Posts from — July 2008

“This, we will defend.” It is a common refrain among brothers in arms. Yet, more pressing than the visible threat from terrorists and the states which sponsor them, we are at serious risk of losing sight of what “this” is while we call on those few dedicated men and women who defend it honorably and without hesitation. We appear at grave risk of losing our way. Right now.

In the Hamdan trial at Guantanamo Bay, we learn that bin Laden’s driver, captured and now on trial, said in interrogation that the United States could have killed bin Laden on more than one occasion in the 1990’s. The context is a far greater reflection upon us than our enemies.

The message was, ”You had these opportunities, America. You didn’t do anything,” FBI agent George Crouch Jr. testified Friday at Salim Hamdan’s war crimes trial.

The United States could have killed bin Laden in Khartoum, Sudan, before he moved to Afghanistan in 1996, Hamdan told his interrogators. They could have killed him after al Qaida’s 1998 twin bombings at the U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. Or after the October 2000 suicide bombing of the USS Cole, at the port of Aden in Yemen, which left 17 U.S. sailors dead.

Instead, ”Bin Laden was emboldened.” So he struck with the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, leaving nearly 3,000 dead.

None of the information is new. It is ‘news’ simply because of the source and the setting. No more, no less.

It is bitter irony that lawyers are conveying such through a trial. Remote controlled Tomahawks, the illusion of safety beyond the sanctuary of oceans, and the hot pursuit via attorneys and law both remote and unrecognized by murderous men who seek our death. This was how we convinced ourselves of our certain and active defense.

Long before the Hamdan trial, we already knew that we were offered bin Laden in transit from Sudan to Afghanistan. But we did not want him. Our lawyers had no battle, our leaders no mettle.

Most of us, though not all, have learned nothing. After thousands smote and seven years of war, we are back to our superior ways, demanding Habeas Corpus and noting in the very first trial that bin Laden’s deputy was read no Miranda rights upon his capture - or was it arrest?

They say history repeats itself. Never before has it applied so swiftly, within the same generation and within the same conflict.

A selfish society incapable of sacrifice is equally incapable of self-defense. Our greatest concern is not the pursuit of madmen or the states which feed them. It is not even the cost of oil and its affect on our economy and future. Our most pressing concern seems the cost of the gasoline that cycles through our tanks and its affect on our personal checking account balances.

Cowardice, cloaked in arrogance and concealed behind self-assured brilliance, charts a troubled path; one which appears circular, where constant motion deceptively passes for progress. Progress towards what, we disagree, though our enemies do not, as they laugh.

Many say it will take another catastrophic attack to bring us to our collective senses. But it will likely not come. For, if al-Qaeda (et al) is smart - and they are - they will leave us alone on our own soil while we rip ourselves apart. No explosives, no bombs, no weapons of war required. We are, after all, suddenly and finally waging their centuries-long war upon ourselves. Brilliantly.

We allow ourselves to be told that we are what is wrong with the world; torturous, greedy, destructive, with disregard for the poorest and bitter intolerance for anyone not like us. We Balkanize our society and point fingers at each other, laying these same charges against one domestic group or another with the venom and aggression once reserved for distant, oppressive enemies.

Can we awaken from our own self-destructive slumber? The decisive war is not in Iraq, nor Afghanistan, nor Pakistan or any other distant place where we perceive our enemies to be. The decisive battle is right here, from Maine to San Diego, from St. Louis to Atlanta.

If we are incapable of rediscovering that which Constitutes us and what distinguishes America form every other nation on this planet, and acknowledging that America, her people, our liberty and our unequaled charity are indeed good and our values just, then what does Iraq or Afghanistan matter?

Can we truly identify that which we are defending? For if we cannot, we are not. We are simply preserving soil and borders, protecting cities and people - that which can be found anywhere else on this planet.

What will America be, what will she look like when our children are thrust at the helm? Will they write that we defended her, or will they write that we devoured and discarded her? This, not al-Qaeda or the War on Terror, keeps me up at night.

For we can defeat al-Qaeda and yet have defended nothing at all in the long, painful process. And our children will be compelled to write of us, ”You had these opportunities, America. You didn’t do anything.”

In the field of science and technology research, the stakes are usually a lot higher than the athletic platitude of “no pain, no gain.” In S&T, the risk/reward ratio becomes a guiding consideration when evaluating the merits of an effort. Speaking from my personal experience in research and development of technology, every effort contains a ratio of risk and reward. The question is whether the projected or envisioned end result is worth the time and effort expended. At the same time, considering issues surrounding the Global War on Terror, it is absolutely essential that the unimaginable be imagined. The question is whether the consequences of doing (or not doing) something is worth the risk. Without question, unpredictable events can and will occur. Thus, we have to be prepared for a wide range of possibilities.

Since 1954 when Plum Island was given by the US Army to the Department of Agriculture to study Foot and Mouth Disease following disease outbreaks in Mexico and Canada, the Plum Island Animal Disease Center (PIADC) has operated as a bio-safety level-3 (BSL-3) laboratory. According to the Department of Homeland Security web site, a BSL-3 is a laboratory that studies and thus stores “[m]icroorganisms present in the United States, and foreign and emerging agents that may cause serious consequences in livestock but are not harmful to human beings because of available protective measures.”

But it isn’t really that simple or simplistic. The ownership of the Plum Island facility was transferred from the Department of Agriculture to the Department of Homeland Security as one of the provisions of the Homeland Security Act of 2002. What followed was Homeland Security Presidential Directive 9 (HSPD-9) that brought into motion the creation of a facility that would conduct not only research and development on mitigation strategies for the animal diseases previously studied by the Plum Island facility, but to also expand its scope to study zoonotic diseases (those diseases that impact both animals and human beings). This raised the specter of the need to require a facility that could study not only BSL-3, but also BSL-4 diseases. According the the DHS reference cited above, BSL-4 diseases are “[m]icroorganisms that pose a high risk of life-threatening disease and for which there is no known vaccine or therapy.”

