05 Civil War – Page 35 – Public Intelligence Blog

2014/05/082014/05/08

John Robb: Ukraine, Putin, and Open Source Warfare: In the 21st Century, Warfare is business by other means.

04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 10 Transnational Crime, Commercial Intelligence, Cultural Intelligence

Putin and Open Source Warfare

Is Putin using open source warfare?

Of course he is. Who sold him on the approach? Apparently, he has an advisor called Vladislav Surkov who is a science fiction writer. He recently wrote a short story (published under his nom de guerre) called “Without the Sky” about a many vs. many war. A type of warfare very familiar to readers of Brave New War.

“This was the first non-linear war. In primitive wars of the nineteenth, twentieth and other Middle Ages fought usually two sides. Two nations or two temporary union. Now faced four coalition. And is not that two on two. Or three against one. No. All against all. And what were the coalition! Not like before. Rare state included in them entirely. Sometimes, several provinces were on one side, some on the other, and any city or generation, or gender, or professional community of the same state – the third. Then they could change its position. Go to whatever site. “

In other words a swirling “bazaar of violence.” The author and TV producer Peter Pomerantsev also sees a connection between this approach an a corporatist view of the world. A world where “corporate raiding” can now be accomplished by states and the raids can be violent. I see that too.

In the 21st Century, warfare isn't politics by other means.

Warfare is business by other means.

PS: I wrote some interesting scenarios depicting economic warfare against Russia as a means of defeating it bloodlessly back in 2004.

2014/05/072014/05/07

Anthony Judge: Identification of Bullets – Human Right and Human Responsibility?

04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Health, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Cultural Intelligence, Peace Intelligence

Phi Beta Iota: We identify food that kills people — and demand it be taken off the market. Should we do the same with bullets?

Identification of Bullets: human right and human responsibility?

Introduction

Much is made of the implications of the arms trade and the spread of weapons, notably manufactured by the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. This has become a fact of life and is accepted as such.

Curiously it is less evident whose weapons are used in the final killing of individuals in combat — especially the weapons used “illegally” by insurgents. The following is a brief exploration of the possibility of identifying who supplied the bullet which finally entered the body of the person maimed or killed.

Does the person so wounded — or the relatives of those killed — have the right to know who produced the bullet? Is this a fundamental human right or a matter of human responsibility?

Whereas not many years ago it would have been considered ridiculous to sell fruit individually identified by marks enabling their precise origin to be determined — even to the person who packed them — such labelling is now commonplace. The argument is that in the event of a threat to health associated with the product, whether fruit or other consumer products, responsibility can be precisely established. Such labelling may be a requirement governing import of foreign products.

If precise labelling can be justified for sources of life-giving human nourishment, because of their potential threat to health, is there not a case for denitrifying those products intended as a means of incapacitating individuals, possibly terminally? Do relatives have a right to the bullet by which a loved one was killed?

More generally is it appropriate to be able to indicate, with as much details as possible, who was responsible for the manufacture of the bullet? Should the bullets used in insurgency operations be a matter of public knowledge?

Fruit identification as a precedent

Continue reading “Anthony Judge: Identification of Bullets – Human Right and Human Responsibility?”

2014/05/032014/05/03

Berto Jongman: Benghazi – Was Ambassador Steven Murdered to Cover Up CIA Arming of Al Qaeda?

04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Terrorism, 10 Transnational Crime, Government, Idiocy, Military, Peace Intelligence

CIA Pilot Bombshell!! Confirms Obama’s Gun Running Program To Al Qaeda

A very interesting interview over at InfoWars, which can be heard in part in the video below, with a former CIA gun runner, William Robert “Tosh” Plumlee, which confirmed that before the Benghazi attack which killed four Americans, including Ambassador John Stevens, the Ambassador had expresed concern over the illegal arms reaching Islamic radicals. Plumlee talks about the lack of information provided to the mother of one of an information officer killed that fateful day:

“I began to wonder ‘why won’t they tell her anything?’” He asked. “Then a contact of mine in the Middle East, a high-ranking NATO official, mentioned to me that he had reports that the ambassador [J. Christopher Stevens] had been complaining about the dispatches and cables that he had got from the State Department about the weapons being received and [Islamic] radicals armed, including Stinger missiles.”

According to Plumlee, Steven was ordered to stand down after he asked the State Dept. what he should do about the American arm shipments to al-Qaeda.

“The ambassador and his people had written a series of field reports and cable dispatches advising our State Department that the rebel factions had been armed with U.S. weapons,” he said. “Now my contention is this: if that is the case, why is that classified as a national security matter?”

Was Stevens and the other three Americans killed because of what they knew and expressed concern about? Is that why the White House deliberately had officials providing false information to the public over the attack directly following it, which the latest Benghazi bombshell recently revealed? Is this also why the military was told to stand down and were not allowed to go in to save Ambassador Stevens and the others?

See Also:

Benghazi @ Phi Beta Iota

2014/04/302014/04/30

Chris Hedges: The Crime of Peaceful Protest

05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 10 Transnational Crime, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Idiocy, Ineptitude, Law Enforcement

The Crime of Peaceful Protest

Truthdig.com, 27 April 2014

NEW YORK—Cecily McMillan, wearing a red dress and high heels, her dark, shoulder-length hair stylishly curled, sat behind a table with her two lawyers Friday morning facing Judge Ronald A. Zweibel in Room 1116 at the Manhattan Criminal Court. The judge seems to have alternated between boredom and rage throughout the trial, now three weeks old. He has repeatedly thrown caustic barbs at her lawyers and arbitrarily shut down many of the avenues of defense. Friday was no exception.

