difference, and when the "Li Wen nuclear espionage case" was first exposed, a national television station in the United States even openly said to the American audience: "Your Chinese neighbor may be a Chinese spy." ”
Richard Shelby, chairman of the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee, arbitrarily declared on NBC's "Meet the Press" program: "We must remember that where there are weapons systems, there are Chinese everywhere ... They are real. They are here. And they may be very proficient in deception in some way. ”
Ethnic prejudice occurs not only in national laboratories, but also in government circles, in the scientific community, in ethnic media, and in high-tech business groups. Chinese scientists and engineers in the United States have been "specially treated" by U.S. intelligence.
The FBI has a special rule for all Chinese scholars who go abroad that Chinese are required to undergo a month-long "background information check" before re-entering the United States.
Wu Zhenwei, the first Chinese-American Congressman in the United States and chairman of the Asian-American panel in Congress, spoke at a House Science Committee hearing on the security of the Department of Energy, denouncing racial discrimination against Chinese. He said the greatest strength of the United States is that everyone has the freedom to pursue the American dream, but now Chinese Americans are clearly discriminated against. "It's not the American dream, minister," Mr. Wu told Richardson. "It's an American nightmare."
The Wen Ho Lee case is precisely the absurd manifestation of the United States' "want to add to the crime, why there is no excuse."
It is impossible to find evidence in the Wen Ho lee case because there is no evidence at all. In An interview in August of that year, Ferruman, the former head of counterintelligence activities at Los Alamos National Laboratory, admitted that investigators lacked evidence that Wen Lee had leaked nuclear secrets.
This Ferroman, a month later, was punished along with two other members of the laboratory: the team leader Craig and the head of the laboratory, Heck, but the punishment was minimal, only the salary was frozen, and the reprimand letter was issued.
Even so, the FBI was not dead-hearted, expanding the scope of their investigations, examining hundreds of people involved in the project from 1984 to 1995, trying to find clues to drag Wenhe Lee into the water, of course, these efforts were in vain.
Poor Lee Wen-ho, who, despite repeatedly pleading his innocence, remained in prison for more than 9 months.
During this period, the US media could not stand it, and the Los Angeles Times published a column entitled "The Government Owes Li Wenhe an Apology", strongly criticizing the US government for persecuting Li Wenhe politically regardless of the factual basis.
Until September 2000, the FBI was so skilled that it had to admit its mistake. On September 14 and 14, the "Wen Ho Lee Espionage Case", which lasted for one and a half years, finally ended hastily due to insufficient evidence from the prosecution. U.S. District Judge Parker apologized to Li Wenhe while announcing his release in court.
Afterwards, U.S. federal prosecutor Randy Bellos disclosed some insider information about The Wen Ho Lee case, revealing how the FBI created unjust, false and wrong cases due to dereliction of duty. He believes: "The Wen Ho Lee case is an example of a wrongful judicial investigation! ”
A U.S. Justice Department report after the fact severely criticized the FBI, focusing on:
1. If Wen Ho Lee is a Chinese spy, why not wait for him to be arrested when he hands over the data to the connector? With at least some evidence in hand, the FBI won't be so passive.
2. If Wen Ho Lee wasn't a Chinese spy, the FBI would be even more stupid, wasting so many resources to do meaningless things and putting the Justice Department to shame, which is tantamount to spending money to punch themselves in the mouth.
Li Wenhe suffered injustice, and he swore from the moment he was imprisoned, "As long as they didn't kill me, I will always have a day to wash away my grievances!" ”
After he got out of prison, he lost his job, lost his pension, and had to pay huge legal fees, but he did not forget his oath. In order to fight for his rights and justice, he has fought nearly 7 years with the powerful U.S. government and the news media that has made false reports about itself.
In June 2006, in the face of facts, these institutions finally had to make compromises. On June 2, the two sides reached a settlement in court, and the U.S. Department of Justice, the Department of Energy, and four media outlets paid a total of $1.645 million in damages to Wen Ho Lee. The money looks like a lot, but in fact, Wenhe Lee can only get $750,000, and the remaining $895,000 needs to be used for legal fees and taxes. Therefore, many analysts believe that this result is still far from people's imagination.
For Lee, this did not represent belated justice, and the then interior minister, Renault, did not admit his mistakes, and she even went on television to remind Americans that Lee Was a "felon", not a hero. Wen Ho Lee repeatedly thought about the reasons for all this during his imprisonment, and later, he wrote the results of his thinking into his autobiography "My Country Sues Me": "No matter how wise and hard working, Asians like me, Chinese like me, will never be accepted by American society, and will always be 'foreigners'." ”