Why Edward Snowden is no Whistle-Blower

It took me a long time to come to a decision about NSA leaker Edward Snowden. First of all, because I was too busy doing other things to research the issue, and also because there’s not a lot out there right now to research. I agree that he did terrible damage to our country. But what puzzled me from the beginning was: why did he do it? Whistle-blower or traitor?

And then I remembered some the research I did in writing ROOFMAN. In his memoirs, former CIA officer Harry Rositzke writes about why Eastern European intelligence officers defected to the West during the Cold War:

“In the black-and-white days of the Cold War it is easy to see such men opting with their feet for ‘freedom.’ They were allegedly men who changed sides out of principle, who saw our side as the ‘good guys.’ ”

Rositzke then airbrushes some reality onto this cartoon-like view: “(We deceive) ourselves to see them as heroic fighters for freedom, recurrent testimonials to the rightness of our cause.” (Rositzke, Harry, The KGB: the Eyes of Russia, Doubleday, c1981, p250-251).

Rositzke added that when CIA set up boards and committees to look into patterns of personality and background in those men that might be exploited to encourage more defectors, they found nothing. The Agency concluded that there had been no strictly ideological defectors, only individual intelligence officers who defected for personal reasons. (Roofman: A True Story of Cold War Espionage, Roofman the Spy Publishing, c2011, p31)

What Rositzke wrote back then has convinced me now that Snowden did what he did, not for ideological reasons, but for personal reasons. He is no whistle-blower. Whatever those reasons are, someone will eventually find out.

Edward J Snowden

The more I learn about this guy the less I care what happens to him. He’s no hero. Is he a traitor? I don’t know. Has he hurt the U.S.? Yes.

Edward J. Snowden

My thoughts on the matter: at this point I don’t know enough about the particulars of the case to offer an opinion.  One thing I do know, however; the damage is already done, so I hope Mr. Snowden finds asylum in another country. He seems to be well on his way. Click on this link for the latest:   http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/11/us/snowden-facing-charges-leaves-hong-kong-hotel.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 .

What Do Beijing and Sayreville, N.J. Have in Common?

  The answer to that question is Roofman the Spy’s audio page. ROOFMAN is being pirated big time in China.

I remember that back when there was a Soviet Union, their industrial espionage     involved  both cyber-espionage and recruiting agents (see Clifford Stoll’s Cuckoo’ Egg). I suspect the Chinese might be doing the same thing and using ROOFMAN as a textbook on how NOT to run an American asset.

It seems that ROOFMAN is also being pirated in Sayreville, N.J. – go figure.  I doubt if they’re enemies of the State, however.

Here’s the email I sent to the Department of Homeland Security on 2/19/13. Judge for yourself.

To Homeland Security:

My name is John Pansini, and I live at 1313 E. San Miguel #2, Colorado Springs, CO 80909.

From 12/83 to 12/87, I was a controlled asset of the FBI. They used me against an undercover Soviet intelligence officer (GRU) named Mikhail Katkov. I published an ebook about my experiences in 2011. (Seehttp://roofmanthespy.com/ ; )

The book, ROOFMAN: A True Story of Cold War Espionage, contains 63 minutes of embedded audio in 32 separate mp3 files. In the pdf version, the audio files are embedded. A reader need only click on a link to hear the file; everything is internal to the ebook.

The ebook comes in two other formats: mobi for Kindles and epub for other e-readers such as B&N’s Nook. Because of the primitive capabilities of some e-readers, the 32 mp3 files cannot be embedded into the e-book. Instead, to hear the audio readers must click on a link in the text which then takes them to an external website (seehttp://roofmanpansini.com/ ) then click on a link on that site to hear the audio.

I noticed something very strange in regards to the number of visits in 2012 to the audio website, RoofmanPansini.com. It is for this reason that I am bringing the matter to your attention. My ebook in the mobi and epub formats is being pirated in China; and since the book deals with industrial espionage as carried out by the Soviet Union in the 1980s, I suspect this piracy is being carried out by the Chinese government. The book details counterespionage as practiced by the FBI, industrial espionage as practiced by the U.S.S.R., and how Americans are recruited by hostile intelligence services. Useful information to anyone looking to steal our secrets.

Here are the statistics that first drew my attention to the matter. They can be easily verified by my ISP: http://www.1and1.com/ :

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1) 22,690 hits to RoofmanPansini.com (the audio site that only needs to be accessed by a Kindle or a Nook) came from China. That’s 93.89% of all hits to the site. In contrast, there were only 966 hits to this site from the United States (4%) and 144 hits from Russia (0.6%).

2) 22,364 hits (92.54%) came from one city: Beijing.

3) RoofmanTheSpy.com, my main website where most of my ebook sales are generated, had only 1,123 hits from the PRC (24.87%) in 2012. This compares with 2,131 hits from the U.S. (47.2%) and 200 hits from Russia (4.43%).

4) Again, Beijing had most of those hits: 561 (12.43%).

5) For January 2013, the last month I had Site Analytics Plus which generated the statistics for 2012, of 2,697 hits to the audio site that month, 84.3% (2,030) came from China, and 2,007 came from Beijing. Only 324 came from the U.S., and 14 from Russia. February 2013 should also generate over 2K hits for the month, so they’re not slowing down.

6) I also have a blog that can also be a source of hits to the audio site. In 2012, there were 0 hits to this blog from China.(See https://roofmanthespy.wordpress.com/ )

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Given the PRC’s proclivity for cyber espionage, I think they’re using ROOFMAN as a textbook for conducting industrial espionage in the U.S. I’m willing to cooperate (with DHS in) anyway I can.

Thank you,

John Pansini