My Country Versus Me
 Wen Ho Lee
 (Reviewed by The Editor - Rebecca Brown)
 2001 Hyperion
  ISBN: 0786868031
The First-Hand Account by the Los Alamos Scientist Who Was Falsely Accused of Being a Spy, written with Helen Zia.

Now that the dust has settled, let us not forget Wen Ho Lee nor our knee-jerk reaction when we discovered how lax was the security in one of our supposedly most secure sites--the Los Alamos National Laboratory.

I remember the rabid language of our news anchors as they latched onto this spy hunt, ratcheting up the furor, exhuming other unsavory spy hunts from past decades, as if they were reading a script from a spy movie. I got the impression they were hoping for a drama of dastardly deeds with a clear cut “evil one” among us. What they got was a simple scientist of dignity & modest lifestyle, a family man & a longtime Chinese-American patriot who happened to have been born & raised in Taiwan, on the “wrong side” of the Pacific Ocean. We're far too politically correct to utter that epithet from our past, “The Yellow Peril” however, I could see members of our press biting their tongues not to say it.

It astonishes me how close to the surface are our old prejudices. It astonishes me how our hounds of hell--the agents of our investigatory & judicial systems--are manned by zealots of the worst kind. Yet why do we keep forgetting that power corrupts & absolute power absolutely corrupts?

Here is written, with the help of Helen Zia, the compelling story of how a quiet, industrious & methodical scientist going about his work, was caught up in the hell of all the might & xenophobia our government is heir to.

It is not surprising that it is the investigating agents who, again & again, come off as hellish henchmen, vindictive & petty, acting with impunity & the self-righteousness of federal privilege, all happening on Democratic President Clinton's watch.

There is no other conclusion to come to--not when you can watch CEOs, who have bilked their shareholders & employees out of their life savings, being treated with kid gloves; spies in white skins who had left substantive trails of clues, being handled with tact & decorum.

My Country Versus Me is an apt title. Anyone who lives in a body with a colorful skin, needs to read this sorry, gripping, detailed story of one man upon whom the headlights of an entire nation shone in unrelenting, unblinking scrutiny. If you think it can't happen to you, think again!

Wen Ho Lee will inspire you & make you wary. The illusion that we are a “free” society will be popped as surely as a balloon is punctured by a pin.

I don't hold our country to task nearly as much as I hold our civil servants who have been permitted, nay encouraged, to retain their xenophobias & act upon them, with all the federal privilege & power behind their badges.

Wen Ho Lee reminds us that in this post 9/11 world, we are doing much the same with our citizens of Arabic descent.

My Country Versus Me is a must read, if you're brave enough to face the hounds of hell & listen to how one man made it through, with the help of his wife, daughter & son, lawyers & friends, to the courtroom where a judge was intelligent enough to offer an apology on behalf of us all.
(02/16/03)

Rebecca