Intelligence & National Security Discussion

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Kati
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Post by Kati »

Wealth of info on how FBI penetrated every group and had its informers everywhere....
Case No. 10 -- Socialist Workers Party (1940 to date)
FBI informants are operating within the Socialist Workers Party (SWP) as part of the FBI's long-term intelligence investigation of the SWP. 115 Informants report the political positions taken by the SWP with respect to such issues as the "Vietnam War," "racial matters," "U.S. involvement in Angola," "food prices," and any SWP efforts to support a non-SWP candidate for political office. 116 To enable the FBI to develop background information on SWP leaders, informants report certain personal aspects of their lives, such as marital status. 117 The informants also report on SWP cooperation with other groups who are not the subject of separate intelligence investigations. 118

The intelligence investigation of the SWP began in 1940 as a result of the SWP's description of itself as a Marxist-Leninist "combat" organization which foresaw the inevitability or desirability of violence should revolutionary conditions arise in the United States. 119 The FBI conceded, however, that since shortly after its formation the SWP has not committed any violent acts, nor have its expressions "constituted an indictable incitement to violence." 120 Nevertheless, the FBI's intelligence investigation of the SWP -- and the use of informants against the party and its members -- has continued from 1940 to the present day.
More: http://www.icdc.com/~paulwolf/cointelpr ... rtIIId.htm
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Post by Kati »

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Post by vsudhir »

The age of the immigrant spy By Sreeram Chaulia (asia times)

Needlessly drags India's name into the light when the article and reality focus on chini pincer moves in the spy ring.
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semi-submersibles

Post by Sanjay M »

Drug smugglers are increasingly relying on their own rigged-up submarines or "semi-submersible" vessels:

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htsub/ ... 80329.aspx

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jh ... sub123.xml

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/03/20/drug.subs/

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008 ... 131626.htm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/915059.stm

Any danger that jihadis might use these in the future or be using them in the present? Any record of India ever having intercepted one?
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Post by shyamd »

Addressing the annual meeting of the Surface Navy Association in Arlington on Jan. 17, admiral James Stavridis, who heads the U.S. armed forces’ Southern Command, devoted part of his speech to what he described as a “main challengeâ€
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Post by shyamd »

The scurrilous campaign against Ashok Chaturvedi, the chief of the Research and Analysis Wing, the external espionage agency of the Government, was the talking point in the Delhi-based local and foreign intelligence community till only a couple of weeks ago. But as suddenly as it had surfaced, the malicious campaign died down quickly without any harm coming to Chaturvedi. Now, internal inquiries have revealed that Chaturvedi was targeted by an entrenched group in the organisation which was unhappy at his appointment.

All manner of charges, including that he was unfamiliar with the names of the incumbent rulers of China and that he had treated the Afghan President Hamid Karzai in a most cavalier manner and that he had influenced the award of a hydro-power project in Nepal to an Indian party, were labeled against Chaturvedi in an article which appeared in a West Asian daily. But mysteriously it was made available to a select group of Indian journalists. However, once the security czar M K Narayanan took a dim view of the anti-Chaturvedi campaign, his traducers in RAW decided to lie low.
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Post by ramana »

From Night watch site on how to think and analyse:

Night Watch 4/08/08
Note to new analysts: Handling large bodies of evidence is a lot like solving quadratic equations. The answer derives from working the equation more than once. The manipulation most analysts use is to examine each piece, usually applying limited intellectual tools, such as corroboration.

That process is essential, but misses the cumulative value of the evidence assessed together. Thus, a second manipulation is often helpful. This is to examine all the credible evidence in aggregate.

In the aggregate, the key question is how unusual is the constellation of facts contained in the evidence in a specific time frame. The down side to this manipulation is that sometimes unusual events are just coincidences, not disparate manifestations of a larger plan.

STRATFOR provided an examination of disparate events in the Middle East to issue a warning that something is about to happen and that multiple entities – Syria, Israel, Hezbollah – expect a conflict. The difficulties with that assessment is that it ignores events that are absent but should be happening based on past occurrences; it contains pivotal assumptions that are controverted by facts, and it reasons to dire portents from questionable assumptions. A few examples follow.

If Syria moved two or three armored divisions to the Lebanon border to guard against an Israeli attack, the inconvenience and internal disruptions to civilian life should be reported on blogs and web sites. It is not. The Syrians and Israelis both denied the movements and that denial is reinforced by the absence of complaining and the presence of normality, overall.

The assessment asserts that reservist recalls are costly and thus probative of serious intentions. Israel is the exception to that general rule because the Israel Army is a mobilization base which requires Israel annually to call up large numbers of reservists for active duty training.

Israel’s modest standing army of over 150,000 soldiers swells to 15 divisions with 450,000 soldiers in 72 hours in war time, according to mobilization doctrine. This system only works if reservists participate in regular training, as they are in Turning Point 2. Calling up reservists is not only routine, it is essential annually or Israel’s defense fails. That is one of the primary and most important criticisms of the Winograd Report. Political authorities had been saving money by neglecting the reservists, the backbone of Israel’s defense.

Significant for its absence is the lack of civilian whining about deprivation. When war preparations begin, the civilians whine because the process of protecting them also disrupts daily life. Disruption of civilian normality plus the attendant inconvenience is one of the critical costs of national readiness in anticipation of a crisis.

For example, it was inexcusable in 2006 that the civilian sector was not protected fully before Israel started its attacks in Lebanon. The failure to order adequate precautions before Israel initiated the fighting violates good sense, is not customary Israeli practice and was another criticism of the Winograd Report.

The absence of complaints signifies that impositions on civilian life are not significant enough to be reported by any news service. That is a signature of exercise, not rehearsal, because the disruption costs remain low.

Thus, it is important in an aggregative analysis that the argument is based on facts that may be linked to a process, such as regional war preparations. Those are not present at this time. Aggregative arguments without process analyses always end up in mysteries, unanswered questions and worry. The way out of those boxes is to examine the process and the costs (financial and social). They always differentiate between what is real and what is a hypothetical excursion; whether to be worried or just vigilant. There is no mystery here.
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Post by Kalantak »

CBI chargesheet against former officer of RAW
''The book contains nearly six to eight pages of critical information, some of which were even top secret,'' sources in the CBI said.
Sources close to Singh, however, alleged that his intention was to exposed corruption in RAW and it had come now to be a case of harassing a "whistle-blower".
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Post by Ananth »

shyamd, is your id hijacked? Are you still at LSE? Over last month, your hit count in strat forum has far exceeded that in tech/eco forum. Whatever be the case, your commentary provides new insight. However we are unable to corroborate. I hope you are not divulging confidential data.
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Post by shyamd »

Ananth wrote:shyamd, is your id hijacked? Are you still at LSE? Over last month, your hit count in strat forum has far exceeded that in tech/eco forum. Whatever be the case, your commentary provides new insight.
Yes, at university, not at LSE though! On a break from the econ scene, haven't got time to argue about economics at the moment! :P Enjoying my other passion of intelligence and foreign politics which doesn't cause too many arguements. Glad you like the commentary.
However we are unable to corroborate. I hope you are not divulging confidential data.
Corroborate on the economics or the strat forum stuff?

