Open Letter to U.S. Director of National Intelligence Posted By Author of China-Saudi Arms Expose

Jan. 10, 2011 - PRLog -- The following is the complete text of a letter sent to the office of U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper by Jonathan Scherck, author of the book Patriot Lost.  U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein's office was copied on the message:

January 5, 2011

Dear General Clapper:

I am writing you as the author of the book Patriot Lost, published last summer.  It contains my observations as a contract employee of the Central Intelligence Agency during the George W. Bush administration.  The book includes my account of how the United States Government opted not to intervene in a series of illicit missile shipments from China to the Middle East, shipments that I'm convinced enabled Saudi Arabia to become the undeclared nuclear weapon state that it is today.  

When Patriot Lost was first made public six months ago, the office of U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein responded with "no comment".  Today, I am respectfully requesting an official statement from your office on the matter.

I trust you will agree that a second non-response on this critical issue of weapons proliferation in the Middle East would be problematic, not just for the Obama administration, but for what such stonewalling means for American democracy itself.  After all, the missile shipments I describe are old news by now to those in power in Beijing and Riyadh.  Why shouldn't the American people also know about them today in 2011?    

Another "no comment" would also only serve to further undermine Washington's position in negotiations with Tehran over Iran's suspect nuclear program.   No response would suggest that Washington's policy on WMD proliferation is in fact just as self-serving and myopic today as it was under the previous administration.  

With all due respect, my question is a straightforward one:  To your knowledge, was the George W. Bush administration complicit in Saudi Arabia's acquisition of nuclear capable ballistic missiles from the People's Republic of China--a flagrant violation of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty?  Because, as far as I’m concerned, they were.
 
Very respectfully,

Jonathan Scherck

Scherck's book highlights a radical transformation of Saudi Arabia's ballistic missile arsenal, involving replacement of the CSS-2 with China's CSS-5 class medium range ballistic missile.

Patriot Lost was originally published as an eBook in June 2010 following unanswered requests by the author for response from the Central Intelligence Agency's publication review board.   The book was later made available in print containing Scherck's unredacted observations as an employee in the CIA's Counter-Proliferation Division from 2005-2007.  

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