Chuck Spinney is still the best “real” engineer in this town–almost everyone else is staggering after fifty years of government-specification cost-plus engineering. Also, as Chuck explores in the piece on Complexity to Avoid Accountability is Expensive we in the “requirements” business are as much to blame–Service connivance with complexity has killed acquisition from both a financial inputs and a war-fighting relevance outcome point of view. The Services have forgotten the basics of requirements definition and multi-mission interoperability and supportability.
The Marine Corps Intelligence Center (MCIC) was created by General Al Gray, USMC (Ret), then Commandant of the Marine Corps, for three reasons:
1. Intelligence support to constabulary and expeditionary operations from the three major services was abysmal to non-existent.
2. Intelligence support to the Service level planners and programmers striving to interact with other Services, the Unified Commands, and the Joint Staff was non-existent–this was the case with respect to policy, acquisition, and operations. The cluster-feel over Haiti and the total inadequacy of our 24-48 hour response tells us nothing has changed, in part because we still cannot do a “come as you are” joint inter-agency anything.
The decision downgrades China from “Priority 1” status, alongside Iran and North Korea, to “Priority 2,” which covers specific events such as the humanitarian crisis after the Haitian earthquake or tensions between India and Pakistan.
One new area that has been given a higher intelligence priority under the Obama administration is intelligence collection on climate change, a nontraditional mission marginally linked to national security. The CIA recently announced that it had set up a center to study the impact of climate change.
Phi Beta Iota: The priorities are primarily influential on collection by the National Security Agency (NSA), determining whether the “system” stays on Beijing or goes to Central Asia instead, and this is probably the heart of the matter. HOWEVER, in combination with the DoD concerns that CIA is totally ineffective with respect to China, Afghanistan, or anything else of immediate concern (e.g. Somalia, Sudan, Yemen), and the idiocy of creating a Climate Change Center rather than restructuring to attack all ten high-level threats to humanity, this latest “theater” must be labeled for what it is–naked Emperors parading their very expensive rags. CIA is an utter travesty in all respects. The DNI is treading water for lack of vision, understanding, authority, and the will to confront “the system.” DoD is not much better–paper-pushing stuffed shirts and politically-correct uniforms disconnected from ground truth and the real needs of policy directors, acquisition managers, and operational commanders down to the company level. Not pretty at all.
My friends who served in the military speak of the pride with they performed what they viewed as their duty. This duty included the obligation to act with honor, including, above all, following the Geneva Conventions when handling detainees and prisoners of war. My friends tell sadly of the despair they felt in seeing this obligation shredded during the Bush administration as word came down that they should do “whatever it takes.” Some of them resigned in disgust. Others resisted what they viewed as moral decay from within.
A new story by attorney Scott Horton at Harpers reveals yet another very disturbing episode of dishonor. Horton reveals strong credible evidence that three alleged “suicides” at Guantanamo in June 2006 were really homicides. The official story is that during the night of June 9, 2006, three prisoners were found hanging in their cells in Alpha Block of Guantanamo's Camp 1.
Simon Johnson, former chief economist of the IMF, lays out the political case for “Trust Busting” in the 21st Century — it is a political argument that Andrew Jackson and Teddy Roosevelt would have understood and probably approved of.
At this stage in the electoral cycle, Democrats should be running hard against big banks and their consequences. Some roots of our current economic difficulties lie in the Clinton 1990s, but the real origins can be traced to the financial deregulation at the heart of the Reagan Revolution – and all the underlying problems became much worse in eight years of George W. Bush’s unique brand of excess and neglect.
The theme for the November midterms should be: Which part of the 8 million jobs lost [since December 2007] do you not understand? The big banks must be reined in and forced to break themselves up, or we’ll head directly for another such crisis.
Instead, the Democrats have fallen into a legislative and electoral trap that – amazingly – they built for themselves.
1) US Intelligence Community does not actually “know” where Iran is on nuclear, where Yemen is on Al Qaeda, where the Taliban is on Afghanistan….the list is long.
2) CIA and DoJ ares out of control on assessments and investigations–or they are consistently politicized. One or the other, which is it?
3) Terrorism is still the crutch for those unable or unwilling to comprehend Grand Strategy and a more mature appreciation for all of the threats, all of the policies, all of the information, all of the time. The USA remains government by uninformed sound-bite.
4) India matters, so we are told, as a recipient of expensive U.S. war-fighting technology and as a partner against terrorism. Never mind the deeply shared problem of poverty in America and India, a problem quickly addressable by the redirection of a fraction of the Pentagon budget toward “peaceful preventive measures.”
Herewith, then, is an all-inclusive guide to the scandal of the New Black Panther Party voter-intimidation case, based largely on documents unearthed by The Washington Times, along with other original reporting – and why it is important:
The FBI illegally collected more than 2,000 U.S. telephone call records between 2002 and 2006 by invoking terrorism emergencies that did not exist or simply persuading phone companies to provide records, according to internal bureau memos and interviews. FBI officials issued approvals after the fact to justify their actions.
The Christmas Day episode highlights three critical points. First is how much progress U.S. intelligence has made. . . . Second, the Christmas Day plot demonstrates that much of what passes for security is a waste of time and money. . . . Third, the public furor over the foiled plot shows that more perspective on terrorism is essential.
Rep. Peter Hoekstra, Michigan Republican and ranking member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, said in an interview that “they wrote a political document in 2007 to embarrass President Bush which everyone uniformly agrees was a piece of trash.”
That said, there are still more opportunities for closer cooperation that will allow us to share technology and increase the flow of information and expertise. . . . Perhaps the greatest common challenge India and the United States face is terrorism.
NIGHTWATCH Afghanistan: Multiple news services reported today’s bold Afghan Taliban attacks in Kabul. The coordinated multiple attacks killed at least 15 and injured 62, as reported in this Watch
Four militants also were killed, including two suicide bombers who detonated their explosives, and Afghan forces were searching several other areas in the city for more attackers, a government spokesman said.
It was the biggest attack in the capital since 28 October when gunmen with automatic weapons and suicide vests stormed a guest house used by U.N. staff, killing at least 11 people including three U.N. staff.
The attack coincided with the investiture of those Cabinet members in the Karzai government who had been confirmed by the Parliament. A majority of his choices have been rejected twice.
Americans have a choice. They can allow their government to bully and threaten them into conforming to their view of reality like Winston Smith or they can go down swinging like Cool Hand Luke and Randall McMurphy. The cowboy spirit of the Old West is what is required today. We need tough hardened individualists who are willing to say enough is enough. Our government has been corrupted by weak men slithering around the halls of Congress soliciting for money, an evil banking cartel creating fiat money, corporate fascists paying off criminals in Washington DC, and the military industrial complex enforcing Washington’s power across the globe. The country longs for an Andrew Jackson or a Dwight Eisenhower. Instead we are stuck with Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi. The citizens of the country have chosen a false security in place of liberty and freedom.
Phi Beta Iota: We monitor the Independent press and above is the beginning of one of the most extraordinary statements by a simple US citizen interested in the truth and in upholding the Republic's traditions.