India and Nepal to share intelligence ahead of polls
Banbasa (Uttarakhand)/Kanchanpur (Nepal), Apr 9 (ANI): Indian and Nepali intelligence agencies have agreed to share intelligence on security issues ahead of the April 10 polls in Nepal.
Indian security personnel at Banbasa, in Uttarakhand, said that they are in constant touch with their Nepali counterparts at Kanchanpur. “We are in touch with our counterparts in Nepal. We have agreed to fully cooperate with each other. We have agreed to intelligence information sharing,â€
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Post by Ananth »

shyamd wrote: Corroborate on the economics or the strat forum stuff?
strat and intel briefs that you are putting here. Are these heresay or can you corroborate them with links to open source articles? How come staying in London you are getting access to all the ME related stuff?
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Post by ramana »

Ananth,
A previous poster also asked similar questions of shyamd and he was willing to share them. I stopped it as its none of anyone business as to how he gets them- asking for source will dry up the info. If you dont want to you need not read them. And dont ask him again. Thanks, ramana
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Post by svinayak »

Ananth wrote: How come staying in London you are getting access to all the ME related stuff?
:rotfl:
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Post by vsudhir »

The new E-spionage threat (Businessweek)
The e-mail message addressed to a Booz Allen Hamilton executive was mundane—a shopping list sent over by the Pentagon of weaponry India wanted to buy. But the missive turned out to be a brilliant fake. Lurking beneath the description of aircraft, engines, and radar equipment was an insidious piece of computer code known as "Poison Ivy" designed to suck sensitive data out of the $4 billion consulting firm's computer network.

The Pentagon hadn't sent the e-mail at all. Its origin is unknown, but the message traveled through Korea on its way to Booz Allen. Its authors knew enough about the "sender" and "recipient" to craft a message unlikely to arouse suspicion. Had the Booz Allen executive clicked on the attachment, his every keystroke would have been reported back to a mysterious master at the Internet address cybersyndrome.3322.org, which is registered through an obscure company headquartered on the banks of China's Yangtze River.
Aah. There's more on this juicy spicy tale.
The e-mail aimed at Booz Allen, obtained by BusinessWeek and traced back to an Internet address in China, paints a vivid picture of the alarming new capabilities of America's cyber enemies. On Sept. 5, 2007, at 08:22:21 Eastern time, an e-mail message appeared to be sent to John F. "Jack" Mulhern, vice-president for international military assistance programs at Booz Allen. In the high-tech world of weapons sales, Mulhern's specialty, the e-mail looked authentic enough. "Integrate U.S., Russian, and Indian weapons and avionics," the e-mail noted, describing the Indian government's expectations for its fighter jets. "Source code given to India for indigenous computer upgrade capability." Such lingo could easily be understood by Mulhern. The 62-year-old former U.S. Naval officer and 33-year veteran of Booz Allen's military consulting business is an expert in helping to sell U.S. weapons to foreign governments.

The e-mail was more convincing because of its apparent sender: Stephen J. Moree, a civilian who works for a group that reports to the office of Air Force Secretary Michael W. Wynne. Among its duties, Moree's unit evaluates the security of selling U.S. military aircraft to other countries. There would be little reason to suspect anything seriously amiss in Moree's passing along the highly technical document with "India MRCA Request for Proposal" in the subject line. The Indian government had just released the request a week earlier, on Aug. 28, and the language in the e-mail closely tracked the request. Making the message appear more credible still: It referred to upcoming Air Force communiqués and a "Teaming Meeting" to discuss the deal
The U.S. government, and its sprawl of defense contractors, have been the victims of an unprecedented rash of similar cyber attacks over the last two years, say current and former U.S. government officials. "It's espionage on a massive scale," says Paul B. Kurtz, a former high-ranking national security official. Government agencies reported 12,986 cyber security incidents to the U.S. Homeland Security Dept. last fiscal year, triple the number from two years earlier. Incursions on the military's networks were up 55% last year, says Lieutenant General Charles E. Croom, head of the Pentagon's Joint Task Force for Global Network Operations. Private targets like Booz Allen are just as vulnerable and pose just as much potential security risk. "They have our information on their networks. They're building our weapon systems. You wouldn't want that in enemy hands," Croom says. Cyber attackers "are not denying, disrupting, or destroying operations—yet. But that doesn't mean they don't have the capability."
Ahem.
But many security experts worry the Internet has become too unwieldy to be tamed. New exploits appear every day, each seemingly more sophisticated than the previous one. The Defense Dept., whose Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) developed the Internet in the 1960s, is beginning to think it created a monster. "You don't need an Army, a Navy, an Air Force to beat the U.S.," says General William T. Lord, commander of the Air Force Cyber Command, a unit formed in November, 2006, to upgrade Air Force computer defenses. "You can be a peer force for the price of the PC on my desk."
OK. Journalistic license apart, unkil has something up his sleeve. They're likely feeding false info to the false flag fraudsters. This kinda 'e-spionage', a spy variant of phisihing, is too basic to fool the DoD. IMHO, of course.
Adding to Washington's anxiety, current and former U.S. government officials say many of the new attackers are trained professionals backed by foreign governments. "The new breed of threat that has evolved is nation-state-sponsored stuff," says Amit Yoran, a former director of Homeland Security's National Cyber Security Div. Adds one of the nation's most senior military officers: "We've got to figure out how to get at it before our regrets exceed our ability to react."
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Post by Venkarl »

Prime Minister reconstitutes national security advisory board
http://in.news.yahoo.com/ani/20080411/r ... cbaa1.html
New Delhi, Apr 11 (ANI): Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has reconstituted the National Security Advisory Board, which is an important element of the National Security Council system.

The NSAB is a multi-disciplinary body comprising persons from outside Government to provide long-term analysis to the National Security Council and recommending solutions and policy options to the issues raised by them.

The seven new members of the reconstituted 23-member board are:

1. K.S. Bajpai, IFS (retired) - Chairman Former Secretary, MEA, former Ambassador to China and the USA. Currently Chairman Delhi Policy Group is an independent thinktank.

