Johnson S – Public Intelligence Blog

2008/02/062010/01/05

Review: Silent Steel–The Mysterious Death of the Nuclear Attack Sub USS Scorpion

5 Star, Empire, Sorrows, Hubris, Blowback, Executive (Partisan Failure, Reform), Intelligence (Government/Secret), Power (Pathologies & Utilization), Security (Including Immigration)

First-Rate Cover Story Great Human Interest, Service Loyalty, February 6, 2008

Stephen Johnson

EDIT of 9 Feb 09: There is evidently a very strong community of submariners, mostly officers, none of whom were in service at the time the incident happened, most of whom have little intelligence experience and very small libraries, who feel they and only they are qualified to judget between the two books. My two reviews stand. Normal people will find the other book much better in terms of trying to get to a reasonable semblance of the truth. Better yet, skip both books and go right to those I list below.

This a superb individual effort using normally available materials. It fully merits five stars because it can be bought and read simultaneously with Scorpion Down: Sunk by the Soviets, Buried by the Pentagon: The Untold Story of the USS Scorpion, which leverages Freedom of Information demands, direct invesdtigative journalism (HUMINT), and the end of the Cold War which produced a treasure trove of valuable primary materials. If you buy only one book, buy the other one but I find reading books in twos and threes is more interesting.

See for context, other reviews and if attractive, the books also:
The Rules of the Game: Jutland and British Naval Command
Very Special Intelligence: The Story of the Admiralty's Operational Intelligence Centre 1939-1945
Lost History: Contras, Cocaine, the Press & ‘Project Truth'
The Age of Missing Information (Plume)
Fog Facts: Searching for Truth in the Land of Spin
Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA
Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media
The Pathology of Power – A Challenge to Human Freedom and Safety
The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic (The American Empire Project)

2006/07/182009/09/06

Whole Earth Review Archives on Public Intelligence (Historical)

