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News you may have missed #0250

January 12, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Pakistanis ask US to quit drone strikes. A Pakistani intelligence official has told the Associated Press that the response to the December 30 suicide bombing that killed seven CIA agents should not include intensifying unmanned drone strikes inside Pakistan. However, the CIA has reportedly “stepped up drone strikes” since the bombing.
Bush, Obama administrations guilty for neglecting info sharing. Thomas E. McNamara, former head of the US federal Information Sharing Environment, says the Bush and Obama administrations are both guilty of either losing interest or not focusing at all on promoting information sharing among often-secluded US government agencies.
China ends probe into Rio Tinto espionage case. Chinese prosecutors have now taken over the case of Stern Hu, the jailed boss of Anglo-Australian mining corporation Rio Tinto, after officials ended their investigation. Hu was arrested last July on espionage charges.

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Afghanistan, Australia, Bush Administration, China, CIA, energy resources, espionage, intelligence sharing, News, news you may have missed, Obama Administration, Pakistan, Predator drones, Rio Tinto, Stern Hu, Thomas E. McNamara, UK, United States, US Information Sharing Environment

BREAKING NEWS: Bomb blast kills Iranian physicist

January 12, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Dr. Mohammadi

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS| intelNews.org |
Iran’s state broadcaster has said a government physicist was “martyred” earlier this morning in a suspicious blast outside his home. The Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB) news agency reports that police forces have sealed off the area around the Tehran residence of Masoud Ali-Mohammadi, whom it described as a “dedicated revolutionary professor”. Dr. Ali-Mohammadi was reportedly killed by a remotely controlled explosive device that was planted at the entrance of his residence. Iranian officials hint that the remnants of the device point to the work of “outside intelligence agencies”, and some implicate the Mossad. Read more of this post

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Ardeshire Hassanpour, assassinations, CIA, defectors, IAEA, Iran, Iranian nuclear program, Israel, Masoud Ali Mohammadi, Mir Hossein Mousavi, Mossad, News, nuclear espionage, nuclear proliferation, Qum (Iran), Shahram Amiri, United States

Too much intelligence collection overwhelms US agencies

January 12, 2010 by intelNews 3 Comments

USAF drone

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
The broad debate about America’s recent intelligence setbacks has centered on the view that US spy agencies do not share enough information with each other. Several days ago, however, Politico’s Laura Rozen noticed an important remark by an anonymous former intelligence official, buried in a longer piece in The Washington Post about the Christmas Day bomber. The official told the Post that “[t]he real story line internally [in the Christmas Day bomber affair] is not information-sharing or connecting dots […]. Information was shared. It was separating noise from chaff. It’s not that information wasn’t passed around, it’s that so much information is being passed. There’s an inherent problem of dealing with all the data that is sloshing around” (emphasis added). This view may in fact be closer to reality than the more dominant ‘turf war’ argument. Read more of this post

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with airborne surveillance, information overload, intelligence overload, intelligence sharing, Laura Rozen, News, turf wars, Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab, United States, US Air Force

CIA to continue working with Jordanians, despite suicide attack

January 11, 2010 by intelNews 1 Comment

GID logo

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
The vast majority of intelligence insiders, as well as intelligence observers, seem to agree that the CIA is determined to maintain its close links with Jordanian intelligence services, despite the December 30 suicide bombing that killed and injured 13 CIA personnel. Jordanian doctor Humam Khalil al-Balawi, who detonated a concealed bomb shortly after he was allowed into the US Forward Operating Base Chapman in Khost, Afghanistan, had been recruited as a high-level informant by Jordan’s General Intelligence Department (GID). The Jordanian agency, which is known for its brutal interrogation tactics, is widely considered America’s most valuable intelligence partner in the Arab world. But the December 30 blunder, which resulted in the CIA’s second highest casualty disaster in its 63-year history, prompted some to question GID’s overall value. Read more of this post

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Afghanistan, CIA, Forward Operating Base Chapman, General Intelligence Department (Jordan), Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, Humam Khalil al-Balawi, intelligence cooperation, Jordan, Khost, News, Phillip Knightley, suicide bombings, United States

Comment: Is CIA Lying About its Blackwater Contacts?

January 8, 2010 by intelNews 11 Comments

Blackwater logo

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
After CIA director Leon Panetta revealed last summer that private contractor Blackwater was part of a covert CIA hit squad, tasked with summary killings and assassinations of al-Qaeda operatives, the CIA vowed to sever its contacts with the trigger-happy security firm. But did it do so? It doesn’t look like it. Last November, it became known that the company, (recently renamed Xe Services) remains part of a covert CIA program in Pakistan that includes planned assassinations and kidnappings of Taliban and al-Qaeda suspects. More recently, it was revealed that two of the seven Americans who died in the December 30 bomb attack at Forward Operating Base Chapman in Khost, Afghanistan, were actually Blackwater employees subcontracted by the CIA.