A number of BSL-4 laboratories already exist in the United States performing various types of high-risk research. There have been few known accidents or critical releases from a level 4 facility in the U.S. (One exception was the escaped baboon from the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research (SFBR) in San Antonio Texas in July 2006, but not known to be from the Level 4 part of the lab. It should also be noted that the escapee was never out of the sight of his keepers, and that it was the first breach in 16 years at the SFBR.) Nevertheless, there is an undercurrent of conspiracy theorists and doomsayers that argue strenuously against the creation of any National Bio and Agro-Defense facility. Without differentiating between BSL-3 and BSL-4 laboratories, and further, without actually substantiating the hazard, those in strident objection are vehemently opposed to the establishment of the NBAF anywhere beyond that which could be rebuilt on Plum Island (noting that there is limited if any support from the community for this to occur).

Two anti-research organizations of note have existed; the Sunshine Project (which inexplicably suspended operations in February 2008) and a less subtle organization called Stop the NBAF (specifically anti-NBAF in North Carolina), both of which have publicized the mistakes and accidents that have occurred. Make no mistake about it, however, there have been other accidents that have occurred and became visible because of the pending decisions about the NBAF. These included:

• the power outage at the Center for Disease Control Level 4 facility in the Summer of 2007, but the lab was not operational at the time of the outage.

• the unreported accidental exposure of workers at Texas A&M’s Level 3 laboratory to brucellosis during an experiment (BSL-3).

Some very dangerous and virile diseases will be studied at both the BSL-3 and BSL-4 elements of the new NBAF. The real question lies in whether the risk (that has been mitigated in the security and safeguards parts of the plans to build the facility) outweighs the benefits of studying and potentially solving the puzzles of how to tame these viruses before they become threats to the human populations.

Diseases Studied in BSL-3 Facilities
• Foot and Mouth Disease (FMD)

• Classical Swine Fever (CSF)

• African Swine Fever (ASF)

• Rift Valley Fever (RVF)

• Contagious Bovine Pleuropneumonia (CBPP)

• Japanese Encephalitis (JE) Virus

Diseases Studied in BSL-4 Facilities

• Nipah Virus

• Hendra Virus

It should be recognized that 10.9% of the space allocated at the new NBAF will be used for BSL-4 research, with nearly ¾ of the space being used for BSL-3 work. Some of the other issues are discussed below.

The result of HSPD-9 was the initiation of a program, the National Agro and Bio-Defense Facility with the objective of replacing and upgrading the animal research center on Plum Island.

HSPD-9 tasked the Secretaries of Agriculture and Homeland Security to develop a plan to provide safe, secure, and state-of-the-art agriculture biocontainment laboratories for research and development of diagnostic capabilities and medical countermeasures for foreign animal and zoonotic diseases. To partially meet these obligations, DHS has requested Congress to appropriate funds to construct a new facility, the National Bio- and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF). This facility would house high-containment laboratories able to handle the pathogens currently under investigation at PIADC, as well as other pathogens of interest.

The Federal Register of January 18, 2006 was the first moment in a mad and expensive dash by almost 2-dozen locations to respond to the Request for an Expression of Interest.

This Request for Expressions of Interest resulted in submissions by 29 different sites from which the DHS then selected 12 Consortia that comprised 18 potential sites for follow-on evaluations. When the second down-selection decision was made on July 11, 2007, various groups in the finalist areas became sensitized the possibility that their community might be the “winner” in the NBAF lottery. It is on this background that the questions of research and the risk/reward ratio can be discussed.

There are five finalist cities plus the so-called “no-decision, decision” in which the NBAF could be re-built on Plum Island. The finalist areas are South Milledge Avenue Site, Athens, Georgia; Manhattan Campus Site, Manhattan, Kansas; Flora Industrial Park Site, Flora, Mississippi; Plum Island Site, Plum Island, New York; Umstead Research Farm Site, Butner, North Carolina; Texas Research Park Site, San Antonio, Texas. Just a couple of weeks ago, the Department of Homeland Security published its much awaited Environmental Impact Statement (EIS).

On September 11, 2007, an open public forum was held in San Antonio, Texas. Other, similar public forums were held in each of the down-selected areas. At these open meetings, people from the communities had the opportunity to voice their support or outrage at the possible locating of the NBAF in their city. I attended only the meeting in my city. At the time, there were very few negative statements made, while I’m told that in other areas, especially in North Carolina and in Georgia, there was an outspoken opposition. Since that time, even before the release of the EIS, a number of issues have come to the surface.

Since the release of the EIS, the most substantial issue that has been raised is the use of a mainland facility that might increase the risk of a release of foot and mouth disease. Related, sub-issues were:

• It is now argued, following the release of a report from the Government Accountability Office (GAO) that risk assessments of moving a laboratory studying animal diseases near cattle herds have not been done. Further, it is being used by opponents that the DHS supposedly did not have the “right” data available when they made the decision to move the Plum Island replacement on-shore.

• A mainland facility will be at a higher risk of terrorism than a facility on an island.

Both arguments are compelling, yet should be seen through a number of filters. These “filters” would include whether the research community has learned nothing about risk mitigation, safety and security safeguards around such facilities. Additionally, there truly needs to be a question raised as to whether or not an island or a mainland facility is more or less vulnerable to a terrorist attack. Logically, if a terrorist wanted to attack an island facility, its ability to do so exists (the attacks of September 11th, I believe, prove that virtually anything is possible, and that if we do not imagine the unimaginable, then events even more unimaginable may occur).

Further to these, it is also worthy to note that currently, legislation exists that bans the study of Foot and Mouth Disease on the mainland. Therefore locating the NBAF on the mainland would require permission from the Department of Agriculture to do so. This is a result of the circumstance that when the ownership of Plum Island was transferred from the Department of Agriculture to the Department of Homeland Security, the Secretary of agriculture retained the authority to prevent Foot and Mouth Disease research from being conducted on the mainland. Legislation is pending in Congress to allow this to occur. It has been estimated that a leak of Foot and Mouth Disease from the facility could result in $2.8 billion to $4.2 billion in economic losses.

By law, research on live foot and mouth disease (FMD) virus is not permitted on the U.S. mainland. This policy would need to be changed before DHS could conduct FMD research at NBAF if it were sited on the U.S. mainland. The conference agreement to the 2008 farm bill, H.R. 2419, as well as H.R. 1717, address possession of live FMD virus by DHS.

