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Why Counter-Terrorism Is In Shambles
Early last week several questions were submitted to former CIA analyst Ray McGovern about the sad state of counter-terrorism in the United States, and he has answered frankly and in-depth. In addition, McGovern solicited former FBI attorney/special agent Coleen Rowley to review his answers and provide her own comments. Ray's biggest tip to the intelligence community was to "HOLD ACCOUNTABLE THOSE RESPONSIBLE. More 'reform' is the last thing we need. Sorry, but we DO have to look back. The most effective step would be to release the CIA Inspector General report on intelligence community performance prior to 9/11. That investigation was run by, and its report was prepared by an honest man, it turns out. It was immediately suppressed by then-Acting DCI John McLaughlin — another Tenet clone — and McLaughin's successors as director, Porter Goss, Michael Hayden, and now Leon Panetta."
The people directing the operations believe them to be ineffective? It's all smoke and mirrors, and nothing is really safer? If something was going to happen, it still is, regardless of the measures implemented today? Who could have guess this to be the case?
The answer to that first question (the first part anyway) could basically be summed up in one sentence: Read the goddamned 9/11 Commission Report. As one of probably seven Americans who actually did, I must say that it always surprised me just how flat it seemed to fall on the populous and government both. Sure, it made the NYT best-seller list for a bit, because hey, in 2004 what better coffee table book was there?
Sure, the first third of the report might be horrifying, and the middle third was extremely dry, but they were still extremely telling. What's more, the final section offered some suggestions, potential fixes, and forward-thinking plans that were excellent. Of course none of them were fully-fledged, but they were great jumping-off points. How many were put into action? Surely not too many, and five and a half years later we're still reeling from that inaction.
The main message in the report was that of any good relationship, communication, and that's precisely what hasn't been happening. McGovern hits a lot of good points, but I agree with him that this is all incredibly old. Not stale, because it hasn't been done, but old nonetheless. And lord knows holding those responsible responsible is a novel concept.
I live in constant fear of the Coming of the Red Spiders.
Look, the main thing is we forgot that terrorism is a tactic, and let ourselves get swept up in Fear.
From my personal experience (multiple counter-terrorism ops) what works is fairly simple: basic police detective work.
Torture doesn't work. Fear plays into what they want.
Stop living in fear and treat this as we treat natural disasters and food poisoning - don't overreact, don't reduce your freedom or liberty, but do allocate a PORTION of your police resources to proper detective work in tracking them down.
That works. None of what we've done so far does, sadly.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
It was since 9/11 that it struck me: the US secret services, intelligence and security communities are... well, a bit dumb. The measures taken on planes after 9/11 should have been there before. Plain-clothes officers on planes were introduced only AFTER the fact. In Israel that has been common practice since the 70's. I don't even need to mention security theater at the airports in the US. And then the more recent Jordanian double-agent that kills 7 CIA officers in Afghanistan. Then there's the ridiculous list of no-fly passengers that is checked against a name!? Really? Now that's really hard to defeat. And it aggravates everybody who happens to have the same name. These just from the top off my head, but there are much more such stupendously silly things.
Beyond drastic, strategic changes in philosophy, the intelligence community in the US should be more imaginative, more broad-minded, more alert. Basically, more intelligent.
"The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
Two problems with this statement.
1 You can't be sure they are a terrorist while your punching them there have been several people tortured who were, in the end, found innocent.
2 Torture only makes the person say what they think will make you leave them alone. Maybe they confess to something they didn't do or maybe they give you bad intelligence.
In World War two it was discovered that the best way for the allies to get intel from their prisoners on what the Germans were up to was a steak dinner.
Torture is just a violent jerk finding righteous excuses for unconscionable behavior and is counter productive every time.
If you want to see how frequent terrorist attacks can become, take a look at Iraq,
Wooooooooooosh!
The reason "terrorist attacks" are so frequent in places like Iraq is because of LOCAL CONDITIONS. Terrorism does not appear out of nowhere. It takes a lot of local infrastructure in order to pull off, including motivated individuals with lots of experience in both the tradecraft of terrorism and the local society.
And, lets see if I get your argument correct here - even though we haven't been doing anything substantial and the number of attacks have been near zero, we need to massively ramp up the amount of effort we put in to stop all those non-existent attacks? Right? Because I'm saying the opposite and you appear to be disagreeing with me.
Actually, Israel is outsmarting the terrorists by staying on the offensive.
And yet they fail far more often than our own counter-terrorism program.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
There is a long history here that needs to be taken into consideration... We are seeing a paradigm shift in our government that is long overdue. It used to be that the government had to protect paper documents, "eyes only", and the biggest threat were photocopiers and miniature cameras... not any more.
I wrote about this transformation many years ago. Is it any wonder why the NSA is being brought up and groomed to help protect the critical information assets that the United States has?
