Domestic Military Intelligence Is Back

Code Name of the Week: Cornerstone

Yesterday, Walter Pincus reported in The Washington Post about the Defense Department's Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA), certainly one of the more mysterious Pentagon agencies, and one that is at the center of the Defense Department's expanded programs aimed at gathering and analyzing intelligence within the United States. 

Proposals, Pincus said,"would transform CIFA from an office that coordinates Pentagon security efforts -- including protecting military facilities from attack -- to one that also has authority to investigate crimes within the United States such as treason, foreign or terrorist sabotage or even economic espionage." 

Well, CIFA already has these authorities, has its own agents, and collects information on common American citizens under the guise of "sabotage" and "force protection" threats to the military. Since 9/11, functions that were previously intended to protect U.S. forces overseas from terrorism and protecti U.S. secrets from spies have been combined in one super-intelligence function that constitutes the greatest threat to U.S. civil liberties since the domestic spying days of the 1970's.

On May 2, 2003, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz signed a memorandum (large pdf) directing the military to collect and report "non-validated threat information" relating to U.S. military forces, installations or missions. His memorandum followed from the establishment of the Domestic Threat Working Group after 9/11, the intent of which was to create a mechanism to share low-level domestic "threat information" between the military and intelligence agencies.

 It is the military's equivalent of the FBI and intelligence community's post 9/11 shift, and Wolfowitz directed the sharing of reports on ambiguous activity.  This new reporting mechanism -- called TALON for Threat and Local Observation Notice -- applies to seven reporting categories:

  • Non-specific threats
  • Surveillance
  • Elicitation
  • Test of security
  • Unusual repetitive activity
  • Bomb threats
  • Other suspicious activity

According to a classified Standing Joint Force Headquarters-North document on "intelligence sharing" dated July 20, 2005, and obtained exclusively by this washingtonpost.com blogger, collection of intelligence on U.S. persons is allowed by military intelligence units if there is a reason to believe the U.S. person is: 

  • "Connected to international terrorist activities;
  • Connected to international narcotics;
  • Connected to foreign intelligence;
  • A threat to DoD installations, property, or persons; or,
  • The subject of authorized counterintelligence."

In other words, some military gumshoe or over-zealous commander just has to decide that someone is "a threat to" the military. 

Under well-worn intelligence oversight rules, military intelligence units are restricted from collecting information concerning "U.S. persons," but the post 9/11 reality is these restrictions are increasingly meaningless. 

What is more, the post 9/11 redefinition of "counter-intelligence" opens the way for the military to conduct domestic surveillance. Military law enforcement organizations such as the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI), the Army Criminal Investigations Division (CID) and its domestic counter-intelligence brigade, and the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) have increasing domestic duties that straddle the world between "counter-intelligence" and law enforcement, and are the main sources for TALON reporting to CIFA. 

Ever since 1998, when Secretary of Defense William Cohen went crazy building up a cover-your-ass force protection policy, the law enforcement arms have increasingly moved from traditional counter-intelligence missions of going after enemy spies to going after, well, whomever they deem as a "threat" to the military. Overseas, this makes sense, but in the United States, the counter-intelligence/force protection loophole is ripe for abuse. 

The "counter-intelligence" function of CIFA itself is couched to encompass "force protection," according to DOD Directive Number 5105.67, "Counterintelligence Field Activity (DoD CIFA)," February 19, 2002. What is more, the directive states that "in carrying out the mission of these elements, the Director of the DoD CIFA may employ law enforcement personnel, in whole or in part, as appropriate, to carry out the DoD CIFA's law enforcement functions…" 

CIFA is charged with correlating TALON information with all-source intelligence and providing "fused" products. In this regard, fused products are raw law enforcement and FBI reports relating to suspected domestic terrorism, NSA intercepts, and CIA and military intelligence reports that might bear upon domestic security. 

Cornerstone is the new repository for this combined intelligence and TALON threat reporting. It originated in May 2000, when Deputy Secretary of Defense John Hamre established a requirement to track foreign visitors to DOD installations. Post 9/11, the database came to encompass not intelligence and investigative leads to support foreign visitor tracking, but also "insider threat" information, counter-intelligence, law enforcement support, counter-terrorism, and force protection. Under a new program -- Project Voyager -- the Cornerstone database is being improved to support coordination with local, state and federal law enforcement. 

When one looks at the seven TALON reporting categories, it is clear that what is to be collected is broad enough to encompass virtually anything the military feels is a threat. "Non-specific threats" and "other suspicious activity" can be interpreted to include just about anything.

"Elicitation," for instance, is defined in TALON documents as:

"Any attempts to obtain security-related or military-specific information by anyone who does not have the appropriate security clearance and the need-to-know. Elicitation attempts may be made by mail, fax, telephone, by computer, or in person."

Ask questions of a military person about their tour in Iraq, protest about the presence of military recruiters on campus or at the Mall, engage in lawful protest against the Iraq war, and you could find yourself in the Cornerstone database, forever a "suspect."  Tomorrow I'll write about how this is really happening.

CIFA not only manages the Cornerstone database, but it also "makes the determination whether to release information about U.S. persons to analysts."  In other words, CIFA as both a "counter-intelligence" and law enforcement arm of the Pentagon bridges between two worlds, and is allowed to obtain and store information about American citizens. I hope that there are a lot of lawyers on the staff. 

And there's the rub. One can hardly find out who the director of this organization is, let alone how many people work there are what they are really doing.  

Tomorrow: What They Are Really Doing.

By William M. Arkin | November 29, 2005; 10:28 AM ET | Category: Code Name of the Week , Domestic Role of the Military , Intelligence
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Hold the policy holders accountable. That is the top leadership, the civilian leadership (appointed by the administration) accountable for their abuse of power. When the court martials are completed you will see a few young troops take the fall. Abu Graib and GITMO torture methods were troops following the tone of Gonzalez, SECDEF and A/SECDEFs march orders. How many senior Pentagon appointees had to answer to the court martials, or to the standards of our nation, treaties and bylaws (Geneva Conventions). The SECDEF said these people were non combatants, so the GC does not apply, so we can torture. The detainees are a mixed bag of mostly people in the wrong place at the wrong time. They followed their local leaders (Taliban) who told them to drop their picks and shovels (farmers) and bring your rifles (the Russians are coming again...). They had no uniforms in Afghanistan, so they are non combatants...
We need to hold these thugs running this boondockle responsible because the great american experiment of a government by the people, for the people and of the people has failed, and it is a government of big business. They are reaping the profits of the stock market and of the hardships that our military endures.
They, the civilian leadership, should be put on trial.

Posted by: John Florio | Dec 3, 2005 8:06:43 AM

Geez wrote: "Were all these Presidents "acting like kings" and violating the Constitution too?"

Yup. An oath is an oath, no matter what kind of unconstitutional EOs the judicial branch and legislatibe branch let the president get away with. If its unconstitutional, he's broken his oath to his position and the American people.

As is being noted lately, Congress did not do its job under the Constitution by declaring war before Bush invaded. Instead they "authorized" Bush to use all means possible. Its not unconstitutional but its not really what the writers of the Constitution had in mind. If the JB, now being stocked with neocons, and the legislature, already headed by neocons, want to let this neocon president get away with EOs that are unconstitutional then government has failed the Constitution. Failed government does not create president for unconstitutional acts being allowed in the future though. The Japanese internment is a great example of how government failed the American people by not following the Constitution. Yet today I have heard first-hand how we should lock up all arabs in the NY area to prevent another 9/11. Bush could sign an EO to have that happen, but if Congress and the JB didn't act sufficiently to stop it, it would still be unconstitutional. There is a lot of debate about the EO powers of the president.

If the Dems gain a majority in either House next year, you will likely see much checking and balancing. In this country its the Constitution that reigns supreme, not a president or any party. I think that's why so many Americans like divided government. It enhances scrutiny of each branch of government as the Constitution demands.

Posted by: Sully | Dec 1, 2005 2:31:13 PM

"you need to remember happened on those flights. People had their throats slit with box cutters that have an inch-long blade. Now maybe a Flight93 uprising might occur again, but many people would have been dead even if 93 had landed safely after the uprising. Allowing once again objects that can become lethal weapons on airlines, in order to reduce the workload on TSA, should not be considered."

Only a few were executed to terrify the rest into submission. But in any case, in the right hands, almost ANYTHING can be a lethal weapon - you can cut someone's throat with a credit card or the sharpened edge of a house key if you really want to. So, unless everyone is required to strip naked, put all their stuff in checked luggage, and fly in government-issued hospital gowns, the issue of what is or is not allowed on aircraft is really a moot point.

If you want to argue that TSA is incompetent, you should be much more concerned that they don't scan every piece of cargo that goes in the hold than the fact that scissors are now allowed in the cabin.

