When a loved one wants you to turn traitor

A curious detail about the case of Major Jamie Lee Henry and Russia

Last month, news broke about a Maryland couple trying and failing to supply Russia with sensitive info about U.S. military personnel. I’ve been asked to write about this bizarre case multiple times, but I wasn’t sure what to say.

Until I noticed something.

First of all, you can read the main details from the Department of Justice above. Major Jamie Lee Henry and his wife, Anna Gabrielian, met with an undercover FBI agent who they thought worked for the Russian government and tried to pass sensitive information along in order to aid Russia’s barbaric war.

Henry came out as a trans woman in 2015, but as the Advocate has noted, the Department of Justice stated that he has most recently used male pronouns.

Here’s video of Henry and Gabrielian in Baltimore. I took a screenshot of the video in case the ads cause your browser to crash, like they initially did with mine (ugh):

This is Gabrielian’s LinkedIn page, archived.

The most interesting part, however, is in this very good article by Dan Mangan and Kevin Breuninger.

There is one specific detail from the indictment that these journalists zeroed in on. It’s about Henry’s hesitation when speaking to the person he thought worked for Russia. This is a screenshot of that exchange:

So Henry is worried that if the U.S. actually fights Russia directly, he will have a problem. His wife interjects and says that he will solve that problem. Notice the power dynamic here? She’s saying this in front of their supposed “Russian contact.” She is not pulling her husband aside to whisper in his ear. She is putting him on the spot.

The New York Post then picked up on this other detail:

Gabrielian called her husband a coward for being concerned about violating HIPAA as the couple prepared to turn sensitive information over to the Russians.

In the indictment, we also find Gabrielian’s instructions to her husband to read a particular book about a successful Soviet spy, note her words about “loyalty” and “sacrificing everything”:

Pretty passionate, isn’t it?

Seems to me like Henry was under considerable pressure from his wife to prove himself to the Russians.

As I’ve argued before, this type of pressure should be taken seriously. We joke about “Russian agents” and “reds under the bed” in DC all the time, but the truth is, there are people out there who can lay traps for you. Sometimes, those people are the ones you love.

I’m not saying this because I believe that poor little Major Henry is not to blame. He’s an adult. He swore an oath. He has a clearance. He knew better.

What I am saying is that what we have on display here is a poisonous dynamic and the very real consequences of letting this dynamic grow and warp your mind and your behavior. You could just end up in federal court.

Even worse, you could end up in Russia.

Maybe Major Henry thought that life in Russia would be a picnic for him (the couple was angling for a chance to flee to Turkey if things went south, but would the Russians call in favors with the Turks for something like this? Lol I don’t think so), maybe his wife insisted that it would be, but, and I never get tired of beating this particular dead horse:

Russians hate traitors. For example, do you think they love Snowden? He may have been useful to them once, but now they mostly regard him as a curiosity at best. An unhappy curiosity, when you really dig into it. He’s not feted. He’s closely watched.

Because, once a traitor — always a traitor. It’s the only bit of Russian logic that has made any sense to me.

The feds say that Anna Gabrielian was stupid enough to e-mail the Russian embassy offers to help the Russian cause. The Russians must’ve have balked at that. They probably thought they were being played. They probably made contact with whoever they needed to make contact with on the subject, to indicate that they did not appreciate being played. That’s when the FBI came in, most likely.

Leaving aside the fact that these people wanted to help the Russians in their genocidal campaign against Ukraine, I think they are a good example of what happens when foolishness, warped politics, twisted loyalties, and unpleasant family dynamics go too far.

Please discuss this case with the people you love. There are lessons here.