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2006 Intelligence News:

20061211

US - Iraq - Military - Police - Terrorism - Religion - Intelligence - Politics - Analysis - "Intensified Combat on Streets Likely." ... "President Bush's plan to send tens of thousands of U.S. and Iraqi reinforcements to Baghdad to jointly confront Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias is likely to touch off a more dangerous phase of the war, featuring months of fighting in the streets of the Iraqi capital, current and former military officials warned." ... "The prospect of a more intense battle in the Iraqi capital could put U.S. military commanders in exactly the sort of tough urban fight that war planners strove to avoid during the spring 2003 invasion of the country. The plan to partner U.S. and Iraqi units may compel American soldiers to rely on questionable Iraqi army and police forces as never before. And while the president insisted there is no timetable associated with the troop increase, military officials said sustaining it for more than a few months would place a major new strain on U.S. forces that already are feeling burdened by an unexpectedly long and difficult war." ... "Most of all, the White House's insistence on confronting all insurgents and militias, both Sunni and Shiite, may mean that the U.S. military will wind up fighting the Mahdi Army of radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. That militia is estimated by some U.S. intelligence officials to have grown over the past year to about 60,000 fighters, and some in the Pentagon consider it more militarily effective than the Iraqi army." -By Thomas E. Ricks and Ann Scott Tyson -WashingtonPost

20061110

US - Government - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Privacy - Environment - Health - Seniors - Drugs - Oil - Industry - Legal - History - Missouri - "Democrats are set to subpoena: The new majority is expected to hold hearings on military spending and the Iraq war -- just for starters." ... "[Missouri Democrat] Rep. Ike Skelton knows what he will do in one of his first acts as chairman of the Armed Services Committee in the Democratic-led House: resurrect the subcommittee on oversight and investigations." ... "The panel was disbanded by the Republicans after they won control of Congress in 1994. Now, Skelton (D-Mo.) intends to use it as a forum to probe Pentagon spending and the Bush administration's conduct of the Iraq war." ... "With control of every committee in Congress starting in January, the new majority will inherit broad powers to subpoena and investigate. And that is expected to translate into wide-ranging and contentious hearings." ... "The agenda is likely to be dominated by the Iraq war, but could include probes into the Bush administration's warrantless surveillance, environmental policies and new prescription-drug program for seniors. Industries, such as oil companies, could also come under closer scrutiny." ... ""This could be remembered as a historically unique period in which an administration got immunity from Congress to engage in errors with impunity," said Charles Tiefer, a University of Baltimore law professor and a former House counsel." ... "Democrats are expected to bore into the Iraq war, including review of no-bid contracts for reconstruction, intelligence failures and decisions to ignore the advice of military commanders about troop levels." (1, 2) -By Richard B. Schmitt and Richard Simon -LAtimes

20061108

Noteworthy - Secret - US - Iraq - Iran - Religious - Terrorism - Military - Intelligence - History - "Gates’ CIA Past Could Haunt Him in Confirmation Hearings." ... "President Bush’s pick to replace Donald H. Rumsfeld with former CIA Director Robert Gates is an odd one, considering it’s almost certain to revive festering questions about the Bush administration’s handling of pre-war intelligence on Iraq." ... "In early 1987, his role in the so-called Iran-Contra affair, a secret White House operation to sell weapons to radical Islamic Iran in exchange for the release of U.S. hostages — and cash for CIA-backed rebels in Nicaragua — came under scrutiny." ... "Then, in during his 1991 nomination hearings to run the CIA, Gates ran into a buzz saw of testimony from a former agency analyst who said that during the 1980s Gates had skewered intelligence to fit the convictions of senior Reagan administration officials that Soviet agents had concocted a plot to assassinate the pope and were arming and encouraging Marxist revolutionary groups to carry out terrorist attacks." ... "Both theories turned out to be wrong, according Carolyn McGiffert Ekedahl, who headed a team of CIA analysts assigned the task of investigating the theory." ... "Senior former CIA analyst Mel Goodman charged Gates with a number of improprieties, including “the imposition of intelligence judgments, often over the protests of the consensus in the Directorate of Intelligence, to slant intelligence . . . suppression of intelligence that didn’t support the Casey agenda . . . (and) use of the Directorate of Operations to slant intelligence of the Directorate of Intelligence.”" -By Jeff Stein -CQ.com

20061103

Secret - US - Iraq - Nuclear - Government - Military - Intelligence - Internet - Archive - History - Hoekstra - Michigan - Roberts - Kansas - Legislation - Politics - "U.S. Web Archive Is Said to Reveal a Nuclear Primer." ... "Last March, the federal government set up a Web site to make public a vast archive of Iraqi documents captured during the war. The Bush administration did so under pressure from Congressional Republicans who had said they hoped to “leverage the Internet” to find new evidence of the prewar dangers posed by Saddam Hussein." ... "But in recent weeks, the site has posted some documents that weapons experts say are a danger themselves: detailed accounts of Iraq’s secret nuclear research before the 1991 Persian Gulf war. The documents, the experts say, constitute a basic guide to building an atom bomb." ... "Last night, the government shut down the Web site after The New York Times asked about complaints from weapons experts and arms-control officials. A spokesman for the director of national intelligence said access to the site had been suspended “pending a review to ensure its content is appropriate for public viewing.”" ... "Officials of the International Atomic Energy Agency, fearing that the information could help states like Iran develop nuclear arms, had privately protested last week to the American ambassador to the agency, according to European diplomats who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the issue’s sensitivity. One diplomat said the agency’s technical experts “were shocked” at the public disclosures." ... "The documents, roughly a dozen in number, contain charts, diagrams, equations and lengthy narratives about bomb building that nuclear experts who have viewed them say go beyond what is available elsewhere on the Internet and in other public forums. For instance, the papers give detailed information on how to build nuclear firing circuits and triggering explosives, as well as the radioactive cores of atom bombs." ... "The director of national intelligence, John D. Negroponte, had resisted setting up the Web site, which some intelligence officials felt implicitly raised questions about the competence and judgment of government analysts. But President Bush approved the site’s creation after Congressional Republicans proposed legislation to force the documents’ release." ... "The campaign for the Web site was led by the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Representative Peter Hoekstra [Republican] of Michigan. Last November, he and his Senate counterpart, Pat Roberts [Republican] of Kansas, wrote to Mr. Negroponte, asking him to post the Iraqi material." (1, 2, 3) -By William J. Broad with contributions by Scott Shane -NYTimes

20061102

Noteworthy - US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Politics - History - "Bush owes troops an apology, not Kerry: Olbermann: Bush 'appearing to be stupid' about Kerry's joke." ... "A brief reminder, Mr. Bush: You are not the United States of America." ... "You are merely a politician whose entire legacy will have been a willingness to make anything political; to have, in this case, refused to acknowledge that the insult wasn't about the troops, and that the insult was not even truly about you either, that the insult, in fact, is you." ... "So now John Kerry has apologized to the troops; apologized for the Republicans' deliberate distortions." ... "Thus, the president will now begin the apologies he owes our troops, right?" ... "This president must apologize to the troops for having suggested, six weeks ago, that the chaos in Iraq, the death and the carnage, the slaughtered Iraqi civilians and the dead American service personnel, will, to history, "look like just a comma."" ... "This president must apologize to the troops because the intelligence he claims led us into Iraq proved to be undeniably and irredeemably wrong." ... "This president must apologize to the troops for having laughed about the failure of that intelligence at a banquet while our troops were in harm's way." ... "This president must apologize to the troops because the streets of Iraq were not strewn with flowers and its residents did not greet them as liberators." ... "This president must apologize to the troops because his administration ran out of "plan" after barely two months." ... "This president must apologize to the troops for getting 2,815 of them killed." (1, 2, 3, 4) -By Keith Olbermann -MSNBC

20061101

Secret - US - Iraq - Religious - Police - Politics - Intelligence - "Military Charts Movement of Conflict in Iraq Toward Chaos." ... "A classified briefing prepared two weeks ago by the United States Central Command portrays Iraq as edging toward chaos, in a chart that the military is using as a barometer of civil conflict." ... "A one-page slide shown at the Oct. 18 briefing provides a rare glimpse into how the military command that oversees the war is trying to track its trajectory, particularly in terms of sectarian fighting." ... "The slide includes a color-coded bar chart that is used to illustrate an “Index of Civil Conflict.” It shows a sharp escalation in sectarian violence since the bombing of a Shiite shrine in Samarra in February, and tracks a further worsening this month despite a concerted American push to tamp down the violence in Baghdad." ... "In fashioning the index, the military is weighing factors like the ineffectual Iraqi police and the dwindling influence of moderate religious and political figures, rather than more traditional military measures such as the enemy’s fighting strength and the control of territory." ... "The conclusions the Central Command has drawn from these trends are not encouraging, according to a copy of the slide that was obtained by The New York Times. The slide shows Iraq as moving sharply away from “peace,” an ideal on the far left side of the chart, to a point much closer to the right side of the spectrum, a red zone marked “chaos.” As depicted in the command’s chart, the needle has been moving steadily toward the far right of the chart." ... "An intelligence summary at the bottom of the slide reads “urban areas experiencing ‘ethnic cleansing’ campaigns to consolidate control” and “violence at all-time high, spreading geographically.” According to a Central Command official, the index on civil strife has been a staple of internal command briefings for most of this year. The analysis was prepared by the command’s intelligence directorate, which is overseen by Brig. Gen. John M. Custer." -By Michael R. Gordon -NYTimes

20061024

Noteworthy - US - Guantanamo Bay - Cuba - Military - Intelligence - Torture - Terrorism - Prison - Religion - People - War Crimes - Law Enforcement - Politics - "Can the '20th hijacker' of Sept. 11 stand trial? Aggressive interrogation at Guantanamo may prevent his prosecution." ... "Mohammed al-Qahtani, detainee No. 063, was forced to wear a bra. He had a thong placed on his head. He was massaged by a female interrogator who straddled him like a lap dancer. He was told that his mother and sisters were whores. He was told that other detainees knew he was gay. He was forced to dance with a male interrogator. He was strip-searched in front of women. He was led on a leash and forced to perform dog tricks. He was doused with water. He was prevented from praying. He was forced to watch as an interrogator squatted over his Koran." ... "That much is known. These details were among the findings of the U.S. Army's investigation of al-Qahtani's aggressive interrogation at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba." ... "But only now is a picture emerging of how the interrogation policy developed, and the battle that law enforcement agents waged, inside Guantanamo and in the offices of the Pentagon, against harsh treatment of al-Qahtani and other detainees by military intelligence interrogators." ... "In interviews with MSNBC.com - the first time they have spoken publicly -former senior law enforcement agents described their attempts to stop the abusive interrogations. The agents of the Pentagon's Criminal Investigation Task Force, working to build legal cases against suspected terrorists, said they objected to coercive tactics used by a separate team of intelligence interrogators soon after Guantanamo's prison camp opened in early 2002. They ultimately carried their battle up to the office of Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, who approved the more aggressive techniques to be used on al-Qahtani and others." ... "Although they believed the abusive techniques were probably illegal, the Pentagon cops said their objection was practical. They argued that abusive interrogations were not likely to produce truthful information, either for preventing more al-Qaida attacks or prosecuting terrorists." ... "And they described their disappointment when military prosecutors told them not to worry about making a criminal case against al-Qahtani, the suspected "20th hijacker" of Sept. 11, because what had been done to him would prevent him from ever being put on trial." ... "Defense Department e-mails seen by MSNBC.com show that a delegation visiting Guantanamo on Sept. 25, 2002, included Alberto R. Gonzales, then the White House counsel and now attorney general; David S. Addington, legal counsel to Vice President Dick Cheney, now his chief of staff; Timothy E. Flanigan, the deputy White House counsel; William Haynes III, the Pentagon general counsel; Larry Thompson, then deputy attorney general; Christopher A. Wray, the principal associate deputy attorney general, now head of Criminal Division at the Justice Department; and John Yoo, a lawyer in the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, who reportedly had just helped write an Aug. 1, 2002, "torture memo" to Gonzales, defining torture narrowly as causing pain equivalent to organ failure or death." ... "The visiting VIPs met with Gen. Dunlavey and his staff, but not with any of the law enforcement investigators who opposed the aggressive interrogations." ... "Under the Military Commissions Act signed last week by President Bush, statements made under torture would not be admissible in a military trial." ... "But the law says a military judge could accept statements made under coercion. A court may have to decide which category, torture or coercion, encompasses such techniques as a fake trip to Egypt, sleep deprivation, and being forced to do dog tricks. The new law also extends legal protection from prosecution for war crimes to any U.S. personnel who used coercive tactics, if they believed in good faith that what they were doing was lawful." (1, 2, 3, 4) -By Bill Dedman -MSNBC

20061013

Secret - US - World - German - Syrian - Military - Terrorism - Torture - Prisons - Politics - Journalist - Book - "Inside the CIA's Secret Prisons Program: An explosive new book provides a rare glimpse into the full extent of the agency's controversial terror renditions — and the curious coalition of partners who helped the U.S. pull them off." ... "In December of 2001, U.S. agents arranged to have a German citizen flown to a Syrian jail called the Palestine Branch, renowned for its use of torture, and later offered to pass written questions to Syrian interrogators to pose to the prisoner, according to a secret German intelligence report shown to TIME on Wednesday. The report is described in the new book Ghost Plane: The True Story of the CIA Torture Program by British investigative journalist Stephen Grey. The complex arrangement was part of the CIA's sprawling practice of extraordinary renditions, the secret transfer of terror suspects to hidden prisons across the world — which has involved the aid of numerous foreign governments and the knowledge of key Western European allies, according to the book, which was shown to TIME by the author. After U.S. officials long refused to confirm the CIA's secret detention of terror suspects abroad, President Bush last month admitted that terror suspects had been transferred abroad to secret CIA facilities, but U.S. officials continue to deny that such prisoners have been tortured, saying that foreign governments assured them that they would be treated fairly." ... "The cooperation between an unlikely coalition of intelligence agencies did not end there. The intelligence report gives a rare glimpse into the favors exchanged between governments during the CIA renditions. One day after Germany learned that the Syrians were holding Zammar, the CIA offered the German foreign-intelligence agency BND the chance to put written questions to their prisoner. The intelligence report doesn't make clear whether CIA interrogators had direct physical access to Zammar. In June 2002, Syrian officials offered German interrogators access to Zammar in prison, according to the 263-page report by the BND, marked "Geheim" (Secret). That same day, the BND chief asked Germany's federal prosecutors to drop their charges against Syrian intelligence agents who had been arrested in Germany for allegedly collecting information on Syrian dissidents." (1, 2) -By Vivienne Walt -TIME.com

20061007

Rove - Abramoff - Ralston - Sports - Entertainment - Money - Government - Intelligence - Northern Mariana Islands - E-Mail - Safavian - "Rove Aide Linked To Abramoff Resigns: Scandal Claims Its First West Wing Job." ... "A top aide to White House strategist Karl Rove resigned yesterday after disclosures that she accepted gifts from and passed information to now-convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff, becoming the first official in the West Wing to lose a job in the influence-peddling scandal." ... "Susan B. Ralston submitted her resignation to avoid causing political damage to President Bush a month before the midterm elections, officials said. "She did not want to be a distraction to the White House at this important time," said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino." ... "A congressional report showed last week that Ralston accepted sometimes-pricey tickets to nine sports and entertainment events from Abramoff while she provided him with inside White House information. The bipartisan report said there is no evidence that Rove knew of or approved of Ralston's actions, and sources said yesterday that the White House was surprised by the report's revelations." ... "The only other White House official caught up in the probe has been David H. Safavian, the procurement chief for the Office of Management and Budget, who was convicted in June of lying about his ties to Abramoff." ... "As a former Abramoff assistant, Ralston played intermediary between the lobbyist and Rove. The congressional report found 66 Abramoff contacts with the White House, more than half of them with Ralston. In addition, Abramoff's lobbying colleagues contacted Ralston 69 times." ... "On Oct. 21, 2001, Ralston e-mailed Abramoff that Rove had read an Abramoff memo about a political endorsement in the Mariana Islands governor's race, a little-noticed election but one important to Abramoff because he had lucrative clients there. Ralston reported to Abramoff that Rove had agreed, writing the next day: "You win :)."" (1, 2) -By Peter Baker and James V. Grimaldi -WashingtonPost