"By ammendments, voted into place by 2/3 of the House and Senate and then ratified by 3/4 of the States. Not an easy task but it has been done as you say. But no executive order can overrule the Constitution. If one does, the Judicial Branch can get rid of it. Its called checks and balances and they rightly limit the president's power."

Over TEN THOUSAND Executive Orders have been issued since the 1860s, but only TWO were ever overturned by the courts. Many of them were manifestly unconstitutional - e.g. interning Japanese-Americans - but the judicial branch never acted. In short, the contention that Bush is doing something exceptional that is inconsistent with past practice and his oath of office hardly holds water. Were all these Presidents "acting like kings" and violating the Constitution too? I hope you were screaming about "dictatorship" back in the 1990s when Clinton was signing EO after EO.

Posted by: Geez | Dec 1, 2005 1:25:09 PM

Geez wrote:
"Sully, I am totally serious that a 9/11 style hijacking will NEVER succeed again, even if people were allowed to bring bayonets and machetes on the plane. 9/11 succeeded because the passengers were passive, and passengers will never again be passive."

Well, you need to remember what happened on those flights. People had their throats slit with box cutters that have an inch-long blade. Now maybe a Flight93 uprising might occur again, but many people would have been dead even if 93 had landed safely after the uprising. Allowing once again objects that can become lethal weapons on airlines, in order to reduce the workload on TSA, should not be considered.

Geez continues: "The Constitution, U.S. laws, Executive Orders, and various regulations are not set in stone and immutable. They have been changed in the past, according to circumstances, and they will be changed in the future, that much is guaranteed."

By ammendments, voted into place by 2/3 of the House and Senate and then ratified by 3/4 of the States. Not an easy task but it has been done as you say. But no executive order can overrule the Constitution. If one does, the Judicial Branch can get rid of it. Its called checks and balances and they rightly limit the president's power. Here's article 5 of the constitution explaining it all:
http://www.law.emory.edu/FEDERAL/usconst/art-5.html

Geez continues: "I am surprised that a great legal scholar such as yourself is unaware that such changes occur."

You don't need to be a legal scholar to understand and respect the Constitution and the process it places on the government to govern. By ignoring the Constitution Bush destroys what American government is. Much of the Constitution was set in place to prevent a king from ruling America.

Geez continues: "Do we still live according to the exact Constitution ratified in 1791? No, guess not. Does every change made since then through the work of the Executive represent a violation of the Presidential oath of office?"

No changes to the Constitution are made through the Executive, legally. See the reference to Article 5 above. Any actions that go against the Constitution ARE a violation of the Presidential oath. Why is that hard to understand? Only by the process of Article 5 can the Constitution be changed. The President serves the people through the Constitution. He is not an elected king.

Posted by: Sully | Dec 1, 2005 9:32:31 AM

Considering the actions of the BRAC commission in removing much of the National Guard from control of the various Governors, recent relavations of actions within the administration, and Bush's statements at Anapolis; do you really still feel secure about homeland defense?

Posted by: DickLaw | Dec 1, 2005 8:31:39 AM

www.onlinejournal.com
www.takingaim.info/audio

www.onlinejournal.com
www.takingaim.info/audio

Martial Law in a Nutshell--15 Questions

By Mary Maxwell, Ph.D.

1. Q: Is it likely that martial law is imminent in the U.S.?

A: Yes. The way has been partially cleared for it legally by the Homeland Security Act, that 'grandfathered in' the whole of a secret 1979 executive order dealing with emergency rule. One legal hurdle to martial law still remains, namely, the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, which explicitly forbids soldiers to participate in domestic law enforcement. However, Congress could easily annul the Posse Comitatus Act, and is being pressured by the attorney general and the Pentagon to do just that.

2. Q: What is martial law?

A: In popular usage, martial law means that some or all civil liberties are suspended. For example, there could be a curfew, which would prevent people from exercising their normal liberty to walk around after 9 p.m. Legally, martial 'law' means that military commanders are assigned to carry out law and order among civilians. Hence, soldiers can determine what the rules are, can arrest civilians for breaking them, and can subject them to summary justice. A person could not turn to the courts for help.

3. Q: Have any democratic countries experienced martial law?

A: Yes, many. For example, Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada declared martial law over Montreal in 1970 in response to kidnappings by Quebec separatists. In the Philippines, martial law under President Marcos lasted from 1972 to 1981. Greece endured 'the rule of the Colonels' from 1967 to 1974.

4. Q: At the moment, while the Posse Comitatus Act is still in effect, does it offer good protection?

A: No. Posse Comitatus was substantially weakened by amendments in 1981 and 1991 that gave the Defense Department a role in the enforcement of drug laws. Since then, many American cities have acquired joint task forces composed of military and local police (who can be temporarily deputized as federal officers). A drug dealer, or an innocent person, may have his door broken down--legally--and his home entered by soldiers and police with guns drawn.

5. Q: What does the Constitution of the U.S. say about martial law?

A: The term 'martial law' never appears in the Constitution. However, the idea of it is conveyed in two sections of Article I as follows: Section 8 says The Congress shall have the Power . . . (15) To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions. Section 9 (2) says The Privilege of the Writ of Habeas Corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety will require it.

6. Q: Does the Constitution tell us which branch of government has the right to declare martial law?

A: Yes, the legislative branch has the right. Currently, there are 'White House radicals,' particularly in the Office of Legal Counsel to the President, advocating the position that the Constitution can be interpreted to support almost unlimited executive power. However, even they must acknowledge that the above-quoted sections (Sections 8 and 9) appear in Article I of the Constitution, which is the article that allocates specific powers to the legislature! Indisputably, this means that Congress can suspend our right to habeas corpus. One looks in vain for any similar authority for the president. Article II, which lays out the prerogatives of the executive branch, is silent on these matters.

7. Q: Has martial law ever been declared in the U.S.?

A: Yes. President Lincoln declared it during the Civil War. but this was overruled by the Supreme Court, after the war ended, in the case of Ex Parte Mulligan (1866). Mr. Mulligan was a civilian in Indiana who was allegedly aiding the enemy, i.e., the Confederacy. He was arrested and tried by the military. The Supreme Court ruled that there was no justification for martial law since the ordinary courts had functioned throughout the Civil War, and thus Mr. Mulligan should not have been deprived of his right to habeas corpus. One of the Justices said, "No graver question was ever considered by this court, nor one which more nearly concerns the rights of the whole people . . ."

8. Q: Then what about Jose Padilla, who has been held in a military brig since 2001, uncharged, even though he is an American civilian? Isn't the deprivation of his rights a grave matter?

A: Not according to the US Court of Appeals, which has taken the pro-executive position that the president requires scope to fight the war on terror.

(Note: the Latin 'habeas corpus' literally means "Produce the body" i.e., bring the accused before a judge.)

9. Q: Will we ever see Army tanks roll onto the streets in our country?

A: This has already happened. Tanks rolled out in Los Angeles during the Watts riots in 1965. It happened again in that city in 1992, when rioting followed the verdict of 'not guilty' in the case of four white police officers who had severely beaten an African-American, Rodney King.

10. Q: Is it likely that race riots will be the thing that triggers martial law?

A: In many countries, ethnic minority repression leads to outbursts that are quelled by military force. Since Americans are conditioned to see racial conflict as a frightening possibility, our government may be able to 'sell' the idea of martial law. An alternative scenario, which cannot be ruled out, is that someone would kidnap or assassinate a high official of the American government with an eye to bringing about martial law.

11. Q: What is the first assignment for soldiers when martial law is declared?

A: If the actual intent of the government is to establish illegitimate dictatorial rule, one of the first things it must do is remove oppositional leaders and popular figures--be they poets, physicians, priests, or judges. When General Augusto Pinochet seized power in Chile in 1973, his soldiers immediately arrested hundreds of dissidents and corralled them in a stadium. They were subsequently tortured and many were 'disappeared.' Now, three decades later, technological advances such as stun guns and remote-control pain delivery make it even easier to arrest huge groups of people.

12. Q: Is it conceivable that mercenaries would be used domestically?

A: It is more than conceivable; it has already happened. Following Hurricane Katrina, the Blackwater USA (and perhaps other mercenary units) were assigned to duty in Louisiana by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

13. Q: Where does FEMA get its authority?

A: As above mentioned, the Homeland Security Act established it legislatively. Section 502 of that act says" . . . there shall be transferred to the Secretary [of the new Homeland Security Department] the functions, personnel, assets, and liabilities of . . . the Federal Emergency Management Agency."

14. Q: Didn't FEMA have an unsavory history during the Reagan administration when it helped to run a secret government inside the White House, doing deals that became known as the Iran-Contra affair?

A: Yes.