From my post:
HumInt/SigInt:
Human Intelligence, CIA
Signal Intelligence, NSA
The English have been masters at the spy trade for centuries. In WWII, the United States felt that it should get into the act and turned to the English for guidance.
With their tutelage, the CIA became a formidable tool against the Soviet threat throughout the cold war. We had clearly defined enemies with clearly defined borders. Gathering intelligence became a methodical science... then, once the Soviet Union collapsed, the clearly defined enemies with clearly defined borders went with it.
The growth of the internet created an atmosphere wherein information and 'intelligence' became a commodity. Then the emergence of an enemy that is not only difficult, if not impossible, to clearly define but who also operates entirely without borders. The polar opposite from what the CIA were trained to do.
Not only has this rule-set reset turned the CIA upside-down, it has rendered it all but useless. The UK isn't doing much better either. The problem is that western society itself is at odds with the rules required to make an effective spy agency. Our open government(s), free access to information, laws against spying on citizens and so forth are what both protect our civil liberties as well as create the environment in which our enemies can plot against us.
The CIA knew about al Qaeda operators operating in the USA prior to 9/11, yet did nothing to notify the FBI. This is because of the opposing nature of each agency. The CIA finds a criminal and wants to string them along to see what intelligence they can uncover by monitoring them. When the FBI finds a criminal, they want to string them up. From the CIA perspective, the FBI sure knows how to screw up an investigation and destroy your intelligence network.
The CIA is now dysfunctional to the point of uselessness. In fact, there isn't a single effective spy agency in the western world. The current battle we're fighting and the enemy we face is one that cannot be defeated by military might, it is a war that MUST be fought using intelligence.
So, the administration turned to the only other agency with experience in gathering and monitoring enemies. It also happens that this agency is experts at SigInt, as opposed to the HumInt. The problem is that the NSA is forbidden by law from spying on American Citizens, UNLESS they are monitoring overseas communications. This exception has always been allowed, no warrant necessary. There is no law that states that I have the constitutional right to conspire with enemies overseas.
No other nation even comes close to the SigInt capabilities of the NSA...
It is imperative that the NSA get on top of this nations information security. A staggering number of government agencies are still not even behind firewalls! There is so much bureaucratic stagnation that nothing meaningful has been done to secure this nations governmental infrastructure.
Finally, they are putting an agency in charge that actually *knows* something about security. I applaud this effort wholeheartedly.
Regards,
Joel Helgeson
Good security is based upon reality and common sense. Common sense is a function of having common knowledge.
The so called acts of "terrorism" against the USA, could be called by another name. They are the resistance. The United States is an empire. it's ok, it's not a bad thing in itself. Embrace what you are. So, there is a resistance. A small, stupid, disorganized, and full of religious fanatics resistance. The fact that the resistance isn't bigger doesn't mean there are not a lot of other people that would like to resist, they just don't think blowing up buildings is the way to resist the empire.
So, when you say "Anti-terrorism" you actually mean "Anti enemies of the empire". What the government is doing is chasing the enemies of the empire. It is doing so using the worth methodologies: fear, violence, persecution, surveillance. And what the US is accomplishing is far from stopping that resistance: It actually gets more people to join in, and causes even more hate against your country.
The UK was once a Huge Empire, and they conquered most of the known world. And nobody hated them as much as everyone hates the US. And many times, what they did was actually far worse than the actions of the US. Then, why is the US hated so much? two reasons: One, people don't like self-righteous fucks. Do what you must, but don't pretend to be the land of the free and home of the whatever anymore. You are an empire. Conquer and STFU. Stop trying to sell the "American" way to everyone. Second: Conquer, but don't destroy. The UK conquered half the world, and now those places are known as Australia, The United States, Canada ... The US, OTOH, conquered Iran, Afghanistan, Vietnam, and those places are the same shitholes they were before. They are actually worse now after you screwed them up. Want their oil? Conquer them, get their oil, and in the process establish there and build trains and schools. The Colony model works, the big country takes the resources and cheap work that they need, and the small startup country grows and learns. Eventually, it becomes independent.
But if you keep conquering, screwing the place up, and then leaving, with the sole goal of selling more weapons and controlling the price of oil, people will hate you mroe and more, and they'll continue trying to blow the fuck out of your country.
Being a self righteous fuck and saying "why does the world hate us" doesn't help. Realizing what you are, and acting in consequence does.
WTF am I doing replying to an AC at 5 A.M on a Friday night?
Terrorists are trolls.
Don't feed the trolls, it's fucking simple.
If you quote this signature there'll be 72 copies of Windows ME waiting for you in Heaven.
In World War two it was discovered that the best way for the allies to get intel from their prisoners on what the Germans were up to was a steak dinner.
