A jury on Sept. 25 convicted James Fondren Jr., a retired USAF lieutenant colonel and former Pentagon civilian employee, of passing classified information to the Chinese government. He could face up to 20 years in prison when he is sentenced in January, the Associated Press reported Sept. 26. The Justice Department accused Fondren, 62, of providing the classified information from November 2004 to February 2008 to Tai Shen Kuo, a naturalized US citizen from Taiwan who was a Chinese spy, while Fondren was deputy director of the Washington, D.C., liaison office of US Pacific Command. The trial began Sept. 21 in US District Court in Alexandria, Va. (For more, read the Washington Post’s Sept. 25 report.)
The design of the launch facilities for the Air Force’s new Sentinel intercontinental ballistic missile are likely to undergo major revision, posing yet another challenge for the much-delayed and over-budget program to modernize the land-based component of America’s nuclear triad, officials said.