MILITARY INTELLIGENCE: All Eyes No Brain

04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 10 Security, Advanced Cyber/IO, info-graphics/data-visualization, InfoOps (IO), Intelligence (government), Methods & Process, Military, Politics of Science & Science of Politics, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Real Time, Secrecy & Politics of Secrecy, Strategy, Technologies
DefDog Recommends...

Interesting, but also fails to mention we do not train our analysts on the
basics, know your enemy……we are so focused on technology we forget
that the basics are still the best way to view the situation…..

When military investigators looked into an attack by American helicopters
last February that left 23 Afghan civilians dead, they found that the
operator of a Predator drone had failed to pass along crucial information
about the makeup of a gathering crowd of villagers.

In New Military, Data Overload Can Be Deadly

By THOM SHANKER and MATT RICHTEL

New York Times, Published: January 16, 2011

When military investigators looked into an attack by American helicopters last February that left 23 Afghan civilians dead, they found that the operator of a Predator drone had failed to pass along crucial information about the makeup of a gathering crowd of villagers.

Click on Image to Enlarge

But Air Force and Army officials now say there was also an underlying cause for that mistake: information overload.

See Also:

Gorgon Stare–USAF Goes Nuts (Again)

Gorgon Stare (All Eyes, No Brain)

1961-2011: 50 Years of The Military-Industrial Complex

03 Economy, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 07 Other Atrocities, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Officers Call, Strategy, Waste (materials, food, etc)
Chuck Spinney Recommends....

It's a good think Ike is dead… else he would realize his nightmare survived.  Chuck

Newsday January 13, 2011 Pg. 34

The Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex

Eisenhower warned against the influence of arms production, but did we listen?

By Bob Keeler

EXTRACT:  Now, the deficit has caused some unexpected voices to say, ever so softly, that everything is on the table – including defense cuts. Last week, Gates talked about plans to slow the defense budget's growth by $78 billion over five years. That dainty nibble is a start, but we need big bites. A group called the Sustainable Defense Task Force has laid out ways to cut $1 trillion in 10 years. That's better.

Full story below the line…

And…

Obama Ignores Eisenhower at Country's, World's Peril (Melvin Goodman)

Military-Industrial Complex, Fifty Years On (Leslie Gelb, Council on Foreign Relations)

Continue reading “1961-2011: 50 Years of The Military-Industrial Complex”

Journal: Microcosm of US Failure in Afghan Development

01 Poverty, 02 Diplomacy, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Budgets & Funding, Cultural Intelligence, Gift Intelligence, Government, Methods & Process, Non-Governmental, Peace Intelligence
DefDog Recommends...

More wasted money…..

Program to modernize Afghan justice system yields little so far

MORE FROM MCCLATCHY

McClatchy's November investigation of contracting in Afghanistan

Military bans two U.S. firms from Afghan contracting

Contractor Louis Berger settles in Afghan overbilling probe

Follow Afghanistan developments at McClatchy's Checkpoint Kabul

See Also:

Reference: Quadrennial Diplomacy & Development Review

Graphic: Whole of Government Intelligence

Journal: Whole of Government Competence & Contractors

Review: Losing the Golden Hour–An Insider’s View of Iraq’s Reconstruction

Worth a Look: The Golden Hour and Rebalancing the Instruments of National Power

Journal: Taliban Doubles US Casualties in Two Years…

04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, Cultural Intelligence, Military, Peace Intelligence
Chuck Spinney Sounds Off....

January 12, 2011

Why Mine Warfare is Good for Protracted War

Surging Tit for Tat in Afghanistan

By FRANKLIN C. SPINNEY, Counterpunch

President Obama's ballyhooed surge of US forces in Afghanistan added 17,000 troops in early 2009 plus an additional 30,000 by 2010, in effect doubling the number of troops in Afghanistan (not to mention the concomitant surge in the camp-follower contractor force). The Taliban may not have doubled its troop strength, but as Tom Vanden Brook reports in the 10 January issue of USA Today, the insurgents have doubled the the total number of casualties inflicted by mines in just the last two years of the nine year war. [See graphic]

Read rest of article….