15. Q: How is it that the controversial powers of FEMA did not get resolved in the past 20 years?
A: Perhaps because there have been too many distractions. Fortunately for us, however, Professor Harold Koh, Dean of Law at Yale, provides excellent recommendations for reform in his 1990 book The National Security Constitution. Koh calls for a return to the proper balance of power among the three branches of government, even in times when foreign crises--or domestic terrorism--work to unbalance those powers.

Posted by: Che | Dec 1, 2005 7:17:35 AM

Sully, I am totally serious that a 9/11 style hijacking will NEVER succeed again, even if people were allowed to bring bayonets and machetes on the plane. 9/11 succeeded because the passengers were passive, and passengers will never again be passive.

The Constitution, U.S. laws, Executive Orders, and various regulations are not set in stone and immutable. They have been changed in the past, according to circumstances, and they will be changed in the future, that much is guaranteed. I am surprised that a great legal scholar such as yourself is unaware that such changes occur. Do we still live according to the exact Constitution ratified in 1791? No, guess not. Does every change made since then through the work of the Executive represent a violation of the Presidential oath of office?

Posted by: Geez | Nov 30, 2005 4:47:37 PM

Geez wrote: "9/11 succeeded not because the terrorists had knives"

Are you nuts? nothing more to say here. Your words say it all.

You diatribe leads me to believe that you believe that government only maintains our rights, granted to all citizens under the Constitution and its Bill of Rights, until they decide it is a bad idea. Please go read the Constitution again, if you ever have, which I doubt.

If we are to live in a society where the Constitution and the Bill of Rights can be ignored in order to protect our society then maybe the first thing to be ignored is the second ammendment ... I can hear you saying 'Oh No! Not that! All Americans should be able to buy an uzi. How could a terrorist use that freedom against us?'

Oh, and by the way, what did the president swear an OATH to do when he was sworn in? I'll give you a hint, it begins with:

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend ..."

Here are your choices to finish the oath:
a) whatever Dick Cheney tells me is the truth.
b) the American People
c) our Way of Life
d) the Constitution of the United States.

Now every new president takes this oath because it is required in Article II secion I of the Constitution. I guess if Bush can ignore other parts of the Constitution he can ignore that oath as well........

Posted by: Sully | Nov 30, 2005 12:54:15 PM

Sully, 9/11 succeeded not because the terrorists had knives, but because of the stupid doctrine that passengers and aircrew should passively cooperate with the terrorists. A hijacking with knives alone will NEVER succeed again, because the passengers and crew will fight back and overwhelm the hijackers. Therefore the decision to allow scissors and small sharp objects on flights does not reflect any sort of "incompetence".

"Of course there are threats but these threats have been handled in the past within the law and our Constitution. We fought hot and cold wars without ristricting our rights."

We now face a fundamentally new and different type of threat. Terrorist groups now have both the desire and the ability to kill large numbers of people - they deliberately seek mass casualties. If we must change our laws and procedures to avoid suffering mass casualties, so be it.

I would also put it to you that our "rights" were significantly restricted during both the Second World War and the Cold War. The security laws, procedures, and institutions created in the 1940s and 1950s were VERY different from those that existed during the 1930s. So you cannot properly argue that our government and laws have never changed as a result of security threats.

"If you want to believe we could defeat the Nazis and Japanese, hold back the Soviet Union, fight wars in Vietnam and Korea (lets not forget Granada) but cannot fight this war without restricting our basic freedoms,"

I think we DID "restrict our basic freedoms" in the process of defeating the Nazis and the Japanese. There was censorship, rationing, curfew, arrest and detention of security threats, forcible relocation of American citizens, imprisonment of conscientious objectors, sedition trials, government spying on citizens, and many other things.

Posted by: Geez | Nov 30, 2005 11:44:46 AM

America is on it's way to becoming a military dictatorship, silence the questioners. It is scary what is happenning in America today, all because of 9/11. How convenient to have a Pearl Harbour to raise fear in peoples minds and therefore control them. It is very interesting to read Professor Steven Jones a physics professor at Brigham Young University, and his study of 9/11. He said

he believes there were explosives in the
basement of all the towers. In the
history of high rise towers globally, has
a building have the steel actually melt
and become a pool of molten metal. How
does Building 7 essentially melt into a
puddle when no aircraft struck it. No one
has answered this question.

I believe Bush had a hand in 9/11, the information is out there in good hard science. Check out Professor Jones report and his video, it is very compelling and well researched. He is a scientist, he does not answer why, he just looks at this event with a critical eye. Everyone should.
As one Russian who lived in America said, " there is propaganda in the U.S. and Russia, the only difference is that in the U.S. they actually believe the propaganda." The truth is out there, you have to look for it. Although it is my experience that as soon as you question, the namecalling starts. Are Americans afraid of hard questions? Are they so afraid of how potentially evil their govenment is they are in denial?
This is frightening to me that now Bush can take it one step furthur, and completely control the people. Do not sleep through this or fall into the habit of name calling to assuage your own fears. This is serious. When the military comes for you who will speak up?

Posted by: Gael | Nov 30, 2005 10:57:13 AM

Karl Rove's White House " Murder Inc. ".

Ariel Sharon's & Karl Rove's White House " Assassinations Inc. " !!!
Neocon's IPO.

"The significance of this masterpiece is not only the divulsion of facts,
but the focus it's made on the covert cooperation between the parties who
are playing enemies.... "

http://www.abcnorio.org/pcgi-bin/boards/housing/robboard.cgi?action=display&num=71

Special Investigation.

DEC., 2005- On September 15, 2001, just four days after the 9-11 attacks,
CIA Director George Tenet provided President [sic] Bush with a Top Secret
"Worldwide Attack Matrix"-a virtual license to kill targets deemed to be a
threat to the United States in some 80 countries around the world. The Tenet
plan, which was subsequently approved by Bush, essentially reversed the
executive orders of four previous U.S. administrations that expressly
prohibited political assassinations.

According to high level European intelligence officials, Bush's counselor,
Karl Rove, used the new presidential authority to silence a popular Lebanese
Christian politician who was planning to offer irrefutable evidence that
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon authorized the massacre of hundreds of
Palestinian men, women, and children in the Beirut refugee camps of Sabra
and Shatilla in 1982. In addition, Sharon provided the Lebanese forces who
carried out the grisly task. At the time of the massacres, Elie Hobeika was
intelligence chief of Lebanese Christian forces in Lebanon who were battling
Palestinians and other Muslim groups in a bloody civil war. He was also the
chief liaison to Israeli Defense Force (IDF) personnel in Lebanon. An
official Israeli inquiry into the massacre at the camps, the Kahan
Commission, merely found Sharon "indirectly" responsible for the slaughter
and fingered Hobeika as the chief instigator.

The Kahan Commission never called on Hobeika to offer testimony in his
defense. However, in response to charges brought against Sharon before a
special war crimes court in Belgium, Hobeika was urged to testify against
Sharon, according to well-informed Lebanese sources. Hobeika was prepared to
offer a different version of events than what was contained in the Kahan
report. A 1993 Belgian law permitting human rights prosecutions was unusual
in that non-Belgians could be tried for violations against other
non-Belgians in a Belgian court. Under pressure from the Bush
administration, the law was severely amended and the extra territoriality
provisions were curtailed.

Hobeika headed the Lebanese forces intelligence agency since the mid- 1970s
and he soon developed close ties to the CIA. He was a frequent visitor to
the CIA's headquarters at Langley, Virginia. After the Syrian invasion of
Lebanon in 1990, Hobeika held a number of cabinet positions in the Lebanese
government, a proxy for the Syrian occupation authorities. He also served in
the parliament. In July 2001, Hobeika called a press conference and
announced he was prepared to testify against Sharon in Belgium and revealed
that he had evidence of what actually occurred in Sabra and Shatilla.
Hobeika also indicated that Israel had flown members of the South Lebanon
Army (SLA) into Beirut International Airport in an Israeli Air Force C130
transport plane, in full view of dozens of witnesses, including members of
the Lebanese army and others. SLA troops under the command of Major Saad
Haddad were slipped into the camps to commit the massacres. The SLA troops
were under the direct command of Ariel Sharon and an Israeli Mossad agent
provocateur named Rafi Eitan. Hobeika offered evidence that a former U.S.
ambassador to Lebanon was aware of the Israeli plot. In addition, the IDF
had placed a camera in a strategic position to film the Sabra and Shatilla
massacres. Hobeika was going to ask that the footage be released as part of
the investigation of Sharon.

After announcing he was willing to testify against Sharon, Hobeika became
fearful for his safety and began moves to leave Lebanon. Hobeika was not
aware that his threats to testify against Sharon had triggered a series of
fateful events that reached well into the White House and Sharon's office.