20061002

Government - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - History - Politics - Reporting - Book - "Records Show Tenet Briefed Rice on Al Qaeda Threat." ... "A review of White House records has determined that George J. Tenet, then the director of central intelligence, did brief Condoleezza Rice and other top officials on July 10, 2001, about the looming threat from Al Qaeda, a State Department spokesman said Monday." ... "The account by Sean McCormack came hours after Ms. Rice, the secretary of state, told reporters aboard her airplane that she did not recall the specific meeting on July 10, 2001, noting that she had met repeatedly with Mr. Tenet that summer about terrorist threats. Ms. Rice, the national security adviser at the time, said it was “incomprehensible” she ignored dire terrorist threats two months before the Sept. 11 attacks." ... "Mr. McCormack also said records show that the Sept. 11 commission was informed about the meeting, a fact that former intelligence officials and members of the commission confirmed on Monday." ... "When details of the meeting emerged last week in a new book by Bob Woodward of The Washington Post, Bush administration officials questioned Mr. Woodward’s reporting." ... "Now, after several days, both current and former Bush administration officials have confirmed parts of Mr. Woodward’s account." ... "Officials now agree that on July 10, 2001, Mr. Tenet and his counterterrorism deputy, J. Cofer Black, were so alarmed about an impending Al Qaeda attack that they demanded an emergency meeting at the White House with Ms. Rice and her National Security Council staff." ... "According to two former intelligence officials, Mr. Tenet told those assembled at the White House about the growing body of intelligence the Central Intelligence Agency had collected pointing to an impending Al Qaeda attack." -By Philip Shenon and Mark Mazzetti -NYTimes
Government - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - History - Politics - "Rumsfeld, Ashcroft received warning of al Qaida attack before 9/11." ... "Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and former Attorney General John Ashcroft received the same CIA briefing about an imminent al-Qaida strike on an American target that was given to the White House two months before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks." ... "The State Department's disclosure Monday that the pair was briefed within a week after then-National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice was told about the threat on July 10, 2001, raised new questions about what the Bush administration did in response, and about why so many officials have claimed they never received or don't remember the warning." ... "One official who helped to prepare the briefing, which included a PowerPoint presentation, described it as a "10 on a scale of 1 to 10" that "connected the dots" in earlier intelligence reports to present a stark warning that al-Qaida, which had already killed Americans in Yemen, Saudi Arabia and East Africa, was poised to strike again." ... "Former CIA Director George Tenet gave the independent Sept. 11, 2001, commission the same briefing on Jan. 28, 2004, but the commission made no mention of the warning in its 428-page final report. According to three former senior intelligence officials, Tenet testified to commissioner Richard Ben-Veniste and to Philip Zelikow, the panel's executive director and the principal author of its report, who's now Rice's top adviser." ... "A new book by Bob Woodward of The Washington Post alleges that Rice failed to take the July 2001 warning seriously when it was delivered at a White House meeting by Tenet, Cofer Black, then the agency's chief of top counterterrorism, and a third CIA official whose identity remains protected." ... "Rice's deputy, Stephen J. Hadley, who became national security adviser after she became secretary of state, and Rice's top counterterrorism aide, Richard Clarke, also were present." -By Jonathan S. Landay, Warren P. Stroebel, and John Walcott with contributions by Matt Stearns and Drew Brown -McClatchy via -RealCities
Secret - Government - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - Politics - History - "9/11 Commission failed to disclose 'scary' briefing also given to White House." ... "The independent Sept. 11, 2001, commission was given the same “scary” briefing about an imminent al Qaida attack on a U.S. target that was presented to the White House two months before the attacks, but failed to disclose the warning in its 428-page report." ... "Former CIA Director George Tenet presented the briefing to commission member Richard Ben Veniste and executive director Philip Zelikow in secret testimony at CIA headquarters on Jan. 28, 2004, said three former senior agency officials." ... "Tenet raised the matter himself, displayed slides from a Power Point presentation that he and other officials had given to then-national security adviser Condoleezza Rice on July 10, 2001, and offered to testify on the matter in public if the commission asked him to, they said." ... "Richard Clarke, who was the National Security Council's top counter-terrorism advisor, confirmed the former senior intelligence officials’ account. Clarke was present when Tenet briefed Rice, along with deputy national security adviser Steven Hadley, CIA counter-terrorism chief Cofer Black and another CIA officer whose identity remains protected." -By Jonathan S. Landay -McClatchy via -RealCities

20060929

Noteworthy - US - Iraq - Political - Intelligence - History- Book - "Book Says Bush Ignored Urgent Warning on Iraq." ... "The White House ignored an urgent warning in September 2003 from a top Iraq adviser who said that thousands of additional American troops were desperately needed to quell the insurgency there, according to a new book by Bob Woodward, the Washington Post reporter and author. The book describes a White House riven by dysfunction and division over the war." ... "The warning is described in “State of Denial,” scheduled for publication on Monday by Simon & Schuster. The book says President Bush’s top advisers were often at odds among themselves, and sometimes were barely on speaking terms, but shared a tendency to dismiss as too pessimistic assessments from American commanders and others about the situation in Iraq." ... "As late as November 2003, Mr. Bush is quoted as saying of the situation in Iraq: “I don’t want anyone in the cabinet to say it is an insurgency. I don’t think we are there yet.”" ... "Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld is described as disengaged from the nuts-and-bolts of occupying and reconstructing Iraq — a task that was initially supposed to be under the direction of the Pentagon — and so hostile toward Condoleezza Rice, then the national security adviser, that President Bush had to tell him to return her phone calls. The American commander for the Middle East, Gen. John P. Abizaid, is reported to have told visitors to his headquarters in Qatar in the fall of 2005 that “Rumsfeld doesn’t have any credibility anymore” to make a public case for the American strategy for victory in Iraq." ... "Robert D. Blackwill, then the top Iraq adviser on the National Security Council, is said to have issued his warning about the need for more troops in a lengthy memorandum sent to Ms. Rice. The book says Mr. Blackwill’s memorandum concluded that more ground troops, perhaps as many as 40,000, were desperately needed." ... "It says that Mr. Blackwill and L. Paul Bremer III, then the top American official in Iraq, later briefed Ms. Rice and Stephen J. Hadley, her deputy, about the pressing need for more troops during a secure teleconference from Iraq. It says the White House did nothing in response." (1, 2) -By David E. Sanger with contributions by Mark Mazzetti, David Johnston, and Julie Bosman -NYTimes
Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - Torture - Death Penalty - Human Rights - War Crimes - Law - Politics - "Many Rights in U.S. Legal System Absent in New Bill." ... "Included in the bill, passed by Republican majorities in the Senate yesterday and the House on Wednesday, are unique rules that bar terrorism suspects from challenging their detention or treatment through traditional habeas corpus petitions. They allow prosecutors, under certain conditions, to use evidence collected through hearsay or coercion to seek criminal convictions." ... "The bill rejects the right to a speedy trial and limits the traditional right to self-representation by requiring that defendants accept military defense attorneys. Panels of military officers need not reach unanimous agreement to win convictions, except in death penalty cases, and appeals must go through a second military panel before reaching a federal civilian court." ... "By writing into law for the first time the definition of an "unlawful enemy combatant," the bill empowers the executive branch to detain indefinitely anyone it determines to have "purposefully and materially" supported anti-U.S. hostilities. Only foreign nationals among those detainees can be tried by the military commissions, as they are known, and sentenced to decades in jail or put to death." ... "At the same time, the bill immunizes U.S. officials from prosecution for cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment of detainees who the military and the CIA captured before the end of last year. It gives the president a dominant but not exclusive role in setting the rules for future interrogations of terrorism suspects." ... "But Tom Malinowski, the Washington office director for Human Rights Watch, said Bush's motivation is partly to protect his reputation by gaining congressional endorsement of controversial actions already taken. "He's been accused of authorizing criminal torture in a way that has hurt America and could come back to haunt our troops. One of his purposes is to have Congress stand with him in the dock," Malinowski said." -By R. Jeffrey Smith -WashingtonPost

20060925

US - Afghanistan - Iraq - Pakistan - Osama bin Laden - Religious - Terrorism - Money - Politics - Military - Intelligence - "Afghanistan, 5 years later: U.S. confront Taliban's return." ... "Afghanistan has become Iraq on a slow burn. Five years after they were ousted, the Taliban are back in force, their ranks renewed by a new generation of diehards. Violence, opium trafficking, ethnic tensions, official corruption and political anarchy are all worse than they've been at any time since the U.S.-led intervention in 2001." ... "By failing to stop Taliban leaders and Osama bin Laden from escaping into Pakistan, then diverting troops and resources to Iraq before finishing the job in Afghanistan, the Bush administration left the door open to a Taliban comeback. Compounding the problem, reconstruction efforts have been slow and limited, and the U.S. and NATO didn't anticipate the extent and ferocity of the Taliban resurgence or the alliances the insurgents have formed with other Islamic extremists and with the world's leading opium traffickers." ... "There are only 42,000 U.S. and NATO-led troops to secure a country that's half again the size of Iraq, where 150,000 U.S.-led coalition troops are deployed. Suicide bombings have soared from two in all of 2002 to about one every five days. Civilian casualties are mounting." ... "James Dobbins, who was President Bush's special envoy to Afghanistan, said that the administration dismissed European offers of a major peacekeeping force after the U.S. intervention and almost immediately began shifting military assets to invade Iraq." ... "The White House "resisted the whole concept of peacekeeping," said Dobbins. "They wanted to demonstrate a different approach, one that would be much lower cost. So the decision to skimp on manpower and deploy one-fiftieth the troops as were deployed in Bosnia was accompanied by a decision to underplay economic assistance." ... ""We invaded Afghanistan in October 2001. We conquered the country in December, and Congress was not asked to provide any (reconstruction) money until the following October," he continued. "Much of the money didn't show up for years. And not only were the actual sums relatively small, but with the failure to establish even a modicum of security in the countryside, there was no way to spend it."" ... "There are 22,000 U.S. troops in Afghanistan. But there are only 5,000 U.S. combat soldiers in eastern Afghanistan bordering Taliban refuges in Pakistan, a 27,000-square-mile area of vast deserts and mountains nearly the size of South Carolina." ... "ISAF [International Security Assistance Force led by NATO], with 20,000 troops from 36 nations, has only 8,000 troops for 77,000 square miles - slightly smaller than Minnesota - in the south." ... "The insurgents and their leaders operate from Pakistan, aided by Pakistani officials, radical Islamic parties and al Qaida. They're flush with recruits from Islamist seminaries on both sides of the border that offer religious instruction and combat training." ... "Taliban extremists also have been to Iraq for training in combat and bomb-making, and Iraqi insurgents have traveled to Pakistan to forge closer ties with Afghan and Pakistani extremists, according to U.S. intelligence officials." ... "The Afghan army has about 30,000 troops who participate in operations with U.S. and ISAF forces. But they lack basic equipment - helmets, radios and armored vehicles - and rely on U.S. and other foreign funds for their salaries." -By Jonathan S. Landay -McClatchy-RealCities

20060924

US - Government - Intelligence - Iraq - Global - Religious - Military - Terrorism - Politics - "Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Worsens Terror Threat." ... "A stark assessment of terrorism trends by American intelligence agencies has found that the American invasion and occupation of Iraq has helped spawn a new generation of Islamic radicalism and that the overall terrorist threat has grown since the Sept. 11 attacks." ... "The classified National Intelligence Estimate attributes a more direct role to the Iraq war in fueling radicalism than that presented either in recent White House documents or in a report released Wednesday by the House Intelligence Committee, according to several officials in Washington involved in preparing the assessment or who have read the final document." ... "The intelligence estimate, completed in April, is the first formal appraisal of global terrorism by United States intelligence agencies since the Iraq war began, and represents a consensus view of the 16 disparate spy services inside government. Titled “Trends in Global Terrorism: Implications for the United States,’’ it asserts that Islamic radicalism, rather than being in retreat, has metastasized and spread across the globe." ... "An opening section of the report, “Indicators of the Spread of the Global Jihadist Movement,” cites the Iraq war as a reason for the diffusion of jihad ideology." ... "The report “says that the Iraq war has made the overall terrorism problem worse,” said one American intelligence official." ... "The estimate’s judgments confirm some predictions of a National Intelligence Council report completed in January 2003, two months before the Iraq invasion. That report stated that the approaching war had the potential to increase support for political Islam worldwide and could increase support for some terrorist objectives." ... "The [new] estimate concludes that the radical Islamic movement has expanded from a core of Qaeda operatives and affiliated groups to include a new class of “self-generating” cells inspired by Al Qaeda’s leadership but without any direct connection to Osama bin Laden or his top lieutenants." ... "In early 2005, the National Intelligence Council released a study concluding that Iraq had become the primary training ground for the next generation of terrorists, and that veterans of the Iraq war might ultimately overtake Al Qaeda’s current leadership in the constellation of the global jihad leadership." (1, 2) -By Mark Mazzetti -NYTimes
US - Iraq - Global - Military - Religious - Terrorism - Politics - "Spy Agencies Say Iraq War Hurting U.S. Terror Fight." ... "The war in Iraq has become a primary recruitment vehicle for violent Islamic extremists, motivating a new generation of potential terrorists around the world whose numbers may be increasing faster than the United States and its allies can reduce the threat, U.S. intelligence analysts have concluded." ... "A 30-page National Intelligence Estimate completed in April cites the "centrality" of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and the insurgency that has followed, as the leading inspiration for new Islamic extremist networks and cells that are united by little more than an anti-Western agenda. It concludes that, rather than contributing to eventual victory in the global counterterrorism struggle, the situation in Iraq has worsened the U.S. position, according to officials familiar with the classified document." ... ""It's a very candid assessment," one intelligence official said yesterday of the estimate, the first formal examination of global terrorist trends written by the National Intelligence Council since the March 2003 invasion. "It's stating the obvious."" ... "The NIE, whose contents were first reported by the New York Times, coincides with public statements by senior intelligence officials describing a different kind of conflict than the one outlined by President Bush in a series of recent speeches marking the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks." ... "The latest terrorism assessment paints a portrait of a global war in which Iraq is less the central front of actual combat than a unifying battle cry for disparate extremist groups and even individuals. "It is just those kinetic actions that lead to the radicalization of others," a senior counterterrorism official said earlier this summer. "Surgical strikes? Nothing is surgical about military operations. They tend to have impacts, affects."" ... "But "a really big hole" in the U.S. strategy, a second counterterrorism official said, "is that we focus on the terrorists and very little on how they are created. If you looked at all the resources of the U.S. government, we spent 85, 90 percent on current terrorists, not on how people are radicalized."" (1, 2) -By Karen DeYoung with contributions by Dafna Linzer and Thomas E. Ricks, and Magda Jean-Louis -WashingtonPost

20060922

Torture - Secret - Noteworthy - United States - Government- International - Military - Intelligence - Terrorism - Prisons - Human Rights - War Crimes - Law - Politics - Ariz - SC - VA - "The Abuse Can Continue: Senators won't authorize torture, but they won't prevent it, either." ... "The bad news is that Mr. Bush, as he made clear yesterday, intends to continue using the CIA to secretly detain and abuse certain terrorist suspects. He will do so by issuing his own interpretation of the Geneva Conventions in an executive order and by relying on questionable Justice Department opinions that authorize such practices as exposing prisoners to hypothermia and prolonged sleep deprivation. Under the compromise agreed to yesterday, Congress would recognize his authority to take these steps and prevent prisoners from appealing them to U.S. courts. The bill would also immunize CIA personnel from prosecution for all but the most serious abuses and protect those who in the past violated U.S. law against war crimes." ... "In short, it's hard to credit the statement by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) yesterday that "there's no doubt that the integrity and letter and spirit of the Geneva Conventions have been preserved." In effect, the agreement means that U.S. violations of international human rights law can continue as long as Mr. Bush is president, with Congress's tacit assent. If they do, America's standing in the world will continue to suffer, as will the fight against terrorism." ... "In theory, Congress could override Mr. Bush's regulations governing treatment if it judges that they are being used to authorize unacceptable practices." ... "But the senators who have fought to rein in the administration's excesses -- led by Sens. McCain, Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) and John W. Warner (R-Va.) -- failed to break Mr. Bush's commitment to "alternative" methods that virtually every senior officer of the U.S. military regards as unreliable, counterproductive and dangerous for Americans who may be captured by hostile governments." ... "Mr. Bush will go down in history for his embrace of torture and bear responsibility for the enormous damage that has caused."-WashingtonPost

20060921

Secret - Torture - United States - World - Military - Intelligence - Terrorism - Prisons - Human Rights - Law - Michael Hayden - "CIA Praises Deal; Harsh Techniques Would Continue." ... "The CIA director, General Michael Hayden, praised the deal reached in Congress today that, in effect, would permit CIA interrogators to use harsh techniques critics call torture." ... "President Bush and the CIA have repeatedly maintained the procedures are not torture and have saved American lives." ... "Human rights groups maintain the procedures constitute a form of torture, and the United States military has banned its personnel from using water boarding [which may be allowed under the current Republcan congressional deal]." ... "Today's congressional deal, if signed into law, would allow the CIA to continue the six techniques and to continue to run secret prisons overseas for select terror suspects." -By Brian Ross -ABCNEWS.com

20060919

US - Iraq - Religious - Military - Intelligence - Politics - "Young children fight U.S. troops in Iraq." ... "Shiite militias are encouraging children — some as young as 6 or 7 — to hurl stones and gasoline bombs at U.S. convoys, hoping to lure American troops into ambushes or provoke them into shooting back, U.S. soldiers say." ... "Gangs of up to 100 children assemble in Sadr City, stronghold of radical anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and his Mahdi Army militia, and in nearby neighborhoods, U.S. officers said in interviews this week." ... "Militants have used children before. Marines in the volatile city of Ramadi say Sunni Arab insurgents often send children to check out U.S. defenses or warn of approaching patrols. And Israeli troops have long faced stone-throwing Palestinian kids." ... "The incidents have seemed to increase since U.S. soldiers moved their security crackdown into Shiite neighborhoods surrounding eastern Baghdad's Sadr City. The U.S. crackdown in the capital is aimed at curbing the power of the Mahdi Army and other sectarian militias." ... "Army intelligence officers say they predicted before the offensive began this summer that militants in Baghdad would make use of children." -By Antonio Castaneda -AP via -Yahoo

20060918

Canada - US - Syria - Secret - Torture - Intelligence - Religious - Terrorism - Politics - "Canadian was falsely accused, panel says: Muslim held by U.S. was sent to Syria for interrogation." ... "Canadian intelligence officials passed false warnings and bad information to American agents about a Muslim Canadian citizen, after which U.S. authorities secretly whisked him to Syria, where he was tortured, a judicial report found Monday." ... "The report, released in Ottawa, was the result of a 2 1/2-year inquiry that represented one of the first public investigations into mistakes made as part of the United States' "extraordinary rendition" program, which has secretly spirited suspects to foreign countries for interrogation by often brutal methods." ... "The inquiry, which focused on the Canadian intelligence services, found that agents who were under pressure to find terrorists after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, falsely labeled an Ottawa computer consultant, Maher Arar, as a dangerous radical. They asked U.S. authorities to put him and his wife, a university economist, on the al-Qaeda "watchlist," without justification, the report said." ... "Arar was also listed as "an Islamic extremist individual" who was in the Washington area on Sept. 11. The report concluded that he had no involvement in Islamic extremism and was on business in San Diego that day, said the head of the inquiry commission, Ontario Justice Dennis O'Connor." (1, 2) -WashingtonPost via -MSNBC