So the question remains, are the levels of risk associated with the NBAF in general, and the location of the facility on the mainland instead of an off-shore island facility in or out of balance with the reward of developing effective countermeasures to the diseases? I could, but will not, draw upon course work that I recently completed for Department Homeland Security certification in “Enhanced Threats and Risk Assessment” to show how land-based versus island locations have relatively similar risk levels for terrorism. But then, it would also hold that an assessment for man-made or natural disasters would also need to be provided. As Hurricane Rita approached the Texas coast in 2005, University of Texas Medical Branch (UTMB) went through a series of shutdowns in both their BSL-3 and BSL-4 laboratories as a preventative measure, and actually relocated many of their high risk experiments to the Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research in San Antonio (including research on such viruses as that which causes hemorrhagic fever).

Why is it important that a National Bio Agro Defense Facility exist? Setting aside for a moment any possible man-made or terrorist release of a zoonotic disease, over the 4th of July weekend, it was reported that another outbreak of brucellosis (which causes pregnant cattle to abort their young) occurred in the bison her in Yellowstone Park.

There is no effective brucellosis vaccine for wildlife, and cattle vaccines are only 60 to 70 percent effective. Humans are susceptible to the disease, but cases are rare and usually limited to those who work with infected cattle.

Eradicated everywhere else in the nation, brucellosis surfaced seven times in the Yellowstone area this decade, including twice since mid-June. With the recent cases, Montana ranchers near Yellowstone face severe restrictions on out-of-state cattle sales, and Wyoming ranchers could face a similar fate if another cow in the state tests positive for brucellosis in the next two years.

CONCLUSION

In summary, yes there are risks associated with performing research on high risk zoonotic diseases. And yes, there are risks associated with performing Foot and Mouth Disease on the mainland. Protecting the U.S. food supply requires elite scientists devoting attention to detecting and countering outbreaks of foreign animal diseases such as foot-and-mouth disease. In addition to potential threats that could devastate livestock herds, the scientists will work on others diseases that can jump from animals to people. How likely is it that hundreds of world class scientists will want to travel to work each day to an off-shore island laboratory? Or still, how likely is it that they will want to house themselves and their families in an off-shore location?

However, on May 22 in his testimony before the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, Gary Voogt, President-elect of the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association not only called for and supported the creation of a state of the art research facility to study the effect of potentially devastating outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease to our cattle population he is confident we have adequate technological containment ability already. Perhaps most importantly in the context of this current debate was his statement that “[w]e believe modern bio-containment technology is adequate to protect our industry and to allow for safe research and diagnostics, regardless of location.”

The establishment of a National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility (NBAF) is both necessary and wise, and should be supported. The risks of inaction on this front far outweigh the mitigated risks associated with such a facility. Though no facility of any type - in any industry or science - can be guaranteed absolute infallibility, we have the technological means to reasonably assure the safe operation of such a facility today, and we likewise clearly have the need for the benefits a National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility would provide.

The city of Memphis, Tennessee sued AOL for the names of people contributing to the web blog MPD Enforcer 2.0….

With the passage of a new FISA law, a predictable hue and cry from privacy advocates and fear-mongers has reached a crescendo. So-called “domestic spying,” we are assured, will soon bring about an end to the republic and personal and civil liberties in a fashion that only the Emperor Palpatine could have conjured up. Thankfully the dark side of the force, Orwell’s Big Brother and fears of the return of Palmer Raids and internment camps are all equally fantastic and unreal.

Let’s address the clear, known problems with the government’s rush to know as much as it can about everyone under their purview.

The FBI’s misuse of devices such as national security letters is as good a place as any to start. Essentially administrative subpoenas, they allow government agents to gather information about you without the more rigorous scrutiny and oversight of a warrant. Roughly 3,000 violations of the NSL policy were recently reported.

The military’s TALON database was another example of data collection on Americans gone wrong. TALON was designed to support force protection, which is a military concept that focuses on identifying and countering or defeating threats to military personnel. TALON included information about Americans because it was largely Americans who showed up at anti-war protests and demonstrations outside of military bases. The collection was somewhat indiscriminate, in part because those gathering the information – military law enforcement – were unaware or unclear of what could or should be included in the database.

In the aftermath of September 11^th one could be forgiven an overactive sense of immediacy about the threat of more attacks from within our borders. What the Feds might have known, local and state law enforcement did not; and vice versa. The fastest and easiest way to work from a common operating picture – disparate organizations with different responsibilities all using the same information – is to just vacuum up as much information as you can. The efficacy of the end result – DHS and state-fusion centers – is debatable. But with the passage of time we can look at these past activities through a filter of perspective.

No matter whose numbers you use, a tiny fraction of a percent of the people in the US have been “spied” upon – as defined by the privacy crowd – to some extent. That’s a few thousand people who the government knows more about than your average telemarketer. Anyone who thinks those numbers represent an epidemic of privacy violations should probably ask Santa for a dictionary. Furthermore, anyone who thinks this activity is going on with true secrecy and without oversight hasn’t been paying attention.

If we look at what really drives these “abuses,” it is largely your standard issue government bureaucracy screw-ups or human nature, not malice. Carefully read the reporting on the investigation into the national security letter misuse and you will note that a large part of the “abuse” is a record keeping exercise. In the case of TALON, it was a case of mission creep as a database designed to do one thing morphed into a system that did something else, which resulted not so much in a database on Americans’ private lives but a membership list of anti-war groups. To be sure, there are arms of the government that are snooping on the very personal information of Americans; IRS and State Department employees seem to have a penchant for peeking into the files of various politicians and celebrities, which should give you an idea of what really drives true invasions of privacy.

Why does intelligence need to have access to so much information about people? The short answer is that the information age has forced them to change their way of doing business. Intelligence used to be almost scientific in the pursuit of answers. You started with a question or hypothesis, gathered information, attempted to prove or refute the hypothesis based on the information gathered and expert opinion, and made decisions based on the answers. That sort of system worked well when the bulk of intelligence questions had to be answered with information stolen from myriad adversaries who were trying to keep the information away from us. Obtaining information of value required a lot of hard work and involved serious risk.

Today the reverse is true; information is plentiful and free. While the value of any discrete secret may have gone up, the vast majority of questions needed to make national security decisions can be answered with non-secret information. Consequently, intelligence agencies have been forced into a new operating model: gathering as much information as possible and then using various methodologies to identify and evaluate patterns and trends of interest. The bulk of such information, whether used by an intelligence agency, polling company or marketing firm, is never actually looked at with any granularity if at all; unless it is part of a pattern or meets a variety of criteria of interest it is worthless and unseen.

