Threats – Page 731 – Public Intelligence Blog

With a tip of the hat to Marcus Aurelius, who flagged this, we have loaded an original document summarizing the lessons learned on leadership from the “Black Hawk Down” engagement (19 hours of intense combat) and list the highlights below. Click below for the full document (5 pages).

STRATEGIC LESSONS:

White House gutted the mission before it started by limiting the force to 450 instead of the normal 600, meaning they went in with 25% less ORGANIC strength and skills than they trained with.

White House gutten the mission before it started by forbidding AC-130 Gun Ships, the absolute core air fire support element of all Ranger missions.

Continue reading “Journal: Col Danny R. McKnight, USA (Ret) on Leadership”

2009/08/232009/08/23

Journal: Chuck Spinney Flags Words from the front line: the bloody truth of Helmand – by a combat soldier

04 Inter-State Conflict, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, Military

The past eight weeks have been the army's worst time in Afghanistan since the US-led invasion eight years ago. Here, in his brutally frank diaries of life on the front line, a serving soldier records the bitter toll of death, and his anger and frustration at the lack of military and political support Mark Townsend The Observer, Sunday 23 August 2009.

EXTRACTS as Highlighted by Chuck Spinney:

We need better weapons. Every one of the SA80s stopped firing after one round (weapons were cleaned and oiled just as we were trained) but these weapons are a load of shit.

The chiefs should be pressing for a better weapons system. And why don't the army have more sniffer dogs? Would be finding IEDs [improvised explosive devices] a lot easier with a furry friend running about and a lot more lives would be saved. Since I've been here, haven't seen one dog. Told might have to go back to Camp Bastion because of injury.

Continue reading “Journal: Chuck Spinney Flags Words from the front line: the bloody truth of Helmand – by a combat soldier”

2009/08/212009/09/06

Journal: Afghanistan = Viet-Nam, National Security Council Remains “Like a Moron”

05 Civil War, 10 Security, Ethics, Government, Military, Peace Intelligence

Saigon 2009

Afghanistan is today's Vietnam.

No question mark needed.

BY THOMAS H. JOHNSON, M. CHRIS MASON

AUGUST 20, 2009

For those who say that comparing the current war in Afghanistan to the Vietnam War is taking things too far, here's a reality check: It's not taking things far enough. From the origins of these North-South conflicts to the role of insurgents and the pointlessness of this week's Afghan presidential elections, it's impossible to ignore the similarities between these wars. The places and faces may have changed but the enemy is old and familiar. The sooner the United States recognizes this, the sooner it can stop making the same mistakes in Afghanistan.

Continue reading “Journal: Afghanistan = Viet-Nam, National Security Council Remains “Like a Moron””

2009/08/202009/08/22

Journal: Junk Politics, Brand Obama, and Empire as Usual–From the Left, a Slam Heard Round the World

05 Civil War, 6 Star Top 10%, Cultural Intelligence, Ethics

John Richard Pilger (born 9 October 1939) is an Australian journalist and documentary maker. He has twice won Britain's Journalist of the Year Award, and his documentaries have received academy awards in Britain and the US.^[1]^[2] Based in London, he is known for his polemical campaigning style: “Secretive power loathes journalists who do their job, who push back screens, peer behind façades, lift rocks. Opprobrium from on high is their badge of honour.”

Below is a slam on “Brand Obama” as a continuation of Empire as Usual that is being heard around the world. It is rocketing through the YouTube circles, being Twittered, and could well be the first real articulation of the left waking up to the fact that Wall Street owns the White House. The Brzezinski/CIA backdrop is touched upon–we anticipate Bob Gates being “sacrificed” and John Hamry replacing him in January, all as part of Washington “theater for the masses.” John Hamry is of course Zbigniew Brzezinski's caretaker or ward, take your pick. “Junk Politics” and “Empire of Illusion” are touchstone phrases.

EXCERPT (SHORT)

Continue reading “Journal: Junk Politics, Brand Obama, and Empire as Usual–From the Left, a Slam Heard Round the World”

2009/08/202009/08/20

Journal: CIA Blows–Blackwater, $5M Bar Bill, and Reprise of Rendition Atrocities

09 Terrorism, 10 Security, Ethics, Government

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) is more of a laughingstock around the world than most realize. From being called “useful idiots” (tontos utiles) in Latin America to much, much worse in the Middle East, it appears to have become a bloated bureaucracy incapable of achieving anything of positive significance. Intelligence is an inherently governmental function, and clandestine and covert intelligence especially so. Both require the very highest standards of integrity and professional skill. CIA appears to be lacking in both, and nothing has changed under Leon Panetta. It is in our view high time that the President and Congress require a full General Accountability Office (GAO) of every aspect of CIA operations, as well as those of the National Security Agency (NSA).

Below are three headlines that turn our stomach.

Continue reading “Journal: CIA Blows–Blackwater, $5M Bar Bill, and Reprise of Rendition Atrocities”

2009/08/182009/08/18

Journal: Washington Post Continues to Die….

09 Terrorism, 10 Transnational Crime, Government, Law Enforcement, Military

Meet Walter Pincus. He has “covered” the U.S. Intelligence Community for over two decades.

Fine Print: U.S. Intelligence and Afghan Narcotics

By Walter Pincus

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Click on the story title to read the story. The entire story is built arouind an Air Force contracting announcement, and everything there-in is taken at face value including the absurd claim electronic processing of Dari information not only allows it to accept locally generated Afghan intelligence but to also return finished intelligence reports in Dari to the Afghan counternarcotics police.

Continue reading “Journal: Washington Post Continues to Die….”

2009/08/17

Journal: Up to 90 percent of US paper money [in large cities] contains traces of cocaine

09 Justice, 10 Transnational Crime, 11 Society

Traces of cocaine exist in up to 90 percent of banknotes in many large US cities, a new study reports. Credit: The American Chemical Society

Reports are glossing over the fact that this pertains to notes from large cities, not all across America, but it is none-the-less an interesting signal of “contamination.” Noam Chomsky would say this is another indicator that the USA is moving toward “failed state” status.

We draw two different conclusions: 1) that Canada is as much if not more of a threat to the USA because of its extraordinarily ineffective policing of its borders and its illegal alien and underground criminal populations, both Arab and Asian; and 2) the cross-contamination of bills is probably as much an indicator of increasing sophistication of money-laundering by gangs, to include increasing use of halawa and other “off-banking” means of international transfer.

Click on the photo to read the original story.