55: Former U.S. Ambassador Manual Rocha Accused of Being Cuban Agent

Colombian-born former U.S. Ambassador to Bolivia Manuel Rocha was arrested in Florida, accused of serving as an agent of Cuba. He had been in the diplomatic corps for 25 years serving in Argentina, Italy, Honduras, Mexico and the Dominican Republic, and worked as a Latin America expert for the National Security Council. "His diplomatic postings included a stint at the U.S. Interests Section in Cuba during a time when the U.S. lacked full diplomatic relations with Fidel Castro’s communist government."

https://apnews.com/article/fbi-cuba-bolivia-former-ambassador-arrested-af9d80a4f268099364dff249dd74b3ec

Phillip Linderman in his December 11, 2023 article "Manuel Rocha: Fanatic, Spy--and My Colleague" on The American Conservative website stated that the FBI's revelation that Rocha was a mole caused him "deep sadness and outrage." He believed Rocha was recruited as "a young idealist in 1973 Chile, influenced both by Allende’s Marxism and Pinochet’s coup against it." 

Linderman noted, "Natural gifts in dealing with people serve diplomats well, and they serve spies even better. Like the notorious Hiss, Rocha had attended all the right Ivy League schools and had made extensive connections with everybody in the Washington foreign-policy establishment who worked Latin America. Rocha was clearly a rising Foreign Service star, destined for an ambassadorship which he later got in his Bolivia assignment."