On January 24, 2002, Hobeika's car was blown up by a remote controlled bomb
placed in a parked Mercedes along a street in the Hazmieh section of Beirut.
The bomb exploded when Hobeika and his three associates, Fares Souweidan,
Mitri Ajram, and Waleed Zein, were driving their Range Rover past the
TNT-laden Mercedes at 9:40 am Beirut time. The Range Rover's four passengers
were killed in the explosion. In case Hobeika's car had taken another route

through the neighborhood, two additional parked cars, located at two other
choke points, were also rigged with TNT. The powerful bomb wounded a number
of other people on the street. Other parked cars were destroyed and
buildings and homes were damaged. The Lebanese president, prime minister,
and interior minister all claimed that Israeli agents were behind the
attack.

It is noteworthy that the State Department's list of global terrorist
incidents for 2002 worldwide failed to list the car bombing attack on
Hobeika and his party. The White House wanted to ensure the attack was
censored from the report. The reason was simple: the attack ultimately had
Washington's fingerprints on it.

High level European intelligence sources now report that Karl Rove
personally coordinated Hobeika's assassination. The hit on Hobeika employed
Syrian intelligence agents. Syrian President Bashar Assad was trying to
curry favor with the Bush administration in the aftermath of 9-11 and was
more than willing to help the White House. In addition, Assad's father,
Hafez Assad, had been an ally of Bush's father during Desert Storm, a period
that saw Washington give a "wink and a nod" to Syria's occupation of
Lebanon. Rove wanted to help Sharon avoid any political embarrassment from
an in absentia trial in Brussels where Hobeika would be a star witness. Rove
and Sharon agreed on the plan to use Syrian Military Intelligence agents to
assassinate Hobeika. Rove saw Sharon as an indispensable ally of Bush in
ensuring the loyalty of the Christian evangelical and Jewish voting blocs in
the United States. Sharon saw the plan to have the United States coordinate
the hit as a way to mask all connections to Jerusalem.

The Syrian hit team was ordered by Assef Shawkat, the number two man in
Syrian military intelligence and a good friend and brother in law of Syrian
President Bashar Assad. Assad's intelligence services had already cooperated
with U.S. intelligence in resorting to unconventional methods to extract
information from al Qaeda detainees deported to Syria from the United States
and other countries in the wake of 9-11. The order to take out Hobeika was
transmitted by Shawkat to Roustom Ghazali, the head of Syrian military
intelligence in Beirut. Ghazali arranged for the three remote controlled
cars to be parked along Hobeika's route in Hazmieh; only few hundred yards
from the Barracks of Syrian Special Forces which are stationed in the area
near the Presidential palace , the ministry of Defense and various
Government and officers quarters . This particular area is covered 24/7 by a
very sophisticated USA multi-agency surveillance system to monitor Syrian
and Lebanese security activities and is a " Choice " area to live in for its
perceived high security, [Courtesy of the Special Collections Services.]
SCS...; CIA & NSA & DIA....etc.

The plan to kill Hobeika had all the necessary caveats and built-in denial
mechanisms. If the Syrians were discovered beforehand or afterwards, Karl
Rove and his associates in the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans would be
ensured plausible deniability.

Hobeika's CIA intermediary in Beirut, a man only referred to as "Jason" by
Hobeika, was a frequent companion of the Lebanese politician during official
and off-duty hours. During Hobeika's election campaigns for his
parliamentary seat, Jason was often in Hobeika's office offering support and
advice. After Hobeika's assassination, Jason became despondent over the
death of his colleague. Eventually, Jason disappeared abruptly from Lebanon
and reportedly later emerged in Pakistan.

Karl Rove's involvement in the assassination of Hobeika may not have been
the last "hit" he ordered to help out Sharon. In March 2002, a few months
after Hobeika's assassination, another Lebanese Christian with knowledge of
Sharon's involvement in the Sabra and Shatilla massacres was gunned down
along with his wife in Sao Paulo, Brazil. A bullet fired at Michael Nassar's
car flattened one of his tires. Nassar pulled into a gasoline station for
repairs. A professional assassin, firing a gun with a silencer, shot Nassar
and his wife in the head, killing them both instantly. The assailant fled
and was never captured. Nassar was also involved with the Phalange militia
at Sabra and Shatilla. Nassar was also reportedly willing to testify against
Sharon in Belgium and, as a nephew of SLA Commander General Antoine Lahd,
may have had important evidence to bolster Hobeika's charge that Sharon
ordered SLA forces into the camps to wipe out the Palestinians.

Based on what European intelligence claims is concrete intelligence on
Rove's involvement in the assassination of Hobeika, the Bush administration
can now add political assassination to its laundry list of other misdeeds,
from lying about the reasons to go to war to the torture tactics in
violation of the Geneva Conventions that have been employed by the Pentagon
and "third country" nationals at prisons in Iraq and Guantanamo Bay.


Tensions in the Middle East have prompted public expressions of anti-U.S.
rhetoric and public sentiment. Events in past years in Lebanon, such as
bombings directed at U.S. franchises and the November 2002 murder of a U.S.
citizen in Sidon, underscore the need for caution and sound personal
security precautions. Anti-American demonstrations have occurred in the last
12 months in refugee camps, in the southern suburbs of Beirut and in Beirut
proper to protest U.S. foreign policy. In May 2004, an anti-government
demonstration in the southern suburbs of Beirut turned violent resulting in
the deaths of five demonstrators.

It is noteworthy that the State Department's list of global terrorist
incidents for 2002 worldwide failed to list the car bombing attack on
Hobeika and his party.... But Listed a small Hand Grenade thrown at
a U.S. franchise....? The White House wanted to ensure the attack was
censored from the report. The reason was simple: the attack ultimately had
Washington's fingerprints on it....

This is some of the evidence for you and for the World ....
*******************************************************************************
~encrypted/logs/access ====>> INTELLIGENCE Agencies Servers footprints.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Not to mention hundreds of private companies and governments........!
...See Below :
*******************************************************************************

Lines 10-36 of my logfiles show a lot of interest in this article:

# grep sid=1052 /encrypted/logs/access_log|awk '{print$1,$7}'|sed-n'10,36p'.
spb-213-33-248-190.sovintel.ru /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Soviet/Russian Intelligence services...
ext1.shape.nato.int /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
NATO Intel.
server1.namsa.nato.int /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Nato Intel.
ns1.saclantc.nato.int /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Strategic Air Command US Intel.
bxlproxyb.europarl.eu.int /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
European Parliament Intel. Unit
wdcsun18.usdoj.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Department of Justice...
wdcsun21.usdoj.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Department of Justice...
tcs-gateway11.treas.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Treasury Department
tcs-gateway13.treas.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Treasury Department
relay1.ucia.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
CIA Langley
relay2.cia.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
CIA Langley
relay2.ucia.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
CIA Langley
n021.dhs.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Department of Homeland security Intel.
legion.dera.gov.uk /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
British Intel.
gateway-fincen.uscg.mil /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Pentagon US.
crawler2.googlebot.com /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Intel....
crawler1.googlebot.com /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Intel.....
gateway101.gsi.gov.uk /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
British Intel.
gate11-quantico.nmci.usmc.mil /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Marine Corps Quantico Virginia Intel.
gate13-quantico.nmci.usmc.mil /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Marine Corps Quantico Virginia Intel.
fw1-a.osis.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
US Intel SIS.
crawler13.googlebot.com /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Intel....
fw1-b.osis.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
US Intel. OSIS.
bouncer.nics.gov.uk /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
British Intel.
beluha.ssu.gov.ua /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Ukrainian Intelligence.
zukprxpro02.zreo.compaq.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052....
Intel....

"The significance of this masterpiece is not only the divulsion of facts,
but the focus it's made on the covert cooperation between the parties who
are playing enemies.... " At the very Least in Lebanon since the 1970s...!!!


Posted by: Dr. Paul Olson 3rd | Nov 30, 2005 10:45:32 AM

Karl Rove's White House " Murder Inc. ".

Ariel Sharon's & Karl Rove's White House " Assassinations Inc. " !!!
Neocon's IPO.

"The significance of this masterpiece is not only the divulsion of facts,
but the focus it's made on the covert cooperation between the parties who
are playing enemies.... "

http://www.abcnorio.org/pcgi-bin/boards/housing/robboard.cgi?action=display&num=71

Special Investigation.

DEC., 2005- On September 15, 2001, just four days after the 9-11 attacks,
CIA Director George Tenet provided President [sic] Bush with a Top Secret
"Worldwide Attack Matrix"-a virtual license to kill targets deemed to be a
threat to the United States in some 80 countries around the world. The Tenet
plan, which was subsequently approved by Bush, essentially reversed the
executive orders of four previous U.S. administrations that expressly
prohibited political assassinations.