20060914

US - World - Military - Intelligence - Terrorism - Secret - Police - Prisoner - Human Rights - Legislation - South Carolina - Virginia - Arizona - "Senate Panel, Rebuffing Bush, Approves Terror Tribunal Measure." ... "A Senate committee, in a bipartisan rebuff to President George W. Bush, approved military tribunal legislation that would give more legal protection to suspected terrorists than the administration wants." ... "Four of the 13 Republicans on the panel joined the 11 Democrats to pass their version of the measure, rejecting Bush's proposal to bar defendants from seeing classified evidence prosecutors may want to use in court. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell endorsed the Senate approach, warning that the Bush administration is risking the safety of U.S. troops and worldwide opinion by permitting harsh treatment of detainees." ... "Today's Armed Services Committee vote would let suspected terrorists see evidence used against them and would bar statements obtained through torture or inhumane treatment. It also would authorize military judges to fashion declassified summaries of evidence and to dismiss charges if the prosecutors don't consent to the disclosures." ... "[South Carolina Republican Lindsey] Graham joined the panel's chairman, Virginia Republican John Warner, and Arizona Republican John McCain in resisting Bush's demand to redefine the terms ``cruel, inhumane and degrading'' in describing treatment barred by Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions." ... "Graham, a former Air Force lawyer, said that if the interpretation of the Geneva Conventions is changed, ``why wouldn't every other country do the same thing, have their secret police tell them to change the treaty obligations?''" -By James Rowley -Bloomberg
US - Iran - Iraq - Military - Nuclear - Intelligence - Politics - Peter Hoekstra - Mich - "U.N. Inspectors Dispute Iran Report By House Panel: Paper on Nuclear Aims Called Dishonest." ... "U.N. inspectors investigating Iran's nuclear program angrily complained to the Bush administration and to a Republican congressman yesterday about a recent House committee report on Iran's capabilities, calling parts of the document "outrageous and dishonest" and offering evidence to refute its central claims." ... "Officials of the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency said in a letter that the report contained some "erroneous, misleading and unsubstantiated statements." The letter, signed by a senior director at the agency, was addressed to Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), chairman of the House intelligence committee, which issued the report. A copy was hand-delivered to Gregory L. Schulte, the U.S. ambassador to the IAEA in Vienna." ... "The IAEA openly clashed with the Bush administration on pre-war assessments of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Relations all but collapsed when the agency revealed that the White House had based some allegations about an Iraqi nuclear program on forged documents." ... "After no such weapons were found in Iraq, the IAEA came under additional criticism for taking a cautious approach on Iran, which the White House says is trying to build nuclear weapons in secret. At one point, the administration orchestrated a campaign to remove the IAEA's director general, Mohamed ElBaradei. It failed, and he won the Nobel Peace Prize last year." -By Dafna Linzer -WashingtonPost

20060913

US - Afghanistan - Intelligence - Religious - Politics - "U.S. passes up chance to strike Taliban: Predator had suspected fighters in its sights, but military passed on shot." ... "U.S. military officials tell NBC News they had "high-level" Taliban fighters in their gunsights during a July reconnaissance flight but decided not to fire. The decision to pass on the target angered some in the military, but commanders say they have "no regrets."" ... "Army intelligence officers say the grainy black-and-white aerial photo taken by a Predator drone and obtained by NBC News on Tuesday shows some 190 suspected Taliban militants standing in several rows outside near a vehicle in Afghanistan." ... "The military said Wednesday that the group seen in the Predator image was apparently gathered for a funeral at a cemetery." ... "Intelligence officers monitoring the footage captured by the armed, unmanned aircraft tell NBC News they were prepared to fire at the group but were prevented from doing so by military rules of engagement that prohibit targeting a cemetery." ... "Such rules are in place in an effort to minimize collateral damage, the killing of innocent civilians or destruction of sensitive targets, such as religious sites." ... "Defense Department officials have said repeatedly that while they try to be mindful of religious and cultural sensitivities, they make no promises that such sites can always be avoided in battle because militants often seek cover in those and other civilian sites." -MSNBC

20060910

Money - People - 2006 Election - Intelligence - "In a Pivotal Year, GOP Plans to Get Personal: Millions to Go to Digging Up Dirt on Democrats." ... "Republicans are planning to spend the vast majority of their sizable financial war chest over the final 60 days of the [2006 Election] campaign attacking Democratic House and Senate candidates over personal issues and local controversies, GOP officials said." ... "The National Republican Congressional Committee, which this year dispatched a half-dozen operatives to comb through tax, court and other records looking for damaging information on Democratic candidates, plans to spend more than 90 percent of its $50 million-plus advertising budget on what officials described as negative ads." ... "The hope is that a vigorous effort to "define" opponents, in the parlance of GOP operatives, can help Republicans shift the midterm debate away from Iraq and limit losses this fall." (1, 2) -By Jim VandeHei and Chris Cillizza -WashingtonPost

20060908

Noteworthy - US - Iraq - Secret - Censored - Intelligence - Transportation - Government - Politics - Virginia - "[US Army Fort] Eustis chief: Iraq post-war plan muzzled: Army Brig. Gen. Mark Scheid, an early planner of the war, tells about challenges of invasion and rebuilding." ... "Months before the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld forbade military strategists from developing plans for securing post-war Iraq, the retiring commander of the Army Transportation Corps said Thursday." ... "In fact, said Brig. Gen. Mark Scheid, Rumsfeld said "he would fire the next person" who talked about the need for a post-war plan." ... "Rumsfeld did replace Gen. Eric Shinseki, the Army chief of staff in 2003, after Shinseki told Congress that hundreds of thousands of troops would be needed to secure post-war Iraq." ... "Scheid, who is also the commander of Fort Eustis in Newport News [Virginia], made his comments in an interview with the Daily Press. He retires in about three weeks." ... "Scheid said the planners continued to try "to write what was called Phase 4," or the piece of the plan that included post-invasion operations like occupation." ... "Even if the troops didn't stay, "at least we have to plan for it," Scheid said." ... ""I remember the secretary of defense saying that he would fire the next person that said that," Scheid said. "We would not do planning for Phase 4 operations, which would require all those additional troops that people talk about today." ... ""He said we will not do that because the American public will not back us if they think we are going over there for a long war."" -By Stephanie Heinatz with contributions by Tracy Sorensen -DailyPress.com
Noteworthy - US - Iraq - Military - Terrorism - Religion - Osama bin Laden - Dick Cheney - Politics - "Intelligence Didn't Back Bush Iraq Claims, Senate Reports Say." ... "Bush administration claims justifying the war against Iraq were based on fragmented, conflicting, and at times unreliable intelligence, according to two reports released today by the Senate Intelligence Committee." ... "Administration statements that Saddam Hussein was allied with Osama bin Laden and was helping al-Qaeda obtain chemical and biological weapons proved wrong and misleading and weren't based on solid intelligence in its possession, the declassified Senate reports said." ... "Contrary to assertions by Vice President Dick Cheney and other senior Bush administration officials, Hussein didn't have links to al-Qaeda and the Sept. 11 terrorist plot, the reports said." ... "``Saddam Hussein was distrustful of al-Qaeda and viewed Islamic extremists as a threat to his regime,'' one of the reports said. Hussein refused all requests from al-Qaeda to provide material or operational support, said the reports." ... "Allegations that Hussein provided chemical and biological weapons training to al-Qaeda operatives also turned out to be false, the reports said. The Defense Intelligence Agency said in 2002 that it was unlikely Iraq gave Bin Laden any useful weapons assistance." ... "While Bin Laden's al-Qaeda lieutenant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was in Iraq in 2002, he was traveling under cover and eluded efforts by Hussein to capture him, the reports said." -By William Roberts and James Rowley -Bloomberg
Noteworthy - US - World - Military - Intelligence - Legislation - Secret - Prisons - Human Rights - War Crimes Act - "Interrogation Methods Rejected by Military Win Bush’s Support." ... "Many of the harsh interrogation techniques repudiated by the Pentagon on Wednesday would be made lawful by legislation put forward the same day by the Bush administration. And the courts would be forbidden from intervening." ... "The proposal is in the last 10 pages of an 86-page bill devoted mostly to military commissions, and it is a tangled mix of cross-references and pregnant omissions." ... "But legal experts say it adds up to an apparently unique interpretation of the Geneva Conventions, one that could allow C.I.A. operatives and others to use many of the very techniques disavowed by the Pentagon, including stress positions, sleep deprivation and extreme temperatures." ... "So-called high-value detainees held by the C.I.A. have been subjected to tough interrogation in secret prisons around the world." ... "More run-of-the-mill prisoners held by the Defense Department have, for the most part, faced milder questioning, although human rights groups say there have been widespread abuses." ... "The new bill would continue to give the C.I.A. the substantial freedom it has long enjoyed, while the revisions to the Army Field Manual announced Wednesday would further restrict military interrogators." ... "The legislation would leave open the possibility that the military could revise its own standards to allow the harsher techniques." ... "The intent of the legislation, they [anonymous senior officials] said, is to prevent the prosecution of interrogators under amendments to the War Crimes Act that were passed in the 1990’s." ... "The bill proposed by the White House would also amend the War Crimes Act, which makes violations of Common Article 3 a felony." (1, 2) -By Adam Liptak with contributions by Neil A. Lewis -NYTimes

20060907

Secret - US - Foreign - Military - Terrorism - Prisons - Human Rights - Law - War Crimes Act - Politics - UN - Guantanamo Bay - Cuba - "Bush Admits the CIA Runs Secret Prisons: Bush admits CIA runs secret prisons overseas, says interrogations made terrorists reveal plots." ... "President Bush on Wednesday acknowledged for the first time that the CIA runs secret prisons overseas and said tough interrogation forced terrorist leaders to reveal plots to attack the United States and its allies." ... "Bush said 14 suspects _ including the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks and architects of the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole and the U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania _ had been turned over to the Defense Department and moved to the U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, for trial." ... "Earlier this year, an anti-torture panel at the United Nations recommended the closure of Guantanamo and criticized alleged U.S. use of secret prisons and suspected delivery of prisoners to foreign countries for questioning. Some Democrats and human rights groups argued that the CIA's secret prison system did not allow monitoring for abuses and they hoped that it would be shut down." ... "The Supreme Court ruled that prisoner protections spelled out by the Geneva Conventions should extend to members of al-Qaida. In addition to torture and cruel treatment, the treaties ban "outrages against personal dignity" and "humiliating and degrading treatment."" ... "Administration officials said they were concerned the ruling left U.S. personnel vulnerable to be prosecuted under the War Crimes Act because the language under the Geneva Conventions was so vague." -By Deb Riechmann with contributions by Anne Plummer Flaherty -AP via -CBSNews

20060901

- US - Iraq - Government - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - Politics - Noteworthy - Religion - Human Rights - Law - History - Salt Lake City - Utah - Ross C. Anderson

"Challenging the Culture of Obedience." ... [August 30, 2006 speech by Salt Lake City, Utah mayor Ross C. "Rocky" Anderson, watch the video via KUTV.com]

Ross C. Anderson, Mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah
Challenging the Culture of Obedience.

"A patriot is a person who loves his or her country. Who among you loves your country so much that you have come here today to raise your voice out of deep concern for our nation--and for our world?

And who among you loves your country so much that you insist that our nation's leaders tell us the truth?

Let's hear it: "Give us the truth! Give us the truth! Give us the truth!"

Let no one deny we are patriots. We love our country, we hold dear the values upon which our nation was founded, and we are distressed at what our President, his Administration, and our Congress are doing to, and in the name of, our great nation.

Blind faith in bad leaders is not patriotism.

A patriot does not tell people who are intensely concerned about their country to just sit down and be quiet; to refrain from speaking out in the name of politeness or for the sake of being a good host; to show slavish, blind obedience and deference to a dishonest, war-mongering, human-rights-violating President.

That is not a patriot. Rather, that person is a sycophant. That person is a member of a frightening culture of obedience--a culture where falling in line with authority is more important than choosing what is right, even if it is not easy, safe, or popular. And, I suspect, that person is afraid--afraid we are right, afraid of the truth (even to the point of denying it), afraid he or she has put in with an oppressive, inhumane regime that does not respect the laws and traditions of our country, and that history will rank as the worst presidency our nation has ever had to endure.

In response to those who believe we should blindly support this disastrous President, his Administration, and the complacent, complicit Congress, listen to the words of Theodore Roosevelt, a great President and a Republican, who said: The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole.

Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else."

" -By Ross C. "Rocky" Anderson, mayor of Salt Lake City, Utah speech, Challenging the Culture of Obedience. - Ross C. Anderson

20060819

Law - Intelligence - Privacy - Media - Politics - "The Bloggerati response to Judge Taylor's ruling in the NSA Case." ... "When a presidential program that wouldn't have been exposed at all but for leaks that the administration is trying not just to plug but to prosecute is manifestly lawless in the most fundamental respects; when that program challenges constitutional as well as statutory constraints on executive authority; when it is promulgated by an executive branch in the hands of characters who care little about the rule of law, much less about legal nuance; and when the lawmakers who are posturing as the program's critics have in fact engineered a statutory "fix" that amounts to little more than a whitewash in the offing -- when all these things are true, it's not costless to harp on the details of a basically correct legal denunciation of that program to the point of ridiculing the motives and capacities of the judge delivering the blow. Taking that tack is likely to play into the hands of the administration that was caught red-handed." ... "My point isn't that judges who play the role Judge Taylor did should never be held to account for the shoddy quality of their legal analysis; of course they should, especially in the context of sober second thoughts offered in law reviews and other scholarly venues. But It's those with constitutional blood on their hands who deserve to be chastized most insistently in the public press, and it seems to me something of an indulgence to spend so much time complaining in the media that the judge who called foul used some ill-chosen rhetoric, and that she stuttered and sputtered a bit more than necessary, when the principal effects might well be to underscore one's own professional credentials and one's cleverness and even-handedness and fair-mindedness at the expense of distracting the general public from the far more important conclusion that the nation's chief executive has been guilty of a shamelessly unlawful power grab." -By Laurence Tribe -Balkininzation

20060817

Secret - US - International - Government - Terrorism - Intelligence - Free Speech - Telephone - E-Mail - Privacy- Politics - Michigan - "Judge strikes down the warrantless eavesdropping program." ... "In a scathing rebuke, a federal judge ruled Thursday that the Bush administration's warrantless eavesdropping program is unconstitutional and should be shut down, but legal scholars said the administration has a good chance of reversing the decision on appeal." ... ""There are no hereditary kings in America and no power not created by the Constitution," U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor of Detroit [Michigan] said in a 43-page opinion blasting the program." ... "Taylor said that the program, which President Bush secretly approved after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, violated the rights of free speech and privacy and went far beyond the president's authority. Administration officials say the surveillance program targets telephone calls and e-mails between the United States and suspected terrorists overseas." ... "The Justice Department immediately appealed the ruling, and all the parties agreed that the Bush administration is free to keep eavesdropping without warrants pending the Sept. 7 appeals-court hearing." ... "While the ruling was a clear victory for Bush's critics, it didn't end the legal battle over the government's secret eavesdropping. Legal scholars said the administration had a good chance of winning its appeal to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, which handles cases from Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio and Tennessee." -By Ron Hutcheson and Margaret Talev -McClatchy-RealCities
Secret - US - International - Government- Terrorism - Intelligence - Law - Free Speech - Privacy - Telephone - Internet - Civil Righs - Journalists - Educators - Michigan - "NSA eavesdropping program ruled unconstitutional: Justice Department says it will appeal judge's decision." ... "A federal judge on Thursday ruled that the U.S. government's domestic eavesdropping program is unconstitutional and ordered it ended immediately." ... "The Justice Department said it would appeal the ruling, saying the program was "a critical tool that ensures we have in place an early warning system to detect and prevent a terrorist attack."" ... "In a 44-page memorandum and order, U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor, -- who is based in Detroit, Michigan -- struck down the National Security Agency's program, which she said violates the rights to free speech and privacy. (Read the complete ruling -- PDF)" ... "The defendants "are permanently enjoined from directly or indirectly utilizing the Terrorist Surveillance Program (TSP) in any way, including, but not limited to, conducting warrantless wiretaps of telephone and Internet communications, in contravention of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and Title III," she wrote." ... "She further declared that the program "violates the separation of powers doctrine, the Administrative Procedures Act, the First and Fourth amendments to the United States Constitution, the FISA and Title III."" ... "She went on to say that "the president of the United States ... has undisputedly violated the Fourth in failing to procure judicial orders."" ... "The lawsuit, filed January 17 by civil rights organizations, lawyers, journalists and educators, "challenges the constitutionality of a secret government program to intercept vast quantities of the international telephone and Internet communications of innocent Americans without court approval."" -With contributions by Bill Mears and Andrea Koppel -CNN
US - World - Government - Intelligence - Free Speech - Privacy - Civil Liberties - Journalists - Scholars - Michigan - "Judge nixes warrantless surveillance." ... "A federal judge ruled Thursday that the government's warrantless wiretapping program is unconstitutional and ordered an immediate halt to it." ... "U.S. District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit [Michigan] became the first judge to strike down the National Security Agency's program, which she says violates the rights to free speech and privacy as well as the separation of powers enshrined in the Constitution." ... ""Plaintiffs have prevailed, and the public interest is clear, in this matter. It is the upholding of our Constitution," Taylor wrote in her 43-page opinion." ... "The American Civil Liberties Union filed the lawsuit on behalf of journalists, scholars and lawyers who say the program has made it difficult for them to do their jobs. They believe many of their overseas contacts are likely targets of the program, which involves wiretapping conversations between people in the U.S. and people in other countries." -By Sarah Karush -AP via -HoustonChronicle.com
US - Iraq - Terrorism - Intelligence - Politics - "Bombs Aimed at G.I.’s in Iraq Are Increasing." ... "The number of roadside bombs planted in Iraq rose in July to the highest monthly total of the war, offering more evidence that the anti-American insurgency has continued to strengthen despite the killing of the terrorist leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi." ... "Along with a sharp increase in sectarian attacks, the number of daily strikes against American and Iraqi security forces has doubled since January. The deadliest means of attack, roadside bombs, made up much of that increase. In July, of 2,625 explosive devices, 1,666 exploded and 959 were discovered before they went off. In January, 1,454 bombs exploded or were found." ... "The bomb statistics — compiled by American military authorities in Baghdad and made available at the request of The New York Times — are part of a growing body of data and intelligence analysis about the violence in Iraq that has produced somber public assessments from military commanders, administration officials and lawmakers on Capitol Hill." ... "“The insurgency has gotten worse by almost all measures, with insurgent attacks at historically high levels,” said a senior Defense Department official who agreed to discuss the issue only on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak for attribution. “The insurgency has more public support and is demonstrably more capable in numbers of people active and in its ability to direct violence than at any point in time.”" ... "A separate, classified report by the Defense Intelligence Agency, dated Aug. 3, details worsening security conditions inside the country and describes how Iraq risks sliding toward civil war, according to several officials who have read the document or who have received a briefing on its contents." (1, 2) -By Michael R. Gordon, Mark Mazzetti, and Thom Shanker -NYTimes

