The Rosenbergs' Sons Face Reality

The Rosenbergs' Sons Face Reality

I mentioned early this month that one of Julius Rosenberg's co-conspirators finally came clean and admitted that he and Julius Rosenberg had, in fact, spied for the Soviet Union--to the shock and amazement of a whole generation of leftists. In spite of going along with proper leftist groupthink for many years, their sons have acknowledged that they can no longer pretend that their father was innocent. From September 17, 2008 MSNBC:

NEW YORK - After years of professing their parents' innocence, the sons of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg are acknowledging that their father was a spy.

The about-face came after their father's co-defendant, Morton Sobell, admitted for the first time that he and Julius Rosenberg stole non-atomic military and industrial secrets for the Soviet Union.

...

Michael was 10 years old when his parents were executed. His brother, Robert, was 6. After living with a series of relatives, the boys were eventually adopted.

As adults, they sued the government for documents relating to their parents' case and worked to establish their innocence.

In separate interviews with the Times since Sobell's confession, the brothers said they concluded they could no longer claim their father was innocent of an espionage conspiracy. They still say, however, that any atomic bomb information he gave the Russians was at best superfluous, that the case against their parents was flawed and that neither deserved the death penalty.

I feel bad for them. They weren't responsible for what their parents did, and I can understand why they might have wanted to believe that their parents were unjustly accused. That's a very human reaction, especially since the innocence of the Rosenbergs has long been one of the shibboleths of leftist thought.