{"id":1448796,"date":"2022-04-21T08:51:47","date_gmt":"2022-04-21T12:51:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1448796"},"modified":"2022-04-21T08:52:07","modified_gmt":"2022-04-21T12:52:07","slug":"newly-discovered-emails-raise-questions-about-department-of-defense-involvement-in-spygate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/newly-discovered-emails-raise-questions-about-department-of-defense-involvement-in-spygate\/","title":{"rendered":"Newly Discovered Emails Raise Questions About Department Of Defense Involvement In Spygate"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">24<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fnewly-discovered-emails-raise-questions-about-department-of-defense-involvement-in-spygate%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1448796&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>After spending weeks dismissing concerns about its work with Russia hoax-connected researchers, a newly discovered email from The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to a Georgia Tech researcher with the subject line \u201cMueller case\u201d casts doubt on DARPA\u2019s denials.<\/p>\n<p>Last month, The Federalist first reported that an email exchange obtained from Georgia Tech pursuant to a Right-to-Know request <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/03\/10\/exclusive-special-counsels-office-is-investigating-the-2016-dnc-server-hack\/\">indicated<\/a> that Special Counsel John Durham\u2019s office was investigating the Democrat National Committee hack. Manos Antonakakis, the Georgia Tech researcher branded \u201cResearcher-1\u201d in the special counsel\u2019s indictment of former Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann, penned the email shortly after being questioned by one of Durham\u2019s top prosecutors.<\/p>\n<p>The special counsel\u2019s office charged Sussmann last fall with lying to the FBI\u2019s general counsel, James Baker, when Sussmann provided Baker with data and white papers supposedly showing the existence of a secret communications network between the Donald Trump campaign and the Russian-based Alfa Bank. The Sussmann indictment also revealed that the Georgia Tech researchers, since identified as Antonakakis and David Dagon, \u201cwere receiving and analyzing Internet data in connection with a pending federal government cybersecurity research contract.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The then-unidentified government contract originated with DARPA, with DARPA eventually awarding Georgia Tech more than $17 million for the project dubbed \u201cRhamnousia,\u201d after the mythical Greek goddess of divine retribution, Rhamnous.<\/p>\n<p>As part of its investigation into Sussmann, the special counsel\u2019s office subpoenaed both Antonakakis and Dagon and later granted Dagon immunity. While Durham did not provide Antonakakis immunity, Antonakakis nonetheless spoke with the special counsel\u2019s office after receiving assurances that he was merely considered a witness in the investigation.<\/p>\n<p>Then, after speaking with the special counsel\u2019s team, Antonakakis told the university\u2019s general counsel and other members of upper management that he was asked point-blank by lead prosecutor Andrew DeFilippis: \u201c\u2018Do you believe that DARPA should be instructing you to investigate the origins of a hacker (Guccifer_2.0) that hacked a political entity (DNC)?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p>According to his email, Antonakakis told DeFilippis that was \u201ca question for DARPA\u2019s director.\u201d As I <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/03\/10\/exclusive-special-counsels-office-is-investigating-the-2016-dnc-server-hack\/\">reported<\/a> at the time, this represented \u201ca seeming confirmation that DARPA had, as the special counsel\u2019s question presumed, directed Antonakakis to investigate who bore responsibility for the DNC hack, although it is unclear whether Antonakakis\u2019 task concerned solely the supposed identity of \u2018Guccifer,\u2019 or more broadly the question of who hacked the DNC.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>However, within days, DARPA <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/justice\/durham-related-emails-prompt-darpa-to-deny-involvement-in-attributing-2016-dnc-hack-to-russia\">denied<\/a> any involvement \u201cin efforts to attribute the DNC hack.\u201d \u201cDr. Antonakakis worked on DARPA\u2019s Enhanced Attribution program, which did not involve analysis of the DNC hack,\u201d according to Jared Adams, DARPA\u2019s chief of communications. Adams further told the Washington Examiner that \u201cDARPA was not involved in efforts to attribute the Guccifer 2.0 persona, nor any involvement in efforts to attribute the origin of leaked emails provided to Wikileaks.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>While acknowledging DARPA met with the special counsel\u2019s office, DARPA noted that \u201cthe meeting between DARPA and special counsel Durham was to provide a high-level overview of the Enhanced Attribution program,\u201d stressing that \u201cduring the course of that meeting, DARPA did not discuss matters related to the DNC hack, Guccifer 2.0, or leaked DNC emails provided to Wikileaks.\u201d The Washington Examiner\u2019s article added the DARPA spokesman\u2019s claim that, \u201cto the best our knowledge, no DARPA-funded researchers investigated\u201d the DNC hack or assisted the FBI\u2019s or Special Counsel Robert Mueller\u2019s investigation of the hack.<\/p>\n<p>In response to a request for clarification based on the Washington Examiner\u2019s reporting, Adams told The Federalist that, to DARPA\u2019s knowledge, no one affiliated with DARPA had asked Antonakakis \u201cto research, in any way, at any time, either the DNC hack or the hacker.\u201d An attorney for Antonakakis did not respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n<p>But now an email first obtained by The Federalist shows Chris Schneck from DARPA\u2019s Information Innovation Office, known as \u201cI2O,\u201d writing Antonakakis on September 25, 2018, with the subject line of \u201cMueller case.\u201d While redactions prevent a full understanding of the email, the \u201cMueller case\u201d subject line and Schneck\u2019s \u201cgreat work\u201d closer indicate the DARPA-funded Georgia Tech researcher was assisting Special Counsel Robert Mueller.