20060816

US - Iraq - Afghanistan - Intelligence - Politics - "Pentagon studying its war errors: Analysts assess tactics in Iraq, Afghanistan." ... "The US military establishment has quietly undertaken a wholesale reassessment of its war strategy with a goal of identifying the mistakes made in Iraq and Afghanistan -- and remedying them before the next conflict." ... "This summer, high-level Pentagon officials ordered a pair of secret studies to pinpoint the military's failures in the two conflicts, and, according to one of the authors, ``the results won't be pretty" when the findings are produced this fall. Last week, the Defense Department invited about 50 of the nation's top counter insurgency specialists to a closed-door meeting outside Washington to critique recent operations and chart a way forward." ... "The studies, according to several Pentagon officials involved, have found serious deficiencies across the board. For example, US troops in Iraq have often used too much force when conducting operations in civilian areas, unnecessarily alienating local populations. They cite US commanders as being too slow to establish working relationships with local allies, and note that providing security and safety for the Iraqi people wasn't an early priority." ... "The military's continuing shortcomings in gathering accurate intelligence about insurgents has particularly hampered its missions: ``We know relatively little about insurgent motivation and morale, leadership, and recruitment," according to an unpublished study produced in June by the government-funded RAND Corporation." -By Bryan Bender -Boston/Globe

20060815

British - Pakistan - US - Aviation- Terrorism - Law Enforcement - Intelligence - Book - Military - Politics - "The Triumph of Unrealism." ... "The London plot against civil aviation confirmed a theme of an illuminating new book, Lawrence Wright's "The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11." The theme is that better law enforcement, which probably could have prevented Sept. 11, is central to combating terrorism. F-16s are not useful tools against terrorism that issues from places such as Hamburg (where Mohamed Atta lived before dying in the North Tower of the World Trade Center) and High Wycombe, England." ... "Cooperation between Pakistani and British law enforcement (the British draw upon useful experience combating IRA terrorism) has validated John Kerry's belief (as paraphrased by the New York Times Magazine of Oct. 10, 2004) that "many of the interdiction tactics that cripple drug lords, including governments working jointly to share intelligence, patrol borders and force banks to identify suspicious customers, can also be some of the most useful tools in the war on terror." In a candidates' debate in South Carolina (Jan. 29, 2004), Kerry said that although the war on terror will be "occasionally military," it is "primarily an intelligence and law enforcement operation that requires cooperation around the world."" -By George F. Will -WashingtonPost

20060813

Britain - Iraq - Afghanistan- Military - Intelligence - Historical - Terrorism - Religion - Mental Health - Enforcement- "These ludicrous lies about the West and Islam." ... "There is indeed a plausible argument that military action in recent years has made Britain less, not more, secure. In particular, the conduct of the war in Iraq, regardless of the virtues of removing Saddam Hussein from office, has been riddled with error. The absence of weapons of mass destruction, removal of which was the premise for war, has undermined trust in the Prime Minister. Meanwhile, engagement in Iraq has made it harder to secure victory in Afghanistan, where the anti-terror justification for war was rock solid." ... "But even within the bleakest possible analysis of Mr Blair's foreign policy, it is still simply not true that the West is waging war on Islam. Just as it is not true that the CIA was really behind the 11 September attacks or any other arrant conspiratorial nonsense that enjoys widespread credence in the Middle East and beyond. It is also a logical and moral absurdity to imply, as some critics of British policy have done, that mass murder is somehow less atrocious when it is motivated by an elaborate narrative of political grievance." ... "If young British Muslims are alienated, that is sad and their anger should be addressed. But anyone whose alienation leads them to want to kill indiscriminately has crossed a line into psychopathic criminality. Policy cannot be dictated by the need to placate such people." ... "British Muslim leaders are entitled, along with everybody else, to raise questions about the conduct and consequences of Mr Blair's foreign policy. But they have a more immediate responsibility to promote the truth: that Britain is not the aggressor in a war against Islam; that no such war exists; that there is no glory in murder dressed as martyrdom and that terrorism is never excused by bogus accounts of historical victimisation." -Observer.co.uk via -Guardian.co.uk

20060812

US - British - Iraq - Global - Military- Intelligence - Airline - Terrorism - Religion - Politics - Election 2006 - John Boehner - Ohio - "Can Democrats make case Iraq diverted war on terror?" ... "The immediate domestic political impact of the latest airliner-bombing plot is to bolster Republican fortunes in the campaign leading to midterm elections on Nov. 7." ... "Terrorism has been the issue that has kept the Bush administration afloat since Sept. 11, 2001. The White House and its Republican allies should benefit at least momentarily from the traditional rallying effect that helps the party in power in the face of a national threat." ... "How long that moment lasts will be the supreme test for Democratic candidates in the coming days. For if Democrats now, with the revelation of the British-based plot, cannot make the case that the Bush administration has mishandled the fight against terrorism, they deserve whatever may befall them 12 weeks from Tuesday." ... "This will not be easy, given Republican possession of the White House and its bully pulpit and Republican willingness to demagogue the issue." ... "The British suspects were barely in handcuffs before House Majority Leader John Boehner was complaining about "Defeatocrats." Funny, but I don't recall it was Democrats who stood in the way of full implementation of the recommendations of the Sept. 11 commission." ... "This isn't about whether you can pack hand cream in your carry-on bag. This is about how President Bush has squandered manpower and materiel in the war in Iraq, a conflict that has emboldened radical Islamists and made their cause more acceptable and recruiting much easier." ... "In his first public response to the arrest of suspects in Britain, Bush said that uncovering the plot was "a stark reminder that this nation is still at war with Islamic fascists."" ... "What Bush did not say was that the continuing war in Iraq has been a diversion from U.S. leadership in the global war on terrorism." -By Cragg Hines -HoustonChronicle.com
US - UK - Airline - Terrorism - Police - Intelligence - "Source: U.S., U.K. at odds over timing of arrests: British wanted to continue surveillance on terror suspects, official says." ... "NBC News has learned that U.S. and British authorities had a significant disagreement over when to move in on the suspects in the alleged plot to bring down trans-Atlantic airliners bound for the United States." ... "A senior British official knowledgeable about the case said British police were planning to continue to run surveillance for at least another week to try to obtain more evidence, while American officials pressured them to arrest the suspects sooner." ... "In contrast to previous reports, the official suggested an attack was not imminent, saying the suspects had not yet purchased any airline tickets. In fact, some did not even have passports." ... "The source did say, however, that police believe one U.K.-based suspect was ready to conduct a "dry run." British authorities had wanted to let him go forward with part of the plan, but the Americans balked." ... "At the White House, a top aide to President Bush denied the account." -By Aram Roston and Lisa Myers -MSNBC

20060810

Secret - Government - Military - Intelligence - Business - Law - Cunningham - California - "'Duke' Inquiry Cites Breakdowns: The findings could widen the [California Republican] Cunningham scandal, a Democratic memo suggests." ... "An internal congressional investigation has found that "major breakdowns" in legislative controls enabled former Republican Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham to use his position on the House Intelligence Committee to steer classified government contracts to political cronies, according to a memo distributed this week to Democrats on the panel." ... "The memo accuses Republicans of backing out of an agreement to subpoena Cunningham, and calls for the public release of a 20-page unclassified report documenting the findings of the investigation." ... "The criminal investigation of Cunningham focused largely on the military contracts he influenced as a member of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee." ... "But the internal House probe has found a similar pattern of abuses in contracts involving U.S. intelligence agencies — and includes language describing cases in which the disgraced congressman pressured committee aides to set aside secret funds for his associates, according to congressional sources familiar with the investigation." (1, 2) -By Greg Miller -LAtimes
US - Britain - Airline -Terrorism - Intelligence - "Britain Thwarts Airline Terror Plot: UK, U.S. Raise Security Threat Levels." ... "British authorities said Thursday they have disrupted a sophisticated and well-advanced terrorist plot to blow up U.S.-bound airliners using liquid explosives, arresting 24 people who police said had planned to commit mass murder over the Atlantic Ocean." ... "Police said they were confident they had the "main players" in custody, but authorities in London and Washington ordered a full-scale security clampdown at U.S. and British airports out of concern that other plotters may still be at large." ... "A senior European intelligence official said at least a few people suspected of being involved in the plot were missing and that it was unclear whether they were still in Britain." ... "The plotters had not yet booked specific flights but were searching airline routes and apparently did not plan to purchase tickets until the last minute, the official said." ... "British authorities said the threat involved terrorists who aimed to smuggle liquid explosive material aboard airplanes in hand baggage, as well as timers and detonators that could be assembled in flight. British Home Secretary John Reid said the operation was aimed at bringing down "a number of aircraft" -- reportedly as many as 10 -- "through mid-flight explosions, causing a considerable loss of life."" ... "Peter Clarke, chief of the London police department's anti-terrorism branch, said the investigation reached a "critical point" Wednesday night, requiring immediate disruption of the plot, the arrests and the imposition of heightened security measures." (1, 2, 3, 4) -By John Ward Anderson and William Branigin with contributions by Karen DeYoung, Dafna Linzer, Dan Eggen, Debbi Wilgoren, Del Quentin Wilber, Fred Barbash and Spencer S. Hsu -WashingtonPost

20060809

US - Iraq - International - Military - Intelligence - Prisons - Human Rights - War Crimes Act - Enforcement - Politics- "War Crimes Act Changes Would Reduce Threat Of Prosecution." ... "The Bush administration has drafted amendments to a war crimes law that would eliminate the risk of prosecution for political appointees, CIA officers and former military personnel for humiliating or degrading war prisoners, according to U.S. officials and a copy of the amendments." ... "Officials say the amendments would alter a U.S. law passed in the mid-1990s that criminalized violations of the Geneva Conventions, a set of international treaties governing military conduct in wartime. The conventions generally bar the cruel, humiliating and degrading treatment of wartime prisoners without spelling out what all those terms mean." ... "The draft U.S. amendments to the War Crimes Act would narrow the scope of potential criminal prosecutions to 10 specific categories of illegal acts against detainees during a war, including torture, murder, rape and hostage-taking." ... "Left off the list would be what the Geneva Conventions refer to as "outrages upon [the] personal dignity" of a prisoner and deliberately humiliating acts -- such as the forced nakedness, use of dog leashes and wearing of women's underwear seen at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq -- that fall short of torture." (1, 2) -By R. Jeffrey Smith -WashingtonPost
US - International - Military - Intelligence - Detainees - Human Rights - War Crimes Act - Enforcement - Politics - "Retroactive war crime protection proposed." ... "The Bush administration drafted amendments to the War Crimes Act that would retroactively protect policymakers from possible criminal charges for authorizing any humiliating and degrading treatment of detainees, according to lawyers who have seen the proposal." ... "The move by the administration is the latest effort to deal with treatment of those taken into custody in the war on terror." ... "At issue are interrogations carried out by the CIA, and the degree to which harsh tactics such as water-boarding were authorized by administration officials. A separate law, the Uniform Code of Military Justice, applies to the military." ... "One section of the draft would outlaw torture and inhuman or cruel treatment, but it does not contain prohibitions from Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions against "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment."" -By Pete Yost -AP via -MercuryNews

20060802

Secret - Government - Law - Enforcement - Military - Intelligence - Aviation - Transportation- Terrorism - Politics - "9/11 Panel Suspected Deception by Pentagon: Allegations Brought to Inspectors General." ... "Some staff members and commissioners of the Sept. 11 panel concluded that the Pentagon's initial story of how it reacted to the 2001 terrorist attacks may have been part of a deliberate effort to mislead the commission and the public rather than a reflection of the fog of events on that day, according to sources involved in the debate." ... "Suspicion of wrongdoing ran so deep that the 10-member commission, in a secret meeting at the end of its tenure in summer 2004, debated referring the matter to the Justice Department for criminal investigation, according to several commission sources. Staff members and some commissioners thought that e-mails and other evidence provided enough probable cause to believe that military and aviation officials violated the law by making false statements to Congress and to the commission, hoping to hide the bungled response to the hijackings, these sources said." ... "In the end, the panel agreed to a compromise, turning over the allegations to the inspectors general for the Defense and Transportation departments, who can make criminal referrals if they believe they are warranted, officials said." ... ""We to this day don't know why NORAD [the North American Aerospace Command] told us what they told us," said Thomas H. Kean, the former New Jersey Republican governor who led the commission. "It was just so far from the truth. . . . It's one of those loose ends that never got tied."" ... "For more than two years after the attacks, officials with NORAD and the FAA provided inaccurate information about the response to the hijackings in testimony and media appearances." -By Dan Eggen -WashingtonPost

20060801

US - Iraq - Israel - Military - Terrorism - Political - Intelligence - Media - "Competing realities." ... "Meaningful political debates require agreement at least as to the basic facts comprising reality. For a substantial portion of the American population, that agreement is lacking, due to a desire to believe only those facts which comport with one's beliefs and the powerful, self-contained ideology-based media bubble which enables that desire. Those who live in the world where Iraq helped Al Qaeda plan terrorist attacks, Saddam had WMDs, things are going well in Iraq, and Hezbollah rather than Israel collapsed the apartment building in Qana, don't merely have different political views but really live in a different reality." -By Glenn Greenwald

20060730

US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Law - 2006 Election - Nev. - Pat Roberts - Kan. - "Report on Prewar Intelligence Lagging: Information Democrats Want Most Might Not Come Out Until After Election." ... "When angry Democrats briefly shut down the Senate last year to protest the slow pace of a congressional investigation into prewar intelligence on Iraq, Senate Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) claimed a rare victory." ... "Republicans called it a stunt but promised to quickly wrap up the inquiry. Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which is overseeing the investigation, said his report was near completion and there was no need for the fuss." ... "That was nine months ago." ... "The Republican-led committee, which agreed in February 2004 to write the report, has yet to complete its work. Just two of five planned sections of the committee's findings are fully drafted and ready to be voted on by members, according to Democratic and Republican staffers. Committee sources involved with the report, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said they are working hard to complete it. But disputing Roberts, they said they had started almost from scratch in November after Democrats staged their protest." -By Dafna Linzer -WashingtonPost

20060728

Noteworthy - Secret - Military - Intelligence - Terrorism - Detainee - Civil Righs - Politics - "Bush Submits New Terror Detainee Bill." ... "U.S. citizens suspected of terror ties might be detained indefinitely and barred from access to civilian courts under legislation proposed by the Bush administration, say legal experts reviewing an early version of the bill." ... "According to the draft, the military would be allowed to detain all "enemy combatants" until hostilities cease. The bill defines enemy combatants as anyone "engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners who has committed an act that violates the law of war and this statute."" ... "Legal experts said Friday that such language is dangerously broad and could authorize the military to detain indefinitely U.S. citizens who had only tenuous ties to terror networks like al Qaeda." ... "Scott L. Silliman, a retired Air Force Judge Advocate, said the broad definition of enemy combatants is alarming because a U.S. citizen loosely suspected of terror ties would lose access to a civilian court — and all the rights that come with it. Administration officials have said they want to establish a secret court to try enemy combatants that factor in realities of the battlefield and would protect classified information." ... "The administration's proposal, as considered at one point during discussions, would toss out several legal rights common in civilian and military courts, including barring hearsay evidence, guaranteeing "speedy trials" and granting a defendant access to evidence. The proposal also would allow defendants to be barred from their own trial and likely allow the submission of coerced testimony." -By Anne Plummer Flaherty -AP via -SFGate.com
Noteworthy - International - US - Afghanistan - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Terrorism - Detainee - Death Penalty - Human Rights - Politics - History - "Detainee Abuse Charges Feared: Shield Sought From '96 War Crimes Act." ... "An obscure law approved by a Republican-controlled Congress a decade ago has made the Bush administration nervous that officials and troops involved in handling detainee matters might be accused of committing war crimes, and prosecuted at some point in U.S. courts." ... "Senior officials have responded by drafting legislation that would grant U.S. personnel involved in the terrorism fight new protections against prosecution for past violations of the War Crimes Act of 1996. That law criminalizes violations of the Geneva Conventions governing conduct in war and threatens the death penalty if U.S.-held detainees die in custody from abusive treatment." ... "In light of a recent Supreme Court ruling that the international Conventions apply to the treatment of detainees in the terrorism fight, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales has spoken privately with Republican lawmakers about the need for such "protections," according to someone who heard his remarks last week." ... "Gonzales told the lawmakers that a shield is needed for actions taken by U.S. personnel under a 2002 presidential order, which the Supreme Court declared illegal, and under Justice Department legal opinions that have been withdrawn under fire, the source said." ... "Since the U.S. invasions of Afghanistan in 2001 and Iraq in 2003, hundreds of service members deployed to Iraq have been accused by the Army of mistreating detainees, and at least 35 detainees have died in military or CIA custody, according to a tally kept by Human Rights First. The military has asserted these were all aberrant acts by troops ignoring their orders." ... "Defense attorneys for many of those accused of involvement have alleged that their clients were pursuing policies of rough treatment set by officials in Washington. That claim is amplified in a 53-page Human Rights Watch report this week that quoted interrogators at three bases in Iraq as saying that abuse was part of regular, authorized procedures. But this argument has yet to gain traction in a military court, where U.S. policy requires that active-duty service members be tried for any maltreatment." (1, 2) -By R. Jeffrey Smith with contributions by Julie Tate and Madonna Lebling -WashingtonPost