It is worth noting that the Americans who work in the intelligence community and their families don’t get a get-out-of-spying-free card. That is to say that a true, invasive dragnet of personal information, emails and phone conversations would just as easily scoop up information of the people doing the collecting and their own families. When you join the intelligence community you willingly agree to live under a regime of certain suspended liberties, but freedom from unreasonable search and seizure is not one of them. Does anyone think that the hundreds of career, professional intelligence officers would willingly sign themselves and their families up to be subjected to a truly sinister plot to undermine our liberties?

Advocates of privacy strangely ignore the fact that Americans frequently and willingly subject themselves to much more surveillance than any government program might bring to bear upon them. The millions of visitors to Las Vegas are given the informational equivalent of a colonoscopy just by setting foot on the strip, not to mention in a casino. What happens in Vegas may or may not stay in Vegas, but one this is certain: everything that goes on there is documented indiscriminately. In fact surveillance in Vegas is probably much more accurate to the fear-mongering descriptions of what privacy advocates would have you believe the government is doing. In a casino the “eye in the sky” watches all because you never know who is going to try and pull a fast one. On the gaming room floor it is assumed that anyone is a potential crook: intelligence doesn’t work that way.

Those who believe Orwell’s 1984 has finally been realized also fail to point out just how the government would carry out the reckless, wanton arrests and detentions of innocents based on the flimsiest information without public awareness or backlash. Guantanamo Bay is not Manzanar on many levels, and in case you have not been paying attention, this is a technological era in which a photo snapped on your cell phone can be posted online and seen by millions worldwide in a matter of minutes. No one subscribing to the Orwellian paranoia has yet explained how the people of this country would allow a government action akin to the Red Scare to quietly take place under our very noses in this day and age.

Those who complain the loudest about supposed violations of privacy are almost always people who have never been involved in intelligence work. This is not to say that you cannot learn a lot about a subject through study and discussion with actual practitioners. But unless you have done the work, you really don’t have a full and complete understanding or appreciation of how the work is done, how hard it is to get even fundamental tasks completed, and the scrutiny you work under. Real intelligence work is so totally and completely unlike 24 or Enemy of the State that both shows – in an intelligence context – should be reclassified as comedies.

Let us also not forget that people who leak information about surveillance programs are hardly paragons of morality, ethics or integrity. By revealing the existence of such programs they are violating a sworn oath to protect the information they are leaking, which should immediately set off an alarm. More importantly, most chose to stay anonymous not out of fear of their jobs – any serious investigation should root any given leaker out (and in the case of Mary McCarthy, it may very well have) - but for purely political reasons. At some point they forgot that they were instruments and not crafters of policy. At some point they decided that professional integrity and honor were just words. You may not agree with what Daniel Ellsberg did with the Pentagon Papers, but at least he had the integrity and conviction to put his career and freedom on the line. Those who fancy themselves Ellsberg’s heirs are operating with much more base motives and considerably less intestinal fortitude.

This is neither an apology nor cheers for the government. We are as quick to jump on the legitimate foibles and missteps as anyone. But we are not going to get carried away with fantasies and imagined abuses when reality is so much more interesting and challenging. More intelligence capabilities would be preferable to less, as would more oversight of said capabilities. Absent a perfect regime for a perfect world that does not exist, we should be content to recognize that in an age of fast, cheap and accurate information, it takes very little time for any sort of improper activity to see the light of day. This reality can be witnessed in the news each week.

At the end of the day, it is not without irony that the same Americans who screamed loudest that the intelligence community failed to protect us and prevent the attacks of 9/11 are the same Americans that steadfastly oppose seemingly every action taken by that same intelligence community since in efforts to learn more and perform better - seemingly as demanded. The enemy was among us then, using our systems and institutions with the comfort of relative obscurity, and is still using those systems today. If the enemy is in your house, one does not trot to the neighbor’s to find them.

One thing is for certain. We cannot continue to complain about real and perceived specific intelligence failures only to in turn object to productive means of addressing them.

Gmail privacy flaw reveals user name provided when the e-mail account was established. When Gmail users share Google Calendar items…

Color printers are growing in popularity as the price declines. Most consumers do not know that when they print documents…

The first ever European Privacy Seal for ICT products or IT-based services was awarded to ixquick.com. The seal guarantees that…

It should be no surprise that according to a recent survey done among 122 homeland security professionals (36% of whom has over 10 years experience and 32% had more than 5 years in the field), the top four priorities for the next administration are border security, emergency response, development of medical counter-measures to weapons of mass destruction, and port security.

More than 83 percent of homeland security experts expect major disaster or attack within next four years; 22 percent expect WMD attack on the Unite States; 54 percent say it would be a good idea to reorganize DHS.

While it is hard to debate those priorities and concerns, without politicizing this important message, the question is not the identification of these priorities, but having the ability to implement programs designed to meet these challenges. Thus, publisher of the Homeland Security Journal, Don Dickson said, “The purpose of the survey is to help set the priorities for homeland security as the next president and the next Congress take office.” His comment reflects the importance of the transition to the next Administration since it will be the first time since September 11th that someone other than the Bush Administration had had oversight on the DHS. But the opinions are striking nonetheless:

· More than 83% expected a major disaster in the U.S.
· About 58% said the most probable scenario for a major disaster was a natural disaster, with 22% saying that the cause would be a terrorist attack with a WMD
· 72% expect change if Obama wins; 80% expect no change if McCain wins
· 54% said DHS should be maintained but reorganized; 30% percent said the agency should be unchanged; nearly 15% answered that the DHS should be broken up

In another report written by the National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA) and using interviews with 81 officials from both inside and outside DHS, , the DHS was urged to better integrate the roles of its 22 component agencies, many of which still operate as “stand-alone” entities and to consolidate the Congressional Oversight of the department.

You can read the full report here.

Given the greater risk to attack during the transition period when our jihadist enemies will be believe that the U.S. will be more vulnerable, wisdom supports the following of the NAPA suggestions on transitioning the DHS to the next administration, regardless of which political party wins.

“It doesn’t matter what you say or do, and we don’t care why or who, we’re against it.”