2. Shyamala B. Cowsik, IFS (retired)

3 Tarun Das, Chief Mentor

4 H.K. Dua, Editor-in-Chief, The Tribune.

5. Prodipto Ghosh, IAS (retired) Former Secretary

6. Sudha Mahalingam, Member (Distribution), Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board

7. Vice Admiral (retired) K.K. Nayyar, Chairman, National Maritime Foundation.

The other existing members are:

1. Professor Alka Acharya, JNU (Expert on China)

2. N. Balakrishnan, Associate Director, Indian Institute of Science

3. P.M. Bhargava, former Vice-Chairman, National Knowledge Commission Founder

4. Vice Admiral (retired) P.S. Das

5. Rakesh Datta, Professor and Head, Department of Defence Studies, Punjab University

6. A.S. Dulat, former Secretary (retired)

7. V.K. Grover, Indian Foreign Services (retired) Former Secretary, MEA.

8. Wasbir Hussain, Political Analyst and Associate Fellow, Institute for Conflict Management

9. Air Chief Marshal (retired) S. Krishnaswami

10. Rajiv Kumar, Director, Indian Council for Research in International Economic Relations (ICRIER)

11. K. Raghunath, former Foreign Secretary

12. K.V. Rajan, IFS (retired) Former Ambassador to Nepal and Secretary, MEA.

13. N. Ravi, Editor, The Hindu
14. General. (retired) V.N. Sharma

15. M.R. Srinivasan, former Chairman, Atomic Energy Commission

16. S.P. Talukdar, former Commissioner, Bureau of Civil Aviation Security (BCAS) (ANI)
Is he N RAM? If yes, we already have a chinese agent in our NSAB committee. who else in our NSAB committee is working on foreign govts' payroll? Any idea?[/code]
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Post by Ananth »

Nope N. Ravi is his brother. He has not yet displayed commie sympathies like his brother. IIRC he was out maneuvered for the top job by N. Ram.
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Post by Ananth »

ramana wrote:Ananth,
A previous poster also asked similar questions of shyamd and he was willing to share them. I stopped it as its none of anyone business as to how he gets them- asking for source will dry up the info. If you dont want to you need not read them. And dont ask him again. Thanks, ramana
Ramana, I asked him *open source* links for corroboration. If it is open source how will it dry up? I am not interested in uncles-cousin's-chaiwala connection. There is nothing wrong with what shyamd is doing, as those posts may be considered as opinions. But shyam is writing names and giving data points, which adds value and provoked my curiosity. The data points raises interests and you very well know about popularity of BR and its impact in certain areas. We on the forum have been used to google after every copy-paste-post of Acharya to see the source of the article. But here google fails.

Shyam I have nothing against you, just curiosity. No need to reply. Ramana, it is your perogative either to leaves this exchange or delete them.
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Post by ramana »

Yes its not google privy thats why. Last word.
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Post by Rampy »

Did any one read this by B Raman FIGHT AGAINST TERRORISM: A SCORE CARD (15-Dec-2007)
http://ramansterrorismanalysis.blogspot.com/
If one were to award objective gradings to different Prime Ministers/Chief Ministers for the political leadership provided by them in counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency, one would award the following gradings:
PRIME MINISTERS
Mrs. Indira Gandhi: A
Shri Rajiv Gandhi and Shri Narasimha Rao: B
Shri A. B. Vajpayee and Dr. Manmohan Singh: C
Shri V. P. Singh, Shri Chandrasekhar, Shri Deva Gowda and Shri I. K. Gujral: D
CHIEF MINISTERS
The late Shri Beant Singh, former Chief Minister of Punjab: A
Shri Sharad Pawar, former Chief Minister of Maharashtra, Miss J. Jayalalita, former Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, and Shri M. Karunanidhi, present Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu: B
Shri Narendra Mod, Chief Minister of Gujarat: C :eek:
He has also given reason for the same for ABV
Very badly mishandled the hijacking of an Indian Airlines plane to Kandahar
:roll:

For Mr Karunanidhi
Miss Jayalalita and Shri Karunanidhi: The credit for effectively neutralising the activities of Al Ummah and for the successful investigation and prosecution of the Coimbatore blasts case of February,1998, should equally go to them
What about Madani. I am spell bound :evil:

And Gem is here
Shri Narendra Modi: His main claim has been that there has been no major act of jihadi terrorism in his State after the Akshardam incident, but Gujarat has always had a very little history of terrorism---whether of the jihadi or the Naxalite kind. The tribute for keeping away from terrorism should go more to the people of the State than to any political leader
Does that Include minorities too? Than Congress and mr Javen Sahab's allegation are baseless no?
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Post by shyamd »

The CIA Owns India
April 12, 2008: Throughout the Cold War, India positioned itself as the leader of the unaligned nations. In practice, India leaned to the left, and obtained most of its imported weapons from the Soviet Union. India wanted Western arms, but was unable to get technology transfers. So, in the early 1960s, modernization of the Indian armed forces took place with Russian assistance. By the end of the Cold War, seventy percent of Indian Army tanks and artillery, eighty percent of warplanes and , and eight-five percent of warships were Russian.


In U.S. eyes, India was an ally of Russia, and thus had to be watched carefully. Since most senior Indian government and military officials spoke English, and many were actually pro-American, it was not difficult for the CIA to penetrate Indian intelligence agencies. This soon became known, and those many Indians who were anti-American, became more so.



Since the end of the Cold War, India has also shed its strong support for Palestinians, established diplomatic relations with Israel (in 1991) and become a major importer of Israeli defense equipment and weapons. India also became disenchanted with Russia as a military supplier since the 1990s, as the collapsing Russian economy made the supply of spare parts and warranty service even more undependable. At the same time, the Indian government realized that its socialist attitudes, when it came to economic policy, were not working. Communist China had dumped socialist economic policy in the 1970s, and its economy had been expanding ten percent a year ever since. India's economy, guided by socialist policies, was lucky to grow two percent a year. So the Indians dumped the socialist ideas in the 1990s, and the economy began to grow. With more money, Western weapons now became affordable.



But some things did not change. Many Indian politicians were still communist (despite the collapse of European communism in the 1980s and 90s), and the CIA still had its hooks into the Indian intelligence agencies. But the CIA has spies inside many foreign intelligence organizations. The Indians complain to the U.S., but everything is denied. Unofficially, the Indians are told that if they were true friends of the United States, there would be no need for the CIA to be so involved. And there it all sits, for the moment.
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Post by Kalantak »

shyamd wrote:The CIA Owns India - From strategypage
Shyam you posts such articles from strategypage and debka and pass it as secret intelligence from sources. All i can say is please grow up. If articles written by people who lost their brain to meth can be regarded as credible then shyam please post from paki deaf and dumb forums too.

Is there no quality control or moderation here on bharat rakshak forums?
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Post by shyamd »

Kalantak wrote: Shyam you posts such articles from strategypage and debka and pass it as secret intelligence from sources. All i can say is please grow up. If articles written by people who lost their brain to meth can be regarded as credible then shyam please post from paki deaf and dumb forums too.

Is there no quality control or moderation here on bharat rakshak forums?
How can I post articles with links and claim it is "secret intelligence from sources"? You are contradicting yourself. So much for your accusations :lol: If you got a problem, email a forum administrator and ask them to look at it.
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Post by Kalantak »

shyamd wrote:How can I post articles with links and claim it is "secret intelligence from sources"?
I meant your posts in Middle east thread. Can you give sources for these claims that you make in your posts. I dont think you will ever do. You dont get tried of comparing RSS to Hamas and doing and equal-equal business there but wont give sources for your claims.
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Post by shyamd »

I think you happen to miss the conversation that happened above on this same thread.
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Post by shyamd »

Sehmat, the secular spy who fought a silent war for India
[quote]By Madhusree Chatterjee
Book: “Calling Sehmatâ€
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Post by ramana »

Book Review of Intelligence books in US

Intelligent Design?