<\/p>\n<p>The only <a href=\"https:\/\/www.vox.com\/policy-and-politics\/2018\/2\/20\/17031772\/mueller-indictments-grand-jury\">apparent<\/a> pending Mueller case at the time of the email appears to have been that special counsel\u2019s case against the 12 officers of the Russian military intelligence organization known as GRU, who had been indicted two months earlier and charged with crimes\u00a0related to the hacking of the DNC\u2019s emails in 2016.<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>While DARPA\u2019s September 25, 2018 email to Antonakakis about his \u201cgreat work\u201d regarding the \u201cMueller case\u201d does not mention the DNC hack, a \u201cchat log\u201d for the DARPA Rhamnousia project shows the Georgia Tech researchers discussing both the DNC hack and GRU. One text reads: \u201cFor FBI to give a heads up to the DNC in fall 2015, this means that the attack was active for many months before.\u201d In another message, one of the researchers jokes that if GRU sends the Russian beauty Annet Mahendru after him, he\u2019s \u201cgiving up\u201d his colleagues.<\/p>\n<p>Moreover, another email reviewed by The Federalist reveals that Dagon told Durham\u2019s team that the \u201centire set\u201d of \u201cRhannousia chat logs\u201d were \u201cpertinent to\u201d the Special Counsel\u2019s investigation.\u201d Those chat logs, in addition to involving chats between Dagon and Antonakakis, included conversations involving, or about, two other DARPA-connected individuals, Angelos Keromytis and Tejas Patel\u2014both of whom were included on the September 25, 2018 email about the \u201cMueller case.\u201d (The Georgia Tech emails obtained by The Federalist also established that Durham\u2019s team sought to question Keromytis about his time at DARPA.)<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"694\" height=\"396\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/MargotDarpa2.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-271051\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/MargotDarpa2.jpg 694w, https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/MargotDarpa2-300x171.jpg 300w\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"698\" height=\"422\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/MargotDarpa3.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-271052\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/MargotDarpa3.jpg 698w, https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/MargotDarpa3-300x181.jpg 300w\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>The extensive redactions in the \u201cRhannousia chat logs\u201d make it impossible to assess whether Antonakakis and his colleagues were working on the DNC hack or investigating the identity of Guccifer2.0 for the \u201cMueller case\u201d against the Russian GRU agents. But if so, it raises serious questions, the foremost of which is: Why did DARPA claim no DARPA-funded researchers assisted the FBI\u2019s or Special Counsel Robert Mueller\u2019s investigation of the DNC hack?<\/p>\n<p>If Antonakakis assisted Mueller in the DNC hack investigation, as these various documents suggest, it raises a second significant question: Did Rodney Joffe provide Antonakakis the data necessary to conduct an attribution analysis of the hack?<\/p>\n<p>Other emails The Federalist obtained from Georgia Tech establish that Joffe had assisted Antonakakis with data requests he needed for some attribution requests, beginning in August of 2016, even before the DARPA contract became official. So, the question is, did Joffe continue providing the data Antonakakis needed to run various attribution analyses, and specifically did he provide data used to investigate the DNC hack?<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"581\" height=\"497\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/MargotDarpa4.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-271053\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/MargotDarpa4.jpg 581w, https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/MargotDarpa4-300x257-1.jpg 300w\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>Given Joffe\u2019s role in the Alfa Bank hoax, and given yesterday\u2019s revelation by the special counsel\u2019s lead prosecutor DeFilippis that a CIA analyst <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ProfMJCleveland\/status\/1516795560329625609\">believed<\/a> the data was user-created, the country deserves to know whether Georgia Tech researchers assisted the special counsel\u2019s office in investigating the DNC hack and, in turn, relied on data Joffe provided.<\/p>\n<p>DARPA Chief of Communications Jared Adams has not replied to multiple requests for clarification from The Federalist, leaving one to wonder why. (The author of the \u201cMueller case\u201d email, Chris Schneck, also did not respond to The Federalist\u2019s request for comment.) And if DARPA and Antonakakis weren\u2019t working on the DNC hack case, then what was the Mueller case with which they were assisting?<\/p>\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\" \/>\n<p>\n  Margot Cleveland is The Federalist&#8217;s senior legal correspondent. She is also a contributor to National Review Online, the Washington Examiner, Aleteia, and Townhall.com, and has been published in the Wall Street Journal and USA Today. <\/p>\n<p>Cleveland is a lawyer and a graduate of the Notre Dame Law School, where she earned the Hoynes Prize\u2014the law school\u2019s highest honor. She later served for nearly 25 years as a permanent law clerk for a federal appellate judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Cleveland is a former full-time university faculty member and now teaches as an adjunct from time to time. <\/p>\n<p>As a stay-at-home homeschooling mom of a young son with cystic fibrosis, Cleveland frequently writes on cultural issues related to parenting and special-needs children. Cleveland is on Twitter at @ProfMJCleveland. The views expressed here are those of Cleveland in her private capacity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After spending weeks dismissing concerns about its work with Russia hoax-connected researchers, a newly discovered email from The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to a Georgia Tech researcher with the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":489,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1448796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1448796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/489"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1448796"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1448796\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1448796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1448796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1448796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}