Porposal Tim Barnes
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From: "Tim Barnes" To: <[email protected]> Subject: proposal to Mike Kapoustin Date: Saturday, November 08, 2003 1:54 AM Dear Mike: I had an idea which might be of interest to you and help your case. Let me, if you will, approach this idea in a roundabout way. Firstly, though it has been quite some time, I vividly recall our brief times together and my subsequent work on your case (which work was probably far more intensive than you may have realized – even my initial report to Eric Polten from Sofia was so long it had to be sent in three bursts). I remember you as a personable chap of obvious considerable intellect and ability. By and large, under the severe time limitations of our meetings, I believed the story you told me. I told Eric that in my opinion you had had the misfortune of operating ambitiously and skilfully (and, perhaps, somewhat on the sharp edge of practice) in a financial field fraught with potential hazards and in a land which was just emerging from the dark ages of consumerism and economic backwardness. You were and are a relatively sophisticated person in the midst of a simple, gullible, and ignorant people prone to suspicion and paranoid fantasies of conspiracy. You also were tried and sentenced by a justice system which had yet to evolve out of totalitarianism. I said that it seemed clear that you had coped well and courageously with privation, solitude, personal loss and humiliation. And, finally, it seemed that you had not been well served by Canadian authorities who had prejudged your case and given false assurances. Secondly, the political climate has shifted slightly in Canada, as you are no doubt aware. First there was the case of the Canadian photographer, Mrs. Zahra Kazemi, who was arrested in Tehran and tortured to death. Yesterday, November 6th, William Sampson, the Canadian who was arrested in Saudi Arabia, tortured into confessing to a car-bombing, and went through 32 months of hell, gave testimony before the House of Commons Committee on Foreign Affairs. Articulate and intelligent, he savaged the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs in a very credible and powerful manner; the Department’s reputation has surely suffered a devastating blow. Gar Pardy’s name came up repeatedly, and never in a positive way. Lastly, the media is also full of the story of Maher Arar, a Syrian-born Canadian who, arrested during a flight stop-over in New York, was deported from the United States to Syria, then tortured brutally. I am sending you copies of news reports about the Sampson and Arar cases. The result of the recent revelations is that the Department of Foreign Affairs, as I said, has been discredited and is in a state of
disarray. At his appearance before the House Committee, Sampson agreed to provide the names of Canadian officials who were negligent, and he mentioned that he was attempting to obtain compensation from the Saudis. As for Bulgaria, you know more about the country’s advance out of the dark communist past than I do. On the positive side, Bulgarians have done better than their other Balkan neighbours; compared to places like Macedonia and the former Yugoslavia, for example, they have been an island of stability. And the Bulgarians have shown some balls – although you may be inclined to be cynical, I rather liked their gutsy stand at the U.N. before the Iraq war. Unlike the timid positions assumed by many other countries, including Canada, they backed the United States to the hilt against this pillar of the “axis of evil”, and I for one give them credit. Now Bulgaria is at a crossroads. Even the anticipated magic of Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha has failed to bring the country out of the doldrums. There are only four years left before entry into the E.U., providing the admission criteria are met. That’s not a lot of time. The stress must be showing, and the last thing needed is a scandal. Thirdly, as for myself, there is a small window of time which might be available for a worthwhile project. As an Honours Modern History graduate of the University of Toronto I have dabbled in projects of various kinds for years. For example I am submitting a proposal to the National Post for an article. As a former resident of Ajax, Ontario, I have long been interested in the story behind the fact that the town of about 80,000 residents is named after the H.M.S. Ajax, and the streets are named after the officers and men of the ship. The Battle of the River Plate on December 13, 1939, is an amazing event in which three relatively small cruisers (2 British, one from New Zealand) fought the powerful pocket battleship Graf Spee and forced it into retreat and eventual destruction. They had to run a gauntlet of salvos from the Graf Spee starting at a distance of 12 miles until they could get the battleship within range of their comparatively puny 6-inch guns (from which some of the shells merely bounced off the enemy’s armour plating). Ajax and another cruiser, Achilles, made it. The third, H.M.S. Exeter, was horribly damaged; yet, despite that damage and the fact that it was on fire, it fought on until the last gun was silenced. But I digress. Anyway, I have been engaged in a project which has occupied me for years, a novel in two parts, one taking place in the year 1945, and one part contemporary. Call it the “little book that grew”. For years I have struggled with this monster, and have repeatedly put it on the shelf then taken it down again, blown off the dust, and continued. At this rate I may exceed Goethe’s record of 60 years to complete Faust. Lately I have toyed with the notion of doing a faster interim
