In war, #hashtags are no substitute for victory

From Williamson and Millett's A War to Be Won:

Moral righteousness alone does not win battles. Evil causes do not necessarily carry the seeds of their own destruction. Once engaged, even just wars have to be won-- or lost-- on the battlefield.

John Keegan, Intelligence in War:

A wise opinion would be that intelligence, while necessary, is not a sufficient means to victory. Decision in war is always the result of a fight, and in combat willpower always counts for more than foreknowledge.

Sobering update on the war on terror

From John Schindler--strategist, scholar, and former intelligence operative:

We’re Losing the War Against Terrorism

Now, however, the SpyWar waged against terrorists in the ether is changing, and not to the West’s benefit. Although it’s normal for the enemy to learn from his mistakes, the changes to jihadist tradecraft that we’re witnessing of late are alarming and unprecedented. A new report in The Wall Street Journal brings to light what spies across the West have been privately fretting about over the last year.

Alarmingly, ISIS terrorists have begun to demonstrate a never-before-seen level of sophistication in communications security and encryption. We’ve known for some time that ISIS has cadres of skilled counterintelligence professionals, some of them holdovers from Saddam Hussein’s nasty secret police, but this new emphasis on security is a major problem for the West.

Schindler notes that the West depends on signals intelligence to dirupt terror cells and to prevent terror attacks. We are good at it, but out edge is eroding.

This emphasis on rapidly improving clandestine tradecraft, particularly in pre-attack communications, is terrifying Western security services, since it bluntly means that we will disrupt fewer atrocities “left of boom” as the counterterrorism pros like to say. “More civilians will die, it’s that simple,” explained a Western European security official who specializes in countering jihadism at home.

Over the last 12 months, ISIS fighters in Europe have demonstrated a clear learning curve in communications security and encryption. They stay offline and keep phones away unless they’re really neededand even then they’re relying on harder-to-track technologies and encrypted apps that make it increasingly difficult for European security agencies to keep tabs on them.

The problem with being really good at one facet of intelligence is that it is easy to become over-reliant on your strength and allow other capabilities atrophy.

In World War Two, British signals intelligence had tremendous success against Germany. The code breakers and analysts at Bletchley Park were vital to the victories in the Battle of Britain and the Battle of the Atlantic. But as the allied armies swept across France, the German commanders used wireless less and less. This reduced the material Bletchley Park had available to decrypt.

The Allied commanders, however, were confident in their goose that laid golden eggs of intelligence and early warnings. Their intelligence chiefs were not up to the task when the Bletchley mother lode played out.

The consequences were severe: Failure of Operation Market-Garden and near-disastrous strategic surprise when Hitler launched the Battle of the Bulge.

Schindler’s warning is especially concerning given the historical weakness of Western counter-intelligence.

See, for example, the al-Qaeda disinformation game which led to a deadly suicide bombing near Khost, Afghanistan in December 2009. Joby Warrick’s book on this case is highly recommended.

There is also the fact that CIA was repeatedly duped by the KGB and its affiliates during the Cold War: The CIA was fooled by scores of double agents pretending to be working for the agency but secretly loyal to communist spy agencies during the Cold War and beyond, according to a former CIA analyst, operations officer, and historian.

(See here for more)

From this blog in April 2009

One point Tennent Bagley makes in Spy Wars is that the Bolsheviks and the Cheka quickly became adept at counter-intelligence and sophisticated disinformation very quickly. They ran large-scale operations like the Trust that fooled their enemies-even experienced intelligence agencies in Britain and France. Bagley estimates that they ran 25-40 successful deception operations between 1917 and 1940.

Not bad for a raggedy bunch of revolutionaries.

Which makes you wonder: Could al Qaeda or another terrorist group do the same thing?

And if they could, are they doing it now?

It appears we now have our answer.

Counter-Terrorism in France

Sobering report here:

Merah: The ‘Untold Story’ of a French Jihadist Icon

The undisputed icon and role model for this new generation of French jihadists is Mohamed Merah. In March 2012, the 23-year-old went on a killing spree in and around his native Toulouse, assassinating three French paratroopers in two separate incidents before pulling up in front of a Jewish school on his signature T-Max motorbike and executing three small children and a teacher at point-blank range. He died in a shootout with police three days later, following a 32-hour siege of his apartment.

It seems that French law enforcement and counter-terrorism may have some problems.