Whole Earth Review

1992	US	Whole Earth R	Brand	Army Green
1992	US	Whole Earth R	Kapor et al	We Need a National Public Network
1992	US	Whole Earth R	Kleiner	The Co-Evolution of Governance
1992	US	Whole Earth R	Petersen	Will the Military Miss the Market
1992	US	Whole Earth R	Staple & Dixon	Telegeography: Mapping the New World Order
1992	US	Whole Earth R	Steele	E3i: Ethics, Ecology, Evolution, and Intelligence
1992	US	Whole Earth R	Tibbs	Industrial Ecology: An Environmental Agenda for Industry
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Brilliant	Computer Conferencing: The Global Connection
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Clay	Genes, Genius, and Genocide
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Elgin	Conscious Democracy Through Electronic Town Meetings
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Garcia	Assessing the Impacts of Technology
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Godwin	The Electronic Frontier Foundation and Virtual Communities
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Karraker	Highways of the Mind
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Lovins & Lovins	Winning the Peace
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Marx	Privacy & Technology
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Meeks	The Global Commons
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Rheingold	Electronic Democracy: The Great Equalizer
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Schuman	Reclaiming our Technological Future
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Warren & Rheingold	Access to Political Tools: Effective Citizen Action
1991	US	Whole Earth R	White	Earthtrust: Electronic Mail and Ecological Activism
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Whitney-Smith	Information Doesn't Want
1991	US	Whole Earth R	Wittig	Electronic City Hall
1990	US	Whole Earth R	Barlow	Crime and Puzzlement: The Advance of the Law on the Electronic Frontier
1990	US	Whole Earth R	Brand	Outlaws, Musicians, Lovers, and Spies: The Future of Control
1990	US	Whole Earth R	Dodge	Life Work
1990	JP	Whole Earth R	Ishii	Cross-Cultural Communications & Computer-Supported Cooperative Work
1990	US	Whole Earth R	Jordon III	Restoration: Shaping the Land, Transforming the Spirit
1990	JP	Whole Earth R	Kumon	Toward Co-Emulation: Japan and the United States in the Information Age
1990	US	Whole Earth R	Monschke	How to Heal the Land
1990	US	Whole Earth R	Shapard	Observations on Cross-Cultural Electronic Networking
1990	US	Whole Earth R	Vidal	Founding Father Knows Best
1989	US	Whole Earth R	Berman	The Gesture of Balance
1989	US	Whole Earth R	Garfinkle	Social Security Numbers: And Other Telling Information
1989	US	Whole Earth R	Haight	Living in the Office
1989	US	Whole Earth R	Horvitz	The USENET Underground
1989	US	Whole Earth R	Jaffe	Hello, Central: Phone Conferencing Tips
1989	US	Whole Earth R	Johnson`	The Portable Office
1989	US	Whole Earth R	Rheingold	Ethnobotany: The Search for Vanishing Knowledge
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Baker, S.	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Baker, W.	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Brand	The Information Wants to Be Free Strategy
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Coate	Tales from Two Communities: The Well and the Farm
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Ferguson	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Fields	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Hardin	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Hawkins	Computer Parasites & Remedies–A Catalog of First Sightings
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Keen	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Kleiner	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Leary	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Nelson	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Newroe	Distance Learning
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Pert	The Material Basis of Emotions with Inset, Mind as Information
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Rappaport	Gossip
1988	US	Whole Earth R	Thurow & Walsh	Getting Over the Information Economy
1987	US	Whole Earth R	Donaldson	An Incomplete History of Microcomputing
1987	US	Whole Earth R	Henson	MEMETICS: The Science of Information Viruses
1987	US	Whole Earth R	Horvitz	An Intelligent Guide to Intelligence
1987	US	Whole Earth R	Krause	Bio-Acoustics: Habitat Ambience & Ecological Balance
1987	US	Whole Earth R	Roberts	Electronic Cottage on Wheels
1986	US	Whole Earth R	Fend & Gunther	What Have You Got to Hide: Iraq Iran Basra Abadan
1986	US	Whole Earth R	Minsky	Society of Mind
1986	US	Whole Earth R	Sanders	Etiquette for the Age of Transparency
1986	US	Whole Earth R	Scxhwartz & Brand	The World Information Economy
1986	US	Whole Earth R	Thompson	A Gaian Politics
1985	US	Whole Earth R	Brand, Kelly, Kinney	Digital Retouching: The End of Photography as Evidence of Anything
1985	US	Whole Earth R	Hunter	Public Image
1985	US	Whole Earth R	Kleiner	The Health Hazards of Computers: A Guide to Worrying Intelligently
1985	US	Whole Earth R	Mander	Six Grave Doubts About Computers
1983	US	Whole Earth R	Illich	Silence is a Commons: Computers Are Doing to Communication What …
1982	US	Whole Earth R	Brand	Uncommon Courtesy: A School of Compassionate Skills
1982	US	Whole Earth R	Kayes	Force Without Power: A Doctrine of Unarmed Military Service
1982	US	Whole Earth R	Meadows	Whole Earth Models & Systems

2006/07/182009/09/06

Threat Archives on Public Intelligence (1992-2006)

