Ana Belen Montes was born in 1957 on a United States military base in West Germany. Her parents both had strong Puerto Rican roots, however, English was their first language at home. After leaving the military base, Montes along with her three siblings and parents, settled for a short time in Topeka, Kansas before moving to Towson, Maryland where Ana Belen Montes received a supreme public education. Ana’s family became wealthy after her father took a job in a private psychoanalyst practice. Even though wealthy, Monte’s father was a disciplinarian.
Ana and her father did not enjoy each other’s company and brutal conflicts often arouse from their disagreements. Ana Belen Montes’ father was abusive; however, Ana was able to escape his abuse by going off to college at the University of Virginia. Montes still felt remorse for her other younger three siblings that were stuck at home and had to go through painful events inflicted by her father. Nonetheless, Montes’ parents split while she was in college in 1977 and Ana’s mother gained custody of all children. Montes’ later graduated from the University of Virginia, with a degree in foreign affairs, in 1979.
Ana Belen Montes’ first job was working for the Department of Justice in Washington, DC. She began at an entry level position, however, soon worker her way up to being one of the three paralegals specializing in the Freedom of Information and Privacy Act. Ana Belen Montes, while working at the Department of Justice, blatantly exhibited her opinions on United States politics and Cuban affairs. Cuban Intelligence Officers soon took notice of Ana Belen Montes, as they believed she may have a soft side for Cuba. Ana began to speak with Cuban Intel Officers frequently, until it was decided that she ust receive a job in the United States Intelligence field, in order to work for Cuba. Ana Belen Montes chose the Defense Intelligence Agency as her selection of work. Even though Ana lied on her DIA application about past employment and traveling affairs, Montes Cox2 received a job with the Defense Intelligence Agency anyways and began working in the fall of 1985 as a research specialist for Nicaragua on the Bolling Air Force Base. Ana was a very skilled and intelligent young lady; she moved very rapidly through the ranks and was soon a full enlisted spy.
Montes suited very well in the DIA and in 1992 was chosen for the Defense Intelligence Agency Exceptional Analyst Program. Ana was then to oversee both political and military analyst on Cuba. This was the perfect position for Ana Belen Montes to be in. She was given a TopSecret clearance and was allowed access to many sensitive documents. Montes spent 10 years with the Defense Intelligence Agency and was held in very high regard.
Cuban espionage has been induced for several reasons such as for “Cuba to know the intentions of the U. S. government and the exile community regarding Cuba, influence U. S. government policies towards Cuba, give or sell intelligence to other governments, further its ideological advocacy, swaying global public opinion in its favor; and obtain scientific, technical, and business intelligence. ” http://www. autentico. org/oa10019. php Even though some may see Cuba as a small underdeveloped country that has no real threat to the United States. Cuba plays a key role in information sharing between intelligence agencies around the world. Thus, Cuba still poses as a national security threat to the United States.
Ana Belen Montes, also known as “The Queen of Cuba” became the highest-ranking Cuba analyst in the U. S. Defense Intelligence Agency. As a result, she was able to persuade the United States government that Cuba was no threat to U. S. security. This was considered a major success for the Cuban government as they now had the ability to sway the opinions of United States policymakers and congressmen. Ana Belen Montes, was also allowed to work alongside the Central Intelligence Agency during most of her career. This gave Montes the opportunity to Cox3 sit in on a considerable number of CIA meetings at the headquarters.
During these meetings, Ana Belen Montes, would memorize key points in the brief and then tell Cuban Intelligence Officers what the CIA meetings consists of. Montes never wrote any information down or stole documents from the DIA or CIA. Ana Belen Montes simply retained all the key note information to memory and was able to repeat it to a Cuban official via shortwave radios. This method allowed Ana to go undetected and gave the United States Defense Intelligence Agents little documented evidence to convict Ana of being a spy for Cuba. Ana Belen Montes was one of the most damaging spies in United States history.
