Pentagon Can't Find Deutch Disks

[William Knowles <wk () C4I ORG>]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/aponline/20001009/aponline164533_000.htm

By John Solomon
Associated Press Writer
Monday, Oct. 9, 2000; 4:45 p.m. EDT

WASHINGTON  Pentagon investigators have been unable to locate computer
diskettes that ex-CIA Director John Deutch used to store a journal
when working at the Defense Department, officials say. The journal
contained classified information.

Deutch has declined to be interviewed about the whereabouts of the
disks, created during his tenure as deputy defense secretary in the
mid-1990s, officials said.

"There's no way to tell what their ultimate disposition might have
been without talking to Dr. Deutch, and he has declined requests for
our investigators to talk with him on this or other topics," Rear
Adm. Craig Quigley, a Pentagon spokesman, said.

The investigation of the missing diskettes comes after CIA officials
already concluded that Deutch improperly recorded government secrets
in a private journal about his government experiences. He stored the
journal on electronic storage cards during his tenure as head of the
spy agency.

While the storage cards he used at CIA have been recovered, the
Pentagon was unable to locate the diskettes Deutch created during his
Defense Department days, when he began the journal, officials said
Monday.

The Pentagon has been conducting a damage assessment to determine if
his action jeopardized national security. The Justice Department also
is investigating whether any criminal charges are warranted.

Deutch's lawyer on Monday declined comment, citing the
investigations. Deutch cooperated with the CIA probe, and earlier this
year apologized for sloppy handling of classified information.

At CIA's urging, Pentagon criminal investigators began their own
inquiry in February into Deutch's handling of classified information
when he was the No. 2 defense official from 1993 to 1995.

They concluded he began compiling the journal during his tenure at the
Pentagon and stored it on diskettes.

"Dr. Deutch was known to transport these floppy disks in his shirt
pocket," the investigators wrote in their report, which was obtained
by The Associated Press.

The investigators also found Deutch began to experience technical
problems with the disks at the end of his tenure at the Pentagon,
prompting him to change to higher-capacity storage cards at CIA.

The electronic cards can store hundreds of times more information than
a single floppy disk.

According to the final draft report, Pentagon investigators also found
Deutch "declined departmental requests that he allow security systems
to be installed in his residence," where he sometimes worked on
classified documents. His home computers were sometimes used to access
the Internet.

The missing diskettes are likely to focus new attention on the
government's ability to protect its most important secrets  an issue
that has received extensive scrutiny in the aftermath of the Wen Ho
Lee case at the Energy Department nuclear weapons labs.

Lee was accused of downloading 10 computer tapes of nuclear weapons
design secrets from the labs. Unable to locate seven tapes, the
government charged Lee with 59 felonies and kept him in solitary
confinement for nine months while trying to build a case against
him. The government eventually reached a plea bargain in which Lee
pleaded guilty to a single count of mishandling nuclear secrets. He
also agreed to tell what he did with the information he admits to
having downloaded onto tapes and unsecure computers.

The government has not charged Deutch with any wrongdoing.

The Pentagon investigators who probed Deutch raised concerns about lax
Pentagon computer security.

They noted that some computers the ex-official used were donated to
schools without the hard drives being destroyed. When investigators
located the computers, they were able to recover significant Pentagon
information.

None of the information was classified, but the investigators warned
that such lax security could result in "the improper release and use
of classified or sensitive information.

"Current policy on what is required to dispose of these types of hard
drives is not clear. We recommend that the department implement policy
that requires the destruction of all computer hard drives, classified
and unclassified, before the computer is disposed of outside the
DOD," investigators wrote.


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