20060726

Government - Intelligence - Law - Civil Liberties - "House Panel Faults Pace of U.S. Intelligence Overhaul." ... "A House subcommittee has concluded that the Bush administration has been slow to implement major changes in information sharing and other key provisions of the 2004 law that overhauled the U.S. intelligence community." ... "The Intelligence panel’s report, which is scheduled to be officially released Thursday, found that the administration has failed to revamp its approach to information analysis, neglecting large swaths of potentially useful data. The report also found that the new Office of the Director of National Intelligence has done a poor job of prioritizing key tasks." ... "According to a source who would discuss the subcommittee’s findings, the report faults the administration’s progress in most areas, including its workings with Congress; the establishment of a civil liberties board; and its processing of security clearances to hire new human intelligence officers." ... "The Office of the Director of National Intelligence gets the blame for many of the delays and is faulted for a scattershot approach to its mission rather than focusing in on top priorities such as information sharing." -By Tim Starks -CQ.com
Government - Intelligence - Legislation - Privacy - History - Politics - "Blank Check to Spy: Arlen Specter says his surveillance bill wouldn't give the administration unwarranted power. He's wrong." ... "Today the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on modernizing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the 1978 law that regulates domestic wiretapping and searches. The hearing is an effort on the part of committee Chairman Arlen Specter [Pennsylvania Republican Senator] to move along his very dangerous bill --negotiated with the White House -- to put the National Security Agency's domestic surveillance program before the federal courts. In an op-ed in these pages Monday, Mr. Specter described his proposal as a compromise with President Bush to ensure judicial review of the NSA program, which he called "a festering sore on our body politic." Yet his legislation would essentially respond to this festering sore by shooting the patient." ... "No matter how adamantly Mr. Specter denies that his bill would give Congress's blessing to domestic spying outside of FISA's strictures, it does so explicitly and unambiguously. It adds the following language to a statute that now provides the sole legal means for the government to spy on Americans in national security cases: "Nothing in this Act shall be construed to limit the constitutional authority of the President to collect intelligence with respect to foreign powers and agents of foreign powers." Mr. Specter argues that the bill doesn't accept the president's assertions of unilateral power but merely acknowledges them. But this is incorrect." ... "Under the Supreme Court's decades-old understanding, presidential power is at its lowest ebb when the president is acting contrary to the will of Congress, and at its zenith when he is using his own powers in concert with legislative authorization. Right now, to conduct warrantless surveillance domestically Mr. Bush must act at the very least in sharp tension with FISA. Under Mr. Specter's bill, however, the legislature would be explicitly acknowledging an alternative source of authority for snooping. It would thereby legitimize not only whatever the NSA may now be doing but lots of other surveillance it might dream up." -WashingtonPost

20060723

Randy Cunningham - Secret- Government - Political - Business - Legislation - California - "Study: Ex-Rep. Made Use of 'Black' Budgets: Study: Cunningham Slipped Items Into Classified Bills That Benefited Him, His Associates." ... "An independent investigation has found that imprisoned former [California Republican] Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham took advantage of secrecy and badgered congressional aides to help slip items into classified bills that would benefit him and his associates." ... "The finding comes from Michael Stern, an outside investigator hired by the House Intelligence Committee to look into how Cunningham was able to carry out the scheme. Stern is working with the committee to fix vulnerabilities in the way top-secret legislation is written, said congressional officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because the committee still is being briefed on Stern's findings." ... "Cunningham's case has put a stark spotlight on the oversight of classified or "black" budgets. Unlike legislation dealing with social and economic issues, intelligence bills and parts of defense bills are written in private, in the name of national security." ... "Federal prosecutors found that Cunningham accepted $2.4 million in bribes, including payments for a mansion, a Rolls-Royce and a 65-foot yacht, in return for steering defense and intelligence contracts to certain companies. Cunningham pleaded guilty and was sentenced to more than eight years in prison." (1, 2, 3) -By Katherine Shrader -AP via -ABCNEWS.com

20060721

Dick Cheney - Secret - Government - Intelligence - Law - Privacy - PA - "Surveillance Bill Meets Resistance in Senate." ... "A Senate surveillance bill personally negotiated by President Bush and Vice President Cheney ran into immediate trouble this week, as Democrats and other critics attacked the proposal while key GOP leaders in the House endorsed a different bill on the same topic." ... "The Senate legislation, drafted during negotiations between the White House and Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), would allow the administration to submit the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance program to a secret intelligence court for review of its legality." ... "The proposal was billed as a rare and noteworthy compromise by the administration when unveiled last week. But the legislation quickly came under attack from Democrats and many national security experts, who said it would actually give the government greater powers to spy on Americans without court oversight." -By Dan Eggen -WashingtonPost

20060720

Secrets - Government - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - Telecommunications - Privacy - Politics - "Judge rules against Bush in spying lawsuit: Administration argues defending case threatens to reveal state secrets." ... "A federal judge Thursday refused to dismiss a lawsuit challenging the Bush administration's domestic spying program, rejecting government claims that allowing the case to go forward could expose state secrets and jeopardize the war on terror." ... "U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker said the warrantless eavesdropping has been so widely reported that there appears to be no danger of spilling secrets." ... "Dozens of lawsuits alleging that telecommunications companies and the government are illegally intercepting Americans' communications without warrants have been filed. This is the first time a judge has ruled on the government's claim of a "state secrets privilege."" ... "Walker also wrote that he did not see how allowing the lawsuit to continue could threaten national security." ... ""The compromise between liberty and security remains a difficult one," Walker said. "But dismissing this case at the outset would sacrifice liberty for no apparent enhancement of security."" -AP via -MSNBC

20060719

US - Israel - Lebanon - Iran - Syria - Intelligence - "Arming of Hezbollah Reveals U.S. and Israeli Blind Spots." ... "The power and sophistication of the missile and rocket arsenal that Hezbollah has used in recent days has caught the United States and Israel off guard, and officials in both countries are just now learning the extent to which the militant group has succeeded in getting weapons from Iran and Syria." ... "While the Bush administration has stated that cracking down on weapons proliferation is one of its top priorities, the arming of Hezbollah shows the blind spots of American and other Western intelligence services in assessing the threat, officials from across those governments said." ... "American and Israeli officials said the successful attack last Friday on an Israeli naval vessel was the strongest evidence to date of direct support by Iran to Hezbollah. The attack was carried out with a sophisticated antiship cruise missile, the C-802, an Iranian-made variant of the Chinese Silkworm, an American intelligence official said." ... "At the same time, American and Israeli officials cautioned that they had found no evidence that Iranian operatives working in Lebanon launched the antiship missile themselves." -By Mark Mazzetti and Thom Shanker -NYTimes

20060715

Israel - Iran - Lebanon - Tech - Military - Terrorism - History - "Israel: Iran Aided Hezbollah Ship Attack: Israeli intelligence says Iranian troops helped Hezbollah attack warship; Iran denies charge." ... "Elite Iranian troops helped Hezbollah fire a sophisticated radar-guided missile at an Israeli warship, Israeli officials said Saturday, describing an apparent surprise blow by militants who had been using only low-tech weapons." ... "Iran denied that it had any troops in Lebanon." ... "Israel initially believed that an aerial drone armed with explosives hit the warship, but it became clear that Hezbollah had used an Iranian-made C-802 missile to strike the vessel late Friday, an Israeli intelligence official said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the information." ... "Hezbollah is widely believed to have been trained, funded and guided by the Revolutionary Guard since the militant group was founded during Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon. The Islamic republic's elite corps of more than 200,000 fighters is independent of the regular armed forces and directly controlled by Iran's supreme leader." -By Ramit Plushnick-Masti -AP via -CBSNews

20060714

Secret - Government - Intelligence - Privacy - Law - History - Politics - Pennsylvania - "What will Democrats do in the wake of the Specter cave-in?" ... "Following up on yesterday's post regarding [Pennsylvania Republican Senator] Arlen Specter's complete (and hardly unexpected) cave-in to the administration on the NSA scandal, it is now clear that the bill does not have an express amnesty provision in it (see Update II). But every other possible bad thing can and should be said about this bill. Marty Lederman has an excellent and very thorough statutory analysis of the whole travesty, explaining that Specter "introduces a bill, with Administration blessing, that gives the Administration everything it ever wanted, and much, much more."" ... "Jack Balkin's post is also very much worth reading, in which he concludes: "Barely two weeks after Hamdan, which appeared to be the most important separation of powers decision in our generation, the Executive is about to get back everything it lost in that decision, and more."" ... "In essence, Specter's bill repeals each and every restriction on the President's ability to eavesdrop, all but forecloses judicial challenges, and endorses the very theory of unlimited executive power which Hamdan just days ago rejected (and in the process, rendered the administration's FISA-prohibited eavesdropping on Americans a clear violation of the criminal law). With this bill, Specter -- the self-proclaimed defender of Congressional power -- did more to bolster the administration's radical executive power theories than anything the administration could have dreamed of doing on their own, especially in the wake of Hamdan (permit me here to apologize for all of those times I tepidly defended Specter by characterizing as unduly pessimistic and cynical predictions that he could cave completely; the humiliations he is willing, even eager, to publicly endure are without limits)." ... "The question now is what Democrats (who, by the way, still have filibuster power) are willing to do about this. Here is Lederman's suggestion:"

"I hope this bill is the non-starter that it deserves to be. If so, allow me to make one more plea here: Everyone behind the Schumer bill, please! Let's get the question of NSA legality before the Supreme Court right now, and after that we can worry about how to amend FISA in a responsible manner sensitive to changing needs, such as perhaps along the lines of the models suggested by David Kris or in Jane Harman's bill."

"More important than the legislative question, in my view, is what the Democrats are willing to do about this politically. It should not be hard, even for them, to make the case that everyone is in favor of eavesdropping. The only question is whether (a) George Bush should be able to eavesdrop on Americans in secret and with no oversight, or (b) George Bush can eavesdrop on Americans, but only with a requirement of judicial oversight - a requirement which every President, without complaint, has complied with for the last 30 years, including Ronald Reagan at the height of the Cold War."

Glenn Greenwald

20060707

US - Iraq - Terrorism - Politics - Intelligence - "Hate Groups Are Infiltrating the Military, Group Asserts." ... "A decade after the Pentagon declared a zero-tolerance policy for racist hate groups, recruiting shortfalls caused by the war in Iraq have allowed "large numbers of neo-Nazis and skinhead extremists" to infiltrate the military, according to a watchdog organization." ... "The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks racist and right-wing militia groups, estimated that the numbers could run into the thousands, citing interviews with Defense Department investigators and reports and postings on racist Web sites and magazines." ... ""We've got Aryan Nations graffiti in Baghdad," the group quoted a Defense Department investigator as saying in a report to be posted today on its Web site, www.splcenter.org. "That's a problem."" -By John Kifner -NYTimes

20060705

North Korea - Japan - US - South Korea - Intelligence - Technology - U.N. - Politics - "North Korea Test-Fires Seventh Missile: Japan and U.S. Condemn Action." ... "Japan slapped limited economic sanctions on North Korea Wednesday and moved with the United States to condemn Pyongyang at the U.N. Security Council after the Stalinist state unnerved the region by test launching a barrage of [at] least seven missiles." ... "After firing six missiles over four hours early Wednesday, North Korea continued its unprecedented series of tests by sending a seventh into the Sea of Japan some 12 hours later during rush hour in Japanese cities." ... "But the missile considered most dangerous to the United States -- the long-range Taepodong-2 potentially capable of hitting targets on the U.S. West Coast -- appeared to fail on its first test flight after only 35 seconds and before it entered the second of two-stages, dealing a blow to the North Korean missile program, Japanese and U.S. officials said." ... "The other six missiles, officials said, were all short- or medium-range missiles that plunged into waters from 65 to 300 miles off the North Korean coast. The closest missile to Japan was the Taepondong-2 test, which fell within 312 miles of the Japanese coastal city of Niigata. Military analysts familiar with South Korean intelligence data said the tests of at least five of the six smaller missiles appeared to go smoothly." (1, 2, 3, 4) -By Anthony Faiola and William Branigin with contributions by Ako Yamamoto and Joohee Cho -WashingtonPost
Italy - US - Egypt - Religion - Intelligence - Military - Terrorism - Prisons - "2 Italians Arrested in Kidnapping of Radical Cleric." ... "Two officials with the Italian secret service were arrested today in connection with the kidnapping of a radical Egyptian cleric here in 2003. This was the first indication that the Italian government may have helped American intelligence agents detain the imam, who was then sent to Egypt, where his relatives claim he was tortured while being interrogated." ... "Prosecutors also sought the arrest of three operatives of the Central Intelligence Agency and an employee of the American military airbase at Aviano, in addition to 22 other Americans whom Italian prosecutors said last year they were seeking as part of the investigation into the abduction of Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, also known as Abu Omar." ... "The practice of "extraordinary rendition" — which involves seizing terrorism suspects and then transferring them to other countries for interrogation — has caused a popular furor in Europe." -By Stephen Grey and Elisabetta Povoledo -NYTimes

20060704

Osama bin Laden - Military - Terrorism - "C.I.A. Closes Unit Focused on Capture of bin Laden." ... "The Central Intelligence Agency has closed a unit that for a decade had the mission of hunting Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants, intelligence officials confirmed Monday." ... "The unit, known as Alec Station, was disbanded late last year and its analysts reassigned within the C.I.A. Counterterrorist Center, the officials said." ... "The decision is a milestone for the agency, which formed the unit before Osama bin Laden became a household name and bolstered its ranks after the Sept. 11 attacks, when President Bush pledged to bring Mr. bin Laden to justice "dead or alive."" ... "Agency officials said that tracking Mr. bin Laden and his deputies remained a high priority, and that the decision to disband the unit was not a sign that the effort had slackened. Instead, the officials said, it reflects a belief that the agency can better deal with high-level threats by focusing on regional trends rather than on specific organizations or individuals." -By Mark Mazzetti -NYTimes

20060626

Noteworthy - Secret - US - Belgium - International - Financial - Consumer - Civil Liberties - Free Speech - Media - Government - Terrorism - Law Enforcement - Intelligence - Politics - "What the Government Knows: While an overseas program to track bank records has unleashed a political storm, the domestic Patriot Act has already made a wealth of financial data available to U.S. law enforcement agencies." ... "Over the last four years, U.S. law enforcement agencies have gained access to over 28,000 financial records inside the United States under a little known provision of the USA Patriot Act that parallels the secret international bank data program disclosed by news organizations last week, Treasury Department records show." ... "The disclosure of the overseas program-under which Treasury Department officials have tapped into the records of a vast Belgian-based international financial database called Swift (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications)-has kicked up a storm of controversy. Some critics have decried the program as another example of the administration's invasion of privacy in the name of the war on terror. At the same time, President Bush today condemned as "disgraceful" the disclosure of the operation, which intended to help the government track overseas money movements of suspected terrorists. "For people to leak that program, and for a newspaper to publish it, does great harm to the United States of America," Bush told reporters in Washington." ... "But the international program is only one part of a much broader, if little publicized, Treasury Department effort to probe suspect financial records-including thousands of bank accounts, wire transfers and other transactions involving individuals, companies and nonprofit organizations inside the United States." ... "Although it has received little attention, the Patriot Act program has produced a wealth of previously unavailable financial data that has been shared with U.S. law enforcement agencies-without any notice to the account holders who are being investigated. Since the fall of 2002, when the program began, U.S. Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FINCEN)-an arm of the Treasury Department-has directed searches of 4,397 "subjects of interest" and received reports back on 28,463 accounts and financial transactions, according to recent Treasury records." (1, 2) -By Michael Isikoff -MSNBC/Newsweek

20060623

US - Iraq - Military - Politics - "Report sparks debate over Iraq arsenal." ... "A partially declassified intelligence report provides no new evidence that Saddam Hussein had stockpiled weapons of mass destruction on the eve of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq, U.S. intelligence officials said Thursday." ... "The report, publicized by two Republican legislators in the midst of a Senate debate on the Iraq war, says that about 500 weapons containing degraded mustard gas and sarin nerve agent have been found in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion." ... "President Bush, in making the case for war, alleged that Iraq continued to develop and stockpile weapons of mass destruction. But the intelligence officials said the munitions found since the invasion dated from before the 1991 Persian Gulf War and for the most part were badly deteriorated. "They are not in a condition where they could be used as designed," one intelligence official said." -KnightRidder -WashingtonPost via -SeattleTimes.NWsource

