U.S. Military Officer Benjamin Bishop Arrested
BLITZER: It is the kind of plot you may find in a spy now, but an older man who falls for a beautiful young women who is up for something and it isn't love. That's what allegedly happens with this defense contractor and former army officer. He is charged with passing nuclear secrets to his Chinese girlfriend. Here is CNN's Brian Todd.</s>BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): He is an army reservist with top secret clearance, doing contract work for the U.S. military specific command in Hawaii. Benjamin Bishop now stands accused of leaking military secrets, including information on nuclear weapons, war plans, early warning radar systems. U.S. officials say he gave them to a Chinese woman 32 years younger who he was having a relationship with. Bishop has been arrested and in is in custody. His attorney says this.</s>BIRNEY BERVAR, BENJAMIN BISHOP'S ATTORNEY: He served his country honorably for 29 years. And he maintains he would never do anything to intentionally harm the United States.</s>TODD: Is the woman a Chinese spy? Court documents identify her as person one, 27-years-old, a Chinese national. The documents say she met Bishop at a defense conference and quote, "may have been in the conference in order to target individuals such as Bishop who work with and have access to U.S. classified information regarding person One's purported interests.</s>ERIC O'NEILL, FORMER FBI COUNTER INTELLIGENCE OFFICER: Well, this is a honey trap case.</s>TODD: Eric O'Neill, former FBI counter intelligence officer says a spy master sends an attractive target person to lure a target with sex or blackmail to give up information. O'Neal took down FBI agent Robert Hanson who spied for the Russians. O'Neill was portrayed by a Ryan Philip in a Hollywood movie "Breach" on spies that use honey traps. When they are in the compromising situations, how they actually get the information from?</s>O'NEILL: They can use a couple of different things. If it is a prostitute, for example, pillow talk. Pillow talk, you know, that pillow talk comes from this, from the honey trap, from spies. You talk to someone. You get them to talk, you know, after you're done and you are very relaxed, and all the endorphins are flowing and the happy things are going on in your brain, and people's tongues loosen.</s>TODD: It is not exactly a new phenomenon. One of the most famous cases of a honey trap was the</s>PETER EARNEST, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, INTERNATIONAL SPY MUSEUM: During the cold war, these Germans under Marcus Wolf had a very active program of sending Romeos as they were called into West Germany, seeing who they could meet and develop relationships with them, if they had access to intelligence.</s>TODD: A program that Earnest says worked very well for the East Germans. We tried to get the Chinese embassy in Washington to respond to the documents indicating the woman in Benjamin Bishop's case is likely a Chinese spy. They haven't responded to our calls and e- mails. U.S. officials haven't yet charged the woman with a crime. Brian Todd, CNN, Washington.</s>BLITZER: When we come back, critics are calling for him to quote, "come back to earth." But the House budget committee chairman, Paul Ryan pushes ahead with his plan to balance the nation's books with major spending cuts. He is here in the SITUATION ROOM and he is next.