There was an old book about intelligence Organizational Intelligence by H Wilensky which said there will always be failures in an heirarchial organizations but has to be balanced with need to know.


From Foreign Affairs, March/April 2008

Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA. Tim Weiner. Doubleday, 2007, 720 pp. $27.95.


Summary: Two new books on intelligence reform -- Tim Weiner's Legacy of Ashes and Amy Zegart's Spying Blind -- distort the historical record. A third, by Richard Betts, rightly observes that no matter how good the spies, failures are inevitable.

PAUL R. PILLAR is on the faculty of the Security Studies Program at Georgetown University. Concluding a long career in the Central Intelligence Agency, he served as National Intelligence Officer for the Near East and South Asia from 2000 to 2005.


Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA
Tim Weiner. Doubleday, 2007.

Spying Blind: The CIA, the FBI, and the Origins of 9/11
Amy B. Zegart. Princeton University Press, 2007.

Enemies of Intelligence: Knowledge and Power in American National Security
Richard K. Betts. Columbia University Press, 2007.

Intelligence, Policy,and the War in Iraq
By Paul R. Pillar

Foreign Affairs, March/April 2006

The Limits of Intelligence Reform
By Helen Fessenden

Foreign Affairs, November/December 2005

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Also in this review:

Spying Blind: The CIA, the FBI, and the Origins of 9/11. Amy B. Zegart. Princeton University Press, 2007, 336 pp. $24.95.

Enemies of Intelligence: Knowledge and Power in American National Security. Richard K. Betts. Columbia University Press, 2007, 264 pp. $26.95.

In the 67 years since the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, countless commissions, committees, and other official inquiries have lamented the shortcomings of the U.S. intelligence agencies. Even more unofficial ink has been spilled on intelligence failures and the supposed need for reform. But then why, if there is a problem that needs fixing, has it not yet been fixed, despite the enormous amount of attention devoted to it?

Some observers argue that the U.S. government simply has not found the right formula for change. Yet the many volumes already devoted to the subject of intelligence failure and reform make it unlikely that any bright new ideas (or even dim ones) will emerge. Another popular explanation is that reformers have had good ideas but the political stars have not been aligned in their favor. After all, it took the combination of an election campaign, the trauma of 9/11, and an aggressive commission that skillfully exploited public insecurity to bring about legislation establishing a director of national intelligence in 2004 (an idea that had been discussed for decades). However, this explanation overlooks the strong bias toward reform among managers inside the intelligence community. Like ambitious managers anywhere, they make their careers not by sitting on the status quo but by championing new initiatives and strategic redirections. The dominant pattern in the U.S. intelligence agencies has been not stasis but almost constant revision, even to the point of disruption. Another common claim is that the challenges faced by the intelligence agencies have changed so dramatically that solutions from the Cold War era are now obsolete. But the intelligence agencies were addressing the "new" issues of terrorism and the proliferation of unconventional weapons while the Cold War was still raging. It is true that threats such as terrorism have evolved, but they have not changed nearly as much as the public believes. The shock of the 9/11 attacks was so profound that many Americans mistakenly assumed that they must have come from a new danger that no one, including their own government, had recognized or understood.

Although there is an element of truth to each of these arguments, they all miss the point. There are three far more promising explanations for why intelligence reforms so often fail to live up to the demands and expectations of U.S. citizens and politicians. First, the American public consistently believes the intelligence community's record to be worse than it actually is, prompting calls for reform even when none is required. The stir created by the December 2007 National Intelligence Estimate on Iran's nuclear capabilities is a case in point. Lacking important details, the media (unfortunately encouraged by the estimate's wording and structure) oversimplified what the intelligence community was actually saying, leading the public to believe that it had dramatically reversed previous judgments. In fact, the key aspects of the community's assessment of the Iranian nuclear program were unchanged: Tehran, despite its denials, remains interested in the option of building a bomb; it will have the capability to build one by the middle of the next decade; and its choice to exercise that option will depend on decisions that Iranian leaders have not yet made. Nevertheless, the outside-the-Beltway belief that this is yet another example of the intelligence community's incompetence has become widespread.

In the intelligence business, failures (and apparent contradictions) make headlines, while successes generally remain secret. Failures also prompt inquiries, whereas successes go unnoticed. It is the nature of these inquiries to devise solutions to problems regardless of whether they are soluble and to shift blame in order to avoid political land mines. Moreover, retrospective evaluations make events that were cloudy and ambiguous in real time seem blindingly clear in hindsight.

Second, calling for intelligence reform serves psychological and political purposes that have nothing to do with the intelligence agencies' successes or failures. Such calls remain a fixture of public debates because they satisfy Americans' deeply felt need to attribute bad things to a specific, fixable problem and because they reinforce Americans' comforting but naive belief that similar bad things will not happen in the future if a proper solution is found. But reforms that pander to psychological needs and political agendas encourage changes that are more disruptive than productive. Moreover, they foster falsely reassuring notions of accomplishment -- as if the redrawing of the intelligence community's organizational chart three years ago left Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri shaking in their djellabas.

Finally, intelligence failures are inevitable. This fact, however discomforting, flows directly from the nature of the job, which involves trying to uncover information that is extremely difficult to obtain. Intelligence officers share with debt collectors, vulture investors, and trauma surgeons the challenge of giving unpromising cases their best shot. The information they process is ambiguous and fragmentary and can be assembled in countless ways. Intelligence is called on to connect dots even though, unlike in children's puzzles, many of the dots are missing or have no number. The principal challenge for the U.S. intelligence agencies is outsmarting adversaries who work assiduously to keep secret what the U.S. government hopes to find out. One side's intelligence success is the other side's counterintelligence failure. And the difficulties mount when an intelligence service is expected -- as the United States' services have been in recent years -- to predict almost every significant occurrence across the globe.


INVISIBLE SUCCESS

The widespread public perception that the U.S. intelligence agencies chronically perform poorly has created a receptive audience for a slew of books and articles that both exploit and help to perpetuate misunderstandings. The most recent and most prominent specimen of this genre is Tim Weiner's Legacy of Ashes, which won the 2007 National Book Award for nonfiction -- but probably would have been a better candidate in the category of fiction. His much-heralded history of the CIA is a selective and haphazard treatment of the agency's record. The book's heft and alleged grounding in historical legwork (Weiner says in his preface that he read "more than fifty thousand documents") have earned Legacy of Ashes laudatory reviews. However, readers who know a little bit about the CIA and anything about historical research will not react so favorably to Weiner's work.