project, something to be completed in about 8 months. When I watched William Sampson’s live testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Committee yesterday, I thought of you, and came to the conclusion that the only way in which you are going to get sufficient attention to influence events favourably is for a book to be written about your experience, the story of Mike Kapoustin. There appears to be no alternative – there has to be a rather sensational expose which will gain enough sympathy, move the powers that be, and make a difference. This is my idea. Frankly such a project would require an enormous investment of time and energy on my part. Not for a minute do I doubt that, should you participate, you would cooperate with your best efforts at supplying details. However your story would have to be treated in a certain way. Terry Waite’s book, “Taken on Trust”, involved the imprisonment of a very high level emissary of the Archbishop of Canterbury who was negotiating the release of hostages from terrorists in Beirut; that degree of newsworthiness in itself was sufficient to carry the book (much of which was tedious and dull). You do not enjoy such a reputation, and the average member of the lumpenproletariat barely knows that Bulgaria exists, and could care less. The solution, at first blush, would seem to be that you would be portrayed as a rather heroic and tragic figure who is the victim of powerful and sinister forces. One could hint at conspiracy without, in the end, completely proving the allegation – Eastern Europe is a spawning ground of two great evils: computer viruses and conspiracy theories. I myself, while perhaps agreeing that there may have been a gunman behind the grassy knoll in Dallas in 1963, am not much inclined towards conspiracy theories. But in your part of the world? There must be a myriad of myriads of people throughout Eastern Europe and the Middle East who believe, poor souls, that U.S. intelligence agencies like the CIA were behind the September 11th attack on the World Trade Center (Yeah, right, and 6,000 -10,000 Jews left New York before it happened. Heard that one?). Such an inclination towards fantasy can be exploited. There would have to be some expose of the corrupt system behind your imprisonment. I doubt if I could bring myself to indict scathingly the Bulgarians generally, for whom I have much affection, nor the country nor the state in the abstract sense. But the system? That would be fair game. What I mean is that in Bulgaria you have a country which was once so rigidly pro-Soviet that the government on two occasions offered Bulgaria to the Politbureau as a gift, another Soviet province. Then came the freeing of the shackles and the country became democratic, sort of. The people became free of an authoritarian regime but, like a weaned calf, were not quite sure what to do with that freedom, or how to exist financially in a land where once the state owned the means of production. Long starved for material prosperity, they became excessively materialistic and expected to
achieve in a short time the prosperity which they once could only envy while watching “Dallas” episodes. The government, well-intentioned, struggled to adapt and cope, but it is a poor country after all, and miracles are a rare commodity. And the bad guys? The ones who thought up escapades concerning poisoned-tipped umbrellas and attempted Papal assassinations? They have been in the shadows all the while pulling their shit. And finally, we have the wimpish Canadian Foreign Service, incompetent or worse, unable to grasp a situation adequately or develop a coherent policy, blundering around doing more harm than good, and abandoning Canadian citizens to an unkind fate in foreign prisons – lots to say there! If you think that the idea has merit, get back to me and let me know by e-mail. Do you think a 50-50 split of any proceeds, right down the middle, would be fair? After all, I do see myself as doing the heavy lifting on this project, and, once the product is available, having to flog the thing throughout the publishing world. You, on the other hand, could gain some assistance for your plight, vindication, and, not least, hopefully some money. If we were to do this thing, I would want to move forward with some speed. I am constrained by available time, since my workload at Polten & Hodder is extremely heavy, and you are constrained physically, but I think such a project is “do-able”. Another thing – keep this project under your hat. It seemed that in no time at all after Eric Polten got involved with your case that the news was carried in newspapers throughout Bulgaria. Such publicity can be premature, and I am not sure that it would help me at Polten & Hodder in the near term. It is too bad that there are not more overt scandals, violence, mayhem and beautiful women (though your friend on the board of directors was rather memorable). But there should be enough ammunition to get attention and achieve the objective. What do you say?
