Military – Page 219 – Public Intelligence Blog

2011/12/042012/12/16

Thomas Briggs: Georgetown Students Scoop Secret World on China’s Tunnel System for Nuclear Weapons – or a PSYOP Against US Public?

02 China, 04 Education, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 07 Other Atrocities, 10 Security, Academia, Corruption, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Peace Intelligence

A wonderful example of what can be done with open source material!

Georgetown students shed light on China’s tunnel system for nuclear weapons

By William Wan

Washington Post, November 29, 2011

The Chinese have called it their “Underground Great Wall” — a vast network of tunnels designed to hide their country’s increasingly sophisticated missile and nuclear arsenal.

For the past three years, a small band of obsessively dedicated students at Georgetown University has called it something else: homework.

Read full article.

Phi Beta Iota: The ability of students to excel in relations to spies is not knew, even with hard targets such as China. For decades this web site and its antecedents have been saying “Do not send a spy where a schoolboy can go.” HOWEVER, in this specific case, with China as the target and the Pentagon budget on the line, there is a very high probability that the students are unwitting dupes in an illegal PSYOP being used to create an unethical justification for an ideological and political build-up against China, while protecting the bloated and extraordinarily corrupt Pentagon budget from the mandatory reductions agreed to in relation to the crisis at hand. Bottom line: the students have earned an A but the integrity of this endeavor is suspect.

2011/11/302012/12/04

Winslow Wheeler: US Generals/Admirals Corrupt & Bloated — Panetta Reverses the Token Cuts by Gates

Corruption, Military

WinslowWheeler Cropped — Winslow Wheeler

Two excellent and important articles follow. They address the corrupt nature of America's general officer corps, and they are examples of journalism and think-tank work at their best.

“Corrupt officer corps?” An overstatement? You be the judge.

The first article is yet another in USA Today‘s Tom Vandenbrook's long and continuing series about DOD's “mentor” program. It describes corrupt behavior in indisputable terms. The second by POGO's Ben Freeman describes how the general officer corps has reversed former SecDef Gates' attempt at a modest reduction in officer bloat, a reversal enabled by Leon Panetta. (What next should we expect from this politician occupying the top position in America's most important national security agency?)

The issues are not just ethics and cost. Bloated officer corps are a characteristic of militaries in decline, or rather that have already declined and lose wars. The attachment is a briefing given in recent years by an anonymous and highly respected, at least by me, retired military officer.

It not just a budget crisis the Pentagon is experiencing; it's also a leadership crisis — especially at the top. Moreover, the two are directly related.

I believe these materials are important reading.

Two articles in full below the line.

Continue reading “Winslow Wheeler: US Generals/Admirals Corrupt & Bloated — Panetta Reverses the Token Cuts by Gates”

2011/11/282011/11/28

Mini-Me: Senate Authorizing Military to Lock Up Anyone Anywhere – Including US Citizens – without due process, indefinitely

07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Civil Society, Corruption, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Officers Call

Senators Demand the Military Lock Up American Citizens in a “Battlefield” They Define as Being Right Outside Your Window

While nearly all Americans head to family and friends to celebrate Thanksgiving, the Senate is gearing up for a vote on Monday or Tuesday that goes to the very heart of who we are as Americans. The Senate will be voting on a bill that will direct American military resources not at an enemy shooting at our military in a war zone, but at American citizens and other civilians far from any battlefield — even people in the United States itself.

Senators need to hear from you, on whether you think your front yard is part of a “battlefield” and if any president can send the military anywhere in the world to imprison civilians without charge or trial.

The Senate is going to vote on whether Congress will give this president—and every future president — the power to order the military to pick up and imprison without charge or trial civilians anywhere in the world. Even Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) raised his concerns about the NDAA detention provisions during last night’s Republican debate. The power is so broad that even U.S. citizens could be swept up by the military and the military could be used far from any battlefield, even within the United States itself.

The worldwide indefinite detention without charge or trial provision is in S. 1867, the National Defense Authorization Act bill, which will be on the Senate floor on Monday. The bill was drafted in secret by Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.) and passed in a closed-door committee meeting, without even a single hearing.

Chuck Spinney: UK Dunkirk, USA Long Walk Away from Afghanistan – the Military-Industrial Scam is to “Reset, Rebuy, Retrench”

03 Economy, 05 Iran, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, 11 Society, Articles & Chapters, Blog Wisdom, Budgets & Funding, Commerce, Commercial Intelligence, Corporations, Corruption, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Money, Banks & Concentrated Wealth, Officers Call, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests

… How the Military – Industrial – Congressional Complex (MICC) Will Win By Losing

The old adage that it is easy to get into Afghanistan but painful to leave is true for many reasons — here is a big one described in 27 November issue of the Daily Mirror [also attached below] — the British army plans to use Russian railways, built by the Tsars 140 years ago, to return hundreds of millions of pounds worth of equipment in Afghanistan via a landroute to the English Channel.

If you think the horror described in the Daily Mirror report is bad, think about the US options: Given our deteriorating relations with Pakistan, the long, highly vulnerable land route out of Afghanistan, thru the Bolan and Khyber passes, and then down the road system of the Indus Valley in Pakistan to its port of Karachi, is becoming increasingly problematic.