Weiner portrays an agency careening out of control, with adventure-hungry (and often alcohol-sodden) officers doing the driving. The book's scope is also extremely narrow: Weiner focuses disproportionately on the CIA's early days. The agency, according to Weiner, has been so enraptured with covert action that it has devoted too little energy and attention to collecting foreign intelligence. Legacy of Ashes offers little about two of the CIA's core intelligence functions, the collection of technical information and intelligence analysis, and not much more about the third, espionage. There is no mention, for example, of the CIA's revolutionary A-12 Oxcart spy plane program -- a crucially important technical-collection program during the 1960s. The A-12 was the precursor to the air force's SR-71, the premier U.S. reconnaissance aircraft for over 20 years. Nor does intelligence analysis get much attention. Among many significant omissions, Weiner fails to refer to the assessments from the CIA's Saigon station that anticipated the 1968 Tet offensive, even though President Lyndon Johnson and his national security adviser, Walt Rostow, later cited these reports in claiming that the Tet offensive had not surprised them. (Weiner's only paragraph on Tet portrays the CIA as totally in the dark about the enemy's intentions.) Nor does Weiner mention the CIA analysis that anticipated the Six-Day War of 1967; instead, he attributes Washington's lack of surprise to a single tip from Israel. And there is not a word about the intelligence community's prescient analysis before the invasion of Iraq in 2003, which anticipated the civil strife, terrorism, and instability that ensued.

Weiner's loose treatment of the historical record begins with the book's title. The phrase "legacy of ashes" comes from a remark made by President Dwight Eisenhower at a National Security Council meeting near the end of his presidency, but Weiner conflates two events and completely misrepresents Eisenhower's words. According to Weiner's account, the CIA director, Allen Dulles, was arguing against a proposal to separate his office's responsibilities from oversight of the broader intelligence community (as legislation in 2004 eventually did). Weiner quotes Eisenhower angrily complaining -- ostensibly in response -- that the structure of U.S. intelligence was faulty and that the failure to reform it would "leave a legacy of ashes." In fact, Eisenhower was not responding to Dulles, with whom he agreed about leaving the CIA director's job intact; the president had made his remark at a different NSC meeting a week earlier, and he was not talking about the CIA at all. Rather, his remark concerned how military intelligence had been stitched together during World War II.

The historical inaccuracies continue in the first sentence of Chapter 1, where Weiner claims, "All Harry Truman wanted was a newspaper." Citing a letter Truman wrote to an aide many years after he left office in which he claimed that he had never wanted the CIA to be a "Cloak & Dagger Outfit," Weiner concludes that Truman simply wanted the agency to be a source for global news. But the documented history of the Truman administration's use of the CIA to conduct extensive covert operations during the early Cold War years strongly contradicts that notion. Weiner's use of source material throughout Legacy of Ashes follows in the same vein. Damning quotations are cherry-picked, episodes are chosen to highlight failures and exclude successes, conversations are distorted, presidential desires are misrepresented, and sweeping judgments and naked assertions are made with no apparent reference to any of those 50,000 documents.

Legacy of Ashes does accurately illustrate how the agency has been at the mercy of shifting political winds for decades. This is perhaps the only element of the book relevant to current debates over intelligence reform. Legacy of Ashes is not a history of the CIA, much less the history that the subtitle promises. It is largely a collection of tales of derring-do, deceit, and defeat. This highly tendentious book should be viewed the same way as a good novel: a lively read not to be trusted as history.


BLIND FAITH

Amy Zegart's Spying Blind also exploits the public's attention to intelligence failures. Zegart confesses in her preface that she was researching the difficulties faced by U.S. government agencies attempting to adapt to new challenges when 9/11 suddenly supplied the perfect dramatic event to illustrate her argument. She has therefore tailored her depiction of the official reaction to 9/11 to fit her broad preexisting thesis: that traits inherent to any large organization, especially a government agency, prevent it from adapting well to new challenges and new missions.

Zegart strains to fit the record of the CIA's and the FBI's handling of terrorism into this thesis, and her straining leads to factual errors. She attributes, for example, the CIA's failure to place terrorist suspects on a watch list before 9/11 to the agency's not being "in the habit" of doing so. In fact, this lapse represented a failure to apply well-established and frequently used watch-listing procedures.

Most of the empirical errors in Zegart's analysis of 9/11-related intelligence stem from her extremely heavy reliance on postmortem inquiries, especially the 9/11 Commission report. In fact, much of Spying Blind is little more than a repackaging of that report. Zegart's most serious mistakes concern strategic intelligence about the jihadist terrorist threat. The 9/11 Commission staff used several techniques to suggest that the intelligence community's strategic analysis was inadequate. Most notably, they equated strategic analysis -- which in this case meant assessment of the nature, shape, and severity of the Islamist terrorist threat represented by al Qaeda -- with only one type of report and brushed aside numerous finished assessments in other formats that the intelligence community had produced on the subject prior to 9/11. Zegart uses the same approach and asserts, implausibly and incorrectly, that this flow of information provided only fragmentary insights and missed the big picture.

The intelligence community used other channels in addition to regular written assessments to convey to policymakers a strategic view of the jihadist threat. These included briefings of the most senior officials; special memos from the CIA director; countless discussions in the interagency Counterterrorism Security Group, chaired by the NSC's Richard Clarke; and the assessment portions of covert-action findings. But the 9/11 Commission never mentioned the use of these channels, and so neither does Zegart.

Zegart does disagree with the commission on one important point (although she buries the disagreement in an endnote). The commission asserted that on the eve of 9/11, policymakers and intelligence officials still did not fully appreciate the seriousness of the threat posed by the jihadist movement and al Qaeda. Zegart presents substantial evidence that they did. This difference reflects two different agendas: Zegart's objective is to show that even organizations that understand a threat have trouble adapting to it; the commission's agenda was to muster support for its plan to reorganize an allegedly broken intelligence community. Zegart apparently does not recognize the logical inconsistency in her presentation: she relies heavily on the 9/11 Commission as a source on many issues despite having convincingly discredited it on the central issue of whether the policy and intelligence communities fully appreciated the terrorist threat. Furthermore, given that policymakers were fully aware of the jihadist threat and there is no reason to believe that strategic insights about al Qaeda were missing or incorrect (neither Zegart nor the commission provides any evidence to the contrary), then strategic intelligence must have done its job effectively. The missing piece was something very different: tactical information about a specific plot -- a common problem in counterterrorism.

Legacy of Ashes and Spying Blind exemplify several all-too-common attributes of commentary about intelligence and intelligence reform. One is looseness in the use of evidence (which is ironic, given the tight sourcing standards that are appropriately demanded of the intelligence community). Another is uncritical (or selective) acceptance of whatever a commission or committee says. Zegart exhibits this tendency not only in her discussion of the intelligence community's record on 9/11 but also in her blanket reference to the more than 300 unimplemented recommendations of prior commissions and committees -- evidence, in her view, of the agencies' supposed failure to adapt to new challenges. She does not admit the possibility that any of these recommendations might have been misguided, mediocre, or tailored to fit the needs of the bodies that proposed them.