The silver-haired Zweibel curtly dismissed a request by defense lawyers Martin Stolar and Rebecca Heinegg for a motion to dismiss the case. The lawyers had attempted to argue that testimony from the officer who arrested McMillan violated Fifth Amendment restrictions against the use of comments made by a defendant at the time of arrest. But the judge, who has issued an unusual gag order that bars McMillan’s lawyers from speaking to the press, was visibly impatient, snapping, “This debate is going to end.” He then went on to uphold his earlier decision to heavily censor videos taken during the arrest, a decision Stolar said “is cutting the heart out of my ability to refute” the prosecution’s charge that McMillan faked a medical seizure in an attempt to avoid being arrested. “I’m totally handicapped,” Stolar lamented to Zweibel.

The trial of McMillan, 25, is one of the last criminal cases originating from the Occupy protest movement. It is also one of the most emblematic. The state, after the coordinated nationwide eradication of Occupy encampments, has relentlessly used the courts to harass and neutralize Occupy activists, often handing out long probation terms that come with activists’ forced acceptance of felony charges. A felony charge makes it harder to find employment and bars those with such convictions from serving on juries or working for law enforcement. Most important, the long probation terms effectively prohibit further activism.

Read full article (3 screens)

2014/04/282014/04/28

Robert Young Pelton: General Dostom is INNOCENT of the Dasht-i-Leili Massacre [PBI: What’s It Worth To Set Record Straight in Time for Run-Off?]

05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, Cultural Intelligence, Ethics, Government, Military, Peace Intelligence

ROBERT STEELE: General Dostom is accused of the being directly responsible for the Dasht-i-Leili massacre aka container massacre that has been hugely overblown — as well as civilian collateral damage over time — and this remains a sore point with many Pashtuns and of course those that also consider themselves Taliban. What is your understanding?

ROBERT YOUNG PELTON: I was there for all this and have told many journos (NYTimes, Newsweek, BBC etc) that they are full of shit since they use second hand sourcing and constantly avoid using my first hand testimony since I was in the prison, saw the containers unloaded, took real time photos, notes etc. I also was there with Doran when his doco on Dostum got cancelled by the BBC and he had to make a “massacre” doco, first with British then American troops…using second hand footage and testimony. I have already gathered all the facts at: www.generaldostum.com, see especially the Conflict & Controvery section including the detailed timeline inclusive of photographs. I have been out of touch but this is a long beaten horse started by Atta [Muhammad Nur] with the eager ear of the State Dept flunkies. They wanted to minimize the threat of Dostum to promote Karzai. Ghani was no where near all this but the Pansjiris love to spread this bullshit before every election. One also has to be aware that there are Massoud groupies in the journo world that hate Dostom blindly and have been caught fabricating stories.

2014/04/282014/04/28

Berto Jongman: Citizens in Brazil Take Over Their Story

01 Brazil, 01 Poverty, 03 Economy, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 09 Justice, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Collective Intelligence, Ethics, IO Deeds of Peace, Media, Mobile

How social media gives new voice to Brazil's protests

Street protests continue to rock Brazil and, frustrated by mainstream media coverage, a new group of citizen journalists is using digital tools to tell a different side of the story

EXTRACT

But the battles are not just being waged on the street. Angered by what they see as a misrepresentation of the issues by traditional media, new independent media collectives and networks have emerged over the past year. Armed with smartphones, digital cameras, and apps such as Twitcasting and Twitcam that allow them to broadcast live online, they are presenting their own version of events. Some of them are reaching a huge audience across the country and are now looking to expand their reach internationally.

One such group is the Mídia Ninja, a self-styled loose collective of citizen journalists, which first emerged during last summer's protests. They are keen to present an alternative narrative to the mainstream media by reporting live from the frontline.

Read full article.

2014/04/102014/04/10

Veterans Today: US Produced Sarin Gas for Syrian Rebels, in Georgia (the Country Next to Russia)

03 Environmental Degradation, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 06 Genocide, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Proliferation, 09 Terrorism, DoD, Earth Intelligence, Government, Idiocy, Military, Peace Intelligence

US Produced Sarin Gas Used in Syria

Jeffrey K. Silverman

Veterans Today, 8 April 2014

Jeffrey K. Silverman, 22 years resident of the former Soviet Union, since October 1991, resides in Tbilisi Georgia worked with Radio Free Europe, crime, corruption and terrorism report. USAR, 100th Division Training, Fort Knox and Blue Grass Army Chemical Weapons Depot, both Kentucky bases: decorated veteran, 19D, Calvary Scout. Jeffrey has a track record in breaking through language barriers and bureaucracies to gather information under unconventional circumstances.

EXTRACT

Journalists Jeffrey Silverman and Lika Moshiashvili are credited with having discovered the secret and illegal operations taking place in the US-controlled Central Reference Laboratory (CPHRL) in the Tbilisi suburb the Alekseevka Settlement.”As soon as this scary information was made known to the public, Georgia & World contacted Tbilisi based American journalist and researcher Jeffrey Silverman.

. . . . . . .

A number of labs, strewn across Eastern Europe, are linked like an umbilicial cord to the Biological Weapons Proliferation Prevention (BWPP) programme and various projects within it. This programme provides a cover for what is most likely an offensive programme. If the strains they are investigating turn out to be antibiotic resistant, this implies they are conducting ongoing research into special organisms that can eat bacteria and attack infections that are antibiotic resistant, which can be quickly accessed. Whoever has the capacity to release these controls the bioweapons battlefield.

Read full article/interview.