Jordanov’s research provides a unique window onto Merah’s life and crimes, offering important insight into his motives and the unflinching brutality of the ideology to which he subscribed. But it also reveals mind-boggling failings on the part of French counterterrorism. The story of Mohamed Merah is, in effect, that of a train wreck waiting to happen or, to paraphrase his brother Abdelghani, a ticking time bomb waiting to explode—while French intelligence looked on.

Indeed, in conversation with negotiators during the siege of his apartment, Merah himself expressed amazement at the fact that he was able to carry out his attacks unhindered, attributing his success—and the failure of French authorities—to the will of Allah. To coax Merah out of the building, the police had called in none other than Hassan Loubane, the local DCRI officer in charge of Merah’s file. Alluding to his own carelessness in having sent e-mails to his family during a 2011 trip to an al-Qaeda stronghold in Pakistan’s notorious tribal regions, Merah chided Loubane and his colleagues for their failure to react. “Hamdulillah!”—praise God—Merah exclaimed, “Allah made you blind!” Jordanov confirms that French intelligence officials, thanks to their American colleagues at the National Security Agency, were aware of at least some of these e-mails.

...


The blindness of French security services continued even after Merah had begun his killing spree, indeed even after he had been identified as a suspect and located. Jordanov describes Merah casually slipping out of his apartment on the evening of March 20th—this despite a hundred French police and intelligence officers already staking out the premises, who somehow failed to see him go. It is only thanks to the fact that Merah came back a few hours later—on his own account, to retrieve materials that he needed for another planned attack—that a French SWAT team did not end up raiding an empty apartment. His return, incidentally, also appears to have gone unperceived.

Merah told Loubane, his intelligence contact, that a minivan full of French gendarmes drove right past him as he was in the process of committing his first murder: the execution of French paratrooper Imad Ibn Ziaten in a deserted parking lot on March 11, 2012. (The gendarmerie is a national police force.) Merah said that the driver of the van looked him “straight in the eyes.” “Your gendarmes don’t even intervene,” Merah mockingly told Loubane, “They could have arrested me and look [what happened]!”

Europe's terror threat: Beyond self-radicalized lone wolves (UPDATED)

This is an excellent piece of reporting by the BBC

Europe's Terror Networks

It's a little less than a half hour and well worth the listen.

Three items really caught my attention:

1. ISIS has a logistical system set up in Europe. They have found ways to move explosives and firearms and get them into the hands of their operatives.

2. As was the case in Mumbai (2008) the November 2015 attacks in Paris utilized multiple, simultaneous attacks so that police and counter-terror forces would be dispersed and unable to mount a quick, overwhelming response.

3. The killers studied their targets. They obtained detailed floorplans of the theater and set up an ambush in the alley outside one of the main avenues escape.

UPDATE 5/17/2016

An interview with Jesse Hughes of Eagles of Death Metal. Harrowing account of the carnage that took place inside the theater. Also, Hughes remains convinced that members of the security/facility staff helped the terrorists.

Surrendering to Death

This really is a big freaking deal

To paraphrase the soon-to-be Democratic nominee for President.

Anyhow-- this story is a couple of months old but it has not received the attention it deserves

CIA Fooled by Massive Cold War Double-Agent Failure

All recruits in East Germany, Cuba, and Russia fooled agency

The CIA was fooled by scores of double agents pretending to be working for the agency but secretly loyal to communist spy agencies during the Cold War and beyond, according to a former CIA analyst, operations officer, and historian.

The large-scale deception included nearly 100 fake CIA recruits in East Germany, Cuba, as well as the Soviet Union (and later Russia) who supplied false intelligence that was passed on to senior U.S. policymakers for decades.

“During the Cold War, the Central Intelligence Agency bucked the law of averages by recruiting double agents on an industrial scale; it was hoodwinked not a few but many times,” writes Benjamin B. Fischer, CIA’s former chief historian.

Fischer’s article was published here.

It seems to me that a lot of journalistic history is in need of revising. All those books and articles that decried the “paranoia” of CIA’s counterintelligence branch under James Angleton now look suspect.

One of the counts against Angleton was that he turned away intelligence sources because he feared that they were double-agents dispatched by the Soviets to spread disinformation.

But it isn’t paranoia if they really were double-agents.

Most of the sources journalists used for those stories were CIA officers who later ‘vetted’ these double-agents, approved them, and fed their disinformation to government policy-makers.

So, a lot of “intelligence experts” look pretty silly now. (As usual Bill Clinton’s favorite girl journalist is a charter member of this group.)