At least that’s the catchy tune I keep hearing.

Earlier today, Warren made an observation that I feel compelled to take issue with. In Limited Resources: Iran and US Military Options, Warren wrote:

Meanwhile, despite the irrefutable fact that the counterinsurgency strategy in Iraq has succeeded brilliantly, the strain of that theater coupled with the concurrent burden of waging war in Afghanistan continues to levy a heavy toll on the U.S. military. The wisdom of fighting two wars on two different fronts with a military that was so manifestly ill-equipped for the added exertion ranks as one of the great blunders of the present administration.

I understand that Warren’s greater point is that our military is entirely too small to most effectively engage and sustain the conflict at hand, in all its theaters - present, looming and potential. And on that we certainly agree.

Debate over what America’s next step should have been post-Taliban-al-Qaeda rout in Afghanistan is a healthy exercise.

However, calling the opening of a second front “one of the great blunders of the present administration” is well off the mark.

Let’s keep in mind that the United States armed forces, while injuriously depleted during both the Carter and Clinton administrations, is one that has been built for the express capability of fighting two wars simultaneously. Its flag commanders had regularly certified it as capable of such, up to and including 2003.

Sure, this - in light of the massive reductions cited and the current persistent combat deployment rotation schedule - can be questioned. But in reading Warren’s piece, one is left with the impression that the “blunder” was that of President Bush for employing a certified force rather than previous administrations and Congresses - from George H. W. Bush post-Gulf War to Bill Clinton - slashing unites, systems and bases in search of the elusive ‘Peace Dividend.’

One thing that can be effectively extracted from Warren’s words today is that the ‘Peace’ is the ‘Dividend,’ and one which can only be maintained through strength, not reduction. Our conventional threats may have subsided, but they have not disappeared. China grows while just this week Russia verbally made military threats against us. Further, the emergence of an asymmetrical terrorist threat currently engaged means that much of our military resources must thus evolve to meet it without ceding weakness on the conventional front.

This means growing our military and not shrinking it or merely maintaining it. This is what I interpret Warren’s point to be.

But to call any additional engagement beyond Afghanistan a “blunder” is to presume that wisdom would have us wait until we spend decades growing and transforming our military forces to best meet the threat. The enemy will not wait for the opposing cavalry to field the ideal horses.

After the rout in Afghanistan, the Taliban and al-Qaeda had poured over the border into Pakistan. We had three choices.

1. Hold and maintain a massive defensive line on the Afghanistan border.

2. Pursue the enemy into his chosen lair, invading Pakistan and turning an already reluctant ally into a battlefield foe with al-Qaeda able to join forces with a conventional army.

3. Hold the line in Afghanistan while taking the offensive against a state sponsor of terrorism with an eye toward the greater conflict at hand.

It has been and still is argued whether Iraq was the wisest choice as part of Option #3. That’s beyond the scope of what Warren is addressing and largely academic at any rate. But choosing Option #3 can hardly be called a “greatest blunder.”

While his words were repeated within an emotional context not present or intended when he spoke them, Donald Rumsfeld was flatly correct when he said after the Iraq invasion, “You go to war with the army you have, not the one you want.”

President Bush and the Pentagon have taken measures to increase the size of the military - the Marine Corps has been slated to grow by 27,000, for instance. But that growth will not be actualized until 2011. The Army’s slated growth by 74,000 is not expected until 2013. The men must be recruited and trained, the units equipped and formed.

Furthermore, Iraq did not go so badly for several years because the military was undermanned and under-equipped for a second front. Rather, as the strategy employed in ‘The Surge’ and its resultant and undeniable success shows, it was because of a failure of command military leadership - primarily though not exclusively from Generals Casey, Sanchez and Abizaid - who directed several years of a garrison-mode posture rather than forward-deployed population protection in counter-insurgency.

The buck must ultimately stop with the president. And I believe President Bush has ensured it does. But it is far more appropriate to ascribe “blunder” to the ambitious shrinking of our military after the Gulf War, or perhaps even to employing a garrison-mode counterinsurgency in Iraq rather than a population-centric strategy in place now since 2007.

But opening a second front was taking the initiative from the enemy, an invaluable aspect of both tactical and strategic warfare. What did falling into a garrison mode once there do? Cede initiative to the enemy. The Petraeus effect in counter-insurgency in Iraq was to take the initiative and deny it to the terrorist enemy.

The ‘Army we had’ in garrison mode then is the same ‘Army we have’ now, with dramatically different results. Had we begun doing in 2004 what we are doing now, where would Iraq be today? (There are many contributing factors - such as the development of the Iraqi Army and police forces - that prevent a direct extrapolation of time factor, but the point remains. As well, rather than simply lament the past, it is more constructive for tomorrow’s engagements to learn from it rather than simply excoriate over mistakes. I say this purely in reference to my own observations above, not in criticism of Warren in any way.)

Yes, the Army and Marine Corps growth announced in January 2007 should have been implemented far sooner as well as in greater numbers. It is, after all, far quicker and easier to disband entire units than to stand them up. But to criticize opening a second front offensive as a “blunder” because we did not have ‘the Army we want’ is to cede the initiative to an enemy that had taken the initiative long before 9/11, and an enemy that extended far beyond mud huts and caves in Afghanistan, however inconvenient that unfortunate fact was and remains.

The Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on a State Department Inspector General report that investigated the abuse of access,…

On July 10, 2008, the President signed the FISA reform bill into law. On the same day the ACLU filed…

Iranian missile testing at night in the Persian Gulf; Israeli jet fighters practicing long-range military exercises over Mediterranean waters; stepped-up American naval maneuvers in the Straits of Hormuz and missile defense testing of U.S. communications equipment in the Middle East – all telltale signs of preparations for war in the region…

Until recently, no nation but Israel has wanted to talk about a military option against Iran, as the Islamic Republic races to finish its controversial nuclear program. While events in early July have changed international perceptions, it has taken a long time for Western nations to re-align their thinking on the Iranian threat.

A History Worth Noting

In the past, Israel’s desire to see the international community adopt a more urgent tone about the Iranian nuclear crisis was met with mixed responses. On one hand, U.S. and European leaders had willingly met with Israeli officials to discuss unprecedented upgrades in strategic cooperation on all levels. Yet on the other, while much was going on behind the scenes, the public heard continued assurances from international leaders that the diplomatic track of stiffer UN sanctions against Iran was the only initiative on the table.

