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Leaked Documents Detail Al-Qaeda's Efforts To Fight Back Against Drones
An anonymous reader writes "The Washington Post reports, 'Al-Qaeda's leadership has assigned cells of engineers to find ways to shoot down, jam or remotely hijack U.S. drones ... In July 2010, a U.S. spy agency intercepted electronic communications indicating that senior al-Qaeda leaders had distributed a "strategy guide" to operatives around the world advising them how "to anticipate and defeat" unmanned aircraft. The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) reported that al-Qaeda was sponsoring simultaneous research projects to develop jammers to interfere with GPS signals and infrared tags that drone operators rely on to pinpoint missile targets. Other projects in the works included the development of observation balloons and small radio-controlled aircraft, or hobby planes, which insurgents apparently saw as having potential for monitoring the flight patterns of U.S. drones... Al-Qaeda has a long history of attracting trained engineers ... Khalid Sheik Mohammed, the self-proclaimed architect of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, holds a mechanical-engineering degree ... In 2010, the CIA noted in a secret report that al-Qaeda was placing special emphasis on the recruitment of technicians and that "the skills most in demand" included expertise in drones and missile technology.'"
Should we be prosecuting them?
So leaks that are marketing for NSA mass surveillance is OK then?
If the NSA leaks to market itself, it will leak to discredit politicians the General doesn't like, and leak opponents emails to its supporters. The leaks they reveal as marketing simply reveal how the rules don't apply to the leadership of the NSA.
little planes flying into bigger planes?
In July 2010, a U.S. spy agency intercepted electronic communications indicating that senior al-Qaeda leaders had distributed a "strategy guide" to operatives around the world
They may just be making this up to get more funding. Sometimes these "intercepted messages" or "chatter" look just so convenient (often well timed) and meaningless that one has to wonder.
Better pay, free food, "20% time" to work on individual plots to destroy Israel, and of course, 72 geeky virgins.
http://news.slashdot.org/story/09/12/30/1318240/why-do-so-many-terrorists-have-engineering-degrees
The Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) reported that al-Qaeda was sponsoring simultaneous research projects to develop jammers to interfere with ... infrared tags that drone operators rely on to pinpoint missile targets.
Well, to jam them, al-Qaeda should just build bonfires around their secret bases. That'll jam the infrared signals those Americans use!
I'm such a tactical genius! And to think, I flunked military science!
How is it that any company seems to report on leaked documents for profit rather than turn over documents [which could potentially carry information detrimental to the safety of millions of people] to the proper authorities? Its incredible that these leaked documents keep turning up in the hands of corporations that apparently have no sense of patriotic duty.
Designed to create the belief:
1 - Intelligence intercepts and interrogations are effective at getting information that "protects" "us".
2 - Drones are an effective weapon against "our" "enemies" and not principally dangerous to villagers and local civic functions.
But WHY do you believe ANY public information from an agency that has DECEIT in its charter?
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
I'm guessing every other military in the world is also interested in a defence against drones.
Putin claims Al Qaeda is the main echelon of the Syrian rebels, and that Kerry knows this. But Obama has been pushing to arm them for over a year. So here the USA is, about to jump into that fight, on the side of the rebels, against the will of most of We the People.
If Putin is right, the issue of how Al Qaeda is going to shoot down US drones becomes moot, they'll do it with the anti-aircraft weapons Obama is going to provide them. Oh, you might say, but the Senate resolution says we'll vet any group of rebels we support. yes, because they wear labels with faction affiliation on them....
Do people really expect them not to? They're getting bombed and dying, of course they'll try to figure out a way not to.
I can't believe the summary mentioned Khalid Sheik Mohammed without mentioning that he's not just any trained engineer -- he designed a classified vacuum cleaner .
Sheesh...and they call this "News for Nerds"....though come to think of it all the true nerds already knew this!
For when the time comes "they" turn these weapons against American Citizens.