20060622

US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Rick Santorum - Pennsylvania - Pete Hoekstra - Michigan - "Lawmakers Say WMDs Were Found In Iraq ... Kind Of: Report reveals discovery of degraded chemical weapons likely buried in 1980s." ... "You'd think that after the numerous revelations of faulty prewar intelligence and the failure to find the dangerous weapons cache allegedly stockpiled by former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, the Bush administration would be shouting from the rooftops about finding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq." ... "Instead, in a hastily called news conference on Wednesday, a pair of Republican lawmakers told reporters that it turns out we did find those WMDs after all, even though the White House and the intelligence community have admitted that no such weapons caches had been discovered." ... "According to The Washington Post, Representative Peter Hoekstra [Michigan Republican], chairman of the House intelligence committee, and Senator Rick Santorum [Pennsylvania Republican] made the announcement, based on an unclassified summary from a report by the National Ground Intelligence Center regarding 500 chemical munitions shells that had been buried near the Iranian border." ... "Of course, most of those weapons were buried by Iraqi troops during their eight-year war with Iran — which ended in 1988 — and were long forgotten." -By Gil Kaufman -MTV.com/News
Phone - Companies - Consumer - Government - Intelligence - Law - Law Enforcement - "AT&T revises privacy policy, says owns customer data." ... "AT&T Inc. said on Wednesday it was revising its privacy policy, explaining to customers that it owns their phone records and can hand them over to law enforcers if necessary." ... "The changes take effect on Friday and come at a time when AT&T and other phone companies face lawsuits claiming they aided a U.S. government domestic spying program by giving the National Security Agency call records of millions of customers without their permission." -Reuters via -ABCNEWS.com
Law Enforcement - Intelligence - Illinois - Florida - "Feds: Terror suspects targeted Sears Tower." ... "FBI agents in an undercover sting operation arrested seven terrorism suspects in Miami on Thursday who allegedly were plotting to attack the Sears Tower in Chicago [Illinois], the FBI headquarters in Miami [Florida] and other U.S. buildings, officials said." ... "The suspects had "aspirations" but "no means" to attack the Sears Tower or other buildings, a senior federal law-enforcement source said." ... "The men were all Muslims who thought they were plotting "in conjunction with Al Qaeda" but they really were dealing with law-enforcement undercover agents, one law-enforcement official told The Miami Herald." ... "The 110-story Sears Tower is the nation's tallest building. Security was ramped up after the Sept. 11 attacks, and the 103rd-floor Skydeck was closed for about a month and a half." -By Michael Tackett and Jeff Zeleny with contributions by David Heinzmann and Gerry Doyle -ChicagoTribune

20060613

Secret - Military - Prisoner - Human Rights - "Interrogation Tactics Won't Be Secret: Pressured By Congress, Pentagon Drops Bid To Classify Techniques." ... "Under pressure from Congress, the Pentagon has dropped plans to keep some interrogation techniques secret by putting them in a classified section of a military manual, defense officials said Tuesday." ... "Two senior officials said there will not be a classified section in the long-awaited revision of the Army Field Manual. One of the officials said descriptions of interrogation techniques initially planned for the classified section are either being made public or are being eliminated as tactics that can be used against prisoners. The officials requested anonymity because the manual has not been completed." ... "One human rights group hailed the decision." ... "Military leaders have argued that disclosing all the interrogation techniques public would make it easier for enemy prisoners to resist questioning." -AP via -CBSNews
Terrorism - Law Enforcement - Religion - Politics - Delaware - New York - "US officials seeing new home-grown terror cells." ... "U.S. intelligence and law enforcement authorities are discovering new home-grown cells of Islamist radicals in the United States that draw inspiration and moral support from al Qaeda, officials said on Tuesday." ... "Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware, the panel's ranking Democrat, said the emergence of home-grown U.S. terror cells is widely recognized within the intelligence community." ... ""Everyone I've spoken to in the intelligence community says there are more cells now in the United States, there's more activity in the United States," Biden said." ... "Biden noted that word of new cells inside the United States comes at a time when the Bush administration has proposed 40 percent cutback in counterterrorism funding for New York and Washington — the two cities hit in the September 11 attacks." ... "He also blasted the administration for not meeting security funding recommendations by the September 11 commission." ... ""We're spending $740 million for the whole shooting match and the recommendation is $44 billion over five years," the Delaware senator said." ... ""I find it absolutely on the verge of criminal."" -By David Morgan -Reuters via -ABCNEWS.com
US - Iraq - Terrorism - Religion - Internet - Military - Politics - "Agencies: Homegrown Radicals Inside U.S.." ... "U.S. counterterrorism officials say they are uncovering homegrown Islamic radicals inside the United States who lack formal ties to al-Qaida and operate independently." ... "Those independent qualities - combined with the radicals' ability to organize and plot on the Internet - make them particularly difficult to disrupt, retired Vice Adm. John Scott Redd, director of the National Counterterrorism Center, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee Tuesday." ... "The hearing came less than a week after the U.S. military and intelligence agencies killed one of the world's top terror leaders in an airstrike, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the former leader of al-Qaida in Iraq." ... "Redd said the merger between al-Zarqawi's group and al-Qaida's central organization gives terror leaders a more diverse pool of "battle-hardened" operatives from which to draw. Intelligence officials, he said, are also seeing signs that al-Zarqawi's group was hatching plots outside Iraq. But he did not elaborate." -By Katherine Shrader -AP via -Forbes
Karl Rove - Political - Reporter - Intelligence - Libby - Cheney - "Leak Counsel Won't Charge Rove, Lawyer Announces." ... "In a statement, [Karl Rove's lawyer] Mr. Luskin said, "On June 12, 2006, Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald formally advised us that he does not anticipate seeking charges against Karl Rove."" ... "Mr. Fitzgerald's spokesman, Randall Samborn, said he would not comment on Mr. Rove's status." ... "For months Mr. Fitzgerald's investigation appeared to threaten Mr. Rove's standing as Mr. Bush's closest political adviser as the prosecutor riveted his focus on whether Mr. Rove tried to intentionally conceal a conversation he had with a Time magazine reporter in the week before the name of intelligence officer, Valerie Plame Wilson, became public." ... "As the case stands now, Mr. Fitzgerald has brought only one indictment against Mr. Libby. The prosecutor accused Mr. Libby of telling the grand jury that he learned of Ms. Wilson from reporters, when in reality, the prosecutor said he was told about her by Mr. Cheney and others in the government. Mr. Libby has pleaded not guilty in the case, which is scheduled to begin trial early next year." (1, 2) -By David Johnston -NYTimes

20060612

Secret - US - Government - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - International - Communications - Journalists - Privacy - "U.S. Asks Judge to Drop Suit on N.S.A. Spying." ... "A National Security Agency program that listens in on international communications involving people in the United States is both vital to national security and permitted by the Constitution, a government lawyer told a judge here today in the first major court argument on the program." ... "But, the lawyer went on, addressing Judge Anna Diggs Taylor of the Federal District Court, "the evidence we need to demonstrate to you that it lawful cannot be disclosed without that process itself causing grave harm to United States national security."" ... "The only solution to this impasse, the lawyer, Anthony J. Coppolino, said, was for Judge Taylor to dismiss the lawsuit before her, an American Civil Liberties Union challenge to the eavesdropping program, under the state secrets privilege. The privilege can limit and even extinguish cases that would reveal national security information, and it is fast becoming one of the Justice Department's favorite tools in defending court challenges to its efforts to combat terrorism." ... "The Detroit case was filed in January on behalf of journalists, scholars, lawyers and nonprofit organizations who contended that the possibility of government eavesdropping interfered with their work. In remarks to reporters after the 90-minute argument, Anthony D. Romero, the A.C.L.U.'s executive director, called the government's invocation of the state secrets privilege "Orwellian doublespeak."" ... ""They argued essentially that the N.S.A. program was off-limits to judicial review," Mr. Romero said." -By Adam Liptak -NYTimes

20060610

Hacker - Government - Nuclear - Energy - Military - Intelligence - Computer - Identity Theft - N.M. - "DOE computers hacked; info on 1,500 taken." ... "A hacker stole a file containing the names and Social Security numbers of 1,500 people working for the Energy Department's nuclear weapons agency." ... "The data theft occurred in a computer system at a service center belonging to the National Nuclear Security Administration in Albuquerque, N.M. The file contained information about contract workers throughout the agency's nuclear weapons complex, a department spokesman said." ... "NNSA Administrator Linton Brooks told a House hearing that he learned of the security breach late last September, but did not inform Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman about it. It had occurred earlier that month." ... "Brooks blamed a misunderstanding for the failure to inform either Bodman or Deputy Energy Secretary Clay Sell about the security breach. Brooks' NNSA is a semiautonomous agency within the department and he said he assumed DOE's counterintelligence office would have briefed the two senior officials." -By H. Josef Herbert -AP via -BusinessWeek

20060608

Noteworthy - Government - Intelligence - Law Enforcement - Politics - Karl Rove - I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby - Dick Cheney - Journalism - "What Ashcroft Was Told." ... "Then-Attorney General John Ashcroft continued to oversee the Valerie Plame-CIA leak probe for more than two months in late 2003 after he learned in extensive briefings that FBI agents suspected White House aides Karl Rove and I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby of trying to mislead the FBI to conceal their roles in the leak, according to government records and interviews. Despite these briefings, which took place between October and December 2003, and despite the fact that senior White House aides might become central to the leak case, Ashcroft did not recuse himself from the matter until December 30, when he allowed the appointment of a special prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald, to take over the investigation." ... "According to people with firsthand knowledge of the briefings, senior Justice Department officials told Ashcroft that the FBI had uncovered evidence that Libby, then chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, had misled the bureau about his role in the leaking of Plame's identity to the press." ... "By November, investigators had obtained personal notes of Libby's that indicated he had first learned from Cheney that Plame was a CIA officer. But Libby was insisting in FBI interviews that he had learned Plame's name and identity from journalists. Libby was also telling investigators that when he told reporters that Plame worked for the CIA, he was only passing along an unsubstantiated rumor." ... "Officials also told Ashcroft that investigators did not believe Libby's account, according to sources knowledgeable about the briefings, and that Libby might have lied to the FBI to defend other -- more senior -- administration officials." ... "Ashcroft was told no later than November 2003 that investigators also doubted the accounts that Rove, President George W. Bush's chief political adviser, had given the FBI as to how he, too, learned that Plame was a CIA officer and how he came to disclose that information to columnist Robert Novak." ... "It was Novak who, in a July 14, 2003, syndicated column, outed Plame as a CIA employee, relying on Rove as one of his sources." -By Murray Waas -NationalJournal

20060607

US - EU - Intelligence - Terrorism - Law Enforcement - Prisons - Transport - Human Rights - Politics - Britain - Germany - Italy - Sweden - Turkey - Spain - Romania - Poland - "Probe of CIA Prisons Implicates EU Nations." ... "Fourteen European nations colluded with U.S. intelligence in a "spider's web" of human rights abuses to help the CIA spirit terror suspects to illegal detention facilities, a European investigator said Wednesday." ... "Swiss senator Dick Marty's report to Europe's top human rights body was thin on evidence but raises the possibility of a cover-up involving both friends and critics of Washington's war on terror. It says European governments "did not seem particularly eager to establish" the facts." ... "He listed 14 European countries - Britain, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Bosnia, Macedonia, Turkey, Spain, Cyprus, Ireland, Greece, Portugal, Romania and Poland - as being complicit in "unlawful interstate transfers" of people." -By Jan Sliva -AP via -Forbes
Noteworthy - Government - Military - Intelligence - Computer - Database - Identity Theft - Law Enforcement - Maryland - "Data Theft Affected Most in Military: National Security Concerns Raised." ... "Social Security numbers and other personal information for as many as 2.2 million U.S. military personnel -- including nearly 80 percent of the active-duty force -- were among the data stolen from the home of a Department of Veterans Affairs analyst last month, federal officials said yesterday, raising concerns about national security as well as identity theft." ... "The department announced that personal data for as many as 1.1 million active-duty military personnel, 430,000 National Guard members and 645,000 reserve members may have been included on an electronic file stolen May 3 from a department employee's house in Aspen Hill [Maryland]. The data include names, birth dates and Social Security numbers, VA spokesman Matt Burns said." ... "Defense officials said the loss is unprecedented and raises concerns about the safety of U.S. military forces. But they cautioned that law enforcement agencies investigating the incident have not found evidence that the stolen information has been used to commit identity theft." ... "Army spokesman Paul Boyce said: "Obviously there are issues associated with identity theft and force protection."" ... "For example, security experts said, the information could be used to find out where military personnel live. "This essentially can create a Zip code for where each of the service members and [their] families live, and if it fell into the wrong hands could potentially put them at jeopardy of being targeted," said David Heyman, director of the homeland security program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)." ... "Another worry is that the information could reach foreign governments and their intelligence services or other hostile forces, allowing them to target service members and their families, the experts said." (1, 2) -By Ann Scott Tyson and Christopher Lee with contributions by Ernesto Londoño -WashingtonPost

20060606

Government - Intelligence - Military - Politics - "Congress, courts push back against Bush's assertions of presidential power." ... "Republican and Democratic House leaders join forces to protest the FBI search of a congressman's office. The Senate Intelligence Committee demands fuller briefings from the CIA. The Supreme Court hears a landmark case challenging presidential war powers." ... "After five years of a concerted White House campaign, there are tentative signs that Congress and the courts are beginning to push back against what has been the greatest expansion of presidential powers in a generation or more." ... "Those pushing back include some congressional Republicans and conservative jurists who have been among President Bush's chief allies. The efforts surely would intensify if Democrats won control of the House or Senate in November's elections — and with it the power to convene hearings and issue subpoenas." ... "The Bush administration has taken a series of actions to expand presidential powers: Enabling past presidents and vice presidents to restrict release of their papers after the 12-year period set in law has expired. Refusing to allow aides to testify before Congress about the federal response to 9/11 and to Hurricane Katrina, arguing that might discourage staffers from providing "unvarnished advice" in the future. Asserting wartime powers to ignore federal laws and international treaties when the president says national security is at stake." ... ""The administration has been very consistent," [Oregon's Portland State University professor of Public Administration Phillip] Cooper says. "At every turn the White House has issued a reading as expansive as possible for its own authority, a reading as narrow as possible of congressional authority, and in some cases pre-empted the courts."" -By Susan Page -USATODAY

20060605

US - Iraq - International - Prisoner - Human Rights - Intelligence - Politics - "Army Manual to Skip Geneva Detainee Rule: The Pentagon's move to omit a ban on prisoner humiliation from the basic guide to soldier conduct faces strong State Dept. opposition." ... "The Pentagon has decided to omit from new detainee policies a key tenet of the Geneva Convention that explicitly bans "humiliating and degrading treatment," according to knowledgeable military officials, a step that would mark a further, potentially permanent, shift away from strict adherence to international human rights standards." ... "The decision could culminate a lengthy debate within the Defense Department but will not become final until the Pentagon makes new guidelines public, a step that has been delayed. However, the State Department fiercely opposes the military's decision to exclude Geneva Convention protections and has been pushing for the Pentagon and White House to reconsider, the Defense Department officials acknowledged." ... "For more than a year, the Pentagon has been redrawing its policies on detainees, and intends to issue a new Army Field Manual on interrogation, which, along with accompanying directives, represents core instructions to U.S. soldiers worldwide." ... "President Bush's critics and supporters have debated whether it is possible to prove a direct link between administration declarations that it will not be bound by Geneva and events such as the abuses at Abu Ghraib or the killings of Iraqi civilians last year in Haditha, allegedly by Marines." ... "But the exclusion of the Geneva provisions may make it more difficult for the administration to portray such incidents as aberrations. And it undercuts contentions that U.S. forces follow the strictest, most broadly accepted standards when fighting wars." (1, 2) -By Julian E. Barnes -LAtimes

20060531

US - Iraq - Military - Intelligence - Phone - Privacy - Law - "Gore: Bush is 'renegade rightwing extremist'." ... "Al Gore has made his sharpest attack yet on the George Bush presidency, describing the current US administration as "a renegade band of rightwing extremists"." ... "Denying that his politics have shifted to the left since he lost the court battle for the 2000 election, Mr Gore says: "If you have a renegade band of rightwing extremists who get hold of power, the whole thing goes to the right."" ... "In the years since, he has been a steady critic of specific Bush administration policies. He opposed the war on Iraq at a time when most prominent Democrats were supporting it, and more recently spoke out against what he called "a gross and excessive power grab" by the administration over phone tapping." -Oliver Burkeman and Jonathan Freedland -Guardian.co.uk

20060530

Noteworthy - Opinion - US - Military - Terrorism - Countries - Intelligence - Libya - Egypt - Lebanon - China - North Korea - Iran - "Neo-cons question Bush’s democratisation strategy." ... "President George W. Bush has likened the “war on terrorism” to the cold war against communism." ... "Addressing military cadets graduating from West Point, Mr Bush reaffirmed at the weekend that the US “will not rest until the promise of liberty reaches every people in every nation”." ... "But as the US struggles to assert itself on the international stage, the president’s most radical supporters now dismiss this as mere rhetoric, and traditional conservatives are questioning the wisdom of a democratisation strategy that has brought unpleasant consequences in the Middle East." ... "Neo-conservative commentators at the American Enterprise Institute wrote last week what amounted to an obituary of the Bush freedom doctrine." ... "“Bush killed his own doctrine,” they said, describing the final blow as the resumption of diplomatic relations with Libya. This betrayal of Libyan democracy activists, they said, came after the US watched Egypt abrogate elections, ignored the collapse of the “Cedar Revolution” in Lebanon, abandoned imprisoned Chinese dissidents and started considering a peace treaty with Stalinist North Korea." ... "The neo-conservatives offered no explanation for desertion of the doctrine, other than a desire to make quick but transitory short-term gains. “The president continues to believe his own preaching, but his administration has become incapable of making the hard choices those beliefs require,” they wrote." -By Guy Dinmore -FT.com