A major difference between the U.S. and Israel had much to do with American officials thinking the window of opportunity to stop Iran was wider and longer than what Israel anticipated. Israel’s intelligence data gathered on Iran was measured against U.S. intelligence reports of when the Persian state might be capable of “going nuclear.” The conclusion was that the Americans were not as convinced as the Israelis that it was necessary to prepare for war while continuing with diplomatic efforts.

Meanwhile, Israeli intelligence officials faced another quandary. Did a military transaction take place between Russia and Iran that could hinder Israel’s ability to launch a pre-emptive strike against Iran, if necessary? Israeli media reported that Russia allegedly sold Iran an advanced air defense missile system that could track dozens of targets, simultaneously, which might endanger potential measures by Israel’s Air Force (IAF). Threatening Israel’s qualitative edge, the deployment of this system into Iran could have major repercussions for the Jewish state. Therefore, for Israel, the window of opportunity became much shorter, with the IAF looking at a possible strike into Iran before Russian delivery of the system.

Persisting in his urgency to persuade the U.S. of the magnitude of the Iranian threat, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert reportedly talked to visiting U.S. Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi in May 2008 about the need for a U.S. naval blockade of Iran. Olmert wanted American warships to limit the movement of Iranian merchant vessels in the Gulf. However, Israel’s objective to compel the U.S. to intimidate Iran militarily was overshadowed by more pressing issues for the Americans — the presidential race, an economic slump, and critical weather conditions causing tornadoes, floods, and fires across the States.

Pressing For A Change of Direction

Then, in June, Israel carried out massive military exercises in the Mediterranean, gaining global media attention, and partially accomplishing what the government in Jerusalem had hoped for — international recognition of Israel’s need to prepare for a confrontation with Iran. These exercises, which spanned 1500 miles between Israel and Greece (duplicating the distance between Israel and Iran), followed less known Israeli military exercises in North America, Italy, and Spain.

Subsequently, the government announced that the distribution of gas masks to the Israeli public could occur as early as January 2009 (instead of the original projection of spring 2009). A race against the clock to get the Iron Dome anti-missile defense system in place earlier than the anticipated 2010 deadline was also implemented, with contractors asked to work on the Sabbath pending rabbinical approval. (The Iron Dome system is expected to deter short-range missiles fired by Iranian proxies — Hamas in Gaza and Hizballah in Lebanon.)

In addition, Israeli military officials implored the Pentagon to release the sale of F-22 and F-35 military jets to Israel, some of the most advanced fighters in the world.

But, despite Israel’s preparations and urgent warnings, U.S. leaders were still not prepared to go beyond talking, publicly, about diplomatic sanctions against Iran. And, while admitting that the military option was somewhere on the table, it generally remained on the back burner of American thinking.

Leaks to the media in June then revealed that U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Michael Mullen had been in Israel twice to talk with defense officials about Iran. His visit followed an unprecedented number of high level U.S. military officers visiting the Jewish state, including two four-star American generals.

Standing By Israel

The hesitancy on the part of U.S. officials to admit a possible partnership with Israel towards a military conflagration in the Middle East has had much to do with fears of repercussion. Iran has threatened that, if attacked, it would cut off global oil interests in the Persian Gulf, which could result in soaring oil prices in the future. A global escalation in oil prices is already occurring, and Americans can feel it in their pockets every time they fill up their cars at the local gas station. The U.S. is concerned about how another war in the Middle East might impact an already uncertain economy in recession.

Until now, Middle East analysts in the States, commenting on the Iranian threat, have demonstrated their own tentativeness to speak about what might happen if Israel acted alone against the Persian state. Would America stand by Israel? Few commentators have wanted to talk about that possibility. Instead, “think tank” experts have wavered back and forth about the pros and cons of what would happen if the U.S., itself, got involved in an attack on Iran, as if Israel would sit on the sidelines and not be involved in such a scenario.

At a forum hosted by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs on June 30, 2008, ThreatsWatch asked U.S. Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (Republican, 18th District of Florida), “Will the U.S. Congress stand by Israel in support of helping Israel militarily if there needs to be a confrontation against Iran in the future?” Congresswoman Ros-Lehtinen answered, “If that were to happen, I would be standing by Israel’s side. So many members would. But, I do not perceive that happening.”

This reinforced Israeli feelings that U.S. interests were dictating a push, publicly, toward further diplomatic sanctions against Iran without a serious commitment toward launching a military offensive.

America’s Hesitancy To Open A “Third Front”

As the debate raged on and U.S. citizens considered military actions vs. continued diplomacy, media outlets revealed that American naval officers in the Middle East had been engaging in new military drills. Reports indicated that the U.S. navy carried out communications testing of its Aegis missile defense system in the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf during a visit to Israel by its chief officers in late June.

But, despite U.S. naval testing, Admiral Mullen warned that an attack on Iran would open a “third front” in the Middle East, which he considered a bad idea. His hesitancy regarding further U.S. military engagement in the region was, most likely, due to America’s extensive commitment in Iraq as well as ongoing operations in Afghanistan. US forces are already heavily committed with losses incurred since 2001. Furthermore, his comments confirmed that there is a limit to the American population’s willingness to get involved in another war overseas.

Pentagon officials for some time now have tried to discourage Israeli leaders from escalating tensions with Iran, or from publicly speaking about the hope of a Western alliance in any future military venture. America’s leaders have acknowledged that for years resources have already been spread too thin in field operations. They have understood that their armed forces overseas, as well as their naval fleets, would be likely targets for direct Iranian retaliation or for terrorist strikes from an Iranian proxy should a war begin.

Until recently, it seemed that the U.S. Bush Administration was divided from within, with reports claiming that the Pentagon was holding back on the idea of an operation against Iran, while Vice President Dick Cheney seemed to be embracing it. Additionally, a wave of short-lived optimism floated in the global media that maybe Iran might retreat from its nuclear ambitions in lieu of the latest round of sanctions imposed on it by the UN. But, so far, that optimism hasn’t led to a confession by the Iranian government that it will obey the demands of the international community and stop enriching uranium.