I heard it a different way from a family member who was actually there and served in his division's intelligence unit. He said that the most effective way to get information out of high ranking POWs was to inform them that we'd turn them over to the Soviets if they failed to cooperate with us.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Oh, you may still say what you want. Just anywhere. I may still post things on the internet. But I should be prepared to be arrested for things I didn't even write. You may still protest against politicians. But you'll be sent to areas where nobody cares and certainly no camera will see your protest.
In case you didn't notice, you're still allowed to say what you want, what's limited is your exposure. And what is it good for to talk about grievances if it's made sure that nobody can hear you? It's classic constitution circumvention. You're not silenced because you can't say what you want, you're silenced by taking away any possible audience that might hear you.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
So what? That was entirely post-attack. The attack was paid for by Saudis, and executed by nationals from Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Lebanon and Egypt.
Now, do you see Iraq in that list? Fuck no, you don't. Do you see Afghanistan there? Fuck no, you don't. Do you see us attacking Egypt? No. Lebanon? No. The UAE? No. Saudi Arabia? No. Instead, we attacked Iraq (a total WTF) and Afghanistan, a country uninvolved in the attack; no nationals, no funding.
And if you think it's ok to attack a country because they don't want to hand someone over, then you better start ducking, because the US holds people back from all manner of countries. A, B, C, D, etc.
If you think it's ok to attack a country because you don't agree with how they do things, then holy chickenshit, you'd *really* better duck, because there's a whole line of countries that can say that about us.
If you think it's ok to attack a country because they're screwed up internally, that is, not obeying their constitution or other founding papers... yeah, you guessed it, duck. because we're so far away from our constitution it can't be seen from here.
But I think you might agree with me that if someone attacks you, then you have some justification to hit back at where they come from and/or who paid/ordered the act. Let me repeat, just for the sake of trying to point the objective facts to you:
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Whatever you want to call them. I feel absolutely zero need to respect the current PC terminology for these superstitious middle easterners, or their so-called "religion." It's a cult of reality-challenged people, just like every other religion, and just like every other religion, it breeds more reality-challenged people doing moronic things.
As far as I'm concerned, our ideal path here is to crash develop electric vehicles, never buy another drop of oil from them, never let another one across our borders, and never send them another red cent. Let them eat sand, to vaguely paraphrase Marie Antoinette, and with about as much concern as her delivery.
Sure they do. They come from a nice mix of the gullible, the ignorant, and the reality-challenged. The same place Christians come from. It's purest superstition. They live their lives -- and die -- by/for an imaginary friend. They're natural idiots, or people of sadly lost potential made idiotic by consumption of mythology.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
The vast majority of muslims are a little bit hypocritical. Same as the vast majority of all people. They subscribe to Islam and revere the Koran, and indeed many do have a lot of sincere faith. But the Koran contains, as does the Bible and other holy books, odd little things that if taken literally and in absolute terms, are very destructive. So they're quietly downplayed or forgotten about. So who gets to say who is a True Scotsman *ahem* True Muslim. Well there's no absolute authority other than God / Allah Itself, and It isn't publishing specifications in the papers for us. For most people, including muslims, someone is a muslim (or a Christian) if they say they are.
A lot of criticism which starts from picking out some part of the Koran to illustrate how Islam believes in wiping out non-believers or whatever, is flawed. Not because there aren't such examples in the Koran, but because it's not really addressing the vast bulk of muslims who don't in their hearts believe or want such things. Yet these people are still muslims. It's an argument based on wanting to prove that culture X is evil and therefore finding legalistic reasons why it ought to be, instead of actual observation. There are nearly two-billion people on this planet that self-identify as muslim. If even one in ten-thousand were determined terrorists wanting to commit atrocities on the United States of America, that would be two-hundred thousand 9/11 hijackers, shoe-bombers, market-place killers decimating the USA right now. Simple fact of the matter is that muslims, like everyone else, are basically just people. There are good and bad bits to their cultures (and I'm an outspoken critic of some of those bad bits), but the demonisation of many millions of people by much of the US media is absurd. And the responses of the US government are absurd - and that's why the anti-terrorism measures have been ineffective:
The causes of terrorism have gone unacknowledged because they have to be. To acknowledge them is to address excess influence on policy and media by the oil industries, by the military-industrial complex, by politicians playing the Fear card to win votes and power, it's to acknowledge the actions of the Israeli government and the US sponsorship of their actions, it's to acknowledge the US navy bombing resistance camps at the request of the Saudi regime, it's to acknowledge all sorts of things that the US government doesn't want to acknowledge. But like someone who's an alcoholic, compulsive eater or whatever, you can't address a problem if you don't acknowledge it is there.
Aide-toi, le Ciel t'aidera - Jeanne D'Arc.