20060524

Michael Hayden - Secret - Military - Intelligence- E-Mail - Phone - Privacy - Law - "Senate committee endorses general as new CIA chief: Full confirmation is expected soon." ... "The Senate Intelligence Committee voted yesterday to approve General Michael V. Hayden as director of the CIA, endorsing a veteran intelligence officer who has pledged to push the troubled agency to take more risks and work more closely with other US spy services." ... "But Hayden's standing among some lawmakers has eroded in recent months amid disclosures of domestic spy operations mounted by the National Security Agency, which Hayden led from 1999 to 2005." ... "During his confirmation hearing last week, Hayden acknowledged that he was a leading architect of a surveillance program launched shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks in which the NSA intercepted international phone calls and e-mails of US residents without prior court approval." ... "Some lawmakers have called the program illegal and said that it was kept secret from all but a handful of members of Congress for four years before it was exposed in news reports last year." ... "More recently, Hayden has had to fend off questions about whether the NSA also assembled phone records on tens of millions of Americans in an effort to identify suspicious calling patterns." -By Greg Miller -LAtimes via -BostonGlobe

20060522

Secret - Government - Terrorism - Intelligence - Journalists - Politics - "Prosecution of Journalists Is Possible in NSA Leaks." ... "Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales raised the possibility yesterday that New York Times journalists could be prosecuted for publishing classified information based on the outcome of the criminal investigation underway into leaks to the Times of data about the National Security Agency's surveillance of terrorist-related calls between the United States and abroad." -By Walter Pincus -WashingtonPost

20060521

- John Edwards - Cheney - Noteworthy - 2008 Election - "Edwards Bashes Cheney, Bush: 2004 vice presidential contender blasts Bush and readies to run again." -With George Stephanopoulos -ThisWeek-ABCNEWS.com
US - Iraq - Edwards - Cheney - Disaster - Energy - Health - Government - Intelligence - Law - History - 2008 Election - NC - "Edwards: Bush Worse than Nixon." ... "Former Sen. John Edwards, D-N.C., says George W. Bush is the "worst president of our lifetime," and "absolutely" worse than Watergate-tainted President Richard M. Nixon." ... "In an exclusive appearance on "This Week with George Stephanopoulos," the former presidential and vice presidential contender said of Bush, "He's done a variety of things -- things which are going to take us forever to recover from." ... ""You have to give Bush and Cheney and gang credit for being good at politics -- you know, good at political campaigns," Edwards added. "They're very good at dividing the country and taking advantage of it. What they're not good at is governing, and it shows every single day in this administration. And the country is paying a huge price for that."" ... ""It is not an accident that he's [Vice President Cheney] unbelievably poorly thought of," Edwards said. "He is one of -- if not the --principal architects of this disaster in Iraq. He put us on an energy path that the American people are paying an enormous price for right now. He paid little to no attention to making sure the government was prepared to respond to the kind of disaster that hit our Gulf Coast. We've got a health care crisis going on, he's had no proposal of any kind that I know of. And people don't trust him anymore, which is understandable. I wouldn't trust him."" ... "Edwards made the pitch for a Democratic president in 2008, claiming the Bush has "intentionally ignored" the law and constitution in the NSA wiretapping controversy." (1, 2, 3, 4) -By Ed O'Keefe-ABCNEWS.com

20060519

Michael Hayden - Military - Intelligence - Privacy - History - Politics - "Hayden grilled on domestic spying: Democrats press the CIA nominee on view of legality." ... "President Bush's nominee to be the next director of the CIA, General Michael V. Hayden, faced intense questions yesterday from Democratic senators about his role in crafting the administration's domestic spying programs, with several lawmakers asking whether he would obey the law if he is confirmed to lead the nation's premier intelligence agency." ... "Hayden stayed cool under the onslaught during his confirmation hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee. The four-star Air Force general insisted that the administration's domestic surveillance programs, which he designed as the former director of the National Security Agency, broke no laws." ... "Hayden said he believes the NSA program intercepting calls between Americans and overseas callers is legal because administration lawyers signed off on it. A 1978 law requires warrants for such wiretaps, but Bush says he has the authority to bypass the law." -By Charlie Savage -Boston/Globe
Michael Hayden - Intelligence - Terrorism - Secrets - Law - Privacy - Porter Goss - Maine - Russ Feingold - Wisconsin - Oregon - "Senators Use Hayden Hearing to Criticize Bush Surveillance Plan." ... "Senators reviewing General Michael Hayden's nomination to lead the CIA used his confirmation hearing to criticize the Bush administration's failure to tell them about warrantless eavesdropping of suspected terrorists." ... "``The Congress was really never consulted or informed in a manner that we could truly perform our oversight role,'' Maine Republican Olympia Snowe told Hayden. The failure to brief all members of the House and Senate intelligence committees until the day before the confirmation hearing ``breeds corrosive mistrust,'' she said." ... "Democrats Russ Feingold of Wisconsin and Ron Wyden of Oregon accused Hayden of misleading Congress in 2002 when he said the government was obtaining warrants to conduct surveillance." ... "President George W. Bush nominated Hayden to succeed Porter Goss, himself a former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. Goss resigned from the CIA post earlier this month. Hayden is currently deputy director in the Office of National Intelligence, which was created last year to coordinate all U.S. intelligence-gathering operations." -By James Rowley and Jeff St.Onge -Bloomberg

20060518

Michael Hayden - Terrorism - Intelligence - Civil Righs - Privacy - Law - Oregon - "Hayden defends eavesdropping at CIA confirmation." ... "Gen. Michael Hayden, U.S. President George W. Bush's nominee for CIA director, strongly defended a domestic eavesdropping program on Thursday, saying it protected the country against terrorism and did not violate Americans' civil rights." ... "The toughest questions came from Oregon Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden and concerned Hayden's role as architect of Bush's domestic spying program and his own credibility." ... "Wyden said Hayden had not kept Congress fully informed of the eavesdropping program and had made misleading statements in previous appearances before Congress." ... ""General, having evaluated your words, I now have a difficult time with your credibility," Wyden said." ... ""So with all due respect, general, I can't tell now if you've simply said one thing and done another, or whether you have just parsed your words like a lawyer to intentionally mislead the public," Wyden said." (1, 2, 3) -By David Morgan -Reuters
Michael Hayden - Terrorism - Intelligence - Law - Secrecy - Civil Righs - Privacy - "Lawmakers Reexamine Hayden: CIA Pick's Involvement in Wiretap Program Raises Questions." ... "In hearings today on President Bush's choice to head the CIA, senators will face an array of questions, loose ends and seeming contradictions about the administration's domestic surveillance techniques. The first mystery they must unravel, however, is the nominee himself, Air Force Gen. Michael V. Hayden, who pitched the eavesdropping program after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and has become its most forceful defender." ... "Bush and Hayden have defended the program as legal -- the White House has said eavesdropping involved only international communications by people with known links to al-Qaeda and its allies -- and said the attorney general reauthorizes it every 90 days. But twice since its inception, the program was stopped after the chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court and a senior Justice Department lawyer raised concerns about its legality." ... "An internal Justice Department investigation tried to determine whether lawyers who authorized the program may have acted improperly. But Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales suggested yesterday that secrecy concerns shut down the inquiry. The department's Office of Professional Responsibility notified lawmakers last week that it was forced to end its investigation because the office was denied security clearances to access information on the NSA program." ... "Gonzales defended that decision yesterday and suggested that the probe was unnecessary because Justice issued a legal analysis supporting the effort." -By Dafna Linzer and Charles Babington with contributions by Thomas E. Ricks, Dan Eggen and Julie Tate -WashingtonPost
Michael Hayden -Military - Phone - Intelligence - "Full committees get NSA briefings: Wiretap details provided to Senate, House panels." ... "The Bush administration provided detailed information on its domestic wiretapping program to the full membership of the House and Senate intelligence committees Wednesday, part of an effort to stem growing criticism surrounding its nominee to head the CIA." ... "White House spokesman Tony Snow acknowledged that the decision to brief the full committees, a move the administration had resisted for months, came as part of an effort to ease the confirmation of Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, the former National Security Agency chief whose confirmation hearings as CIA director are scheduled to begin today." ... "The White House said the Capitol Hill briefings, held by Army Lt. Gen. Keith Alexander, who succeeded Hayden as director of the NSA, would cover both the controversial eavesdropping program -- in which the administration has acknowledged listening in on a handful of phone calls between the United States and overseas -- and the recently disclosed NSA database of domestic phone calls." -By Peter Spiegel -LAtimes via -SFGate.com

20060516

Government - Phone - Company - Noteworthy - Reporters - Free Speech - Civil Liberties - Privacy - Law - Politics - "FBI Acknowledges: Journalists Phone Records are Fair Game." ... "The FBI acknowledged late Monday that it is increasingly seeking reporters' phone records in leak investigations." ... "Officials say the FBI makes extensive use of a new provision of the Patriot Act which allows agents to seek information with what are called National Security Letters (NSL)." ... "The NSLs are a version of an administrative subpoena and are not signed by a judge. Under the law, a phone company receiving a NSL for phone records must provide them and may not divulge to the customer that the records have been given to the government." -Brian Ross and Richard Esposito -ABCNEWS.com
Government- Terrorism - Intelligence - Electronic- Communications - Companies - Consumers - Privacy - Politics - "FCC chief calls for probe of phone cos.." ... "The Federal Communications Commission, which regulates the telephone industry, should open an investigation into whether the nation's phone companies broke the law by turning over millions of calling records to the government, an FCC commissioner says." ... "The National Security Agency has been collecting records of calls made in the U.S. by ordinary Americans as part of its anti-terrorism efforts, according to USA Today. The newspaper story followed reports that the NSA has been conducting eavesdropping on the electronic communications of suspected al-Qaida members and their contacts in the U.S. without warrants." ... ""There is no doubt that protecting the security of the American people is our government's No. 1 responsibility," Commissioner Michael J. Copps, a Democrat, said in a statement Monday. "But in a digital age where collecting, distributing and manipulating consumers' personal information is as easy as a click of a button, the privacy of our citizens must still matter."" -By Douglass K. Daniel -AP via -MercuryNews

20060515

Government - Law Enforcement - Phone - Intelligence - Reporters - Free Speech - Civil Liberties - Privacy - Law - Politics - "Federal Source to ABC News: We Know Who You're Calling." ... "A senior federal law enforcement official tells ABC News the government is tracking the phone numbers we (Brian Ross and Richard Esposito) call in an effort to root out confidential sources." ... ""It's time for you to get some new cell phones, quick," the source told us in an in-person conversation." ... "ABC News does not know how the government determined who we are calling, or whether our phone records were provided to the government as part of the recently-disclosed NSA collection of domestic phone calls." ... "Other sources have told us that phone calls and contacts by reporters for ABC News, along with the New York Times and the Washington Post, are being examined as part of a widespread CIA leak investigation." -Brian Ross and Richard Esposito -ABCNEWS.com

20060514

Dick Cheney - Michael Hayden - Government - Terrorism - E-Mail - Phone - Privacy - Law - Politics - "Cheney Pushed U.S. to Widen Eavesdropping." ... "In the weeks after the Sept. 11 attacks, Vice President Dick Cheney and his top legal adviser argued that the National Security Agency should intercept purely domestic telephone calls and e-mail messages without warrants in the hunt for terrorists, according to two senior intelligence officials." ... "But N.S.A. lawyers, trained in the agency's strict rules against domestic spying and reluctant to approve any eavesdropping without warrants, insisted that it should be limited to communications into and out of the country, said the officials, who were granted anonymity to discuss the debate inside the Bush administration late in 2001." ... "The N.S.A.'s position ultimately prevailed. But just how Gen. Michael V. Hayden, the director of the agency at the time, designed the program, persuaded wary N.S.A. officers to accept it and sold the White House on its limits is not yet clear." ... "As the program's overseer and chief salesman, General Hayden is certain to face questions about his role when he appears at a Senate hearing next week on his nomination as director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Criticism of the surveillance program, which some lawmakers say is illegal, flared again this week with the disclosure that the N.S.A. had collected the phone records of millions of Americans in an effort to track terrorism suspects." (1, 2) -By Scott Shane and Eric Lichtblau-NYTimes
Secret - Military - Government - Intelligence- Phone - Database - Privacy - Law - Civil Liberties - Terrorism - Politics - "Poll: 51% oppose NSA database." ... "A majority of Americans disapprove of a massive Pentagon database containing the records of billions of phone calls made by ordinary citizens, according to a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll. About two-thirds are concerned that the program may signal other, not-yet-disclosed efforts to gather information on the general public." ... "POLL RESULTS: NSA database reaction" ... "The survey of 809 adults Friday and Saturday shows a nation wrestling with the balance between fighting terrorism and protecting civil liberties." ... "By 51%-43%, those polled disapprove of the program, disclosed Thursday in USA TODAY. The National Security Agency has been collecting phone records from three of the nation's largest telecommunication companies since soon after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001." -By Susan Page -USATODAY

20060513

Secret - Michael Hayden - Government - Phone - Intelligence - Terrorism - Privacy - Law - Opinion - "Newsweek Poll: Americans Wary of NSA Spying: Bush's approval ratings hit new lows as controversy rages." ... "Has the Bush administration gone too far in expanding the powers of the President to fight terrorism? Yes, say a majority of Americans, following this week's revelation that the National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone records of U.S. citizens since the September 11 terrorist attacks. According to the latest NEWSWEEK poll, 53 percent of Americans think the NSA's surveillance program "goes too far in invading people's privacy," while 41 percent see it as a necessary tool to combat terrorism." ... "President Bush tried to reassure the public this week that its privacy is "fiercely protected," and that "we're not mining or trolling through the personal lives of innocent Americans." Nonetheless, Americans think the White House has overstepped its bounds: 57 percent said that in light of the NSA data-mining news and other executive actions, the Bush-Cheney Administration has "gone too far in expanding presidential power." That compares to 38 percent who think the Administration's actions are appropriate." ... "News of the NSA's secret phone-records program comes at an especially awkward time for the president. His nominee for the top job at the CIA-former NSA head Gen. Michael Hayden-heads into confirmation hearings on the Hill next week. With Democrats expressing outrage over the surveillance program, and several Republicans voicing concern as well, the hearings could turn into something of a Congressional probe into the NSA's collection of phone data." ... "According to the Newsweek poll, 73 percent of Democrats and 26 percent of Republicans think the NSA's program is overly intrusive." (1, 2) - By David Jefferson -MSNBC/Newsweek

20060512

Kyle "Dusty" Foggo - Randy "Duke" Cunningham - Brent Wilkes - Intelligence - Law - Money - Politics - San Diego - California - Virginia - "FBI searches home of ex-CIA official: The FBI searched the home and office of former CIA Executive Director Kyle "Dusty" Foggo on Friday, the CIA said." ... "Foggo, who was the spy agency's third-ranking official, is part of a broad law enforcement investigation into allegations of corruption, according to officials familiar with the probe." ... "The Associated Press reported that Foggo has been under investigation by the FBI, Internal Revenue Service, Defense Criminal Investigative Service, the CIA's inspector general and the U.S. attorney's office in San Diego, California, according to FBI spokeswoman April Langwell in San Diego. Langwell told the AP that officials -- under a sealed warrant -- searched Foggo's Virginia home and his office at the CIA's Langley, Virginia, campus." ... "Foggo, who resigned this week from his job overseeing day-to-day CIA operations, is under investigation over his ties to a defense contractor linked to the bribery case against former [California Republican Representative] U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, R-California." ... "The investigations stem from Foggo's relationship with defense contractor Brent Wilkes." ... "After reports surfaced last week alleging Wilkes provided Cunningham with limousines and prostitutes at two Washington hotels, Foggo said he had attended poker parties thrown by Wilkes there." -Contributed to by Kevin Bohn and John Roberts -CNN
US - Iraq - Australia - UN- Military - Intelligence - Book- "Ex-WMD inspector: Politics quashed facts." ... "A year after Bush administration claims about Iraqi "bioweapons trailers" were discredited by American experts, U.S. officials were still suppressing the findings, says a senior member of the CIA-led Iraq inspection team." ... "At one point, former U.N. arms inspector Rod Barton says, a CIA officer told him it was "politically not possible" to report that the White House claims were untrue. In the end, Barton says, he felt "complicit in deceit."" ... "Barton, an Australian biological weapons specialist, discusses the 2004 events in "The Weapons Detective," a memoir of his years as an arms inspector, being published Monday in Australia by Black Inc. Agenda." ... "Barton's memoir says that well into 2004, pressure from Washington kept the U.S. public uninformed about the true nature of these alleged WMD systems." -Charles J. Hanley -AP via -Kentucky.com
Privacy - Opinion - Secret - Military - Government - Intelligence - Phone - Database - Civil Liberties - San Francisco - California - "Breaking the Law? A privacy advocate explains why Americans should care about the NSA's database of phone records." ... "Domestic spying or national security? The debate over whether the government is poking too closely into Americans' lives was inflamed this week following reports that the National Security Agency (NSA) is creating a massive database of millions of phone records-and that three major telecom companies have cooperated in the effort. For privacy advocates like the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a [California] San Francisco-based nonprofit, the answer is clear: the NSA is spying on Americans. And, according to EFF, it is illegal for telecom companies to supply customer calling details to the NSA unless they follow established legal procedures to obtain a warrant." ... "If the EFF has its way, the onus may soon be on the federal government to prove that its requests to the telecom companies were legal. In January of this year, the group filed a class-action lawsuit against AT&T for "allowing and assisting" the NSA's "illegal wiretapping and data-mining." The Department of Justice has already stepped in, indicating April 28 that it intends to seek dismissal of the case by asserting the "military and state secrets privilege." With recent allegations in USA Today that Verizon and BellSouth also covertly provided information about domestic phone calls to the federal government, the progress of EFF's suit will be scrutinized by civil libertarians and other privacy advocates. A hearing to determine the court schedule for this case will be held May 17." (1, 2) -By Susanna Schrobsdorff -MSNBC/Newsweek

EFF.org - "Electronic Frontier Foundation."

