The Clinton administration suffered a blow yesterday as a federal
district court judge ordered the U.S. Commerce Department to turn over
documents that could incriminate members of the White House in the
Chinagate scandal.
Charles Smith, a WorldNetDaily columnist well known for investigative
work in the area of military technology, along with his company,
Softwar, filed a Freedom of Information Act request to the Commerce
Department for materials on COSTIND — the Chinese Commission of
Science, Technology, and Industry for National Defense — in an effort
to uncover the illegal trading of military secrets between the United
States and China.
The Commerce Department initially turned down his request stating the
documents didn’t exist and that even if they did, they would be labeled
as “top secret” due to national security reasons. Smith, however, had
already received some of the documents from the Commerce Department and
knew they existed. Thus, he appealed his turned down request.
When the Commerce Department again turned him down, he filed a
lawsuit.
At the pre-trial hearings yesterday, Judge Robert Payne immediately
ruled against the Commerce Department saying that Assistant United
States Attorney Joan Evans failed to show a reasonable cause to withhold
Commerce’s documents.
“He (the judge) immediately wagged his finger at Commerce’s lawyer
for even trying to withhold the documents for ‘national security’
reasons,” Smith said.
“I want you to open this up all the way,” Payne ordered Evans. “I
want it full bore, double barrel, 12-gauge, shotgun open. I want
everything.”
Payne ordered the Commerce Department to comply with his orders
within 60 days if they wanted to avoid trouble from him.
“I will come down on you like a ton of bricks,” Payne warned if
Commerce doesn’t comply with his orders. “I don’t want any fooling
around.”
Smith originally filed an FOIA request with the Commerce Department
for materials on COSTIND because he had received information from
Commerce that former Commerce secretary Ron Brown, along with Bernard
Schwartz, CEO of Loral Space and Communications, met with General Shen
Rongjun of COSTIND. Bernard Schwartz, in June 1994, made a $100,000
contribution to the Democratic National Committee and then joined Ron
Brown on a trip to China that ultimately led to a deal worth $250
million for Loral whose telecommunication satellites were launched by
Chinese rockets.
“The bottom line is that I’ve identified the Chinese unit that
penetrated the White House,” said Smith, who referred to COSTIND as an
espionage unit.
Once Smith obtains the documents from the Commerce Department, he
says that his goal is to identify, in detail, the specific technologies
and the meetings between Clinton administration officials and members of
the Chinese military to arrange illegal military equipment transfers
under the guise of commercial transfers.
Referring to the Commerce Department’s attempt to hide the evidence
of White House dealings with China by implying that the documents don’t
exist, Smith said, “These people may be dressed in green, but they’re no
leprechauns. Their business is killing people.”
Smith said that Payne agreed with his assessment of the situation and
believed that it was for events such as this that FOIA requests were
created — to enable people like Smith to keep the nation’s government
in check.
