Release Paul Whelan from Russian prison? Not so fast! There’s a reason President Trump didn’t bother to make any efforts to free him.
Sadly, the American press has not given the American people the real truth about Paul Whelan, but the Kevin Jackson Network is happy to do it.
Agence France-Presse had the dirt on Paul Whelan all along, as did many foreign newspapers. Why not the American press?
Except for this column of mine, I’ve seen nothing but oratorios of praise for this two-bit crook. Encomiums which lead naïve Americans like Florida Republican Representative Mike Waltz, the first Green Beret to serve in Congress, to go off half-cocked, plaintively asking, “Where is US Marine Paul Whelan who has been unjustly held by Russia for far longer [than Brittney Griner]? Celebrities over veterans?” Obviously neither Waltz nor his staff did the research.
A BIPARTISAN CLUSTERF–K
The cacophony of wails sound from both chambers and both sides of the aisle. Worse. In a bi-partisan clusterf–k, the House of Representatives proudly issued a press release on Aprll 22nd of this year that they had “unanimously passed H.Res. 336, a bipartisan resolution calling on the Russian government to release Michigan native Paul Whelan.” The Senate stupidly followed suit in July.
Sometimes I think that what Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, flushes down the toilet has a higher I.Q. than the collective Intelligence Quotient of the United States Congress.
As for “Michigan native”? Here’s the lowdown on that and more.
HE’S AN AMINO: AMERICAN IN NAME ONLY
“Michigan native”???!!! Paul Whelan was born in Ottawa, Canada of Irish parents who emigrated to the United Kingdom.
He has passports from the United Kingdom, Canada, Ireland, and the United States plus Canadian, UK, Irish, and American citizenships. Where’s his allegiance? Obviously in his pants as proven later in this Op-Ed.
Note to State Department: abolish his American passport and retract his United States citizenship. Permanently. We don’t need him here after he gets out of prison.
In fact, there is a very wise Hungarian saying: “You can’t sit on 2 horses at the same time with one backside.” In other words, your loyalty can only be to one.
“SERVICE”? WHAT MILITARY “SERVICE”?
Whelan served his country like Eddie The Eagle served Olympic skiing.
Whelan joined the Marine Reserves on May 10, 1994 as an administrative clerk. It took him 10 years to be promoted to staff sergeant in December 2004. He served a few months’ total in 2004 and 2006 in Iraq. His last place of duty was Miramar in San Diego. However, in a 2013 court deposition he lied and asserted that he served 5 years in Iraq from 2003 to 2008.
Paul Whelan was busted down to private in 2008 when he was court martialed and convicted of over 14 criminal acts. He was caught stealing over $10,000 USD (nearly $14,000 in today’s dollars) while at Al Asad Airbase in Iraq. He was also convicted of falsely using other people’s Social Security numbers and committing 9 counts of check fraud, including writing $1,000.00 to Citadel Federal Credit in payment of a debt.
Further, Paul Whelan was caught breaking into the military’s secure computer system and fraudulently laundering his personnel records, concocting false evaluations of himself, and writing fake examination grades for himself.
In addition, he violated the Uniform Code of Military Justice(UCMJ) 3 times by willfully engaging in dereliction of duty by making himself absent without leave.
DISREPUTABLE RIGHT OUT OF THE STARTING BLOCK
He lied about his jobs and he lied to get those jobs.
Before his abuse of the military, Whelan claimed to have been a police officer in Chelsea, Michigan. However, the Washington Post reported that the Chelsea Police Department had Whelan working part-time filling in as an officer, dispatcher, street crossing guard, and parking ticket officer.
Although he claimed that he served as a sheriff’s deputy in Washtenaw County, the Sheriff denied that there was ever a record of having employed Whelan in any capacity. His subsequent so-called “service” in the military ended up with a dishonorable discharge for more than 14 crimes.
God only knows what kind of a snow job and false documents the crooked high school graduate gave to Kelly Services and BorgWarner to get the caliber of positions he did. He worked for Kelly Services as their manager of global security and operations according to some accounts from 2001 to 2017, and by other accounts from 2010 to 2016. There is a 9-year discrepancy between the 2 accounts.