Intelligence - Porter Goss - Randy Cunningham - California- Military - Business - Politics - Law - "Law Enforcement Searches Exiting CIA Deputy's Home." ... "CIA and FBI officers today searched the home and former office of the recently retired third-ranking official at the CIA, who is under investigation for his ties to a defense contractor linked to the bribery scandal that has landed former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R-San Diego [California]) in jail." ... "Kyle "Dusty" Foggo resigned as CIA executive director Monday. He had been a top aide to CIA Director Porter J. Goss, who was forced to resign the previous Friday." ... "A CIA spokeswoman said Foggo's legal troubles had "absolutely nothing" to do with Goss' decision to resign." ... "They have been investigating whether Foggo played an improper role in the awarding of defense contracts to Brent Wilkes, a personal friend and San Diego businessman who has been implicated in the bribery scandal involving Cunningham." -By Richard Schmitt -LAtimes

20060511

Secret -

Government -

Terrorism -

Telephone -

Database -

Intelligence -

Law-

Civil Liberties -

Politics -

California -

Russ Feingold -

Wisconsin - "

Bush Says U.S. Spying Is Not Widespread." ... "President Bush today denied that the government is "mining or trolling through the personal lives of innocent Americans," as Democrats expressed outrage over a news report describing a National Security Agency program that has collected vast amounts of telephone records." ... "He [Bush] said all intelligence work was conducted "within the law" and that domestic conversations were not listened to without a court warrant." ... ""The privacy of all Americans is fiercely protected in all our activities," he said. "Our efforts are focused on Al Qaeda and their known associates."" ... "But Democrats reacted angrily to the USA Today article and its description of the program's vast size, including an assertion by one unnamed source that its goal was the creation of a database of every phone call ever made within the United States' borders." ... "Senator Dianne Feinstein, the California Democrat who is a member of the Intelligence Committee as well as the Judiciary Committee, appeared to confirm at least the gist of the article, while stressing that what was under discussion was not wiretapping. "It's fair to say that what is in the news this morning is not content collection," she said." ... "Even so, she warned, "I happen to believe that we are on our way to a major Constitutional confrontation on the Fourth Amendment guarantees over unreasonable search and seizure."" ... "Senator Russell D. Feingold, a Wisconsin Democrat who is also on both the judiciary and intelligence panels, expressed dismay over what he termed the administration's "arrogance and abuse of power." He said the United States can fight terrorism and still protect privacy, "but only if we have a president who believes in these principles."" (1, 2) -By John O'Neil

-NYTimes

Privacy - Law - Terrorism - Politics - Secret - Military - Government - Intelligence - Phone- Database - VT - Ariz.- "NSA Program Revealed: An article in Thursday's USA Today reported that three of the largest U.S. phone companies [AT&T, Bell South and Verizon] have been providing the National Security Agency with phone records from millions of Americans since 9/11."

- SEN. PATRICK LEAHY, D-Vt.: "Look at this headline."

- KWAME HOLMAN: "Only hours after it appeared in print, the story that the National Security Agency secretly has been gathering a giant database of phone records set off a firestorm on Capitol Hill. Vermont Democrat Patrick Leahy was visibly angry about it and lashed out at the Bush administration at a Senate Judiciary Committee meeting scheduled to discuss judicial nominations."

- SEN. PATRICK LEAHY: "Only through the press, we begin to learn the truth. The secret collection of phone call records tens of millions of Americans. Now, are you telling me that tens of millions of Americans are involved with al-Qaida? If that's the case, we've really failed in any kind of a war on terror."

- KWAME HOLMAN: "Arizona Republican Jon Kyl responded."

- SEN. JON KYL, R-Ariz.: "This is nuts. We are in a war, and we've got to collect intelligence on enemy, and you can't tell the enemy in advance how you're going to do it."

- KWAME HOLMAN: "Emblazoned across the front page of USA Today, the lengthy report said the code-breaking National Security Agency contracted three of the nation's largest phone companies to provide records of home and business telephone calls made by their customers." ... "The NSA earlier was revealed to have been monitoring, without warrants, international phone calls and e-mails thought to be linked to terrorists." ... "USA Today telecommunications reporter Leslie Cauley spent the last several months preparing today's story."

- LESLIE CAULEY, USA Today: "The NSA is collecting the call detail records of millions of ordinary Americans."

- KWAME HOLMAN: "The companies reportedly contracted by the spy agency are AT&T, Bell South and Verizon."

- LESLIE CAULEY: "The pitch to the phone companies was: We feel this information can be very helpful in smoking out, you know, and tracking suspected terrorists. And, again, three out of the four agreed."

- KWAME HOLMAN: "But Qwest, a telecommunications company that provides local phone service to 14 million customers in 14 western and northwestern states, reportedly refused to participate."

-PBS /NewsHour

Secret - Government - Terrorism-Telephone Business - Consumer - Privacy - Law - Politics - Massachusetts - Illinois - "NSA Collected Phone Records in U.S., Lott Says (Update1)." ... "The U.S. National Security Agency has obtained the phone records of millions of Americans in an effort to stop terrorists, a Senate Intelligence Committee member confirmed." ... "When the program began, AT&T, whose chief executive officer was C. Michael Armstrong, agreed to provide the information, as did BellSouth, run by Duane Ackerman, and Verizon, headed by Ivan Seidenberg. SBC Communications Inc., whose CEO was Edward Whitacre, also complied with the request, USA Today said." ... "SBC has acquired AT&T and taken its name. Whitacre is the CEO of the company, which also has agreed to buy BellSouth." ... "Also in Congress, Representative Edward Markey of Massachusetts questioned whether intelligence officials are hindering passage of a bill requiring telephone companies to do more to protect their customers' privacy. House Republican leaders canceled a vote last week on the measure, which seeks to prevent the fraudulent acquisition and sale of consumers' phone records." ... "``I am concerned about reports that some intelligence agency or interest had a hand in the bill's disappearance,'' Markey, senior Democrat on the House Commerce subcommittee on telecommunications, said today in a letter to House Speaker Dennis Hastert, an Illinois Republican." -By Robert Schmidt in Nicholas Johnston -Bloomberg
Michael Hayden - Secret - Government - Terrorism - Telecommunications - Intelligence - Database - People - Business- Law - Civil Liberties - Privacy - Politics - "NSA has massive database of Americans' phone calls." ... "The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY." ... "The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom aren't suspected of any crime. This program does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations. But the spy agency is using the data to analyze calling patterns in an effort to detect terrorist activity, sources said in separate interviews." ... ""It's the largest database ever assembled in the world," said one person, who, like the others who agreed to talk about the NSA's activities, declined to be identified by name or affiliation. The agency's goal is "to create a database of every call ever made" within the nation's borders, this person added." ... "For the customers of these companies, it means that the government has detailed records of calls they made — across town or across the country — to family members, co-workers, business contacts and others." ... "The three telecommunications companies are working under contract with the NSA, which launched the program in 2001 shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the sources said. The program is aimed at identifying and tracking suspected terrorists, they said." ... "The sources would talk only under a guarantee of anonymity because the NSA program is secret." ... "Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, nominated Monday by President Bush to become the director of the CIA, headed the NSA from March 1999 to April 2005. In that post, Hayden would have overseen the agency's domestic call-tracking program. Hayden declined to comment about the program." ... "The NSA's domestic program, as described by sources, is far more expansive than what the White House has acknowledged. Last year, Bush said he had authorized the NSA to eavesdrop — without warrants — on international calls and international e-mails of people suspected of having links to terrorists when one party to the communication is in the USA. Warrants have also not been used in the NSA's efforts to create a national call database." -By Leslie Cauley with contributions by John Diamond -USATODAY

20060508

US - Cuba - Guantanamo Bay - UN - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence- Prisons - Human Rights - "Under fire, U.S. says it will ban controversial interrogation practice." ... "The U.S. Army will prohibit "water-boarding" - the controversial practice of submerging a prisoner's head in water in an effort to make him talk - when it issues its new interrogation manual, the State Department's legal adviser told the U.N. Committee Against Torture on Monday." ... "John B. Bellinger III said banning water-boarding wasn't an admission that American interrogators had used the technique on detainees during the war on terrorism." ... "Water-boarding was among several harsh interrogation techniques reportedly sanctioned by a Justice Department memo written in August 2002. Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld in December 2002 approved the use of techniques that induced the sensation of drowning among 17 practices implemented at the prison at the American naval base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba." -By Matthew Schofield -KnightRidder via -MercuryNews
US - International - Michael Hayden - Government - Military - Terrorism - Electronic - Communications - Intelligence - Privacy - Law - Pennsylvania - "Bush Names Hayden to Head CIA Amid Lawmakers' Unease (Update1)." ... "President George W. Bush named General Michael Hayden to head the Central Intelligence Agency today, even as lawmakers from both parties signaled concern about putting a military officer atop a civilian spy agency." ... "Hayden, 61, is currently the No. 2 official in the Office of National Intelligence, a post to which he was named in August. He was director of the National Security Agency from 1999 to 2005." ... "The super-secret NSA runs massive electronic surveillance programs of international communications and operates a much- criticized domestic wiretapping program as well." ... "Under the spying program approved by Bush in 2001, the NSA monitored conversations between U.S. residents and suspected foreign terrorists without seeking a court warrant, as prescribed by the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. [Pennsylvania Senator Arlen] Specter has said the court set up by the act should approve surveillance requests." -By Jeff Bliss -Bloomberg
Michael Hayden - Military - Intelligence - Mich.- "Bipartisan cry rises on likely CIA nominee: Lawmakers raise concerns over having military officer as head of civilian intelligence agency." ... "President Bush's expected choice of Gen. Michael Hayden as the next CIA director drew bipartisan criticism Sunday, including that of the Republican head of the House Intelligence Committee, who said a military man should not run the intelligence agency." ... "Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), who heads the House intelligence panel, said he was concerned that Hayden's military background would further diminish the CIA's post-Sept. 11 role and could enhance the Pentagon's influence over U.S. intelligence operations." ... ""This is one more step in the [Defense Department's] taking over the intelligence community," Hoekstra said." ... "Hoekstra acknowledged that entering into a "public spat" with the White House put him in "an unfortunate position." But, he said, "you kind of look at it and say, `I can't go with you on this one.' In my gut, it just feels wrong." ... ""I do believe he's the wrong person, the wrong place, at the wrong time," the congressman said. "We should not have a military person leading a civilian agency at this time."" (1, 2) -By Siobhan Gorman -BaltimoreSun via -ChicagoTribune
US - Iran - Michael Hayden - Military - Nuclear - Intelligence - Michigan - "C.I.A. Nominee May Face Tough Fight." ... "President Bush announced today that he was nominating Gen. Michael V. Hayden to lead the Central Intelligence Agency, despite concerns raised over the weekend by Republicans as well as Democrats about the wisdom of installing a military officer at the civilian spy agency." ... "Speaking from the Oval Office, Mr. Bush said that General Hayden would bring "vast experience" to his new post. "He knows our intelligence community from the ground up," he said." ... "But in a possible preview of the difficulties that could await General Hayden on Capitol Hill, the Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee today strongly criticized the choice and suggested that the White House was undoing an agreement with Congress on how the intelligence community should be restructured." ... "The chairman, Representative Peter Hoekstra of Michigan, was one of several other Republicans, including some with close ties to the White House, who spoke out on Sunday and said that President Bush should find someone else to run the embattled agency." ... "Mr. Hoekstra said today that it was wrong to choose a military official to lead the C.I.A., especially as crucial questions like the state of Iran's nuclear program loomed. "We need to be able to get the unvarnished intelligence and we need to be able to get it from a civilian," whose independence would be unquestioned, he said."" (1, 2) -By John O'Neil -NYTimes
Michael Hayden - Military - Intelligence - Privacy- Michigan - "Bush Nominates Hayden To Lead CIA." ... "President Bush on Monday chose Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden to lead the embattled CIA, re-igniting a debate over the domestic surveillance program that he once ran." ... "Stephen Hadley, the national security adviser to President Bush, made the rounds of morning television shows to defend Hayden's selection." ... ""There have been several directors of the central intelligence agency who have been military officers in the past. So there's precedent for it," Hadley told CBS News' The Early Show. "We don't see any reason to break that precedent ... The question is not military versus civilian. The question is the best person to do the job."" ... "Asked to what extent a Hayden nomination would get caught up in the controversy over domestic spying by the National Security Agency, Hadley replied: "any nominee to be director of the Central Intelligence Agency would be asked to answer these questions, and who better to answer these questions than Michael Hayden, who has been overseeing this process and is very conversant with it."" ... "Nevertheless, Hayden's elevation to the CIA helm was running into criticism from members of Congress who voiced concern that a military officer would lead the civilian spy agency, CBS News correspondent Bill Plante reports." ... ""This is not about Mike Hayden. This is about the fact that we're rebuilding a civilian agency at this time," House Intelligence Committee Chairman Peter Hoekstra, a [Michigan] Republican, said on The Early Show. "It has to be clearly independent of the Department of Defense. We as public policy makers need an unfiltered, independent, strong voice in the intelligence community. This appointment may lead us in a direction different than that."" (1, 2) -AP via -CBSNews -TheEarlyShow

20060507

Michael Hayden - Noteworthy- Secret - Government - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - Civil Liberties - Telecom - Privacy - Law - Pennsylvania - "House Panel Chairman Opposes Hayden as Next CIA Chief (Update1)." ... "The Republican chairman of the U.S. House Intelligence Committee urged the White House not to nominate Air Force Lieutenant General Michael Hayden to head the civilian Central Intelligence Agency." ... "The appointment may spark a political confrontation over Hayden's role in the government's warrantless wiretapping of suspected terrorists, a secret operation that alarmed civil liberties groups and angered Democrats. Lawmakers from both parties said his confirmation hearings in the Senate may provide an opportunity to examine a program the White House refuses to discuss in detail." ... "The Judiciary Committee chairman, Senator Arlen Specter, a Pennsylvania Republican, said the confirmation process and the budget are the only tools Congress has to extract information from the White House on the wiretapping." ... "``If the Senate has a mind to assert its constitutional prerogatives here, then we could use this for leverage to find out,'' he told ``Fox News Sunday.'' ``I think people do want to know what's going on to protect civil liberties.''" -By Avram Goldstein with contributions by Catherine Larkin and Viola Gienger -Bloomberg

20060506

US - Iraq - Foreign - Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - Politics - Porter Goss - "The Fix-It Man Leaves, but The Agency's Cracks Remain." ... "Porter J. Goss was brought into the CIA to quell what the White House viewed as a partisan insurgency against the administration and to re-energize a spy service that failed to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks or accurately assess Iraq's weapons capability." ... "But as he walked out the glass doors of Langley headquarters yesterday, Goss left behind an agency that current and former intelligence officials say is weaker operationally, with a workforce demoralized by an exodus of senior officers and by uncertainty over its role in fighting terrorism and other intelligence priorities, said current and former intelligence officials." ... "As a result of all these factors, said these sources and outside experts who work with the CIA, the number of case officers has skyrocketed, but there has been no dramatic improvement in how spies collect intelligence about terrorist targets." ... "As important, Goss -- who did not like to travel overseas or to wine and dine foreign intelligence chiefs who visited Washington -- allowed the atrophy of relations with the foreign intelligence services that helped the CIA kill or catch nearly all the terrorists taken off the streets since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, in the view of these officials and several foreign intelligence officials." (1, 2) -By Dana Priest with contributions by Thomas E. Ricks and Julie Tate -WashingtonPost
Military - Intelligence - Privacy - Law - Secret - Terrorism - Prisons- "Goss Forced Out as CIA Director; Gen. Hayden Is Likely Successor." ... "Porter J. Goss was forced to step down yesterday as CIA director, ending a turbulent 18-month tenure marked by an exodus of some of the agency's top talent and growing White House dissatisfaction with his leadership during a time of war." ... "The likely successor to Goss is Gen. Michael V. Hayden, the former director of the National Security Agency and now deputy to Director of National Intelligence John D. Negroponte, senior administration officials said. He could be named as soon as Monday." ... "Members of Congress privately predicted that Hayden, who once enjoyed tremendous support on the Hill, would face a contentious confirmation process over the Bush administration's domestic spying program. Other sensitive issues, such as the existence of secret prisons abroad for terrorism suspects, also are likely to arise." (1, 2) -By Dafna Linzer and Walter Pincus with contributions by Dana Priest, Peter Baker, Jim VandeHei, and Julie Tate -WashingtonPost
Military - Terrorism - Intelligence - Florida - "CIA Chief Goss Resigns: The director ends his 19-month tenure under pressure after seeing his agency's role reduced and his post stripped of much of its clout." ... "CIA Director Porter J. Goss resigned under pressure Friday, ending a tumultuous 19-month tenure marked by clashes with the nation's new intelligence chief over the CIA's reduced role in the restructured spy community." ... "U.S. intelligence and other officials said Goss was pushed out by Director of National Intelligence John D. Negroponte, whose growing disenchantment with the CIA director was shared by members of President Bush's intelligence advisory board." ... "As director, Goss focused on expanding the CIA's clandestine service and pushing it to take more operational risks. But the former Florida congressman was often faulted for a lax management style, for alienating veteran CIA officers — and for his reluctance to surrender resources to espionage organizations created after the Sept. 11 attacks to combat terrorism and weapons proliferation." ... "Goss, who took charge of the CIA in September 2004, was the last director with authority over the nation's other intelligence agencies. He soon had to surrender that authority, when Congress voted to overhaul the nation's intelligence community and Negroponte was appointed to oversee the activities of the CIA and 15 other agencies." (1, 2) -By Greg Miller -LAtimes

20060504

Secret - US - Philippines - Dick Cheney - Leandro Aragoncillo - Government - Military - Intelligence - Politics -