The Court-Martial of Clayton Lonetree

In 1986 Native American Marine sergeant Clayton Lonetree informed the CIA that during his Moscow embassy tour he had made contact with the KGB. Lonetree naively hoped the CIA would assign him as a double agent. Thus began the ``sex-for-secrets'' scandal reported around the world in which the security of the U.S. embassy in Moscow was called into question and the young Lonetree was pilloried as the prime villain. This disturbing book--based on ``classified'' trial transcripts and written by the chief investigator for the defense in Lonetree's trial and Hoffman, a book author--charges that a gullible enlisted man was exploited in order to protect high-ranking officials responsible for the sorry state of embassy security. Headley and Hoffman argue that Lonetree committed no crime other than passing two innocuous pieces of information to a female embassy employee, a Soviet national, with whom he had a brief affair. For this he was arrested and--without being informed of his rights--charged with espionage. The Marine prosecutor in the case sought the death penal ty, and Lonetree was considered lucky by the prosecution to receive a 30-year prison sentence. Readers will agree with Kunstler, another of his lawyers, when he writes: `` Semper fidelis may be the motto of the Marine Corps, but it hardly applied to the inhumane and vindictive vendetta against one of its own . . . '' Illustrations. (Aug.)