According to high level European intelligence officials, Bush's counselor,
Karl Rove, used the new presidential authority to silence a popular Lebanese
Christian politician who was planning to offer irrefutable evidence that
Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon authorized the massacre of hundreds of
Palestinian men, women, and children in the Beirut refugee camps of Sabra
and Shatilla in 1982. In addition, Sharon provided the Lebanese forces who
carried out the grisly task. At the time of the massacres, Elie Hobeika was
intelligence chief of Lebanese Christian forces in Lebanon who were battling
Palestinians and other Muslim groups in a bloody civil war. He was also the
chief liaison to Israeli Defense Force (IDF) personnel in Lebanon. An
official Israeli inquiry into the massacre at the camps, the Kahan
Commission, merely found Sharon "indirectly" responsible for the slaughter
and fingered Hobeika as the chief instigator.

The Kahan Commission never called on Hobeika to offer testimony in his
defense. However, in response to charges brought against Sharon before a
special war crimes court in Belgium, Hobeika was urged to testify against
Sharon, according to well-informed Lebanese sources. Hobeika was prepared to
offer a different version of events than what was contained in the Kahan
report. A 1993 Belgian law permitting human rights prosecutions was unusual
in that non-Belgians could be tried for violations against other
non-Belgians in a Belgian court. Under pressure from the Bush
administration, the law was severely amended and the extra territoriality
provisions were curtailed.

Hobeika headed the Lebanese forces intelligence agency since the mid- 1970s
and he soon developed close ties to the CIA. He was a frequent visitor to
the CIA's headquarters at Langley, Virginia. After the Syrian invasion of
Lebanon in 1990, Hobeika held a number of cabinet positions in the Lebanese
government, a proxy for the Syrian occupation authorities. He also served in
the parliament. In July 2001, Hobeika called a press conference and
announced he was prepared to testify against Sharon in Belgium and revealed
that he had evidence of what actually occurred in Sabra and Shatilla.
Hobeika also indicated that Israel had flown members of the South Lebanon
Army (SLA) into Beirut International Airport in an Israeli Air Force C130
transport plane, in full view of dozens of witnesses, including members of
the Lebanese army and others. SLA troops under the command of Major Saad
Haddad were slipped into the camps to commit the massacres. The SLA troops
were under the direct command of Ariel Sharon and an Israeli Mossad agent
provocateur named Rafi Eitan. Hobeika offered evidence that a former U.S.
ambassador to Lebanon was aware of the Israeli plot. In addition, the IDF
had placed a camera in a strategic position to film the Sabra and Shatilla
massacres. Hobeika was going to ask that the footage be released as part of
the investigation of Sharon.

After announcing he was willing to testify against Sharon, Hobeika became
fearful for his safety and began moves to leave Lebanon. Hobeika was not
aware that his threats to testify against Sharon had triggered a series of
fateful events that reached well into the White House and Sharon's office.

On January 24, 2002, Hobeika's car was blown up by a remote controlled bomb
placed in a parked Mercedes along a street in the Hazmieh section of Beirut.
The bomb exploded when Hobeika and his three associates, Fares Souweidan,
Mitri Ajram, and Waleed Zein, were driving their Range Rover past the
TNT-laden Mercedes at 9:40 am Beirut time. The Range Rover's four passengers
were killed in the explosion. In case Hobeika's car had taken another route

through the neighborhood, two additional parked cars, located at two other
choke points, were also rigged with TNT. The powerful bomb wounded a number
of other people on the street. Other parked cars were destroyed and
buildings and homes were damaged. The Lebanese president, prime minister,
and interior minister all claimed that Israeli agents were behind the
attack.

It is noteworthy that the State Department's list of global terrorist
incidents for 2002 worldwide failed to list the car bombing attack on
Hobeika and his party. The White House wanted to ensure the attack was
censored from the report. The reason was simple: the attack ultimately had
Washington's fingerprints on it.

High level European intelligence sources now report that Karl Rove
personally coordinated Hobeika's assassination. The hit on Hobeika employed
Syrian intelligence agents. Syrian President Bashar Assad was trying to
curry favor with the Bush administration in the aftermath of 9-11 and was
more than willing to help the White House. In addition, Assad's father,
Hafez Assad, had been an ally of Bush's father during Desert Storm, a period
that saw Washington give a "wink and a nod" to Syria's occupation of
Lebanon. Rove wanted to help Sharon avoid any political embarrassment from
an in absentia trial in Brussels where Hobeika would be a star witness. Rove
and Sharon agreed on the plan to use Syrian Military Intelligence agents to
assassinate Hobeika. Rove saw Sharon as an indispensable ally of Bush in
ensuring the loyalty of the Christian evangelical and Jewish voting blocs in
the United States. Sharon saw the plan to have the United States coordinate
the hit as a way to mask all connections to Jerusalem.

The Syrian hit team was ordered by Assef Shawkat, the number two man in
Syrian military intelligence and a good friend and brother in law of Syrian
President Bashar Assad. Assad's intelligence services had already cooperated
with U.S. intelligence in resorting to unconventional methods to extract
information from al Qaeda detainees deported to Syria from the United States
and other countries in the wake of 9-11. The order to take out Hobeika was
transmitted by Shawkat to Roustom Ghazali, the head of Syrian military
intelligence in Beirut. Ghazali arranged for the three remote controlled
cars to be parked along Hobeika's route in Hazmieh; only few hundred yards
from the Barracks of Syrian Special Forces which are stationed in the area
near the Presidential palace , the ministry of Defense and various
Government and officers quarters . This particular area is covered 24/7 by a
very sophisticated USA multi-agency surveillance system to monitor Syrian
and Lebanese security activities and is a " Choice " area to live in for its
perceived high security, [Courtesy of the Special Collections Services.]
SCS...; CIA & NSA & DIA....etc.

The plan to kill Hobeika had all the necessary caveats and built-in denial
mechanisms. If the Syrians were discovered beforehand or afterwards, Karl
Rove and his associates in the Pentagon's Office of Special Plans would be
ensured plausible deniability.

Hobeika's CIA intermediary in Beirut, a man only referred to as "Jason" by
Hobeika, was a frequent companion of the Lebanese politician during official
and off-duty hours. During Hobeika's election campaigns for his
parliamentary seat, Jason was often in Hobeika's office offering support and
advice. After Hobeika's assassination, Jason became despondent over the
death of his colleague. Eventually, Jason disappeared abruptly from Lebanon
and reportedly later emerged in Pakistan.

Karl Rove's involvement in the assassination of Hobeika may not have been
the last "hit" he ordered to help out Sharon. In March 2002, a few months
after Hobeika's assassination, another Lebanese Christian with knowledge of
Sharon's involvement in the Sabra and Shatilla massacres was gunned down
along with his wife in Sao Paulo, Brazil. A bullet fired at Michael Nassar's
car flattened one of his tires. Nassar pulled into a gasoline station for
repairs. A professional assassin, firing a gun with a silencer, shot Nassar
and his wife in the head, killing them both instantly. The assailant fled
and was never captured. Nassar was also involved with the Phalange militia
at Sabra and Shatilla. Nassar was also reportedly willing to testify against
Sharon in Belgium and, as a nephew of SLA Commander General Antoine Lahd,
may have had important evidence to bolster Hobeika's charge that Sharon
ordered SLA forces into the camps to wipe out the Palestinians.

Based on what European intelligence claims is concrete intelligence on
Rove's involvement in the assassination of Hobeika, the Bush administration
can now add political assassination to its laundry list of other misdeeds,
from lying about the reasons to go to war to the torture tactics in
violation of the Geneva Conventions that have been employed by the Pentagon
and "third country" nationals at prisons in Iraq and Guantanamo Bay.


Tensions in the Middle East have prompted public expressions of anti-U.S.
rhetoric and public sentiment. Events in past years in Lebanon, such as
bombings directed at U.S. franchises and the November 2002 murder of a U.S.
citizen in Sidon, underscore the need for caution and sound personal
security precautions. Anti-American demonstrations have occurred in the last
12 months in refugee camps, in the southern suburbs of Beirut and in Beirut
proper to protest U.S. foreign policy. In May 2004, an anti-government
demonstration in the southern suburbs of Beirut turned violent resulting in
the deaths of five demonstrators.

It is noteworthy that the State Department's list of global terrorist
incidents for 2002 worldwide failed to list the car bombing attack on
Hobeika and his party.... But Listed a small Hand Grenade thrown at
a U.S. franchise....? The White House wanted to ensure the attack was
censored from the report. The reason was simple: the attack ultimately had
Washington's fingerprints on it....