Even worse, many in CIA tried to cover-up their mistakes and, in some cases, kept distributing the disinformation to avoid embarrassment for themselves and their agency.

These revelations make Tennent Bagley’s Spy Wars and Spymaster even more persuasive. (I reviewed Spy Wars here)

This is a matter of more than antiquarian or historical interest. As Gertz notes, the disparagement of counterintelligence at CIA (a legacy of William Colby and Stansfield Turner) continues to this day and can cost lives.

Critics have charged the agency with harboring an aversion to counterintelligence the practice of countering foreign spies and the vetting of the legitimacy of both agents and career officers. Beginning in the 1970s, many in the CIA criticized counter-spying, which often involved questioning the loyalties of intelligence personnel, as “sickthink.”

The agency’s ability to discern false agents turned deadly in 2009 when a Jordanian recruit pretending to work for CIA killed a group of seven CIA officers and contractors in a suicide bombing at a camp in Afghanistan.

Joby Warrick’s book on the deadly fiasco at Khost (FOB Chapman) is a great read and a first-rate piece of reporting.

Logic only a journalist could love

The Patriot-News, our local fishwrap, is endlessly fascinating. Their editorial pages are exemplars of the anti-business model so beloved by self-regarding guild members. (See examples here, here, here, and here.)

Lately, they are less likely to argue with their conservative readers; they prefer to troll them.

Case in point: this defense of Marie Harf and her “don’t kill the terrorists hire them” brain fart.

As Marie Harf controversy shows, it's nuance, not truth, that's the first casualty:

See, Marie Harf did not say something stupid, nor did she ad lib an inartful answer to a tough question, nor did she articulate a seriously flawed policy.

No. Marie Harf is a victim. Her subtle geopolitical insights were misunderstood and misinterpreted by sexist, agist, stupid right-wingers.

Now, she's the "terrorists need jobs lady." And, at age 33, she's been patronizingly dismissed (with no small amount of sexism underpinning the criticism) as too young and inexperienced to hold the job she now holds. It's a firm bet that no similar accusation would have been hurled if Harf's first name were Michael instead of Marie.

I guess John L. Micek never heard of Tommy Vietor or Ben Rhodes.

Micek also defended Harf by appealing to the wisdom of the greatest American statesman of the twentieth century.

But any military response must still be accompanied by a political one. After military victory in World War II, it was the Marshall plan that secured seven decades of peace among the warring parties.

This struck me as a poor analogy for a lot of reason. So, I tweeted one to Micek:

Re Harf: We did not start debating the Marshall Plan until we had defeated the Nazis.

Micek then proceeded to “destroy” me like his intellectual heroes Jon Stewart and Vox do to pesky stupid conservatives:

Doesn't mean we have to wait in this case

I was devastated. His tweet laid bare the fatuity of my arguments and I beheld the wisdom of Marie Harf-- our new Kennan.

Now I know Marie Harf was right because of the Marshall Plan, even though the “plan”, circumstances, and timing are completely different.

There are misleading analogies and flawed analogies. Then there is this - a non-analogy which is better than the best analogy because it proves Marie Harf was right and right-wingers are stupid.

Journalist logic at its finest.

By the way, there is a better analogy for Harf and Micek to use. We once did dangle economic growth in front of an enemy engaged in a shooting war.

In 1965 LBJ proposed a “TVA on the Mekong” to Ho Chi Mihn as a carrot to end the invasion of South Vietnam. Ho turned him down cold. Hanoi and the NVA preferred victory first, economic development later.

Just for the record, let’s get a few other points clear.

The Marshall Plan was not an attempt to wean the Nazis away from their warlike ways or address Germany’s legitimate grievances. Before Marshall the Diplomat worked to rebuild Germany, Marshall the General had implemented the Total War strategy which left Germany crushed, helpless, and with no choice but to surrender “unconditionally”. Contra Harf and Micek, Marshall and the rest of the allies were quite prepared to “kill our way” to victory.

At no point did the US negotiate with the Nazis or dangle incentives before them.

As Churchill put in July 1941:

We will have no truce or parley with you [Hitler], or the grisly gang who work your wicked will. You do your worst and we will do our best.

Finally, nuclear weapons, massive retaliation, and Mutual Assured Destruction had more to do with keeping the Cold War cold than did the Marshall Plan. The Bomb and the Polaris kept Western Europe free; the Marshall Plan helped them regain their prosperity.

Worse than Watergate

Stephen Hayes has a must read piece that should trigger earthquakes in DC.