An optional US exit strategy would be an agonizing variation of the Dunkirk option described in the Daily Mirror report plus a sea lift, perhaps via transshipment points in Black Sea ports, like Batumi in Georgia, or Novorossiysk or Sochi in southern Russia, or even Odessa in the Ukraine (which at least would avoid the problem of different railroad gauges).

Continue reading “Chuck Spinney: UK Dunkirk, USA Long Walk Away from Afghanistan – the Military-Industrial Scam is to “Reset, Rebuy, Retrench””

2011/11/262011/11/26

NYC: Day After Thanksgiving, Military with Machine Gun Outside of Bakery/Pastry Shop

Civil Society, Ethics, Military, Uncategorized

NYC Port Authority Terminal, November 25, 2011
Jason Liszkiewicz

Returning from a bus trip, I walked passed a man with a machine gun outside of a “bakery” (pastry-type cafe). I walked up to him and asked why was he outside of a bakery with a machine gun. His only reply was “9/11.”

military_machine_gun_pastries_11-25-11 — click to enlarge

The Department of Defense spent and spends how many Billion$ (and Rumsfeld admitting he could not account for $2.3TRILLION on September 10, 2001) that did not prevent the September 11 attacks and this man with a machine gun is outside of a pastry shop telling me it's because of 9/11.

Is insane the “new normal?”

Many weeks ago I was given a flyer at Liberty Plaza by someone from the War Resisters League that had many links about war tax boycotting:
+ Wartaxboycott.org
+ 3o minute documentary “Death & Taxes”
+ National War Tax Resistance Coordinating Committee
+ Peacetaxfund.org
+ IAVA.org
+ girightshotline.org (877) 447-4487 for military who refuse to fight

|
|Also on the flyer:
+ Defundwar.org
+ Newprioritiesnetwork.org
+ mfso.org (true cost of war)
+ Bringourwardollarshome.org
+ wwfor.org
+ Peaceeconomyproject.org
+ 25percentsolution.com
+ Smartsecuritypa.org
+ 25teachersalaries.org
+ Ourfunds.org
+ Demilitarize.org

Also See: NYC People's Life Fund who redirects donations from war tax resisters into “life-giving activities.”

2011/11/25

Chuck Spinney: Good, Bizarre, and Ugly

04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, 11 Society, Articles & Chapters, Corruption, DoD, Government, IO Deeds of War, Military, Officers Call, Peace Intelligence

WEEKEND EDITION NOVEMBER 25-27, 2011

The Good, the Bizarre and the Ugly

AF-PAK Sitrep

by FRANKLIN C. SPINNEY, Counterpunch

It is becoming increasingly clear that the AF-PAK war will end in yet another grand strategic defeat for the United States. To date, President Obama, has been able to distract attention from this issue, but given the stakes in 2012, that dodge is unlikely to last. Get ready for an ugly debate over “who lost the Afghan War.”

To those readers who disagree with my opening line, I urge you to study Anthony Cordersman’s most recent situation report on the AF-PAK War, THE AFGHANISTAN- PAKISTAN WAR AT THE END OF 2011: Strategic Failure? Talk Without Hope? Tactical Success? Spend Not Build (And Then Stop Spending)? It was issued by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington on November 15. Reading the report is heavy slogging but I urge readers to download and examine it — at the very least, take a few minutes to read the executive summary.

Now compare Cordesman’s systematic, detailed, and workmanlike analysis to the bizarre obscurantism peddled one week later, on 22 November, co-authored by Michael O’Hanlon (Brookings Institution) and former Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz (American Enterprise Institute) in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, entitled Defining Victory in Afghanistan.

O’Hanlon and Wolfowitz posit the bizarre thesis that the admittedly less than successful outcome against the FARC guerrillas in Columbia is a favorable model for justifying continuing business as usual in Afghanistan. Viewed through the refractions of their Columbian lens, O’Hanlon and Wolfowitz conclude, “Our current exit strategy of reducing American troops to 68,000 by the end of next summer and transferring full security responsibility to Afghan forces by 2014 is working. In a war where the U.S. has demonstrated remarkable strategic patience, we need to stay patient and resolute.”

Are O’Hanlon and Wolfowitz living on the same planet as Cordesman or do they live in some kind of parallel universe?

I submit it is latter. Here’s why –

Read full analysis.

2011/11/25

Chuck Spinney: Averting Civil War in Syria

02 Diplomacy, 05 Civil War, 06 Genocide, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, Articles & Chapters, Corruption, Government, Military, Non-Governmental, Peace Intelligence

Patrick Seale is one of the finest and most experienced writers now reporting on the Middle East

Averting Civil War in Syria

by Patrick Seale

Agence Global, 22 Nov 2011

Syria is heading for a bloody sectarian civil war. The mutual kidnappings, torture, beheadings and displacement of populations taking place between the Sunni and Alawi communities in the central city of Homs — often described as “the capital of the revolution” — send a fearsome signal of what might be in store for the rest of the country.

To avert this descent into hell must surely be the immediate priority of Arab leaders and the international community.

The Iraqi example next door is there for all to see. The Anglo-American invasion destroyed a major Arab country. The country’s institutions and infrastructure were shattered; sectarian demons were released, triggering a civil war. Hundreds of thousands died and millions were displaced from their homes or forced to flee abroad. The country was dismembered as the Kurds established their own semi-independent statelet.

Syria needs the intervention of a high-powered, neutral, contact group to stop the killing on both sides.