This is some of the evidence for you and for the World ....
*******************************************************************************
~encrypted/logs/access ====>> INTELLIGENCE Agencies Servers footprints.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Not to mention hundreds of private companies and governments........!
...See Below :
*******************************************************************************

Lines 10-36 of my logfiles show a lot of interest in this article:

# grep sid=1052 /encrypted/logs/access_log|awk '{print$1,$7}'|sed-n'10,36p'.
spb-213-33-248-190.sovintel.ru /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Soviet/Russian Intelligence services...
ext1.shape.nato.int /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
NATO Intel.
server1.namsa.nato.int /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Nato Intel.
ns1.saclantc.nato.int /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Strategic Air Command US Intel.
bxlproxyb.europarl.eu.int /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
European Parliament Intel. Unit
wdcsun18.usdoj.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Department of Justice...
wdcsun21.usdoj.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Department of Justice...
tcs-gateway11.treas.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Treasury Department
tcs-gateway13.treas.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Treasury Department
relay1.ucia.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
CIA Langley
relay2.cia.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
CIA Langley
relay2.ucia.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
CIA Langley
n021.dhs.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Department of Homeland security Intel.
legion.dera.gov.uk /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
British Intel.
gateway-fincen.uscg.mil /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Pentagon US.
crawler2.googlebot.com /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Intel....
crawler1.googlebot.com /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Intel.....
gateway101.gsi.gov.uk /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
British Intel.
gate11-quantico.nmci.usmc.mil /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Marine Corps Quantico Virginia Intel.
gate13-quantico.nmci.usmc.mil /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
USA Marine Corps Quantico Virginia Intel.
fw1-a.osis.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
US Intel SIS.
crawler13.googlebot.com /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Intel....
fw1-b.osis.gov /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
US Intel. OSIS.
bouncer.nics.gov.uk /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
British Intel.
beluha.ssu.gov.ua /modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052
Ukrainian Intelligence.
zukprxpro02.zreo.compaq.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=1052....
Intel....

"The significance of this masterpiece is not only the divulsion of facts,
but the focus it's made on the covert cooperation between the parties who
are playing enemies.... " At the very Least in Lebanon since the 1970s...!!!


Posted by: | Nov 30, 2005 10:45:00 AM

One more thing Geez:

Here is the lead paragraph in an article I just read in the WP that ought to make you worry about getting 'kicked in the nuts' again:

"A new plan by the Transportation Security Administration would allow airline passengers to bring scissors and other sharp objects in their carry-on bags because the items no longer pose the greatest threat to airline security, according to sources familiar with the plans."

In case you are unaware, the TSA is under Bush's executive branch. Also, if you are unaware, the 9/11 hijackers used carpet cutters which have a blade about an inch long.

You may be ready to give up your freedoms to save some money but not me. The Bush administation is incompetent. How many more disasters will Bush allow on America before you understand this? Once you understand their high level of imcompetency, everything else makes sense.

Posted by: Sully | Nov 30, 2005 9:46:10 AM

Geez wrote to Mr. Arkin:
"Do you seriously believe there is no security threat to this country, its military, or its military installations?"

Of course there are threats but these threats have been handled in the past within the law and our Constitution. We fought hot and cold wars without ristricting our rights. We are now in a struggle with a small number of adversaries who, due to errors in the CIA, FBI, and other agencies, including the White House, inflicted 9/11 on us. And Bush embarassed me and most Americans by giving the head of the CIA a medal!

If you want to believe we could defeat the Nazis and Japanese, hold back the Soviet Union, fight wars in Vietnam and Korea (lets not forget Granada) but cannot fight this war without restricting our basic freedoms, then you have fallen into the Cheney/Rumsfeld cabal group think. Your notion that this government cannot do its job without throwing out parts of the Constitution points not to a reason for limiting citizens rights but supports the fact that this administration is incompetent and unworthy of the power and trust handed to them.


Posted by: Sully | Nov 30, 2005 9:30:04 AM

To all the Repubs who think it is necessary to give up freedom and the right to privacy to be secure, the contradiction should be obvious. Since you are slow to catch on, let's try one more time. Those who are under surveillance are not free!

Posted by: phree one | Nov 30, 2005 9:12:26 AM

Forgive the unabashed brown-nosing to follow...

Mr. Arkin - Thank you so, so much for your columns. To have a reasonable mind and a quick wit discuss the plans of the people nestled deep within the Pentagon is a revitalizing experience. CIFA has aroused virtually no comment from my party, nor much reaction from the liberal blogs, nor the infamy it deserves from the remnants of the liberal commentariat. As a civilian historian, all too aware of the clever misdeeds of 19th c. Army officers and all too fearful of those of the present day, I have you to thank for the inkling of understanding I do possess.

William Armshaw
UAW - GSOC Local 2110
New York University

Posted by: William Armshaw | Nov 29, 2005 11:21:25 PM

Arkin, you are the most unbelievable moron. Do you seriously believe there is no security threat to this country, its military, or its military installations? Do we have to get kicked in the nuts again like we did on 9/11 for you to remember that there is a need for counter-intelligence, and that the bad guys don't wear uniforms these days, they can look like any other "U.S. person"?

Posted by: Geez | Nov 29, 2005 10:58:12 PM

Well, the only way to protect our Freedom against the terrorists is to slowly turn our country into a police state.

The terrorists hate Freedom; that's why our President has argued forcefully for the right to have whoever he wants declared an Enemy Combatant (even US citizens) and locked away forever without any review, certainly not review by terrorist-loving judges, just because the President says so. Of course, to secure our Freedom we must have an organized military force making sure nobody criticizes any of this, otherwise the terrorists might win and this business of three co-equal branches of government is quaintly anachronistic.

In fact, the Miami police are ready to cooperate to ensure our Freedom, as they will soon be doing random stops to examine people's IDs. You can't love Freedom if your papers are not in order.

But compared to the Pentagon, they are slackers.

Posted by: Ba'al | Nov 29, 2005 10:11:27 PM

If you know where to look, you can find the info.

Here's the director, at least as of September 2005:
http://www.apa.org/ppo/science/cifafellows05.html

Of course you can't get the numbers. How many people total are on the CIA payroll? How about NSAs? Or, better yet, can you answer how many people are employed by the FAA? You can't. The government has outsourced almost all of its jobs, so that the number of positions is not listed anywhere anymore.

Posted by: none | Nov 29, 2005 10:04:50 PM

ASDG:
Someone, somewhere will always be considering something suspicious.
And there will always be a clown in the local bar ready to drop a dime on you. Why would that cause you to cease exercising your freedom of speech.
My handle is dopey, but I was trying to keep up with "Che" ;)

"Che"
Time for a new act. We already have a Noam Chomskey.

Posted by: Intel pro | Nov 29, 2005 6:50:36 PM

I think these military guys helped me against a terrorist when nobody else listened; but they are very secret.

I think they are the good guys.


Posted by: Cathy | Nov 29, 2005 6:06:27 PM

It all comes down to this, we live in a democracy till we don't demand too much of it, if we do, then the dark forces come out to get you!!!!!!!!

Posted by: Che | Nov 29, 2005 5:17:43 PM

This is a government terrified of its own people!

...But when a long train of abuses and usurpations pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security...

Posted by: Brian Fejer | Nov 29, 2005 4:33:27 PM

How our governments use terrorism to control us

www.onlinejournal.com
www.takingaim.info/audio
By Tim Howells
Online Journal Contributing Writer


Nov 28, 2005, 13:55

Email this article
Printer friendly page

The sponsorship of terrorism by western governments, targeting their own populations, has been a taboo subject. Although major scandals have received cursory coverage in the media, the subject has been allowed to immediately disappear without discussion or investigation. Therefore the appearance this year of two major studies of this subject is a welcome breakthrough, and provides essential reading for anyone struggling to understand the events of September 11, 2001 and the post September 11 world.

The studies are complementary. NATO's Secret Armies, Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe by Daniele Ganser concerns terrorism sponsored by American and British intelligence in Western Europe and Turkey between the end of World War II and 1985. The War on Truth, 9/11, Disinformation, and the Anatomy of Terrorism by Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed chronicles the cultivation and sponsorship of militant Islamic terrorism by the intelligence services of the United States, Britain and Russia from 1979 to the present. Both studies are models of scholarship -- meticulously documented and carefully reasoned -- but the world they reveal will boggle the mind of the most wild-eyed conspiracy theorist.

