Journal: MI-5 Book by Christopher Andrew

10 Security, Law Enforcement

Badly marketed on Amazon by a publisher that evidently does not really care for the future of the book, we do what we can to highlight the availability of this new book by Christopher Andrew, In Defence of the Realm, an authorized but not controlled examination of the history of MI-5 (internal security) in the United Kingdom.  A short article on the book:

Defence of the Realm: author marks 100 years of MI5 with official history

Within the USA there has never been a proper review that we know of with respect to internal security, although there have been a number of books on the failures of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), a few of which we list below.  The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has been an abysmal expensive failure in all respects, substituting money, technology, and butts in seats for thinking, education, and common sense.

Continue reading “Journal: MI-5 Book by Christopher Andrew”

Government Archive on Public Intelligence (1992-2006)

Government
Archives 1996-2006
Archives 1996-2006

2006

SA

Government Yekelo African Early Warning

2002

US

Government FSMO Foreign Military Studies Office

2000

US

Government Steele Spies and Secrecy in an Open World

1999

US

Government Coile Information Overlay for Preparing & Coping with Local Disasters

1999

CA

Government George OSINT: Islamic Unrest in China

1999

US

Government Heidenrich Genocide Web Sites (At the Time)

1999

US

Government Heidenrich Sample Daily Briefing on Genocide

1999

UN

Government Marks Proposal for Integrated Regional Information Networks (IRIN)

1999

US

Government OSS Proliferation Web Sites (At the Time)

1999

US

Government OSS Sample Daily Briefing on Proliferation

1999

NL

Government Reserved OSINT: Foundation for Co-Ordination and Information Sharing

1999

US

Government Sanz Nuclear Terrorism Literature Since 1992

1999

US

Government Sovereign Information Sharing for the Lower End of the Spectrum

1999

US

Government Steele Relevant Information: New Approach to Collection, Sharing, Analysis

1999

US

Government Steele Web-Based Concept for a Global Information Sharing Environment

1999

CA

Government Stout & Quiggin OSINT: High Resolution Imagery for Anyone

1999

AU

Government Wing Optimizing Open Source Information Sharing in Australia

1999

AU

Government Wing OSINT in Australia: The Report

1998

NL

Government BVD Annual Report of the National Security Service

1998

BE

Government Cailloux Belgian Observations on Intelligence Oversight

1998

BE

Government Cailloux Report of the Intelligence Oversight Committee

1998

FR

Government Clerc Economic Intelligence

1998

US

Government Dearth Government and the Information Marketplace

1998

US

Government Hughes FBIS 1995-1998: Transition and Transformation

1998

US

Government Lee Letter to HPSCI Urging Attention to Commercial Mapping Technology

1998

SE

Government Leijonhelm OSINT  and Information Sharing Between Government & Industry

1998

S. Africa

Government Mti OSINT, the African Renaissance, and Sustainable Development

1998

GE

Government Schlickman Ensuring Trust and Security in Electronic Communications

1998

US

Government Steele INFORMATION PEACEKEEPING: The Purest Form of War

1998

US

Government Steele Strategic Issues in National and Regional Intelligence & Security

1998

US

Government Steele Clandestine Human Intelligence Successes, Failures, Possibilities

1998

US

Government Steele (in French) Strategic Intelligence in the USA: Myth or Reality?

1997

UK

Government Andrew Presidents, Secret Intelligence, and Open Sources

1997

US

Government Carroll CENDI Information Managers Group

1997

US

Government Haakon Commercial Imagery Options and Trade-Offs

1997

US

Government Hodge CENDI: Help!  Impact of the Internet on the Consumer

1997

US

Government Johnson National Technical Information Center

1997

US/UK

Government Kerr & Herman Does the Intelligence Community Have a Future? (Two Items in One)

1997

US

Government Robideau Department of Energy Technical Information Program

1996

US

Government Kalil (NEC) Leveraging Cyberspace

1996

US

Government Lucas (COSPO) The Open Source Information System

1995

US

Government Markowitz Community Open Source Program Office (COSPO), Report on the Program

1995

US

Government Peters INADEQUATE ANSWERS: Bureaucracy, Wealth, & Mediocrity (US IC)

1994

US

Government Carroll Harsh Realities: S&T Acquisition Costs, Obstacles, and Results

1994

AU

Government Chantler Producing Intelligence in Australia: H National Open Source Foundation?