disarray. At his appearance before the House Committee, Sampson agreed to provide the names of Canadian officials who were negligent, and he mentioned that he was attempting to obtain compensation from the Saudis. As for Bulgaria, you know more about the country’s advance out of the dark communist past than I do. On the positive side, Bulgarians have done better than their other Balkan neighbours; compared to places like Macedonia and the former Yugoslavia, for example, they have been an island of stability. And the Bulgarians have shown some balls – although you may be inclined to be cynical, I rather liked their gutsy stand at the U.N. before the Iraq war. Unlike the timid positions assumed by many other countries, including Canada, they backed the United States to the hilt against this pillar of the “axis of evil”, and I for one give them credit. Now Bulgaria is at a crossroads. Even the anticipated magic of Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha has failed to bring the country out of the doldrums. There are only four years left before entry into the E.U., providing the admission criteria are met. That’s not a lot of time. The stress must be showing, and the last thing needed is a scandal. Thirdly, as for myself, there is a small window of time which might be available for a worthwhile project. As an Honours Modern History graduate of the University of Toronto I have dabbled in projects of various kinds for years. For example I am submitting a proposal to the National Post for an article. As a former resident of Ajax, Ontario, I have long been interested in the story behind the fact that the town of about 80,000 residents is named after the H.M.S. Ajax, and the streets are named after the officers and men of the ship. The Battle of the River Plate on December 13, 1939, is an amazing event in which three relatively small cruisers (2 British, one from New Zealand) fought the powerful pocket battleship Graf Spee and forced it into retreat and eventual destruction. They had to run a gauntlet of salvos from the Graf Spee starting at a distance of 12 miles until they could get the battleship within range of their comparatively puny 6-inch guns (from which some of the shells merely bounced off the enemy’s armour plating). Ajax and another cruiser, Achilles, made it. The third, H.M.S. Exeter, was horribly damaged; yet, despite that damage and the fact that it was on fire, it fought on until the last gun was silenced. But I digress. Anyway, I have been engaged in a project which has occupied me for years, a novel in two parts, one taking place in the year 1945, and one part contemporary. Call it the “little book that grew”. For years I have struggled with this monster, and have repeatedly put it on the shelf then taken it down again, blown off the dust, and continued. At this rate I may exceed Goethe’s record of 60 years to complete Faust. Lately I have toyed with the notion of doing a faster interim
project, something to be completed in about 8 months. When I watched William Sampson’s live testimony before the House Foreign Affairs Committee yesterday, I thought of you, and came to the conclusion that the only way in which you are going to get sufficient attention to influence events favourably is for a book to be written about your experience, the story of Mike Kapoustin. There appears to be no alternative – there has to be a rather sensational expose which will gain enough sympathy, move the powers that be, and make a difference. This is my idea. Frankly such a project would require an enormous investment of time and energy on my part. Not for a minute do I doubt that, should you participate, you would cooperate with your best efforts at supplying details. However your story would have to be treated in a certain way. Terry Waite’s book, “Taken on Trust”, involved the imprisonment of a very high level emissary of the Archbishop of Canterbury who was negotiating the release of hostages from terrorists in Beirut; that degree of newsworthiness in itself was sufficient to carry the book (much of which was tedious and dull). You do not enjoy such a reputation, and the average member of the lumpenproletariat barely knows that Bulgaria exists, and could care less. The solution, at first blush, would seem to be that you would be portrayed as a rather heroic and tragic figure who is the victim of powerful and sinister forces. One could hint at conspiracy without, in the end, completely proving the allegation – Eastern Europe is a spawning ground of two great evils: computer viruses and conspiracy theories. I myself, while perhaps agreeing that there may have been a gunman behind the grassy knoll in Dallas in 1963, am not much inclined towards conspiracy theories. But in your part of the world? There must be a myriad of myriads of people throughout Eastern Europe and the Middle East who believe, poor souls, that U.S. intelligence agencies like the CIA were behind the September 11th attack on the World Trade Center (Yeah, right, and 6,000 -10,000 Jews left New York before it happened. Heard that one?). Such an inclination towards fantasy can be exploited. There would have to be some expose of the corrupt system behind your imprisonment. I doubt if I could bring myself to indict scathingly the Bulgarians generally, for whom I have much affection, nor the country nor the state in the abstract sense. But the system? That would be fair game. What I mean is that in Bulgaria you have a country which was once so rigidly pro-Soviet that the government on two occasions offered Bulgaria to the Politbureau as a gift, another Soviet province. Then came the freeing of the shackles and the country became democratic, sort of. The people became free of an authoritarian regime but, like a weaned calf, were not quite sure what to do with that freedom, or how to exist financially in a land where once the state owned the means of production. Long starved for material prosperity, they became excessively materialistic and expected to
achieve in a short time the prosperity which they once could only envy while watching “Dallas” episodes. The government, well-intentioned, struggled to adapt and cope, but it is a poor country after all, and miracles are a rare commodity. And the bad guys? The ones who thought up escapades concerning poisoned-tipped umbrellas and attempted Papal assassinations? They have been in the shadows all the while pulling their shit. And finally, we have the wimpish Canadian Foreign Service, incompetent or worse, unable to grasp a situation adequately or develop a coherent policy, blundering around doing more harm than good, and abandoning Canadian citizens to an unkind fate in foreign prisons – lots to say there! If you think that the idea has merit, get back to me and let me know by e-mail. Do you think a 50-50 split of any proceeds, right down the middle, would be fair? After all, I do see myself as doing the heavy lifting on this project, and, once the product is available, having to flog the thing throughout the publishing world. You, on the other hand, could gain some assistance for your plight, vindication, and, not least, hopefully some money. If we were to do this thing, I would want to move forward with some speed. I am constrained by available time, since my workload at Polten & Hodder is extremely heavy, and you are constrained physically, but I think such a project is “do-able”. Another thing – keep this project under your hat. It seemed that in no time at all after Eric Polten got involved with your case that the news was carried in newspapers throughout Bulgaria. Such publicity can be premature, and I am not sure that it would help me at Polten & Hodder in the near term. It is too bad that there are not more overt scandals, violence, mayhem and beautiful women (though your friend on the board of directors was rather memorable). But there should be enough ammunition to get attention and achieve the objective. What do you say?
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