News you may have missed #0246 (CIA bombing edition)

January 7, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Analysis: Strike on CIA base tests US assessment of al-Qaeda. The militant group appears to have achieved a new level of sophistication and may not be as weakened as US officials had thought.
Photo of CIA suicide bomber published. Qatar-based Arabic news network Al Jazeera has published a photograph of Jordanian doctor Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, 36, who last month killed at least 7 CIA agents in Khost, Afghanistan.
Al-Qaida CIA bomber was furious over Gaza war. Suicide bomber Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi was furious over Israel’s Gaza offensive, the London-based Arabic daily Al-Quds Al-Arabi reported on Thursday, citing the man’s sister.
Analysis: The view from Jordan on CIA’s deaths in Khost. For Jordan, far more embarrassing than its role in the Khost suicide bombing, is its connection with the CIA, which while relatively well-known before, has now been put out in the public sphere for all to see –especially the Arab street.
London Arabic newspaper visits home of CIA bomber. The Jordanian authorities have imposed a security cordon around al-Balawi’s family home, which is located in the residential al-Nuzha district, close to the Jabal al-Hussein Palestinian refugee camp in the Jordanian capital of Amman. But a London-based Arabic-language newspaper correspondent managed to visit the location and speak with the bomber’s family members and neighbors.

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with 2008-2009 Israel-Gaza conflict, Afghanistan, al-Nuzha (Jordan), Amman (Jordan), Analysis, CIA, Forward Operating Base Chapman, Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, Humam Khalil al-Balawi, Israel, Jabal al-Hussein refugee camp (Jordan), Jordan, Khost, London, News, news you may have missed, Palestine, suicide bombings, United States

News you may have missed #0245 (CIA edition)

January 7, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

CIA saw Jordanian double spy as valuable asset. Before detonating a suicide bomb in Afghanistan last week, Jordanian double spy (or was he?) Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi was considered by US spy agencies “the most promising informant in years about the whereabouts of Al Qaeda’s top leaders”.
CIA going through worst spell since 9/11. America’s most recognizable intelligence agency is currently going through its worst time since 9/11, what with Christmas Day bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab and the loss of at least seven of its agents in Khost, Afghanistan.
US intel in Afghanistan is broken, irrelevant, says US insider. A new report (.pdf) by US Major General Michael Flynn, the top intelligence aide to International Security Assistance Force Commander General Stanley McChrystal, says the US intelligence community “is only marginally relevant to the overall strategy” in Afghanistan. The report recommends “[s]weeping changes to the way the intelligence community thinks about itself, from a focus on the enemy to a focus on the people of Afghanistan”.

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Afghanistan, CIA, double agents, Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, Humam Khalil al-Balawi, HUMINT, informants, Jordan, Khost, Michael Flynn, News, news you may have missed, Stanley McChrystal, suicide bombings, Umar Farouk AbdulMutallab, United States

News of CIA/Blackwater hit squad upset German government

January 7, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

M. Darkazanli

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
German politicians have finally caught up with the startling revelations of Blackwater founder and CEO, Erik Prince, who last month told Vanity Fair that he worked as a CIA spy, carrying out secret missions with the help of a Blackwater hit squad. The Vanity Fair article revealed that, among other targets, the squad planned to assassinate Mamoun Darkazanli, an alleged al-Qaeda financier living in Hamburg, Germany. But did anyone in Washington think to ask the German government whether it was OK for a Blackwater/CIA assassination team to run around the country, planning extrajudicial murders of alleged al-Qaeda members? Apparently no, says German newsmagazine Der Spiegel, adding that the revelation has upset members of German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union, as well as opposition Social Democrats and Greens, who are now demanding a special investigation into the matter. Read more of this post

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with assassinations, black operations, Blackwater, Christian Democratic Union (Germany), Erik Prince, George Little, Germany, Green Party (Germany), Hamburg (Germany), intelligence outsourcing, News, Social Democratic Party (Germany), United States, War on Terrorism, Xe

News you may have missed #0243

January 5, 2010 by intelNews 4 Comments

US releases video of Iranian arms dealer caught in Georgia. The CIA has released footage showing Amir Hossein Ardebili, an Iranian arms dealer allegedly working for the government in Tehran, trying to purchase avionics systems from two men, who were reportedly covert US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents.
Numbers of ex-KGB agents in Russian government falling. The numbers of Vladimir Putin-linked ex-KGB agents inside the Russian government hit their apogee in 2007, when they accounted for two out of every three members of the Putin’s administration. But since the accession to the presidency of Dmitry Medvedev, they are now down to one in two.

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Amir Hossein Ardebili, CIA, covert operations, Dmitry Medvedev, Georgia, Immigration Customs Enforcement, Iran, KGB, News, news you may have missed, Russia, United States, Vladimir Putin

Comment: Is There a ‘DNA Problem’ in US Spying?