These people may be able to assist you in your search for self-defense :
http://domesticdronecountermeasures.com/
"Al-Qaeda has a long history of attracting trained engineers..."
More evidence that the STEM crisis is a myth.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
Whenever it's a terrorist collaboration they are called cells? Why don't they just call them teams or work groups? Then they can start buying those motivational posters, have team-building programs, etc.
That was the turning point of my life--I went from negative zero to positive zero.
I can't put myself in the head space of someone who would go there. The only aspect of the profiles I happened upon suggest most recruits are twenty somethings with a hormonal state that pushes them to "adventure" and status. I just can't get there from where I am. The world's moving so fast away from the mindset of fundamentalists like al-Qaeda that were they not so psychotically violent they'd be pathetic and pitiable.
I feel we have lost the battle of ideas, psychology, history and economics with AQ.
The AQ attack caused a freeze to settle over social change and equality in the USA.
The Towers were attacked because they housed major American trading companies.
Instead of realizing the ideological and philosophical content of the Attack, we emphasized the fire fighters who were killed after the attack.
An example of an issue the AQ attack froze is the American lifetime of debt. Everybody over the age 21 is probably in debt.
Interest on money is a huge issue with Islamic religion views.
Some critics characterize the conduct of the USA since 9-11 as the conduct of an arrogant empire, complete with an associated spiritual or intellectual emptiness. Drones, torture, informants, web surveilance and airport boarding security are not a satisfactory substitute for ... for what...
A particular issue that interests me is this emphasis on engineers and technically trained people. AQ has a system of "standup brainwashing" that apparently works best on people that have not studied the liberal arts. These are times that call for many clear minded thinkers.
I guess the CIA training offered to Al Qaeda, back when they were our guys, didn't cover drones.
comes to mind. Americans don't yet realize that John Connors is from the middle east.
We're supposed to be afraid of these douchebags? We're supposed to fear their engineering "prowess"? Is that what this is supposed to mean?
They make underpants bombs that won't even work under the best of circumstances. I grew up in the Cold War. I feared Russian engineering, because they actually could lob a *nuclear* tipped missile over the North Pole or from a submarine (they never solved the "launch from under water" thing, though). And the both the Bush and Obama administrations were calling these underpants bombs "sophisticated." Bullshit. Complete, utter bullshit. You know what's sophisticated? Over-the-horizon radar. ICBMs. Nuclear submarines. Tsar Bomba even if it was impractical.
What is not sophisticated: IEDs. ANFO bombs. Flying planes into buildings. These are not sophisticated. These can be pulled off by people of average intelligence and just enough insanity to believe in their bullshit cause.
"But they have a world-wide network of engineers!!!1111ONE@#$@#$R"
What a lot of crap. All the engineering in the world isn't going to help you if you can't implement your "master plan" and the only logistics that they seem capable of is ground fightin' and IEDs. Bring down drones? There are governments that have been throwing money at this problem and Iran got just *one* drone to show for all their work, and it's even disputable that they got it by jamming GPS (which is possible if you've got a loud enough transmitter and a crappy enough receiver). That's not much of a return on investment.
When all you have is a bunch of mentally-ill (because this kind of religious devotion is mental illness) engineers and suicidal foot-soldiers, you really don't have a lot of bright people. You have dolts. Dedicated, but not too bright. Because if they were bright... well... I'll leave you with this apropos quote:
--
BMO
... they are not supposed to defend themselves....
Thank god. The CIA makes SURE that the TRUTH is out there! Like, way, way out there...
In Dec. 2012 it was reported Said al-Shihri, supposedly an "al Qaeda number two", was killed.
It was the third time, according to "official sources", informed by Intelligence, the US reported they'd killed him
And another Three-fer was Abu Yahya al-Libi, which the US claimed to have killed 2 times before they yet again claimed to have killed him in June 2012.
Damn! This US intelligence is SO GOOD it kills "Al Qaeda" guys THREE TIMES!
