Intelligence

Without Intelligence We Can’t Be Safe or Fight Smart

Being Safe

The US intelligence community consists of at least 38 separate components! There’s no mistake in this number. James Bond (Sean Connery) of 007 and James Phelps (Peter Graves) of Mission Impossible could never have operated under this bureaucratic swamp. This shear number of intelligence components hints at a fundamental problem in having a secure nation, and its name is “Government Run Amuck.” It all started with bin Laden. He actually succeeded in his plans to let a few terrorists cause America to go paranoid with billions of dollars in “theater” security and the building up of a more cumbersome security community that has recently proven to be sucked under by its own bureaucratic quagmire. - http://www.youdontsay.org/Amuk1h99.htm

With at least 38 components out there, some collecting intelligence and other using the intelligence to win wars and secure our ports, airports, and borders – well there must be someone in charge, someone calling the shots – right? WRONG! Contrary to popular belief, the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 (IRTPA) under the Bush II administration did not reform the functioning of the intelligence community, but rather made it worse. The IRTPA made our intelligence network into an aggregation of individual agencies and components that work for various cabinet secretaries. Only the CIA is an independent agency but IRTPA took away its central intelligence role and gave it to the Director of National Intelligence (DNI), but unfortunately Dennis Blair, the DNI is not the CEO of US intelligence and has no direct command and control over any major intelligence agency or component, save his own office. Before the 2004 reform the former Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) had direct authority over and responsibility for the CIA. Splitting the old DCI position into a DNI and Director of the CIA has muddied the playing field among intelligence agencies. Using a military analogy, the DNI needs to have combatant commanders to carry out missions under his command and control. Until this happens and laws and organizational structures are changed, US security will remain insecure.
http://security.nationaljournal.com/2009/02/reforming-intelligence.php
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Reform_and_Terrorism_Prevention_Act

Let’s take a look at the 38 multiple patchworks of organizations that make up the nation’s intelligence:

1 - National Intelligence (NI) led by Dennis Cutler Blair, Director of National Intelligence (DNI)- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dennis_C._Blair
2 - National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) led by Michael E. Leiter - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Counterterrorism_Center
3 - National Counterproliferation Center (NCPC) led by Director Ambassador Kenneth C. Brill - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Counterproliferation_Center
4 - Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) - Leon Panetta, an independent agency from DNI
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Panetta
5 - Department of Defense, Under Secretary for Intelligence led by James R. Clapper - principal advisor to the United States Secretary of Defense on matters relating to intelligence- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Under_Secretary_of_Defense_for_Intelligence
6 - Department of Defense, Air Force Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Agency (AFISRA) - Major General Bradley A. Heithold - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Force_Intelligence,_Surveillance_and_Reconnaissance_Agency
7 - Department of Defense, Army Military Intelligence, Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff, Intelligence (G2) – Lieutenant General Richard P. Zahner - http://www.dami.army.pentagon.mil
8 - Department of Defense, Army Ground Intelligence Support Activity (GISA), a subordinate of the G2.
9 - Department of Defense, Army Military Intelligence, Army Intelligence Center School - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army_Intelligence_Center
10 - Department of Defense, Army Intelligence and Security Command (INSCOM) – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Army_Intelligence_and_Security_Command
11 - Department of Defense, Army Intelligence Support Activity (ISA) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_Support_Activity
12 - Department of Defense, Chief of Combined Joint Staff Branch for Intelligence (CJ2), US Forces Afghanistan, Major General Michael T. Flynn - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_T._Flynn
13 - Department of Defense, Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) Lieutenant General Michael D. Maples - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_D._Maples
14 - Department of Defense, Marine Corps Intelligence Activity (MCIA) – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marine_Corps_Intelligence_Activity
15- Department of Defense, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) - James R. Clapper, Jr. (retired Lieutenant General) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Geospatial-Intelligence_Agency
16 - Department of Defense, National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) – Director Bruce Allen Carlson - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_A._Carlson
17- National Security Agency (NSA) - Lieutenant General Keith B. Alexander - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_B._Alexander
18 - Department of Defense, Office of Naval Intelligence (ONI) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Naval_Intelligence
19 - Department of Energy, Office of Intelligence and Counterintelligence (OICI) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Intelligence_and_Counterintelligence
20 - Department of Homeland Security (DHS) - Secretary Janet Napolitano - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janet_Napolitano
21 - DHS, Office of Intelligence and Analysis (I&A) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Intelligence_and_Analysis
22- DHS, Coast Guard Intelligence (CGI) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coast_Guard_Intelligence
23 - DHS, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Citizenship_and_Immigration_Services
24 - DHS, U.S. Customs and Border Protection – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Customs_and_Border_Protection
25 - DHS, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Immigration_and_Customs_Enforcement
26 - DHS, Transportation Security Administration (TSA) – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transportation_Security_Administration
27 - DHS, United States Coast Guard – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Coast_Guard
28 - DHS, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) – led by William Craig Fugate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Emergency_Management_Agency
29 - DHS, United States Secret Service – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secret_Service
30 - Department of Justice – the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) - led by Robert S. Mueller III - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Bureau_of_Investigation
31 - Department of Justice, Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_Enforcement_Administration
32 - Department of the Treasury, Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence (TFI)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Intelligence_Community
33 - Department of State, Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bureau_of_Intelligence_and_Research
34 - Department of State, US Embassies and Consulates led by Hillary Rodham Clinton http://www.answers.com/topic/united-states-department-of-state
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Secretary_of_State
35 - Department of Justice, Assistant Attorney General for the National Security Division - David S. Kris, the top terrorism official for the President - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_S._Kris