Creating "Communist" Terrorism to Fuel the Cold War

NATO's Secret Armies describes how following World War II the US and Britain, fearing a Soviet invasion of Europe, established "stay-behind" paramilitary units throughout Western Europe and in Turkey. Had the anticipated Soviet invasion occurred these units would have constituted ready made resistance groups, trained and armed, with secure communications with each other and with their allies in Britain and the US. In some counties, for example Norway and Sweden, these stay-behind units were true to their original charters, remaining inactive until they disbanded at the end of the Cold War. In other countries, however, the paramilitary units were activated by their handlers in the United States as part of a hellish "Strategy of Tension" designed to convince left-leaning populations in Italy, Germany, Belgium, Greece, Turkey and other countries that their very lives were at risk from communist terrorists. The arms and bombs originally intended for the Soviets were turned instead on their own compatriots with the aim of placing the blame for the waves of terrorist attacks on communists.

In Italy the stay-behind operation was referred to as Gladio (Latin for "Sword"). The Piazza Fontana bombings that killed 16 and wounded 80 shortly before Christmas in 1969 initiated a wave of terrorist bombings in Italy by Gladio operatives that continued throughout the 1970s. The worst single bombing occurred in the Bologna train station in 1980, killing 85 and wounding 200. Another Gladio bombing in Brescia in 1974 killed eight and wounded 102, and the same year a train was bombed in Rome, killing 12 and wounding 48. The case that led to the discovery of the Gladio plots by the Italian courts was a 1972 bombing that killed three policemen.

The Gladio operations in Italy are relatively well known and well understood because of several high level judicial investigations that received coverage in the European press and have been the subject of a few books. One contribution of Ganser's book is to bring this material together in a concise and well organised format. Further, Ganser extends his study beyond Italy to examine the effects of stay-behind operations throughout Western Europe and in Turkey.

I was quite surprised to learn that by far the most extensive and destructive stay-behind operations were those carried out in Turkey under the code name Counter-Guerrilla. Among other crimes, a long series of bombings, random killings and assassinations, covertly perpetrated by CIA-controlled Counter-Guerrilla operatives in the late 1970s, were used as a pretext for the military coup in 1980 that led to the installation of a pro-American and pro-Israeli government there. I was also shocked to learn that stay-behind operatives were responsible for a series of horrific terrorist attacks in Belgium as late in the Cold War as 1985, although this is still the subject of unconvincing official denials.

One limitation of Ganser's study, which he frequently laments, is the unavailability of official documentation because all materials relating to the stay-behind operations remain highly classified. All Freedom of Information Act requests to date have been denied by American authorities. One might have hoped that at least with the end of the Cold War such atrocious strategies would be renounced, and that the implicated governments would make every effort to come clean and ensure that this history would not be repeated. Unfortunately, as The War on Truth by Nafeez Ahmed makes clear, the Strategy of Tension has proved to be so useful a tool both in terms of global and domestic politics that, far from being abandoned, these despicable operations have become increasingly accepted and commonplace.

Creating "Islamic" Terrorism for the Post-Cold War Era

Ahmed's study centres on the attacks of September 11, 2001, but the story begins in Afghanistan prior to the Soviet invasion in 1979. Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security advisor to President Jimmy Carter at the time, has described in an interview how, even prior to the invasion, the US had taken steps to fund the Mujahedeen warlords and to inflame militant Islam in the region. The aim was to destabilise the region and to force the Soviets to invade -- to draw them into their own Vietnam-style quagmire.

According to Brzezinski, "We did not push the Russians into invading, but we knowingly increased the probability that they would. That secret operation was an excellent idea. The effect was to draw the Russians into the Afghan trap."

After the Soviets' inglorious retreat from Afghanistan, and even more so after the collapse of the Soviet Union several years later, the policy of inflaming and exploiting militant Islam was credited by many in the US national security establishment for these historic developments. Ahmed has compiled irrefutable evidence that the United States did not abandon the militant Islamists after the end of the Cold War. In fact, American leadership at the very highest levels has continued to covertly protect, assist and guide militant Islam in general and al-Qaeda in particular in geopolitically important areas around the world, including Central Asia, North Africa, the Balkans, and the Philippines.

It is impossible to do justice to Ahmed's densely packed 390-page presentation here, but I will give some representative examples.

Sergeant Ali Mohamed Joins al-Qaeda

Ali Mohamed, an Egyptian intelligence officer, was fired in 1984 because of his religious extremism. In spite of this and in spite of the fact that his name was on the State Department's terrorist watch list, he was granted a visa to enter the US and became a US citizen. By 1986 he was a sergeant in the US Army and an instructor at the elite Special Warfare School at Fort Bragg. While in this position Mohamed travelled to Afghanistan to meet with bin Laden, and he assisted with the training of al-Qaeda operatives both in Afghanistan and in the US. His immediate supervisors at Fort Bragg were duly alarmed by these illegal activities, and reported them up the chain of command. When their reports failed to produce any action, not even an official debriefing of Mohamed upon his return from Afghanistan, at least one of his supervisors, Lt. Col. Robert Anderson, concluded that Mohamed had been acting as part of an operation sanctioned by an American intelligence agency, "probably the CIA."

Mohamed's activities in support of al-Qaeda throughout the 1990s were of the highest significance to that organisation. In 1991, he handled security for bin Laden's move from Saudi Arabia to the Sudan. In 1993, Mohamed accompanied bin Laden's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, on a fund raising tour of the United States, again handling security arrangements. The funds raised helped support Zawahiri in a Pentagon supported mission in the Balkans, which will be discussed in the next section.

The al-Qaeda members trained by Mohamed in the United States included several who were later convicted in connection with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Top secret US Army training manuals supplied by Mohamed to the defendants were produced as evidence at their trial.

Mohamed himself did the initial surveillance for the al-Qaeda bombings of the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. At the time Mohamed was on active reserve with the Special Forces and was a paid FBI informant. Mohamed was at long last charged with crimes in connection with the 1998 embassy bombings. In October 2000, he was convicted of five counts of conspiracy to murder nationals of the United States. However, the nature of Mohamed's plea agreement, the sentence handed down, if any, and Mohamed's present whereabouts remain secret.

The Pentagon Brings al-Qaeda to the Balkans

The US national security establishment did not miss a beat in seeking to replicate the triumph in Afghanistan in other geopolitically critical areas. The Soviet puppet regime fell in Afghanistan in February 1992. That same year, the Pentagon started importing Afghan jihadists organised by bin Laden into Bosnia to wreak chaos and fuel the civil wars between Muslims and Serbs that devastated the former Yugoslavia in the following years. Bin Laden's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, served as commander of the Mujahedeen forces in the Balkans.

The role of the Pentagon in airlifting the Mujahedeen terrorists into Bosnia and Kosovo between 1992 to 1995 has been well documented and widely reported in the European and Canadian media, but almost completely ignored in the United States. However, the geopolitical advantages of breaking the former sovereign nation of Yugoslavia into a patchwork of NATO protectorates, under the firm control of the United States, did not go unnoted. New Republic editors Jacob Heilbrunn and Michael Lind celebrated the event in a New York Times article titled "The Third American Empire" published on January 2, 1996:

"Instead of seeing Bosnia as the eastern frontier of NATO, we should view the Balkans as the western frontier of America's rapidly expanding sphere of influence in the Middle East . . . The regions once ruled by the Ottoman Turks show signs of becoming the heart of a third American empire . . . The main purpose of NATO countries, for the foreseeable future, will be to serve as staging areas for American wars in the Balkans, the Mediterranean and the Persian Gulf."

The CIA Brings al-Qaeda to the Philippines

In 1991, with the Afghan War winding down, the Abu Sayyaf terrorist group was formed in the Philippines around a core of radical Afghan veterans. They conducted their first kidnapping operation in 1992, and were responsible for a series of bombings and kidnappings throughout the 1990s that were highly destabilising for the Philippine government. Several high level al-Qaeda operatives, including Ramzi Yousef and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed were involved. Funding was provided by one of bin Laden's brothers in law, Mohammed Jamal Khalifa, an important figure in the funding of al-Qaeda operations worldwide.

Ahmed cites many authoritative sources, including Philippine intelligence officer Rene Jarque, Lt. Col. Ricardo Morales, and Senator Aquilino Q. Pimentel, to show that the Abu-Sayyaf group has received special assistance and protection both from the Philippine military and from the United States. Pimentel in a speech before the Philippine Senate in July of 2000 accused the CIA of creating the terrorist organisation with the help of their contacts in the Philippine military and intelligence communities.

Two incidents in particular have exposed the connivance of the United States in the Abu Sayyaf reign of terror beyond a reasonable doubt. In December of 1994, Khalifa was arrested during a visit to San Francisco on immigration violations. The FBI was aware of his ties to the Abu Sayyaf group and to al-Qaeda, and began a criminal investigation. Khalifa's lawyers tried to stall the investigation and manoeuvre for extradition to Jordan. Incredibly, help came to Khalifa from on high. Secretary of State Warren Christopher personally wrote a three-page letter to Attorney General Janet Reno asking that the request for extradition be granted. Accordingly, the FBI investigation was cancelled and Khalifa was sent to Jordan per his own request, where he was soon a free man.