"Flyin' in just a sweet place,
Never been known to fail..."
No, it's about the new god-like powers of the ultra-technical programmers and engineers.
When one man in a basement destroys what an R&D team took 5+ years to build, I'd say he has power.
Imagine the man that scrambles and cracks like no one else..... They want him.
Modern terrorist orgs tend to attract engineers (including far right wing neo-nazi in the US).. Engineering is a high status job in the middle east, You sweat through getting that degree, in expectation of the high status job, but hey, there are no jobs. You feel cheated: I did my part, they didn't live up to the bargain: that makes you ripe for recruitment: it was those corrupt government types that are responsible, come with us and follow the true way. These organizations have a set of rules, you follow the rules, and things happen as promised. Engineers, by nature, tend to like this sort of thing: they like predictability, they've been trained for it.
Very different than the disaffected liberal arts majors and lawyers in the Red Army Faction/ Baader Meinhof style nihilists/terrorists of the 60s and 70s. They were all about more subjective stuff.
Throw in the fact that when you shoot down a drone, you don't lose a pilot that cost years of expensive training that could easily run into a fair fraction of a million dollars to replace
Don't forget the Combat Search and Rescue (CSAR) team that may be sent into harms way if we hear from the pilot once he is on the ground. For example when an F-16 pilot went down in Serbia, O'Grady, the rescue force included 2 CH-53 transport helicopters, 2 AH-1 helicopter gunships, 2 AV-8 ground attack jets, their crews and 51 Marine infantryman. The AH-1's took missile fire but successfully evaded. The CH-53's were hit with small arms fire.
Can't run from IR.
Even this would not bring life back to the 600s when Muhammad lived if you could. Suck it Islamic radical fundamentalists and let your brother and sisters live in peace with the Prophet and the world and values of various cultures. If you all strapped bombs to yourselves and detonated eachother the question of modernity would be answered. Grow up and live a prosperous life or off yourselves dipwads.
Perhaps it would be a good time for DARPA to offer one of their technology challenges... perhaps $1m to the first team/person who can successfully bring down a drone using a home-made countermeasure.
That way we'd know for sure just how viable such "amateur" countermeasures would be (and I'd be $1m richer :-)
Seriously though -- drones flying at lower altitudes (ie: 5000m or lower) would *not* be that hard to take out using "off the shelf" technology adapted and applied in innovative ways.
What's with this abuse of language? It wasn't a leak, as the second sentence in TFS says:
a U.S. spy agency intercepted electronic communications
Intercepted communication by an 'enemy' spy agency is NOT a leak. Huge difference. We're talking night & day. WTF, Washington Post?
I wonder when Al Qaeda is going to infiltrate the H1B workforce into western companies...
They clearly don't appreciate that the US can hurt them without putting any human into their reach. If they do succeed in disabling or destroying a drone, all they get is hardware. No hostage. No video opportunity for a nice beheading. No propaganda victory.
Serves them right!
After all, they are evil death cult followers hell-bent on killing women and children for reasons so insane it's out of this world, and any blow we can deal them is both justified and well deserved.
Terrorists have by their inhumane actions denounced their human rights and should be treated accordingly. They use bombs to target only random innocent people and that is so evil it's hard to comprehend, so getting targeted by drones even when hiding their cowardly asses behind their women and children is completely fair in every way.
"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." -- H.L. Mencken (1880-1956) --
It's possible that many people "want something done" while realizing that the military strikes proposed by Obama aren't the right something, or that there is no effective "something" to do. I would have been in the majority in that poll, counted as "opposed". I DO want somebody smart to come up with some effective action. I do want something done, and understand there's nothing we CAN do that will help.
Of course "most Americans" are probably busy watching Honey Boo Boo and have no idea who "Assad" is.
I hope al Qaeda shares their findings with everyone else who might need that information.
In SOVIET RUSSIA... erm...NSA AMERICA, the Internet logs onto YOU!