In early 2018 he was hired by BorgWarner as their global head of security per their spokeswoman. He was only a high school graduate with a track record of deceit, larceny, forgery, dishonorable discharge, but he can be assumed to have pulled down a six-figure salary. Although a car parts company, BorgWarner Inc. is by no means a teensy Mom and Pop concern. One of the top 25 automotive suppliers in the world, they operate in 22 countries with a whopping 49,000 employees.
PAUL WHELAN IS TO ESPIONAGE WHAT THE KEYSTONE COPS ARE TO LAW ENFORCEMENT
Paul Whelan repeatedly visited Russia between 2007 and 2018. He openly sought out and initiated correspondence with at least 54 Russian male soldiers on VKontakt: Communist Russia’s version of FaceBook.
Whelan constantly rhapsodized about his “friend”, Ilya Yatsenko, to his parents in letters. The BBC reports that Whelan’s relatives said he repeatedly talked about his “friend” Ilya Yatsenko, and bragged that he had Yatsenko’s classified information including the name of the military school Yatsenko had graduated from alongside a list of classmates. He even brought along his parents on one of his Russian trips.
Real spies don’t blab or leave paper and social media trails. Real spies don’t bring Mommy and Daddy to their workplace. U.S. intelligence would never trust such a stupid loser with a security clearance and espionage assignment.
A LEGEND IN HIS OWN MIND
Far from the big shot he played, Paul Whelan is not a man – in character or appearance. He’d lose a masculinity contest to the Pillsbury Dough Boy.
He is obsessed with appearing to be a man of authority and machismo, which is why he tried to be a policeman and a Marine. A photo of him in Iraq captures Whelan in uniform with what looks to me like an M27. He is gingerly holding it with a limp-wristed righthand grasp and splayed out, carefully manicured left fingers dangling.
He was a simple, non-combatant paper-pusher- the type you can’t imagine ever having fired a weapon unless in a temper tantrum to shoot up a filing cabinet he’d awkwardly stubbed his toe on while wearing bunny slippers.
He is the embodiment of the 1939 classic short story by James Thurber called “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty”. Or if you prefer a modern version, he’s the counterpart of Brad Paisley’s 2007 C&W song “Online” which is about a 5’3″ pudgy nerd, but online he’s 6’5″ with 6-pack abs who drives a Maserati and is a black belt in karate. (Worth seeing the hilarious music video starring heavy hitters Jason Alexander–Seinfeld’s George Costanza–as the geek plus William Shatner et alia.)
HOW DID HE GET TO RUSSIA IN THE FIRST PLACE?
During his time in the military, Whelan took advantage of a program that granted members an all expense-paid, two-week vacation anywhere. Whelan chose Russia. Note to the Pentagon: declare countries such as Russia, Communist China, and the like off-limits for vacation travel for the U.S. military.
WHY DID HE GO TO RUSSIA? (COLD WEATHER IS NO EXCUSE.)
Paul Whelan claimed he likes “the cold”. If Michigan’s winters weren’t cold enough for him, I could have recommended Wisconsin. I once visited Rhinelander, Wisconsin one Fourth of July weekend to do volunteer work at a wildlife rescue. I emerged from my cabin in 48-degree Fahrenheit weather and walked a few steps to the restaurant for an early 4:00 p.m. dinner. When I emerged 2 hours later, it was 34 degrees.
Or may I suggest Snowmass Colorado; Sun Valley, Idaho (Ernest Hemingway loved it) or a host of other fine United States locations?
How about Alaska, our closest state to Russia? According to AlaskaCenters.gov, the distance between mainland Alaska and mainland Russia is merely 55 miles. And only 2.5 miles if you measure the distance between 2 islands in the Bering Strait: Russian-owned Big Diomede island and U.S.-owned Little Diomede island.
If Whelan is not a ski aficionado, I would recommend flat terrain North Dakota where winter climate averages from 2°F to 25°F, rarely falling below -18°F/27°C.
And don’t forget Wyoming! The Cowboy State recorded its coldest ever temperature at the Riverside Ranger Station in Yellowstone National Park on February 9th, 1933: a beyond brutal MINUS 66 degrees Fahrenheit!!! That’s minus 54 degrees Celsius, folks.
But nay, forsooth, verily it wasn’t the cold that Paul Whelan was a-hankerin’ for.
