Accusations of Racism Roil Chinese Spy Case

Former Los Alamos security chief Robert S. Vrooman says hes tired of hearing about the Wen that got away. So a week after Energy Secretary Bill Richardson recommended Vrooman be punished for botching the spying case against fired-but-never-charged Wen Ho Lee, Vrooman got on the phone with the Washington Post. He suggested nay, insisted that not only was the espionage case against Lee "built on thin air," but that the Taiwan-born scientist also had been scapegoated because of his race. Vrooman wont get into the nitty-gritty of the case top secret, and all that but he didnt mind saying that Lees ethnicity was "a major factor." Vrooman claimed to have counted 13 white scientists at Los Alamos who made the same visits to China as Lee and talked to the same Chinese scientists. None were part of the investigation. But TIME Washington correspondent Elaine Shannon reminds that none of them had left the door open to one of Los Alamos most important barns. "He took the top-secret legacy codes and left them vulnerable," she says. "The FBI cant prove that he delivered them to the Chinese Vrooman is right about that. But at the very least, he still committed an egregious offense."

Certainly, Lees case hit the papers at a time when the Cox committee was scouring the DOEs shoddy security record and screaming for Asian heads. Not a good time for a Taiwan-born scientist to have broken so serious a rule. But Bob Vroomans heart isnt bleeding, says Shannon - this outburst is more about covering Vroomans rear than saving Lees. "He was head of counterintelligence at a time when security at DOE was very sloppily run, and for him to say there were no significant problems is self-serving," she says. "Does Bill Richardson believe that Lee spied? Yes. Is he scapegoating some officials because theres now no case against Lee? Probably," she says. "Is there more to this than meets the eye? Definitely." In other words, this game of national-security office politics is just getting warmed up.