Threats

2004	NO	Threat	Bjorgo	Root Causes of Terrorism
2004	US	Threat	Kaplan	The Saudi Connection to Terrorism
2004	US	Threat	Knapp	Al Qaeda and the Mass Media (PSYOP Briefing)
2004	US	Threat	Knapp	Al Qaeda and the Mass Media (Reference)
2004	US	Threat	Knapp	Distortion in Islam and Jihad
2004	US	Threat	Knapp	Diversity in Islam
2006	US	Threat	Daly	Al Qaeda Against Saudi Oil
2006	US	Threat	Johnson	Battle of Algiers and Its Lessons
2006	US	Threat	Seagraves	Gold Warriors: New Epilogue, Further of US Theft of WWII Gold Loot
2006	US	Threat	Seagraves	Gold Warriors New Chapter Seventeen
2006	US	Threat	Steele	Who Is to Blamce? The Vice President and Us
2006	US	Threat	Stern	Al Qaeda Approach to US Muslims
2006	UK	Threat	Story	Crunch Time for CIA, Banks, and Related Thieves of $742 Trillion
2005	US	Threat	Ellis	Scenarios for Next Generation Crises in Latin America
2005	US	Threat	GAO	GAO Report: US Not Addressing Islamic Fundamentalism
2005	US	Threat	OSS	Somalia Piracy Quick Report
2005	US	Threat	OSS	Report on Remote Detonation of Improvised Explosive Devices
2005	US	Threat	OSS	PRC Trade in Latin America
2005	US	Threat	Ray & Gross	The Perfect Storm
2005	US	Threat	Steele	Worksheet for Book Review on Crossing the Rubicon
2005	US	Threat	Steele	Mother Nature as Terrorist
2005	US	Threat	Steele	9-11: Who’s To Blame? One Man’s Opinion
2005	US	Threat	Thompson	Is the Terrorism Threat Over-Rated?
2004	US	Threat	Daly	Globalization & National Defense (Ecological Economics)
2004	US	Threat	Louisiana	Pre-Hurricane Katrina Study and Conclusions
2004	US	Threat	Palmer	The Real Axis of Evil: 44 Dictators
2004	US	Threat	Peters	Early Warning of Disease From Pattern Analysis
2004	US	Threat	Seagrave	Transcript of Video on Stolen Gold Held by US Treasury & Citi-Bank
2004	US	Threat	Vlahos	Attachment to the Muslim Renovatio Memorandum
2004	US	Threat	Vlahos	The Muslim Renovatio and U.S. Strategy
2004	US	Threat	Vlahos	The Muslims Are Coming
2004	US	Threat	Vlahos	Insurgency Within Islam
2003	US	Threat	Danzip	Countering Traumatic Attacks
2003	PRC	Threat	OSS	PRC Treaty & Trade Penetration of Latin America
2002	US	Threat	Emerson & Steele	American Jihad Map
2002	US	Threat	Steele	ACFR, 19 Cities: 9-11, U.S. Intelligence, & the Real World
2000	US	Threat	Steele	Georgetown/AWC: Non-Traditional Threats
1998	US	Threat	Steele	TAKEDOWN: Targets, Tools, & Technocracy
1994	US	Threat	Steele	6^th National Threat Symposium: New Directions in Information Sharing
2005	NGO	Threat	NGO	Changing Face of Global Violence
2005	NGO	Threat	NGO	Human Security Audit
2004	US	Threat	Pelton	Robert Young Pelton on Dangerous World
2004	US	Threat	Steele	Three Book Review Relevant to Global War on Terror (GWOT)
2003	US	Threat	Copeland	Analysis of the New Paradigm for Terrorism
2003	US	Threat	Manwaring	Street Gangs: New Urban Insurgency
2003	US	Threat	Manwaring	War & Conflict: Six Generations
2003	US	Threat	Pelton	Summary of Presentation on World’s Most Dangerous Places
2002	US	Threat	Betts	The Next Intelligence Failure: The Limits of Prevention
2002	NL	Threat	Jongman	World Conflict and Human Rights Map 2001-2002
2002	US	Threat	Wheaton	Transitions from Authoritarian Rule: A Model
2002	US	Threat	Wheaton	Virtual Afghanistan: Modeling a Transition from Authoritarian Rule
2001	US	Threat	Godson	Governments and Gangs
2001	US	Threat	Heidenrich	Early Warning & Complex Monitoring of Ethnic Genocide (Slides)
2001	US	Threat	Heidenrich	Early Warning & Complex Monitoring of Ethnic Genocide (Text)
1998	US	Threat		Transnational Enemies: Threats Without Names
1998	US	Threat	Glaebus	Metaphors & Modern Threats: Biological, Computer, Cognitive Viruses
1997	US	Threat	Fialka	War by Other Means: Economic Espionage In (Against) America
1997	US	Threat	Schwartau	Information Warfare: The Weapons of the Information Age
1997	US	Threat	Tenney	Cyber-Law and Cyber-Crime: Spamming Methods and Costs
1996	US	Threat	Keuhl	School of Information Warfare Threat and Strategy: Shifting Paradigms
1996	US	Threat	O’Malley	Countering the Business Intelligence Threat
1996	US	Threat	Strassmann	U.S. Knowledge Assets: The Choice Target for Information Crime
1996	US	Threat	Winkler	Electronic Industrial Espionage: Defining Ground Zero
1994	US	Threat	Whitney-Smith	Refugees: Weapon of the Post Cold War World–Counter Offensive: IW