Before July 2008, Israelis began to wonder if America would publicly align itself with Israel in a serious commitment towards confronting Iran to insure global stability. Moreover, what concerned many Israeli citizens in this deliberation was whether the U.S. would give Israel the proper IFF military codes to be able to fly over Iraq and Turkey, if the Jewish state had to act alone in a war with Iran.

Building Towards A Western Coalition

Finally, change on the Iranian issue began to surface, publicly, during the first days of July, when Iran’s leaders threatened that, if attacked, Tehran would respond by seizing control of the Straits of Hormuz. These statements compelled American naval officials to declare their objections. They responded by stating that Iran would not be able to choke off the Straits of Hormuz and hold 40% of the world’s oil hostage. Vice Admiral Kevin Cosgriff said that the U.S. would not allow Iran to close the Straits.

On July 9 and 10, Iran tested long-range missiles at night near the Straits. This new act of belligerence may have altered the American public discourse regarding the Iranian issue…. at least for a period of time. Currently, calls for increased diplomatic sanctions against Iran have faded away, replaced by an escalation in saber-rattling and public pronouncements that there is a need for Western powers to prepare to fight against this new Iranian antagonism.

For years, Israeli leaders have been united in declaring that Iran would not be allowed to “go nuclear”. Now, there are new factors taking place, much to Israel’s satisfaction. As U.S. officials declare they will not allow Iran to close off the Straits of Hormuz, a Western military coalition to deal with Iran seems to be gaining momentum.

This development can be seen to be reinforced when, after Iran’s recent testing of ballistic missiles, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice immediately declared America’s commitment to stand by Israel in the face of Iranian aggression. Rice and Czech Republic Foreign Minister, Karel Schwarzenberg signed an agreement allowing America to deploy a controversial U.S. missile defense shield on Czech soil. In a coordinated effort, Rice and U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates pronounced that the anti-missile defense system needed to be placed in Europe, and insisted that Russia re-consider its objections. The system would protect Europe, as well as U.S. forces in the region from Iranian hostilities. But, Russia’s Foreign Ministry has threatened that it will respond militarily if the U.S.-Czech agreement is ratified.

Puzzled by Russia’s reaction Paulo Casaca, a member of the European Parliament from Portugal told ThreatsWatch, “Europe did not take a position on the shield. Therefore, we really do not know what Europe is about to do. I think this shield will be important for Europe, but it will not deter Iran.”

A key component in this all-out effort of Israel to encourage a Western led military coalition against Iran, will be whether Europe accepts the defense shield. It also depends on Europe’s willingness to face the Iranian threat with more than diplomatic sanctions. Casaca acknowledged, “All the military demonstrations by Iran coupled with its persistent daily threats against Israel, make a strong case for answering to Iran. I think that the European position is more or less, ‘don’t put us in the picture, but we could understand that some pre-emptive strike against nuclear facilities in Iran will take place.’ This is what more or less is being heard from European leaders.”

The “New Union”

An opportunity to discuss Iran’s latest tactics is expected during a conference of 44 countries in Paris on July 13. French President, Nicholas Sarkozy, who is also the rotating President of the EU, is trying to form a new union of European and Mediterranean countries, hoping for greater strategic relationships. The EU and Israel have upgraded their economic, trade and education ties. And, Israel has curried favor with European nations such as France, Germany, Italy and the U.K., resulting in a stronger partnership of mutual interests.

Nevertheless, Sarkozy’s conference is controversial because European leaders think he is side-stepping the EU to set up an additional union, one which they feel is not necessary. German Chancellor Angela Merkel has expressed strong opposition. She doesn’t want to see Europe separated into another bloc, which includes some European and Mediterranean nations and excludes others. EU members have also protested Sarkozy’s plans because they say it drains funds for crucial EU projects.

Meanwhile, Arab countries don’t want Israel to use the new union to try and establish closer diplomatic ties without dealing first with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Olmert hopes to meet Syrian leader Bashar Assad in Paris, signaling that peace negotiations are moving forward on the Golan Heights. This could further infuriate Arab leaders who already think peace negotiations between Israel and Syria are overshadowing a firm “land for peace” deal between Israel and the Palestinians.

Despite objections to Sarkozy’s plan for a new union, it could be the basis for an emerging alliance of European and Arab states who, along with Israel and the U.S., determine what to do strategically about Iran before time runs out. Leaders will be sitting together at the French negotiating table in the Grand Palais with other rooms available for private talks. Whether hidden from public view or not, the topic of Iranian aggression in the Middle East region is certain to dominate some discussions, with a welcome debate on whether to move forward with military options now or press on for another round of diplomatic sanctions.

C. Hart writes for ThreatsWatch from Jerusalem, Israel.

With rumors of an Israeli rehearsal for attacks against Iran’s nuclear infrastructure still in the news, advocates of a negotiated settlement to the Iranian nuclear stand-off once again urged diplomacy. And once again the Iranians seem intractable on the issue. From a July 7th Reuters article:

Iran’s response to the latest offer of incentives by world powers shows no willingness to meet their core demand for a freeze or suspension of activities that the West suspects are part of a secret nuclear bomb program.

In response to Iran’s intransigence, opponents of a military solution readily cite the prospect of two crucial, and undesirable, consequences of attacking Iran—the increased likelihood of a wider war which could engulf much of the region, and the resultant burdens on an already over-taxed U.S. military. Neither of these should be drowned out by the din of a new military offensive.

On the matter of a wider regional conflict, Iran could indeed enlist the aid of its proxies in Lebanon (Hizballah) and Iraq (Shiite “Special Groups” in Iraq, and the Mahdi Army) to enflame the highly combustible tinder box that is today’s Middle East. Moreover, any strike against Iran, whether by Israel or the United States (or the two acting in concert) would probably engender enough worldwide condemnation to rival that expressed over the present conflict in Iraq. Such discontent with American or American endorsed foreign policy would surely injure any future attempts to bring rogue states to heel through the cooperative efforts of the international community.

Meanwhile, despite the irrefutable fact that the counterinsurgency strategy in Iraq has succeeded brilliantly, the strain of that theater coupled with the concurrent burden of waging war in Afghanistan continues to levy a heavy toll on the U.S. military. The wisdom of fighting two wars on two different fronts with a military that was so manifestly ill-equipped for the added exertion ranks as one of the great blunders of the present administration. Former Missouri Senator and Senate Armed Services Committee member Jim Talent touched on the matter in a March 2007 article for National Review.