Zegart also lacks any sense of performance standards, a common problem among commentators on intelligence. Failures are enumerated, whereas successes are omitted, and the only implied standard -- perfection -- is an unattainable one. Zegart provides one of the more methodologically absurd examples of this sort of performance evaluation when she states that the CIA had a "100 percent failure" rate on 9/11 because it missed all 11 opportunities to disrupt the attacks. (She also presents a similar list of 12 opportunities the FBI missed.) When opportunities are defined only as chances that were missed, the failure rate will naturally be 100 percent. Zegart never counts the opportunities that were successfully seized -- some of which helped create the very missed opportunities she laments.


UNAVOIDABLE FAILURE

Richard Betts' book provides a much-needed antidote to these outsized expectations. Betts has studied intelligence failures for three decades and understands that the nature of the intelligence business makes some failures inevitable. The "enemies of intelligence" Betts refers to in his title can be anything -- human, organizational, or situational -- that impedes the intelligence mission and contributes to failure. Enemies internal to the intelligence community -- negligence, poorly designed organizations, and imperfect flows of information -- get almost all of the attention in public commentary. But, as Betts observes, they are not as big a problem as is often assumed. The larger obstacles are hostile states and organizations that withhold secrets and what Betts calls "inherent enemies": "a collection of mental limitations, dilemmas, contradictory imperatives, paradoxical interactions, and trade-offs among objectives."

These inherent enemies of intelligence agencies generally receive the least attention of all. They can be as simple as funding constraints or limited personnel, which force agencies to focus on certain targets while devoting fewer resources to others. And they can be as complex as determining how and when to issue warnings to policymakers about impending dangers. As Betts' elegant analysis shows, such warnings are not just a matter of intelligence agencies blowing a horn and policymakers jumping in response. Rather, they involve a far more complicated process that includes weighing the danger of false positives against the danger of false negatives and the costs of action against those of inaction. Betts is correct in arguing that these inherent enemies constitute an almost insurmountable obstacle and that intelligence failures are not only inevitable but natural. "The awful truth," he writes, "is that the best of intelligence systems will have big failures."

This, however, does not mean reform is impossible or unnecessary. Further change in the intelligence community is both feasible and worthwhile. But policymakers must begin by heeding Betts' sound recommendation that reforms be evaluated "not just according to what they may fix but what they may break." They must also accept two uncomfortable truths. First, any improvement is likely to be marginal. Betts likens the situation to a baseball player raising his batting average by 15 points: it is worth making the effort and could possibly help the team, but it is hardly the stuff of major overhaul. Second, they must acknowledge that the other branches of government will have to adapt to the reality that the intelligence agencies will never live up to the unrealistic expectations that citizens and politicians have placed on them. The United States must stop hoping for an intelligence superstar who will save the rest of the team from its errors and instead focus on assembling a solid, reliable interagency lineup.
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Post by bart »

http://www.kashmirwatch.com/showexclusi ... value1news

Is the author of that article a real person who actually works at JNU or is it some Paki internet fraud?

If it is a real person, isn't such writing adequate grounds to arrest him for treason or conspiring against the state?
bart
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Post by bart »

bart wrote:http://www.kashmirwatch.com/showexclusi ... value1news

Is the author of that article a real person who actually works at JNU or is it some Paki internet fraud?

If it is a real person, isn't such writing adequate grounds to arrest him for treason or conspiring against the state?
I checked the JNU website, and could not search his name on the faculty directory:
http://www.jnu.ac.in/main.asp?sendval=Search

Nor does his name appear in the faculty for International Studies:
http://www.jnu.ac.in/main.asp?sendval=I ... nalFaculty

Also, an Indian pinko will be able to put across his arguments (however wrong they may be) in a more polished and convincing way. This sounds suspiciously like someone in Pakiland pretending to be associated with JNU.

He/she/it had also tried to post a profile to Wikipedia which has since been deleted:
http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache:lrE ... clnk&cd=29
Dr.Abdul Ruff has served in India in various capacities, but had been a faculty member of Jawaharlal Nehru University, University of Mysore and the ciefl from where he sought voluntary retirement. However, Indian government has not yet respected its own commitment to give him retirement benefits and other salary balance. He manages his life from his meager daily income. Under continued threat from anti-Islamic and anti-social elements sponsored by Indian government, and tortured by remote terrorist methods of India, Abdul Ruff keeps shifting his place of residence, as required by the mood of the network.


Dr.Abdul Ruff has traveled widely; he has visited Russia, Finland, Nepal, and Bhutan and toured India across the nation several times.


Dr.Abdul Ruff was born in Colachal, Tamil Nadu, India, South Asia. He has very high educational qualifications, including professional, up to Ph.D.
:shock:
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Post by John Snow »

Please read this to get the extent PRC spooks doing to US and Indian senstive data....

Note the RFP refers to Indian MRCA requisition as the basis for solicitaion of inforation!

http://images.businessweek.com/mz/08/16 ... covsto.jpg


Read more here

http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/co ... page_2.htm
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Post by shyamd »

Taking stock of RAW’s working
The Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) is the Central agency to which has been entrusted the vital responsibility of keeping the Government posted in a timely and actionable manner with the events, developments and options pertaining to other countries, with special focus on Bangladesh, China, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. It has been in the news in the last few years and it is axiomatic that whenever an intelligence outfit gets into the news it is invariably for the wrong reasons.

There was, for example, the sensational disclosure of its having harboured a CIA mole, Rabinder Singh, who held the high rank of a Joint Secretary, and who managed to escape to the US via Nepal, without the powerful Agency being vigilant enough to prevent it.

In fact, the Web site of wiki.answers blithely says that the ‘easiest way’ to get into RAW is through the CIA and then get posted in India; once you are in the system loop, it says, you would be automatically approached by RAW.

The Web site helpfully advises the person so approached to negotiate the salary with RAW using Rs 38.9 to a dollar!

The blame for the calamitous course of events relating to Kargil was also laid at the doors of RAW. More recently, reports in sections of the media have talked of a feeling of letdown within the Government over not getting a dependable assessment from RAW of the situation in Pakistan leading to the declaration of emergency by President Pervez Musharraf and its sequel, the activities of China on the Arunachal Pradesh border and the growing power of Maoists in Nepal which had enabled them to score a stunningly dominant position in the elections just concluded.

In the very nature of things, it is impossible to verify the correctness of such stories and the intelligence agencies and the Government too, naturally, refuse to be drawn out one way or the other lest it stokes the controversy further.

Nevertheless, the citizens, voters and taxpayers of the country, through Parliament, have an inalienable right to know whether the nation is getting the value for the money (put at Rs 1,500 crore) spent on RAW, especially in the light of accounts of mismanagement, embezzlement, corruption and misuse of secret funds given in some books written by those who had seen its working from the inside.
Inadvisable and risky

This becomes all the more necessary since the expenditure on RAW is not voted but charged, and details of the different aspects of its functions are withheld even from Parliament. In effect, it is only the Prime Minister and the National Security Adviser who alone have access to the full gamut of its operations, if at all, and it is extremely inadvisable, if not risky, to leave matters concerning the nation’s security to the fallible judgment of two individuals.