1994

US

Government Devost Digital Threat: United States National Security and Computers

1994

US

Government Wiener The Intelligence Community: An Outsider’s View

1993

SE

Government Heden & Dedijer The State of the National Intelligence and Security Community of Sweden

1992

US

Government Cotter NASA Open Source Intelligence Requirements & Capabilities (Slides)

1992

US

Government Cotter NASA Open Source Intelligence Requirements & Capabilities (Text)

1992

US

Government Johnson NTIS Open Source Intelligence Requirements & Capabilities

1992

US

Government Keyworth Government as a Customer in the Digital Age

1992

US

Government McConnell Planned Revisions to Circular No. A-130

1992

US

Government Molholm The CENDI Paradigm: How Some Federal Managers Have Organized

1992

US

Government Mortimer LC FRD Open Source Intelligence Requirements & Capabilities

1992

US

Government Riddle FBIS Open Source Intelligence Requirements & Capabilities

1992

US

Government Steele Information Concepts & Doctrine for the Future

1992

US

Government Studeman Teaching the Giant to Dance

Review: The World Was Going Our Way–The KGB and the Battle for the Third World (v. 2) (Hardcover)

5 Star, Intelligence (Government/Secret)

Amazon Page
Amazon Page

5.0 out of 5 stars Extraordinary largely for showing contractors as the weak link ,

September 28, 2005
Christopher Andrew
This is, like the first book, an extraordinary piece of scholarship. While it can be tedious in both its detail and in the drollness of the “accomplishments” that enjoyed so much Politburo attention and funding, it joins books such as Derek Leebaert's The Fifty-Year Wound: How America's Cold War Victory Has Shaped Our World in documenting the insanity and waste that characterized much of the so-called “secret wars” between the US Intelligence Community (within which the CIA is a $3 billion a year runt against the larger defense budget approaching $50 billion a year) and the KGB and GRU.

For those who have the patience or speed to get through this entire book, the single most important revelation and documentation concerns the ease with which the Russians were able to recruit traitors within the US defense community contractors. Ralph Peters has written about this in New Glory : Expanding America's Global Supremacy but speaks mostly of legal treason–corruption and waste. This book carefully addresses the sad reality that DoD is totally penetrated by foreign spies (one would add, Third World and allied spies including France, Germany, and Israel, never mind China and Iran) via the contracting community.

One day someone will do a careful calibration of both the good and the bad of secret intelligence. When that day comes, this book will be as good a place as any with which to start.

Best General Couonterintelligence Books:
Traitors Among Us: Inside the Spy Catcher's World
Merchants of Treason America's Secrets for Sale from the Pueblo to the Present

Vote on Review
Vote on Review

Review: For the President’s Eyes Only–Secret Intelligence and the American Presidency from Washington to Bush

5 Star, Executive (Partisan Failure, Reform), Intelligence (Government/Secret)

Amazon Page
Amazon Page

5.0 out of 5 stars For Presidents, Cabinet Members, Commanders, & Senior Staff,

January 10, 2001
Christopher Andrew
“Over the past two centuries only four American presidents-Washington, Eisenhower, Kennedy (briefly), and Bush-have shown a real flair for intelligence.” This 660-page book documents this assessment, and ends with the conclusion “The presidents in the twenty-first century, like their Cold War predecessors, will continue to find an enormously expensive global intelligence system both fallible and indispensable.” His general findings in the conclusion are instructive: presidents have tended to have exaggerated expectations of intelligence, and have frequently overestimated the secret power that covert action might put at their command. For all that failed, both in intelligence not getting it right and presidents not listening when it did, intelligence undeniably helped stabilize the Cold War and avoid many confrontations. This book is extremely relevant to the emerging discussion, in 2001, about the need to depoliticize the position of the Director of Central Intelligence, and perhaps to consider a new National Security Act of 2001.
Vote on Review
Vote on Review

Review: Comrade Kryuchkov’s Instructions–Top Secret Files on KGB Foreign Operations, 1975-1985

3 Star, Intelligence (Government/Secret)

Amazon Page
Amazon Page

3.0 out of 5 stars Core Reference for the Professional Researcher,

April 8, 2000
Christopher Andrew
Imagine the CIA clandestine mentality and U.S. bureaucracy, as operated by a Soviet-style controlled regime. This is an eye-glazing but very professionally put together testimonial to the fact that much of what the KGB did was pedestrian, pointless, very expensive, and as weak on understanding foreign countries as the US.
Vote on Review
Vote on Review