PAUL WHELAN’S ACHILLES HEEL and THE REAL REASON HE KEPT GOING BACK TO RUSSIA
The second reason Whelan said he chose Russia was that it was ideal for a “single man like me.” Yeah, well, this “single man” never opted for a Russian bride, nor did he ever date a Russian woman. Now 52, he has never married, never had children, and was never known to date or have relationships with women in the United States.
His first trip to Russia came in 2007. There he met the aforementioned Ilya Yatsenko. The day they met is memorialized in a photograph showing both men with their arms around each other.
It is far from unreasonable to believe that Paul Whelan is gay. Besotted Whelan wined and dined his precious Ilya until that fateful December 28th day in 2018.
A TIMELINE
Twin brother David Whelan told CNN that Paul had arrived in Russia on December 22nd, 2018 for a wedding that was to be held December 28th. Paul told David the reason was to attend the wedding of an “old Marine buddy”.
So who and where is the Marine buddy? Why hasn’t he come forward? Any acquaintance or friend of Paul Whelan deserves a good looking into by U.S. authorities. And does he even exist or is he an alibi?
On December 28th Whelan was detained by customs officials at Domodedovo Airport in Moscow with $80,000.00 in cash on him. Per the Russian MBK News, the stash was supposedly only “temporarily” seized. Such a gargantuan amount of money would raise red flags in every country – and rightfully so – especially in a pathologically suspicious Communist country. But for the Russian government not to permanently seize $80k strains credulity.
Later that day, supposedly at the Hotel Metropol, Yatsenko gave Whelan a flash drive which the Russians claim contained a classified list of government personnel and had him arrested. Whelan protested that he thought “vacation pictures” were on the flash drive. Unbeknownst to Whelan, his treasured “comrade”, the Commie lingo he also referred to Ilya by, was an FSB agent (formerly called KGB).
On June 15, 2020 Russia slapped a 16-year prison sentence on Paul Whelan. The charge? Spying.
Poor Ilya. If he was straight, he must have been disgusted to have to drop his pants for goofy-looking meathead Whelan. But the Russian stuck with it for 10 years, grooming his mark – called “calf-rearing” in the spy trade – until he struck like a cobra, offering Whelan the flash drive. Ilya’s sacrifice for his country was rewarded with a nice promotion from low level intelligence agent and the commensurately higher pay.
SO WHY DID RUSSIA IMPRISON A USELESS IDIOT IF HE WASN’T A SPY?
I use the term “useless idiot” to contrast with the phrase, “useful idiot” which latter Lenin and Stalin are said to have contemptuously applied to non-Communists who served Communist goals.
Countries engage in one-upsmanship. My take is that Russia, full well knowing this dolt wasn’t a spy sent by the U.S., nonetheless decided to give us a black eye and globally embarrass us with the Whelan affair. The Russian people are known for their good sense of humor, especially prior to their takeover by Communists. And doubtless they are having a good laugh at America’s expense watching naïve Yankees beseeching moron Biden to bring this other moron home.
Furthermore, with Biden having been so stupid as to trade basketballer Brittney Griner (someone else with a not so stellar character – see my Op-Ed “The Travesty of the Brittney Griner Prisoner Exchange“) for the high value asset, Viktor Bout, Russia knows Biden and his minions are stupid enough to trade loser Paul Whelan for yet another high value Russian asset.
HUBRIS SURPASSING THAT OF THE MYTHOLOGICAL FIGURE, ICARUS
Paul Whelan dishonored our country and all of the United States Military but especially the Marine Corps. He made Kelly Services and BorgWarner look like fools. Yet Whelan most recently bleated to CNN, “My bags are packed…I just need an airplane to come and get me.” He hopes Biden and his gang “would do everything they could to get me home, regardless of the price they might have to pay at this point.” Regardless of the price? Oh, the shameless delusions of grandeur.
Release Paul Whelan? Let him rot.
PLAN OF ACTION
Please directly message your respective state’s Senators and Congressmen at https://www.congress.gov/contact-us and tell them to stop wasting their time and your taxpayer’s money on loser Paul Whelan. Include the link to this Op-Ed.
Congressmen and Senators will only respond to their constituents so use Twitter to make your opinions known to all of them!
You’ll find U.S. House of Representatives’ Twitter handles at https://pressgallery.house.gov/member-data/members-official-twitter-handles
Get the list of all U.S. Senators’ Twitter handles at https://ucsd.libguides.com/congress_twitter/senators
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