36 - Department of Defense Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) (lead by General James Joseph Lindsay - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_J._Lindsay) commands and controls the Intelligence Support Activity (ISA) and the Special Mission Units (SMU) that include the Army's 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment (Delta Force), the Navy's SEAL Team 6 and the Air Force's 24th Special Tactics Squadron. JSOC’s primary mission is to identify and destroy terrorists and terror cells worldwide -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Special_Operations_Command

37 - High-Value Detainee Interrogation Group - an interagency squad housed at the FBI and reporting to the National Security Council (not the Attorney General or the Director of National Intelligence) - http://washingtonindependent.com/56095/meet-the-high-value-detainee-interrogation-group

38 - Then there’s the White House. With 35 organizations one would think the President could get all the security advice he needs, but no, he has to have a National Security Council (NSC) to advice him on national security and foreign policy matters –
* National Security Advisor (NSA) - James Logan Jones Jr. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_L._Jones .
* Deputy National Security Adviser - John O. Brennan - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_O._Brennan

Michael Leiter is the Director of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC), head of the government organization responsible for national and international counterterrorism (an arm of the DNI), and as such may be the fall guy for the most recent terrorist attempt on the US. The NCTC is responsible for gathering and disseminating all information relating to international terrorist identities in the Terrorist Screening Database (TSDB) and the no-fly list. NCTC was the agency set up on the recommendation of the 9/11 Commission in 2004 to analyze terror-threat intelligence.

Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab was already known as “the Nigerian” by the NCTC and already suspected of meeting with “terrorist elements” in Yemen at the time of his failed bombing attempt of NW Flight 253 on Christmas day, but the NCTC did not know “the Nigerian’s” name was Umar Farouk Abdul Mutallab. They failed to put these two “dots” together when the father of Mutallab went to the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria in November to warn the US about his son. Without mentioning Leiter or the NCTC by name, Obama made it plain in his Jan 5, 2010 speech that there was sufficient intelligence in the intelligence community’s hands that had it been "fully analyzed and fully leveraged" Abdul Mutallab would have been stopped from getting on Flight 253. Officials throughout the government recognized the NCTC was the target of Obama's wrath.

Is this a continuation of a failure to connect the dots? Republicans point the finger at the Obama administration, saying he’s let our country down by making us less safe. Republicans have become so polarized that they are incapable of seeing in any dimension beyond the political. When attempted mass murder is seen as an opportunity for them, one can only conclude that for the Republican leadership, partisanship literally matters more than life itself. But in their “hate Obama” furor they’d like for everyone to forget the most notorious case of failure to connect dots when in the summer and fall of 2001 the CIA and foreign intelligence warned the White House repeatedly that al Qaeda was preparing to carrying out attacks on U.S. soil, all leading to the inescapable conclusion that 9/11 might have been avoided had the Bush administration been more attentive to obvious and immediate threats to national security. Despite this disastrous lapse in intelligence analysis, both Republicans and Democrats alike rallied round President Bush II in pursuit of bin Laden.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/articles/SMI402A.html

http://www.justiceblind.com/airplanes.html

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x1904877

Smart Intelligence Helps the US Win Wars

Just how glued together is our intelligence in the Afghani war? It’s no secret that U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates believes the US needs better intelligence. Following the Christmas Day jetliner bombing Gates threw his support behind Major General Michael T. Flynn, Chief of Combined Joint Staff Branch for Intelligence (CJ2), US Forces Afghanistan, who made a harsh critique of the U.S. military's spy agencies in Afghanistan. Flynn described U.S. intelligence officers and analysts in Afghanistan as "ignorant of local economics and landowners, hazy about who the powerbrokers are and how they might be influenced ... and disengaged from people in the best position to find answers." Gates and Flynn were aiming criticism at intelligence agencies overseen by the Defense Department, not the CIA. What the CIA is doing in Afghanistan is only a guess for Gates. As the old saying goes united we stand, divided we fall! http://2164th.blogspot.com/2010/01/us-defense-secretary-gates-wants-spy.html