The ‘operational tempo’ of American conventional forces—the number, intensity, and duration of their deployments—has increased since the end of the Cold War. Yet the forces were almost twice as big in 1992 as they are today. The active-duty Army was cut from 18 divisions during Desert Storm to ten by 1994—its size today. The Navy, which counted 568 ships in the late 1980s, struggles today to sustain a fleet of only 276. And the number of tactical air wings in the Air Force was reduced from 37 at the time of desert storm to 20 by the mid-1990s. ⁱ

Together, the prospect of an overextended military confronted by the possibility of an expanded conflict should sober even the most ardent supporter of resolving the Iranian nuclear conundrum through force. On the other hand, what are the inherent risks of not employing military means to eliminate the threat of a nuclear armed Iran? Webster’s New World Dictionary defines “negotiate” succinctly: “to discuss a matter with a view to reaching agreement.”

For years, American officials believed that the application of sufficient force and an avowed willingness to engage in talks would eventually bring North Vietnam to terms. Unfortunately, nothing short of decapitating the regime in Hanoi could have dissuaded the North from seeking the reunification of Vietnam under the yoke of Communism. To some in North Vietnam’s leadership faction, the matter was simply non-negotiable. Brian Jenkins authored an “unofficial” paper for the RAND Corporation in 1972 which explained the North Vietnamese mindset.

The genius of the North Vietnamese people is their tenacity. It is also their most terrible weapon. Hanoi’s apparent determination to go on fighting reflects convictions that in their eyes seem correct—so correct that the alternative of not fighting may be inconceivable. Confucian doctrine imported from China centuries ago permeates the arguments put forth by the Vietnamese Communist. Terms such as ‘just cause,’ and ‘legitimate government,’ dominate the speech of their leaders. Vietnamese Communists firmly believe that they possess the ‘Mandate of Heaven’ to rule all of Vietnam and therefore must emerge victorious eventually. ⁱⁱ

What if Iran feels a similar ‘Mandate of Heaven’ about the acquisition of nuclear weapons and hegemony over the Middle East? After all, as the United States learned to its regret during the Vietnam War, it takes two to tango and each side has to be amenable to tangible and significant concession. The North Vietnamese were not so disposed. Despite the assurances of some well-intentioned area experts, can either the United States or its allies be sure that Iran can in fact be induced to surrender its nuclear ambitions? What if Iran harbors a desire to join the nuclear club with the same fervor as North Vietnam regarded the unification of Vietnam?

Furthermore, what assurance does the United States possess that Iran would never use a nuclear weapon if it ever produced one? Mutually Assured Destruction may have proscribed a nuclear exchange with a devoutly atheistic state like the former Soviet Union. But can it be assumed that such a convention would automatically hold true with a theocracy as well? Is it prudent to presume that every antagonist will necessarily act rationally and in its perceived best interest? By injecting a measure of ambiguity into the matter of disarmament, Saddam Hussein unwisely invited the sequence of events that ultimately ended his decades long reign as dictator of Iraq. What if the mullahs in Tehran view the destruction of Israel as an aspiration worth risking their power over?

While it is absolutely essential that the national discourse include a stark presentation of the hazards of military action against Iran, the aforementioned questions must also be addressed with rigid intellectual honesty. In order to avoid a repetition of the mistakes of the early years of the Iraq War, or those of the Vietnam War for that matter, all options—and their potential ramifications—must be weighed with transparency and on the scale of “what is” rather than what “should be.”

ⁱ Jim Talent, “More: The crying need for a bigger U.S. military,” National Review, March 5th, 2007 p. 32
ⁱⁱ Michael Lee Lanning and Dan Cragg, Inside the VC and the NVA: The real story of North Vietnam’s armed forces (NY: Ivy Books, 1994) p. 200-201

1. Within the historical context of overstating its conventional military capabilities, the widely published image of this week’s Iranian missile launch is found to have been digitally edited to cover up a missile misfire. Meanwhile, a major French energy firm has canceled a deal originally made with the Iranian regime for development.

2. In Israel, embattled PM Olmert has been questioned a third time by Israeli police over charges of inappropriately accepting money while in government.

3. Egypt has uncovered new tunnels along the Gaza-Egypt border and seized multiple weapons caches.

4. The International Criminal Court is expected to issue an arrest warrant next week for Sudan president Bashir on charges of war crimes in Darfur.

1. Iran publicized a second round of missile tests as it attempts to deter any US or Israeli attack on its nuclear weapons program. Though Iran claimed the tests were of the longer-range version of the North Korean No Dong-based Shahab-3, it is believed to have been the older, shorter range version.

2. Terror attack on US Consulate in Turkey is believed to have been carried out by AQ-linked terrorists. One of the killed attackers is believed to have been released from Guantanamo Bay detention facility. Turkish speculation includes potential cooperation between al-Qaeda and Kurdish PKK terrorists.

3. New Lebanese President Michel Suleiman, seen by Syria as an ally, said in an interview that Hizballah is not a terrorist organization. In justifying, he said, “Whoever defends his land and liberates it from occupation cannot be termed terrorist. I cannot accept this in any case.”

Perhaps one of the most important, yet least understood elements of National and Homeland Security is creating a process of moving leading-edge technologies from the National Laboratory system to use by first responders and other homeland security agencies. One such program was recently moved ahead when it secured approval of from the House Appropriations committee for a $2 million homeland security initiative. The program’s purpose is to move news ideas and technological solutions into the hands of first reponders and law enforcement.

This is just one of many “technology transition” (or technology transfer) initiative around the country. There will be more news about such efforts in the near future.

There are a lot of conferences and symposia one can attend on defense, security and intelligence issues, but few are both important and accessible to a wide audience. The DNI OSINT Conference is one of those that fit both categories. While the price is certainly nice, the fact that it pulls back the curtain (to a certain extent) and exposes you to the people and efforts that are trying to get ostensibly the information-centric enterprise more in sync with the information age is pretty neat.

No, I’m not getting paid to say this; I’ll be standing in line just like everyone else. It’s just a little PSA from a former practitioner who loves the idea that the IC is not going down w/o a fight.