The truth at any cost lowers all other costs — curated by former US spy Robert David Steele.
GOLDEN CANDLE AWARD: Dr. Tore Bjorgo, Norway
OSS '04: To Dr. Tore Bjorgo, Senior Research Fellow of the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI), for his leadership of research on terrorism and international crime. His authorship/editorship of ten books in the field represents the best combination of open sources, scholarship, and operationally-useful intelligence.
Below is the presentation made by Dr. Borgo to OSS '06.
GOLDEN CANDLE AWARD: Dr. Herman E. Daly
OSS '04: To Dr. Herman E. Daly for his early role as a founder of the field of Ecological Economics, including his leadership role in the creation of the journal for this area of ethical study, and his body of work including Steady-State Economics (1977) and the most recent Ecological Economics and the Ecology of Economics (1999).
We discovered Dr. Daly's work when we made the leap from environmental scare mongering to his term, ecological economics. This great man, who spent most of his years in the University of Maryland system, has received every prize short of the Nobel Prize, and we were among those who urged the Nobel Comittee to recognize Daly and and others rather than the celeberity de jour. Below is his presentation to OSS '06. Please search for his books on this website, in the overcall scheme of strategic analytics, Herman Daly is “root.”
GOLDEN CANDLE AWARD: Mr. David Kaplan
OSS '04: To Mr. David Kaplan, for his extraordinary exploitation of legal and ethical sources of information in the pursuit of investigative journalism on behalf of U.S. News & World Report. His studies of North Korean government corruption and of Saudi Arabian government sponsorship of terrorism, represent the best practices in his field.
Today he is Editorial Director for the Center for Public Integrity, one of our Righeous Sites (click on Cover Photo to go to the Center). In addition to overseeing the Center’s editorial work, he serves as director of its International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.
Below is the core story as he told it personally at OSS '04.
GOLDEN CANDLE AWARD: Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory
OSS '04: To the JHU-APL, and especially to Capt Joseph Mazzafro, USN (Ret) and Dr. Michael Vlahos, for sustained excellence in the integration of Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) into their complex all-source analytic efforts in support of the Department of Defense. Aided by the Gibson Library, they have set a new standard.
JHU-APL has always been a special place for special people to work in a manner that allows for the crossing of boundaries. In the world of public intelligence in the public interest, two have stood out–Capt Joe Mazzafro, USN (Ret), who speaks truth to power in a manner most compelling, and Michael Vlahos, more on him on his own page.
Over the years Capt Mazzafro has, in our view, demonstrated integrity in discerning and reporting the truth, that is sorely lacking in too many quarters. He does this on force structure, on strategy, on personnel, not just on sources & methods. Below is hie contribution to OSS '04.
Ambassador Mark Palmer is one of the most thoughtful, focused, practical, and hence impressive professional diplomats we have ever encountered. His book, Defeating the Real Axis of Evil, made a profound impression on all of us thinking about how to create a prosperous world at peace, and was the final nail in the coffin of U.S. foreign policy–no foreign policy that relies on supporting 42 of 44 dictators can possibly have morality, legitimacy, reciprocity, or transparency, all vital attributes if we are to nuture humanity toward clarity, diversity, integrity, and sustainability. Our review of the below book is entitled: Single Most Important Work of the Century for American Moral Diplomacy, and was posted November 30, 2003. We still believe that.
Below is his presentation to OSS '04.
Chuck Spinney, who contributes highlighted items to the Journal of Public Intelligence, wrote the original modern book on defense waste and the plans/reality mismatch, shown below with a link to its Amazon Page.
Although not a professional intelligence analyst, Spinney is a deeply-experienced real-world analyst and understands the lunacy of building a strategy, a force structure, a foreign policy, or a campaign plan on ideological fantasies and misrepresentations. Israel and Palestine is a WATER issue, nothing more, nothing less. Below is his briefing to OSS '04 to that effect–prepare to be shocked at how Israel is stealing water from the Arab aquifers, and how Israeli agruculture is using 50% of the regions water to produce less than 5% of the Israeli GDP, all the while denying Palestinians their own water. The Arab govenrments, and the US Government, “go along” because they do not yet place proper emphasis on human rights and especially on the rights of indigenous peoples.
These briefings were commissioned by the Ministry of Defense in Italy and delivered over two days with independent official briefings from Carol Dumaine, then the active leader of the Global Futures Partnership Initiative (GFP).
2002 FAILURE of 20th Century Intelligence
2004 The Failure of 20th Century Intelligence (Updated 2006)
2004 COLLECTION: Know Who Knows
2004 PROCESSING: Make the Most of What You Know