As was recommended by the L. P. Singh Committee in respect of the Intelligence Bureau, a standing committee comprising five or six persons of unquestioned eminence with impeccable credentials in terms of knowledge and experience should be appointed to undertake a thorough review, say, twice a year, of the functioning of RAW with reference to quality of output and safeguards against malfeasance and wastefulness.

Without seeking to go into the precise identities and deployment of agents and sources, or the specifics of covert operations, the committee should be entitled to be briefed on priorities and thrust areas, and offer advice on their appropriateness and justification.

Most important of all, the stewardship of RAW should not be the exclusive preserve of police persons, but should go to broadband personalities, from whatever calling, endowed with a panoramic sweep of intellect and grasp of the complexities of today’s realpolitik.

B. S. RAGHAVAN
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Post by sum »

In fact, the Web site of wiki.answers blithely says that the ‘easiest way’ to get into RAW is through the CIA and then get posted in India; once you are in the system loop, it says, you would be automatically approached by RAW.

The Web site helpfully advises the person so approached to negotiate the salary with RAW using Rs 38.9 to a dollar!
:rotfl:
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Post by shyamd »

Daily Whines
India recalls its amorous spy from Beijing
* Several Indian diplomats, intelligence officials posted in China fell for Chinese women in recent years

By Iftikhar Gilani

NEW DEHI: India has recalled its spy from Beijing following reports that he fell in love with his Chinese language teacher.
The operative, Manmohan Sharma, was heading the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) desk at the Indian Embassy in Beijing.
According to reports, top intelligence officials believe that the spy’s beloved could be an informant of the Chinese government and that Sharma might have passed on information on India’s moves and counter-moves regarding border talks with China over the past year. Sharma has been reverted to the RAW headquarters after his ‘affair’ was exposed late February.
Over the past few years, Indian diplomats and intelligence officers posted in Beijing and its surroundings have embarked on relationships with Chinese women. A young Indian diplomat also reportedly fell in love with his Chinese language teacher in early 2000. The young officer was removed from his post and posted at an academy in India.
In October last year, senior RAW officer Ravi Nair was recalled from Hong Kong for his reported relationship with a woman believed to be working for a Chinese spy agency. However, the woman met with Ravi again some time later while he was posted in Colombo, and began living with him. The RAW management again acted and recalled him from Colombo.
In early 90s an Indian naval attaché posted in Islamabad reportedly fell in love with a Pakistani woman working in the Military Nursing Service in Karachi. The attaché was interrogated and then forced to resign. Reports said the official, who had initially claimed having recruited the woman as a spy, was being blackmailed by the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), which wanted his services after his return to the Naval Headquarters in Delhi.
In another case, a senior Intelligence Bureau (IB) official, who was due to take over as the chief of counter-intelligence, had an ‘unauthorised’ relationship with a female US consular officer. His meetings with her were recorded on camera by the IB, and he was forced to retire following interrogation.
However, in the history of Indian intelligence, the most famous case was that of KV Unnikrishnan, a RAW officer dealing with the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). He had developed a relationship with an airhostess believed to be an intelligence scion.
He was arrested just ahead of a peace accord signed between India and Sri Lanka.
Because Unnikrishnan was in charge of the Chennai office through which India channelled assistance to the LTTE, his job was considered ‘super sensitive’. Because of his relationship, several LTTE boats had been trapped by the Sri Lankan army — which led to the suspicion that someone had tipped off the Sri Lankan authorities.
Finally, Unnikrishnan was arrested and imprisoned for several years. He was released without a court trial because of the sensitive nature of his job and the fear that India’s connections with the LTTE would become public.
The Indian Mail Today recorded an oldest case of ‘honey trapping’, when an Indian diplomat during the time of the first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru was trapped by a Russian girl in Moscow. When the Russian spy agency KGB presented him with the pictures of his activities with the girl, the diplomat informed his ambassador about his relationship and the KGB’s attempts to blackmail him. The ambassador raised the issue with Nehru, who was himself in charge of the External Affairs Ministry. Nehru just laughed it off, warning the young diplomat to be more careful in future.
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Google image ‘reveals China N-missile site’

Post by pratik »

Source:
http://www.dawn.com/2008/05/16/top12.htm

WASHINGTON, May 15: Commercial satellite imagery has revealed an extensive nuclear missile site in central China with nearly 60 launch-pads for medium-range missiles capable of striking Russia or India, a researcher said on Thursday .

The images from Google Earth show different types of launch-pads, command and control facilities, and missile deployment equipment at a large facility in downtown Delingha, said Hans Kristensen, a researcher with the Federation of American Scientists.

“The US government often highlights China’s deployment of new mobile missiles as a concern but keeps the details secret, so the discovery of the deployment area provides the first opportunity for the public to better understand how China operates its mobile ballistic missiles,â€
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Another chinese missile site targeting India

Post by pratik »

Source:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTJF3wa12Os

Can anyone reply to my mentioned 2 questions in last post?
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Post by shyamd »

Ex-forger, now RAW officer
CHENNAI: The Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW) is yet to wriggle out of the embarrassment caused by reports about one of its senior Beijing officers being caught in a honeytrap with a Chinese language teacher. Now, the closure of a high-profile case in Kerala is set to cast more aspersions on the integrity of its officials.

B Sasidharan, a deputy superintendent of police (DSP) who probed the Kerala case involving a fake letter purportedly from the state's intelligence chief, is now on the rolls of R&AW. Nothing unusual about it unless one examines the grounds cited by the special public prosecutor for seeking a withdrawal of the case after Sasidharan had completed his investigation.

The petition says: "...the CPU, printer and scanner produced by the prosecution (as evidence) before this court are not in any way connected with the creation of the false document in the case as alleged by the prosecution." In other words, the 'evidence' produced by the investigating officer was false. It was perhaps the first time the government petitioned a court that the evidence submitted earlier was false.

It did not stop Sasidharan, who had led the investigation and collected the 'evidence,' from being posted as DSP in R&AW's Kochi office on January 15, 2007, just five months before he was to retire. Now the job in the central agency gives him another four years' service.

While R&AW officials could not be reached, Kerala home minister Kodiyeri Balakrishnan admitted the case was withdrawn because the evidence was false. Asked about Sasidharan's posting in R&AW, he told The Times of India: "His precedents were not brought to our notice. R&AW asked for his services and we cleared his name."
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Post by putnanja »

NSA blasts intelligence agencies
National Security Advisor (NSA) MK Narayanan on Friday blasted the intelligence agencies and called for greater cooperation between the State intelligence gathering machinery and the Intelligence Bureau (IB). Narayanan and Cabinet Secretary KM Chandrasekhar had briefed the Union Cabinet on the Jaipur blasts and the investigations on Thursday.