Montes jeopardized the US national security in ways that may be unfixable. She covered up valuable information on Cuba that allowed the United States military to know about Cuba’s chemical and biological warfare capabilities, all while convincing the United States that Cuba was not a threat to the United States. Instead, Montes gave away United States military strategies to attack Cuba in the Bay of Pigs. Which included, a plan to over through Fidel Castro from Cuban power and put in place a new government marked out by the Bush administration.
However, since Montes did not document information stolen from the Defense Intelligence Agency, much of the knowledge she gave to Cuban officials is unknown to the United States. The only information disclosed to the U. S was intelligence that Montes gave up on her own. An adequate amount of information has still not been declassified or is knowledge that the United States does not know Cuba has received. Since the Cold War, Cuban Missile Crisis, and Bay of Pigs has stretched relations with Cuba and the United States.
Cuba was believed by the U. S. to be a rogue state with a very communistic leader. Fidel Castro enforced agrarian reform and abused foreign oil companies, Cox4 while seizing foreign-owned property in Cuba. Castro soon rooted ties with the Soviet Union and Russia to gain military and economic gains. Soon after, the United States disconnected relations with Cuba. These relations caused Fidel Castro to implement Cuban spies, such as Ana Montes, into the United States intelligence field. Montes was the perfect spy for Cuba.
She had access to absolutely everything the Intelligence Community knew about Cuba. Ana Belen Montes was also in a very high positon with DIA and had the ability to persuade debates about Cuba at the Pentagon, State Department, and on Capitol Hill. Ana Belen Montes was under suspicion by a DIA employee after a counterintelligence awareness brief that encouraged employees to report and security concerns about other works. This experienced DIA analysis soon reported Ana Belen Montes to the DIA’s security office. Montes was soon investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Being the very sly person she is, Ana lied about several issues and made them very believable. Montes had two years prior passed a polygraph test and was believe to be a truthful patriot, the FBI did not see that they had sufficient evidence to continue an investigation on Montes as being a double agent. Further action was not taken to examine Montes background until four years after this incident when the FBI began searching for a known Cuban spy that was supposedly active in Washington, DC. The same DIA employee turned Montes into the FBI for a second time.
The FBI was appalled that Ana matched the profile that they were looking for. The FBI, with a court approval, began surveillance on Montes house and office space. Soon, an abundance of DIA information was found on Montes’ personal laptop and a Cuban intelligence portable Pigs has stretched relations with Cuba and the United States. Cuba was believed by the U. S. to be a rogue state with a very communistic leader. Fidel Castro enforced agrarian reform and abused foreign oil companies, Cox4 while seizing foreign-owned property in Cuba.
Castro soon rooted ties with the Soviet Union and Russia to gain military and economic gains. Soon after, the United States disconnected relations with Cuba. These relations caused Fidel Castro to implement Cuban spies, such as Ana Montes, into the United States intelligence field. Montes was the perfect spy for Cuba. She had access to absolutely everything the Intelligence Community knew about Cuba. Ana Belen Montes was also in a very high positon with DIA and had the ability to persuade debates about Cuba at the Pentagon, State Department, and on Capitol Hill.
Ana Belen Montes was under suspicion by a DIA employee after a counterintelligence awareness brief that encouraged employees to report and security concerns about other works. This experienced DIA analysis soon reported Ana Belen Montes to the DIA’s security office. Montes was soon investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Being the very sly person she is, Ana lied about several issues and made them very believable. Montes had two years prior passed a polygraph test and was believe to be a truthful patriot, the FBI did not see that they had sufficient evidence to continue an investigation on Montes as being a double agent.
Further action was not taken to examine Montes background until four years after this incident when the FBI began searching for a known Cuban spy that was supposedly active in Washington, DC. The same DIA employee turned Montes into the FBI for a second time. The FBI was appalled that Ana matched the profile that they were looking for. The FBI, with a court approval, began surveillance on Montes house and office space. Soon, an abundance of DIA information was found on Montes’ personal laptop and a Cuban intelligence portable