Continue reading “Journal: Taliban Doubles US Casualties in Two Years…”

NIGHTWATCH Extract: US C/JCS & China Arms Race

02 China, 03 Economy, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 07 Other Atrocities, 10 Security, 11 Society, Budgets & Funding, Commerce, Cultural Intelligence, History, Intelligence (government), Military, Peace Intelligence, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Secrecy & Politics of Secrecy, Strategy, Waste (materials, food, etc)

China- US: CJCS Admiral Mullen said today that China's high-tech military capabilities, including the radar-evading stealth J-20 fighter, focus on America.

China has every right to develop military capabilities, Mullen said, adding that he cannot understand why many appear to target the United States despite North Korea's being an evolving threat to the region and to the United States. If Pyongyang obtains long-range nuclear missile capabilities, its provocations may become more catastrophic, Mullen stated, adding that China must pressure North Korean leadership to cease development of intercontinental ballistic missiles and expansion of nuclear weapons capability.

Comment: It is difficult to accept at face value that Admiral Mullen does not understand the Chinese obsession with the threat from the United States.

Taking the statement at face value – and not as an act of political manipulation – it implies that the J2 and J5 staffs have failed to brief him about the origins of Chinese national defense strategy since the death of Deng Xiao Ping. If the Chairman's statement is genuine and not posturing, it is astonishing.

Continue reading “NIGHTWATCH Extract: US C/JCS & China Arms Race”

Journal: Strategies & Technologies Russian Analyst on Chinese Stealth “Demonstrator”

02 China, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 06 Russia, 10 Security, Analysis, Intelligence (government), Military, Peace Intelligence, Technologies, YouTube

China jet upstages US defence chief visit
Sydney Morning Herald

VIDEO: Stealth Race: China test flies Chengdu J-20 ‘Black Eagle'

Key point: It's a demonstrator, not a production model.  China is years from getting to production model.

VISIT: Centre for Analysis of Strategies & Technologies (CAST)

Minor league open source on plasma stealth:

Secret revealed: China’s 4th-generation fighter plane will use the plasma stealth technology

Mo, J. J., S. B. Liu, and N. C. Yuan, “Study on basic theory for plasma stealth,Modern Radar, Vol. 22, No. 3, 9–12, 2002 (in. Chinese)

Continue reading “Journal: Strategies & Technologies Russian Analyst on Chinese Stealth “Demonstrator””

Journal: Will Pakistan Implode Because of US in AF?

04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Terrorism, 10 Security, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Cultural Intelligence, Government, InfoOps (IO), Intelligence (government), Military, Peace Intelligence, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Strategy, Waste (materials, food, etc)
Chuck Spinney Sounds Off

Pakistan will implode if the US does not leave Afghanistan

The continuing US presence in Afghanistan fuels extremism in neighbouring Pakistan

Imran Khan The Observer, Sunday 9 January 2011

The assassination of Salmaan Taseer has shown only too clearly the growing extremism in Pakistan, the radicalisation of its society and the polarisation that is taking hold. This is not just between the religious and the secular, but also the polarisation that the “war on terror” has caused between the various religious sects.

Read rest of article Chuck Spinney is commenting on…

Is the Global War in Terror Creating More Problems than it is Solving?

Chuck Spinney

The late historian Chalmers JOHNSON popularized the term “blowback” to describe the unintended grand-strategic consequences resulting from interventionist foreign policies and military actions.  The term blowback dates to the CIA's internal history of the US’s 1953 Iranian coup that threw out the Iran's democratically elected Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh (a progressive social reformer who wanted to nationalize the oil industry among other things) and replaced him with the tyrannical American puppet Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlevi.  No one can doubt that contemporary problems with Iran today are rooted in resentments dating back to the 1953 coup.

Continue reading “Journal: Will Pakistan Implode Because of US in AF?”