In the meeting, it was pointed out that intelligence officials have been less involved in their primary task of gathering information. It was also revealed that both the Central and the State intelligence agencies have come to rely more on officers on deputation from other Government departments, a CNN-IBN report said.



Narayanan, according to the report, pointed out that sharing of information at the State level between the police and the intelligence agencies is very weak and the foreign intelligence inputs that come in are seldom of a specific nature.



Although India has multiple intelligence agencies, but before Jaipur blasts, there was no specific input that came in from the intelligence organisations, including the IB and the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW), the television report said.



In a series of meetings with intelligence officials over the past two days, Narayanan also raised several questions regarding the identity of the groups behind bomb blasts in the country since 2005.



It was also pointed out that there has been no information about sleeper cells of terrorist organisation ahead of the blasts. Narayanan also questioned the role of the State intelligence agencies and the IB in identifying the sleeper cells, the report further said.



While the Centre has claimed that prior intelligence was provided to Rajasthan Government before the Jaipur serial blasts, the State Government has denied any specific actionable intelligence before the terrorist strike in the Pink City on Tuesday. The issue also resulted in the BJP and the Congress trading charges against each other as the State is ruled by the former and the latter is leading the UPA coalition at the Centre.



Senior intelligence officials say the National Security Council Secretariat headed by Narayanan has not been able to tone up the intelligence gathering machinery as he has not been related to the action teams of the IB in the past.

The growing intensity and the expanse of the terror outfits has clearly not been sufficiently countered by the counter-terrorism efforts of the Centre, of which the secretariat also constitutes a part, sources said.
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Post by shyamd »

Man, this idiot, MKN knows that there is no co-operation and it is his job to sort it out, he bloody encourages the non co operation! This is not something new, it has been going on for a very long time, without being resolved.

There is no co-operation between IB and another domestictehc intel org, people are pissed about the non co operation. Things haven't changed at all.
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Post by Avinash R »

contrary to the report there is indeed co-operation between agencies. if this was not the case then the arrest of totla maoist leader who was nabbed by wb police with specific inputs from central agencies would not be possible. the same is the case in the kims case or the arrest of top leaders of simi in mp.
the terrorist bombings carried out by muslims in jaipur could not be prevented since the modules have moved from taking each and every direction directly from outside the country to being in semi-autonomous mode. the contact is made after the terrorist act has been carried out until then no communication is made. this prevents any inside intelligence like place and the nature of the attack being planned from leaking to security agencies.
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Post by Avinash R »

Absconding SIMI activist behind Jaipur blasts?

Sat, May 17 12:29 PM

Serial bomb blasts in Jaipur recently is suspected to have links with Indore as one of the sketchs released by Rajasthan police is believed to have been involved in the crime resembles with one of the absconding activists of the banned SIMI.

Though Madhya Pradesh police are tight-lipped in this regard, all the indications are directed towards SIMI activists Abu Faisal, who was arrested from a hotel in the Gwaltoli area of the city in 2006 while attending a meeting of the banned organisation. He was release later on bail.

According to sources, Faisal has been actively involved in anti-national and illegal activities since his release and was absconding after March 27, 2007.

Police Superintendent Anshuman Singh Yadav said that he was unable to say anything on the issue and said that so far Jaipur (Rajasthan) Police did not contact the police in Indore.

However, he said that Madhya Pradesh police were in search of Faisal, but it has nothing to do with Jaipur bomb blasts.

He also parried questions on arrival of a five-member police team from Jaipur to question certain people, including the arrested SIMI activists.

The Madhya Pradesh police are rejecting the news in this regard.
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Post by shyamd »

SaiK wrote:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/arti ... stry-1.cms

Security scenario grim, admits Govt
17 May 2008, 0125 hrs IST,Rajeev Deshpande,TNN

NEW DELHI: When India's intelligence czar himself sounds the alarm, it is time to get worried. Lack of coordination between the Centre and states, poor unactionable intelligence, fuzzy and imprecise inputs, dearth of a dedicated pool of officers and patchy information on foreign sources of terror is crippling India's war on terror.

Briefing the Cabinet on Friday on the terror strikes on Jaipur, national security adviser M K Narayanan painted a grim, if accurate, scenario. There was no clear indication that a terror strike on the pink city was imminent. On the investigations, the NSA said the cycles used to plant bombs and a video clip released by email by an entity called Indian Mujahideen had provided leads that were being followed.

The NSA's briefing to the Cabinet will cause some concern to the political leadership as it indicates a dulling of security reflexes due to bureaucratic lethargy and absence of both a culture of accountability and security consciousness. These concerns were highlighted in a front-page series by TOI in August-September last year in the wake of the attack on Hyderabad.

IB sleuths surprised by NSA remarks

There is also a sense of surprise amongst security and intelligence professionals over Narayanan’s "confession" as the NSA — as the intelligence czar — has pretty much had the run of way in top appointments in Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) and Intelligence Bureau. He also straddles the National Security Council.

His position in PMO and the equity he enjoys with 10, Janpath should give him the powers to set the house in order. Certainly, to tide over the problem of lack of coordination. But if India’s top spook can’t fix things, it speaks of the enormity of the challenge as well as the the continued corrosion of the security apparatus. The NSA went with the current RAW secretary Ashok Chaturvedi’s appointment despite serious misgivings. His predecessor, P K Hormis Tharakan, was hand-picked by the NSA. IB, of course, has been home ground for the ex-IB chief.


On a wider canvas, the issues raised by a possibly distraught NSA are not terribly new. TOI had looked at all aspects of terrorism. "India loses more lives to terror than any other country in the world except Iraq" (August 27, 2007) looked at the toll of terror. "It’s terror, no use denying it" (August 28, 2007) examined the cost of denial. In "Political meddling trips up terror probes" (September 3, 2007), TOI argued that agencies were made to bow to political masters and "What other nations are doing to curb terror: Lessons for us" (August 31, 2007), looked at how mature democracies reacted to 9/11.

The essential issue relates to the options the government is prepared to consider. Having taken the political position that it is against special laws like POTA — having rolled it back with much fanfare — the Manmohan Singh government has come under sustained pressure with 10 major blasts in three years. Even after the Jaipur blasts, the PM reiterated the argument that POTA had not prevented the attacks on Akshardham temple and Parliament. But the argument seems to grow weaker with each successive terrorist strike.To counter the "weak-on-terrorism" charge, agencies need to be given enough room while ensuing an end to the turf battles they frequently have.

Special laws have been enacted by countries like US to ensure coordination between banks and financial institutions to choke off terror funding, increase in border security and investigators, easier sharing of data banks, video surveillance, centres for tracking foreign terrorists and above all, fast trials and tough sentences.

Security agencies as well as ordinary police forces tend to follow political signals closely. So stop-start policies with regard to naxals and ULFA, failure of the joint mechanism on terrorism with Pakistan have only added to the problem of corruption and political inteference which have slowed down police. Despite bearing the brunt of terrorism, India’s security apparatus neither has the wherewithal nor has been been given the clear mandate that it requires to take on the forces of global terror.
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