Al Qaeda's strategy has been all along to bleed America bankrupt. Bin Laden has openly stated that each $1 al Qaeda spends on terrorist strikes, the United States spends $1 million. The ancient Chinese warrior Sun Tzu taught his men to know their enemy before going into battle – we haven’t and we’ve completely ignored bin Laden’s own words. Bin Laden has time on his side and can bleed us for a hundred years. As Sun Tzu said, “if you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in a hundred battles.” Today in Afghanistan we are fighting the Taliban, a band of local rebels wanting to take over their own country. In the broad definition of “terrorists” the Taliban have never thought about any operations outside of Afghanistan. So Al Qaeda sits on the sidelines watching his grand strategy being carried out without flaw again in Afghanistan after our huge expense in Iraq. The ancient Chinese warrior Sun Tzu goes on to say “To subdue the enemy without fighting is the zenith of skills.”

Al Qaeda is killing thousands of Muslims and when Muslim’s learn about their brutality they generally turn away from al Qaeda. It’s their ad campaign full of lies that is winning the hearts and minds of young Muslims while our ads are nowhere on the horizon with little dollars spent on our own brand of propaganda through VOA and honest informative outlets about our intentions. Instead, al Qaeda commands the air waves with talk of US plans to take over Middle East Oil, waterboarding, Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, rendition, Hollywood immorality, and on and on. Again and again terrorist experts have pleaded with government officials to spend dollars on winning friends through simple advertising and highly advertised aide programs. But with most of our money spent on two costly wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, we have inadvertently played right into the hands of an enemy we have never taken the time to know, an enemy who has openly told us who he is and what he wants. Repeating the Chinese warrior Sun Tzu, he said, “To subdue the enemy without fighting is the zenith of skills.”

Since Vietnam the US forces have muddled through three wars (Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan) failing to know the people they are fighting much less the people they are protecting. From calling the South Vietnamese people “gooks” to obtaining intelligence through torture that has turned out to be felonious, the US military has unwittingly distanced itself from both friend and foe alike. Without intelligence we can’t fight smart, the way we did in WWII. Notwithstanding, there have been some recent bright spot in intelligence undertakings. One CIA officer described successful efforts in gathering intelligence when in 2008 he gave an Afghan chieftain four blue pills, Viagra. The chieftain returned four days later to an enthusiastic reception. The grinning chief offered up a bonanza of information about Taliban movements and supply routes, followed by a request for more pills. Whether it's building a school or handing out Viagra, it’s the simple things that work. Repeating the Chinese warrior Sun Tzu, he said, “If you do not know your enemies nor yourself, you will be imperiled in a hundred battles.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/25/AR2008122500931.html

We can only hope the tide is turning in our war to win the hearts and minds of the Afghani and Pakistani people. The new strategy approved by the White House in Nov 2009 includes:

* A budget for FY2010 that provides a huge boost for economic and security foreign aid - $2.6 billion to Afghanistan and $1.5 billion to Pakistan.

http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/58296

* A more wide-ranging counterinsurgency strategy focused on enhancing the economic capacity of Afghanistan and Pakistan. http://www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/a-new-counterinsurgency-in-afghanistan-15116

* Targeting development projects to key population centers.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/06/AR2009120602377.html

* A comprehensive counterinsurgency (see below note) strategy that includes improving government affairs, reconstruction, reducing corruption, and cracking down on narcotics and opium.

Note: US Counterinsurgency

The US military has consistently stated that the US counterinsurgency strategy requires the military to first secure areas before people can carry out their normal day to day lives without being terrorized by the Taliban. Why then can Creg Mortenson establish 131 schools in Pakistan and Afghanistan to educate over 58,000 children (including 44,000 girls)? These are rural and often volatile and unprotected regions, areas where the Taliban operates without the protection of US forces!

http://www.threecupsoftea.com/greg-mortenson-bio-and-professional-photo

“To subdue the enemy without fighting is the zenith of skills.”