Roger Sandilands, as well as an economist from the IMF -- Brad probably remembers his name, he is much younger than I am -- have thrown doubt upon the Verona evidence. Roger, by the way, is not a lefty, but a Henry George-like economist.
On Wed, Jun 19, 2002 at 10:17:14AM -0700, Bradford DeLong wrote:
> >I take it you now believe White was a Soviet agent. Why did you
> >change your mind?
> >
> >Carl
>
> Venona. Partial decryption of 4 August 1944:
>
> "As regards the technique of further work with us JURIST said that
> his wife was [B% ready] for any self-sacrifice[;] he himself did not
> think about his personal security, but a compromise[PROVAL] would
> lead to a political scandal and [B% the discredit] of all supporters
> of the new course[o], therefore he would have to be very cautious. He
> asked whether he should [5 groups unrecovered] his work with us. I
> [O% replied] that he should refrain. JURIST has no suitable apartment
> for a permanent meeting place[;] all his friends are family people.
> Meetings could be held at their houses in such a way that one meeting
> devolved on each every 4-5 months. He proposes infrequent
> conversations lasting up to half an hour while driving in his
> automobile."
>
> Everything else sent to Moscow with White as a source can be
> explained away as relatively normal wartime inter-allied
> chit-chat--the kind of thing that Harriman would have told to every
> British official he came across in the course of a day. This is much
> more damaging.
>
> It is *possible* that this cable misrepresents the conversation
> because the NKVD agents wanted to pretend that they had more sources
> than they did, and so misrepresented friendly people interested in
> U.S.-Soviet cooperation as their spies.
>
> It is *possible* that Harry Dexter White thought that he was just
> being a friendly person interested in U.S.-Soviet cooperation--and
> then suddenly realized when this conversation began that they thought
> he was their agent, under NKVD discipline, and was trying to wriggle
> out--stressing that the Russians would not want to try to expose him
> as a spy if he didn't cooperate because it would discredit the entire
> New Deal.
>
> But these possibilities are of the same order of magnitude as that a
> reasonably well-read disbeliever in Nazi gas chambers will turn out
> to be an apolitical liberal...
>
> :-(
>
>
> Brad DeLong
-- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929
Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail michael at ecst.csuchico.edu