Military – Page 310 – Public Intelligence Blog

MOSCOW — The prime minister of Lithuania, a former Soviet republic that broke from Moscow’s orbit and is now a member of NATO, accused the United States on Tuesday of using “Soviet methods” to set up two secret prisons in Lithuania for terrorism suspects.

Iran Comes Out On Top In Secret Simulated War Games

Iran has emerged as the victor in secret war games that simulated an Israeli attack on one of its nuclear facilities. . . . The exercise, staged by Tel Aviv University’s Institute for National Security Studies last month, showed that even an Israeli commando raid on Iran’s heavy water plant at Arak would not draw the US into a military conflict with Iran.

Obama, tell me how this ends: Is Afghanistan just a new war of attrition?

Americans today haven't a clue when, where or how their war will end. The Long War, as the Pentagon aptly calls it, has no coherent narrative. When it comes to defining victory, U.S. political and military leaders are flying blind.

In Russia, Foreboding About America's War In Afghanistan

“It's especially difficult to remember those episodes that so many would like to leave behind,” said Vladimir Kostyuchenko, a helicopter pilot for three tours in Afghanistan who's now active with an Afghan veterans group in Russia. “These generals at the top, they had no sense of reality. They gave us murderous orders. I still bear a cross because I fulfilled those orders.”

Europe’s Revolving Door In Afghanistan

At the same time, there is an element of filling a cup with a hole in the bottom. The Netherlands will withdraw its 2,200 troops in the course of 2010; Canada, with 2,800, will be leaving by 2011. That means as American troop levels rise from 68,000 to 98,000 by next summer, allied troop levels are not likely to go much higher than the present 38,000.

Bin Laden's Closest Family Found Hiding in Iran

Usama bin Laden’s closest relatives are living in a secret compound in Iran, members of the family said Tuesday. They include a wife and children who disappeared from his Afghan camp at the time of the 9/11 attacks on the United States.

2009/12/222010/09/02

Journal: Al Qaeda Has a Regional Strategy, Does US?

08 Wild Cards, Civil Society, Military, Peace Intelligence

berto small — Berto Jongman Recommends...

BOSTON REVIEW

JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2010

‘The real danger is that al Qaeda and the Neo-Taliban will drag the United States into regional war’

Syed Saleem Shahzad

The Obama administration’s troop surge fails to address the real threat in Afghanistan: the insurgents’ efforts to develop a regional strategy in South Asia. Washington’s focus—members of al Qaeda in Pakistan and Afghanistan and the traditional Afghan Taliban—misses the mark. Nir Rosen does, too, when he asks whether “a few hundred angry, unsophisticated Muslim extremists really pose such grave dangers to a vigilant superpower, now alert to potential threats.”

The November 2008 Mumbai attacks and the recent FBI arrests in Chicago for conspiracy to launch attacks in New Delhi suggest that containing the threat from Afghanistan is extremely complicated, and solutions must go beyond troop surges in Afghanistan, training Afghan police and soldiers, or even political dialogue with Taliban commanders inside the country. Intelligence agencies are now realizing that both the Mumbai events and the Delhi plans—plotted directly by al Qaeda affiliated groups, which I call the Neo-Taliban—were directly linked to Afghanistan, but also incorporated wider aims. The goal was to expand the theater of war to India so that Washington would lose track of its objectives and get caught in a quagmire.

2009/12/222009/12/22

Journal: MILNET Headlines (Selected)

05 Iran, 08 Wild Cards, Military

We always do the right thing---we just try everything else first....

AA: Playboy undercover with Dennis Montgomery, who ‘fooled CIA over Al-Jazeera codes'

AA: Our Flip-Flopping Wars

AF: Afghanistan For The Short Term

AF: Allegation: Some Contractors In Afghanistan Paying Protection Money To Taliban

AF: First New U.S. L-3 Spy Plane Due In Afghanistan By Christmas

AF: The Familiar Road To Failure In Afghanistan

IQ: ‘It’s A Whole New Mission’–Iraq: Stryker troops doing detective work

IR: Top US Officer: Force Must Be Option For Iran

2009/12/21

Journal: Fraudulent Security Device Popular in Iraq

09 Terrorism, Commercial Intelligence, Law Enforcement, Military

Original (3 Nov 09) Full Story Online

Iraq Swears by Bomb Detector U.S. Sees as Useless

The small hand-held wand, with a telescopic antenna on a swivel, is being used at hundreds of checkpoints in Iraq. But the device works “on the same principle as a Ouija board” — the power of suggestion — said a retired United States Air Force officer, Lt. Col. Hal Bidlack, who described the wand as nothing more than an explosives divining rod.

Still, the Iraqi government has purchased more than 1,500 of the devices, known as the ADE 651, at costs from $16,500 to $60,000 each. Nearly every police checkpoint, and many Iraqi military checkpoints, have one of the devices, which are now normally used in place of physical inspections of vehicles.

Schneier on Security: A blog covering security and security technology November 6, 2009

The Doghouse: ADE 651: A divining rod to find explosives in Iraq:

ATSC’s promotional material claims that its device can find guns, ammunition, drugs, truffles, human bodies and even contraband ivory at distances up to a kilometer, underground, through walls, underwater or even from airplanes three miles high. The device works on “electrostatic magnetic ion attraction,” ATSC says.

To detect materials, the operator puts an array of plastic-coated cardboard cards with bar codes into a holder connected to the wand by a cable. “It would be laughable,” Colonel Bidlack said, “except someone down the street from you is counting on this to keep bombs off the streets.”

Complete quackery, sold by Cumberland Industries:

Still, the Iraqi government has purchased more than 1,500 of the devices, known as the ADE 651, at costs from $16,500 to $60,000 each. Nearly every police checkpoint, and many Iraqi military checkpoints, have one of the devices, which are now normally used in place of physical inspections of vehicles.

Continue reading “Journal: Fraudulent Security Device Popular in Iraq”

2009/12/192009/12/19

Journal: $30B for Israel, 75% Earmarked for US KR

08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, Commerce, Government, Military, Peace Intelligence

Full Story Online

Obama Approves $30 Billion in Military Aid to Israel Over Next Decade

$500 Million in Aid Also to Go to Palestinian Authority

by Jason Ditz, December 18, 2009

As the single largest expense of the 2010 foreign aid budget, President Obama approved $2.775 billion in military aid to Israel, the first payment in a decade-long commitment that will reach at least $30 billion.

Continue reading “Journal: $30B for Israel, 75% Earmarked for US KR”

2009/12/192010/01/12

Reference: Walter Dorn on UN Intelligence in Haiti

01 Poverty, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Terrorism, 10 Security, 10 Transnational Crime, Academia, Analysis, Articles & Chapters, Civil Society, Ethics, Government, InfoOps (IO), Law Enforcement, Methods & Process, Military, Non-Governmental, Peace Intelligence, United Nations & NGOs

UPDATE: Superceeded by final published version a tReference: Intelligence-Led Peacekeeping

Phi Beta Iota: Dr. Walter Dorn is one of a tiny handful of truly authoritative academic observers of UN intelligence, a pioneer in his own right, and perhaps the only person who has followed UN intelligence from the Congo in the 1960's to the creation of new capabilities in Haiti and elsewhere in the 21st Century. He is the dean of UN intelligence authors. See also Who’s Who in Peace Intelligence: Walter Dorn.

2009/12/192009/12/19