NYC Council Honors Ethel Rosenberg Who Sold U.S. A-Bomb Secrets To USSR

Jeffdunetz | September 30, 2015
DONATE
Font Size

September 28, 2015 was the 100th birthday of Ethel Rosenberg who, along with her husband Julius, was convicted of selling American atom bomb secrets to the Soviet Union. She was executed for the crime in June of 1953. To honor the convicted traitor, the New York City Council issued a declaration honoring Ethel for her union work and asserting that she was innocent and wrongfully executed. Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer added a a second declaration recognizing, "the injustice suffered by Ethel Rosenberg and her family" proclaiming the day, “Ethel Rosenberg Day of Justice in the Borough of Manhattan.”

The city declaration honored her for leading a strike in 1935:

In 1935, at the age of 19, Ethel worked as a Clerk at the National New York Packing and Shipping Company, and, demonstrating great bravery, helped lead a strike for union recognition and a pay raise. The New York Times reported that “about 150 young women pickets moved in squads through the garment district… They lay on the pavement in front of trucks and dared the drivers to move” Ethel was fired and filed a claim for wrongful termination with the National Labor Relations Board, which found in her favor: “There is no allegation or evidence that she was not an efficient employee. The [company’s] antagonism to Ethel Greenglass [her maiden name] undoubtedly arose by virtue of the fact that she was active in organizing the Union.” Ethel remained active in union organizing and used her singing talents to raise funds.

Gale Brewer, as well as the Rosenberg's two sons (now Michael and David Meeropol), base their belief in Ethel's innocence on the recently-released grand jury transcript of David Greenglass, Ethel’s brother who was himself a Soviet spy who served almost ten years in Federal prison for betraying atomic secrets to Moscow. Greenglass saved his own skin, and that of his wife, by fingering his own sister. As reported by the NY Times:

He admitted then, nearly a half-century later, that he had lied on the witness stand to save his wife from prosecution, giving testimony that he was never sure about but that nevertheless helped send his sister and her husband to the electric chair in 1953.

But, the Rosenbergs weren't convicted solely on the basis of Greenglass' testimony.  The Wall Street Journal recently examined some of the other evidence against Ethel Rosenberg:

Hard evidence for Ethel’s guilt can be found in the Venona decrypts of KGB messages to its operatives in the U.S., and in the notebooks of KGB files meticulously copied in the 1990s by Alexander Vassiliev, who fled Russia in 1996 and had them smuggled into London.

A Nov. 21, 1944, Venona decrypt has Julius telling the KGB that he and his wife both recommend the recruitment of Ruth Greenglass, David’s wife. On Nov. 27, KGB agent Leonid Kvasnikov cabled that they considered Ethel “sufficiently well developed politically. Knows about her husband’s work” as well as that of other agents. He characterizes her “positively and as a devoted person.”

In Vassiliev’s notebooks, an entry from the KGB says about Julius that “His wife knows about her husband’s work and personally knows ‘Twain’ and ‘Callistratus.’ [code names of Soviet agents.] She could be used independently, but she should not be overworked. Poor health.” Another entry, about a meeting held on May 12, 1944 with Ruth, Ethel and Julius, reports that when told by Julius that they had to keep silent, “Ethel here interposed to stress the need for utmost care and caution in informing David of the work in which Julius was engaged and that for his own safety all other political discussion and activity on his part should be subdued.”

The bottom line is that David Greenglass was content to let his sister die to save himself. But, that does not mean that Ethel Rosenberg was innocent of spying on behalf of the tyrant Josef Stalin and giving him the keys to atomic weapons. 

For the New York City Council and Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer to name themselves judge and jury by declaring Mrs. Rosenberg innocent, then honoring a woman convicted of betraying the United States, is more than unpatriotic, it's disgusting.

donate