Use that title, out the full text up on Kindle Marketplace, see how long it takes someone to notice.
I would think it would be cheap and easy to put together a bunch of ground-based IR emitters, possibly with the ability to be solid or blink or all of the above in random increments. A related idea would be an object that emits light in the same manner as the reflected laser targeting system.
I could see where having a lot of these in a concentrated space might make it harder for targeting and laser guidance, and they should be cheap to build and operate.
The most successful way for them to deal with drones, is what they are currently doing.
They launched a gas attack, and got their enemy to be blamed for it, and so Obama and others will launch an attack using drones and other weapons, to destroy their enemy, on their behalf.
That our enemies are trying to stop or defense systems. My God, this leaked document has cleared my mind to the world!
I though out enemies liked getting bombed from above. Man my world is soo off.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
As soon as these drones start getting used against Americans on U.S. Soil, then the importance of the leaked documents will become clear.
Seriously, how did this help Americans? It DOES help AQ, because now, they know what we know about them. They also learn how we think about them. Point is, Snowden's continued document releases show that he is more traitor than whistle blower and that he does not care. He should be treated as a traitor once brought back here.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Your (plural "you") repeated calls for Snowden's execution are going to just make it harder to get him extradited legally. Not that it appears that you Americans give a shit about legality.
Oh, incidentally, if you fancy claiming that the journalists are traitors too, I'll give you Wallaces' (mythical) answer : "I can not be a traitor, for I owe him no allegiance. He is not my Sovereign; he never received my homage; and whilst life is in this persecuted body, he never shall receive it." They're not Americans,so they can't be traitors to America.
Yes, the releases are being calculated to continue embarrassing American spies. That's what people who hate what the American spy agencies are doing (including many Americans) do, to try to stop American spy agencies from fucking with the rest of the world.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
First off, you have never seen me call reporters traitors. Had they paid for this information or out and out helped obtain, and then printed it, I might call them a traitor. BUT, when it is delivered into their hands by somebody else's actions, then I would print it as well, though I DO think that there should be selective publication of this rather than all of it. In particular, greenwald is an American and I believe should be more selective about what he is printing. There is a lot there that is NOT whistle blowing, but out right treason. BUT, that is a different issue.
Where have you seen me calling for doing illegal things in my postings ?
Heck, I believe that Manning should be executed (again, out and out treason combined with whistle blowing).
OTOH, while I do not believe that Assange is a reporter, he is clearly not American and therefore we have no legal battle with him. As such, I do believe that we have a right to extradition of him (though sweden clearly does).
Likewise, I oppose what UK is doing to Glenwald's boyfriend, Miranda. They had no reason to hold him once they recovered the stolen material (which that part was legal in my mind; but it will not matter, snowden will simply leak it out other ways). Obviously, the 5 eyes knew that he had it. But holding him for all of those hours and grilling him was plain wrong.
As to Snowden, in the first set of data releases, I was good with it. It was something that I had been concerned about and have said so on this site and others for many years. After all, unlike most ppl here, I DO have experience on this stuff. Lack of oversight was a serious issue. BUT, Snowden went much further than that. Once he started speaking about how it is done and how we do it on other nations and how we follow terrorists and others, he became a traitor. In fact, all other nations would execute him, or worse, lock him up for life, for having done what he is doing now. Personally, I think that we are out of our mind, but I know why. He holds a lot more information. A LOT MORE. Still, it does not change the current situation. He is a whistle blower (good) and a traitor (bad).
And as to the American spy agency fucking with the rest of the world, hey, I hate to point this out, but all of the nations spy on each other and fuck with it as well. UK, France, Germany, Russia, and China are far worse than what America is today, in terms of messing with the rest of the world. This is common. Even the 5 eyes spy on each other (and then share that information). Canada, Australian, New Zealand, and UK all spy on Americans and others around the world. Likewise, I have dealt with 1 confirmed Chinese spy, and probably another, already.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.