January 5, 2010 by intelNews 8 Comments

Sam Tanenhaus

By IAN ALLEN* | intelNews.org |
The controversy of the apparent ineffectiveness of US intelligence agencies to uncover the so-called Christmas Day bomb plot has reignited the discussion about the operational shortcomings of the US intelligence community. Sam Tanenhaus, editor of of The New York Times Book Review, has authored an interesting commentary, in which he delves into some of what he sees as the design deficiencies in American intelligence.

News you may have missed #0242

January 5, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

US signs record US military aid to Israel. US President Barack Obama has just signed a massive 10-year deal for total of $30 billion to be given to Israel over the next decade (including $2.77 billion in 2010), funds that are mainly to be spent on US military hardware. But the Israelis are loudly complaining about the US also giving weapons to Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates.
Which group perpetrated suicide attack on CIA? Various Taliban factions in Pakistan and Afghanistan are competing for credit for the devastating attack on the CIA last week.

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Afghanistan, al-Qaeda, CIA, Egypt, financial aid, Israel, Jordan, News, news you may have missed, Obama Administration, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, suicide bombings, Taliban, United Arab Emirates, United States, weapons trade

News you may have missed #0241

January 4, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

3 of 7 CIA agents killed in Afghanistan are identified. They are Scott Michael Roberson, 39, from Virginia, Jeremy Jason Wise, 35, from Ohio, and Harold E. Brown Jr., 37, also from Virginia.
Al-Qaeda greater now than on 9/11, says ex-CIA agent. The results of eight years of the so-called US “war on terrorism” are plain to intelligence insiders.

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Afghanistan, al-Qaeda, CIA, Harold E. Brown Jr., Jeremy Jason Wise, News, news you may have missed, Scott Michael Roberson, suicide bombings, United States, War on Terrorism

Breaking news: CIA officers were killed by Jordanian double spy

January 4, 2010 by intelNews 2 Comments

Chapman FOB

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Ever since I posted “The Meaning of the Suicide Attack on the CIA” on this blog, I have been telling reporters who contacted me that the attack at Forward Operating Base (FOB) Chapman was probably carried out by a double agent. I dismissed claims on other websites that the bomber had been just a “potential recruit” who was “not required to go through full security checks [at Chapman FOB] in order to help gain [his] trust”. Instead, as I wrote on Saturday, I suggested that “the bomber was able to evade safety search standards [at the US base] by relying on a long-term informant-handler relationship with CIA personnel stationed at the outpost. This would lead to the strong possibility that the informant-turned-bomber had been groomed as a double agent from the very start by local Taliban operatives”. A news report has just appeared on NBC, which appears to confirm just that: namely that the suicide bomber had been “an al-Qaeda double agent” who was “arrested by Jordanian intelligence more than a year ago”, and turned over to the Americans by his Jordanian handlers, who believed he “had been successfully reformed”. Read more of this post

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with Afghanistan, al-Qaeda, CIA, double agents, Forward Operating Base Chapman, General Intelligence Department (Jordan), Humam Khalil Abu-Mulal al-Balawi, Humam Khalil al-Balawi, informants, Jordan, Jordanian royal family, News, Pakistan, Sharif Ali biin Zeid, suicide bombings, United States, Zarqa (Jordan)

US court upholds NSA’s refusal to admit or deny wiretap data

January 3, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

The Glomar

By IAN ALLEN | intelNews.org |
A US federal appeals court has concluded that the National Security Agency can refuse to admit or deny it possesses information about the US government spying on lawyers representing Guantánamo prison detainees. The decision by the 2^nd US Circuit Court of Appeals in New York relates to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request under a civil liberties lawsuit challenging post-9/11 warrantless surveillance operations by US agencies. The latter typically respond to most FOIA requests by confirming or denying possession of information relating to particular requests, and then by proceeding to either deny release, or release selected segments of the requested data. It is rare for an agency to refuse even to acknowledge the existence of information sought through FOIA. Read more of this post

Filed under Expert news and commentary on intelligence, espionage, spies and spying Tagged with CIA, civil liberties, Cold War, domestic intelligence, FOIA, Glomar Explorer, Glomar response, government secrecy, Guantánamo Bay Detention Camp, Hawaii, history, intelligence legislation, lawsuits, maritime intelligence, New York, News, NSA, Project JENNIFER, United States, USSR, warrantless communications interception

News you may have missed #0239

January 2, 2010 by intelNews Leave a comment

Iran denies secret deal to import Kazakh uranium. Iran and Kazakhstan have denied a report that they were close to clinching a deal to transfer to Iran 1,350 tons of Kazakh purified uranium ore. The IAEA has declined comment.
US travel security lapses to mark end of the line for DHS? The US Department of Homeland Security “is adrift and treated as an orphan by the rest of the [US intelligence] community but is so badly staffed by low quality people that no other agency will ever take them seriously”, according to an anonymous former senior US intelligence official.