The second incident is even more extraordinary and revealing. Michael Meiring, an American citizen, arrived in the Philippines in 1992 and promptly formed close working relationships both with high government officials and with rebel leaders in the Abu Sayyaf group. In 2002, in the midst of a wave of Abu Sayyaf bombings, Meiring accidentally detonated a bomb in his own hotel room in Mindao causing grave injury to himself, requiring emergency hospitalisation. US authorities immediately intervened. FBI agents and "agents of the National Security Council" swept him away from his hospital room, first to a hospital in Manila where Meiring was kept incommunicado and was treated by a doctor hand-picked by the US embassy. Then Meiring was rushed back to the United States. Like Ali Mohamed, his fate and current whereabouts are unknown. Numerous attempts to have him extradited back to the Philippines for prosecution have been stonewalled by US authorities.

The motivations for American support of terrorism in the Philippines are not hard to guess. In 1991, the same year that Abu Sayyaf was formed, the Philippines Senate had voted to close all US military bases in their country, an action with profound implications for the military posture of the United States in South Asia. In 2002, due to the destabilising effects of the Abu Sayyaf operations, the US military were invited back into the country to participate in operation Balikatan ("shoulder to shoulder"), a joint US/Philippine military exercise purportedly aimed at eliminating terrorism. These operations required special exemptions from the Philippine Constitution, which forbids foreign armies from operating on Philippine soil. Once again, al-Qaeda, with the help of their American friends, had acted to advance the geostrategic interests of the United States.

The Grand Design

The above examples are by no means isolated anomalies. The bulk of Ahmed's fine book is devoted to recording a pattern of evidence that is finally overwhelming. As he says in conclusion, "not only does the strategy employed in the new 'War on Terror' seem to provoke terrorism, but an integral dimension of the strategy is the protection of key actors culpable in the financial, logistical, and military-intelligence support of international terrorism."

And Then There Is September 11 Itself . . .

But what about the September 11 attacks themselves? Were they "blowback," i.e., unintended domestic consequences of foreign covert operations, or were they an integral part of the Strategy of Tension? Based in part on an analysis of intelligence warnings of the attacks, and on the absence of any air defence response, Ahmed strongly endorses the latter view. He reviews the dozens of very specific foreign and domestic intelligence warnings of terrorist attacks in the United States using airliners that came in the months leading up to the attacks. These in turn led to warnings issued by American intelligence to Pentagon officials, and to others, including author Salman Rushdie and San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown, to cancel all flight plans on the day of September 11, 2001. Meanwhile, no action whatsoever was taken to warn or to protect the American public.

Ahmed points out that the responsible authorities at the Pentagon and the Federal Aviation Administration have produced several profoundly contradictory accounts of their own actions on that day -- each subsequent story seemingly an attempt to remedy the shortcomings of a previous one. And still no remotely satisfactory account of the failure to intercept even one of the four hijacked airliners has been produced. Under ordinary circumstances, interception of wayward aircraft by military fighters would have been absolutely routine; such interceptions occurred at least 56 times in the calendar year prior to September 11, 2001. Ahmed points out that the attacks were allowed to proceed "entirely unhindered for over one and one half hours in the most restricted airspace in the world." He finds the idea that this was due to negligence beyond belief. Instead he argues that there must have been a deliberate stand-down of the air defence system managed by senior national security officials including the vice president and the secretary of defense.

The Future of the Strategy of Tension

The books reviewed herein document a continuous history over the last 40 years of the United States and other governments fostering and manipulating terrorism for their own ends. Terrorist organisations have been used to destabilise inconvenient regimes around the world, and to sow chaos, which can then serve as a pretext for military intervention.

Even more importantly, terrorism is used to create a crisis atmosphere at home under cover of which the crimes and corruption of government officials go unpunished, civil liberties are easily abandoned, and major wars can be launched under false pretences. Although at present there appears to be no reason for the terror-masters in Washington to consider changing their tactics, the publication this year of these two illuminating books raises the hope that the Strategy of Tension, which can only thrive in darkness and confusion, will ultimately have to be abandoned.

# # # # #

Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed, The War on Truth, 9/11, Disinformation, and the Anatomy of Terrorism, Olive Branch Press, An imprint of Interlink Publishing, 2005, Northampton, MA
Daniele Ganser, NATO's Secret Armies, Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe, Frank Cass, 2005, London and New York

Posted by: Che | Nov 29, 2005 4:28:43 PM

Dear Intelpro,

I believe a handle like that would be enough to put you under suspicion. Of course, so would mine. :-)

This is why I shut down my "blog" Sept 12, 2001. There's no way of knowing what someone could consider suspicious, and any clown in the local bar can drop a dime on you.

Posted by: asdg | Nov 29, 2005 4:07:59 PM

Aren't the foregoing the same people who asked the Question: "Where was our Military? Where were our intelligence people" shortly after 9/11?? To give you the answer: They were ham-strung by by archaic administrative policies, and slow acting Congressmen (Investigation has revealed that Senator Kerry's office was forwarded a brief, nearly 90 days prior that would have provided some semilance of intervention...but no, he handed it off to the wrong people); How can we continue to survive if we do not have sufficient human intelligence activities at work? Also, who gave the media the right or even responsibility to delve into this area? Certainly the "public's right to know", an over-used cliche, is not sufficient...

Posted by: Billy On The Bayou | Nov 29, 2005 3:28:00 PM

n.b. Laura Rozen (@warandpiece.com) also notes how Stephen Cambone appears to be one very busy Rumsfelve [ http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6802629/site/newsweek/ ].

Posted by: mt | Nov 29, 2005 1:58:48 PM

"And there's the rub. One can hardly find out who the director of this organization is, let alone how many people work there are what they are really doing"

This [ http://tinyurl.com/bdc4d ] might help. Or at least point. As might this [ http://tinyurl.com/9o2uk ].

Posted by: mt | Nov 29, 2005 1:39:42 PM

First, according to Mr Pincus, CIFA wil now be investigating "crimes" within the United States such as economic espionage." Really? I'm sure the Bureau will be surprised to hear that.

And then there's Alan, "CIFA already has these authorities, has its own agents, and collects information on common American citizens under the guise of "sabotage" and "force protection" threats to the military."
Really, I'm a common American citzen but I'm not engaged in sabotage and making threats against the military. I'm sorry is that what common American cictzens do? I realy must start attending those meetings.

Posted by: Intelpro | Nov 29, 2005 1:11:22 PM

Dear Mr. William M. Arkin,

First of all, congratulation for your balanced and to the point analysis of complex topics.

The Bush-Cheney-Wolfowitz team introduced gangster like policy making into the Pentagon and the White House and wanted to impose it to the rest of the free world.

It is absolutely untrue that the National Security of the USA depends on an aggressive policy and putting aside the International Law and Conventions.

The way things are developing within the borders of the country itself is alarming and astonishing: How can the citizens of a Nation that prides itself for having the brightest minds on earth allow that groups of interest strip them down of their constitutional rights under the false pretense of an anti-terror treat that it is yet to be proven?

Such decisions that affect the freedom and privacy of EVERY single citizen in the USA should be put to a NATIONAL REFERENDUM and not be left to the whim of bureaucrats, who happen to defend financial or/and economical interests, putting in jeopardy the Security and Well Being of the People of a once great country, now at odds with its own people and the majority of the countries of the civilized world.

I think it is time for the free and real America to rise up say: NO to wars, No to poverty in the States, No to the corporative government. Time has come for a policy change.

Best regards,
Ahmed Azeddine
Danish citizen

Posted by: Ahmed Azeddine | Nov 29, 2005 12:49:18 PM

steven lewis is a crazy one-eyed lesbian.

Posted by: donquixote | Nov 29, 2005 12:39:03 PM

Bea Arthur will be avenged.

Posted by: donquixote | Nov 29, 2005 12:38:06 PM

Are the republicans doing anything according to the Constitution and the law?

If the democrats get back the House or Senate in 2006 this will all be placed into investigation. If you want to make it happen, oppose any republican running for any office.

Posted by: Sully | Nov 29, 2005 12:23:55 PM

I enlistted in 1965 and volunteered for the war, going over in 1967. I was astonished at how crooked and devious the military was. Things were nothing like what was reported in the US news.

Root 'em out and jail the bastards. Then, let's go back and get the crooks who were running dope in Air America Otters, C-123's, and Pilatus Porters, such as Albert Hakim, later Ollie North's buddy of Iran-Contra-cocaine fame.

Posted by: gkam | Nov 29, 2005 12:06:01 PM

This is so true. the admin is setting us years back. ON PURPOSE!

Posted by: Patrick Evans | Nov 29, 2005 11:56:16 AM

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