Al Qaeda Wasn’t ‘on the Run’

Why haven’t we seen the documents retrieved in the bin Laden raid?

In July, Lieutenant General Flynn left his post as director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, a year earlier than scheduled. Many intelligence professionals believe he was forced out, in part because heand many who worked for himaggressively challenged the administration’s view that al Qaeda was dying. Flynn’s views were shaped by the intelligence in the bin Laden documents.

Before he left, Flynn spoke to reporter James Kitfield, of Breaking Defense, who asked why he pushed back on the White House’s view that al Qaeda had died with Osama bin Laden. “There’s a political component to that issue, but when bin Laden was killed there was a general sense that maybe this threat would go away. We all had those hopes, including me. But I also remembered my many years in Afghanistan and Iraq. We kept decapitating the leadership of these groups, and more leaders would just appear from the ranks to take their place. That’s when I realized that decapitation alone was a failed strategy.”

Flynn recalled pushing to get information to policymakers with the hope that it might influence their decisions. “We said many times, ‘Hey, we need to get this intelligence in front of the secretary of defense, the secretary of state, the national security adviser! The White House needs to see this intelligence picture we have!’?” He added: “We saw all this connective tissue developing between these [proliferating] terrorist groups. So when asked if the terrorists were on the run, we couldn’t respond with any answer but ‘no.’ When asked if the terrorists were defeated, we had to say ‘no.’ Anyone who answers ‘yes’ to either of those questions either doesn’t know what they are talking about, they are misinformed, or they are flat out lying.”

Hayes also gives us another reason why ValJar and Co. where so eager to accept the resignation of Gen. Petraeus:

Officials at the Defense Intelligence Agency and CENTCOM responsible for providing analysis to U.S. troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan wanted to study the documents. But the CIA had “executive authority” over the collection and blocked any outside access to them.

The ensuing bureaucratic fight, reminiscent of the intragovernment battles that led to the reorganization of the intelligence community after 9/11, unfolded over the spring and fall of 2011. It was resolved, at least temporarily, when then-CIA director David Petraeus weighed in on behalf of the team from CENTCOM and the DIA, a move that did little to improve his standing with the CIA bureaucracy. Petraeus was angry when he learned that the CIA hadn’t been actively exploiting the documents, and as the former head of CENTCOM, he was sympathetic to the pleas from military intelligence. The dispute made its way to Clapper, who met with representatives of the warring agencies and agreed that DIA and CENTCOM should be allowed to study the documents.

The CIA provided access on a read-only basis, but even that limited look into bin Laden’s world made clear to the military analysts that the Obama administration’s public story on al Qaeda reflected the president’s aspirations more than reality.

Hayes article makes Max Holland’s work on Watergate journalism and Mark Felt/Deep Throat especially relevant. People like David Ignatius and Peter Bergen have some explaining to do.

You can see a talk by Holland here. The whole thing is interesting (as is his book Leak). But there is one point that now has new resonance.

Near the end of his talk Holland says this:

"The idea that Nixon would misuse the CIA for his own political purposes-- that really was the most serious count that led to the bill of impeachment."

Hayes makes the case that this White House found CIA much more helpful than Nixon’s did. Which is why, if Hayes is even half right, then we have a problem much worse than Watergate.

RTWT and share it. Plus, it doesn’t hurt the shame a few journalists for not pursuing this story.

Related:

An Inconvenient Book (review of Max Holland Leak)

An inconvenient book (Part two)

Lara Logan (UPDATED)

You could write a book on all the problems with this morally abhorrent article on Lara Logan:

Benghazi and the Bombshell
Is Lara Logan too toxic to return to 60 Minutes?

The most disgusting part was Joe Hagan’s insinuation that Logan was asking for it when she was sexually assaulted in Cairo’s Tahrir Square during the uprising that toppled Mubarak.

First Hagan tells us that “Logan often flouted traditional Islamic dress codes”. And then there is this:

“She was told 15 different ways: ‘Do not leave the hotel after curfew,’ and she did,”

Normally, reporters are lauded for their bravery when they try get close to the events while covering a story. Logan, however, is not to be lauded so the writer has to imply that she was arrogant and reckless. (As if most reporters are humble as church mice.)

The article tips its hand as it builds its case against Logan. What really sticks in the craw of Hagan and the backstabbers at CBS is that Logan left the MSM reservation. I suspect for most people, that is to her credit.

For instance, she is condemned for expressing her political opinions in a speech in October 2012:

Then, at a Chicago luncheon for the Better Government Association in October 2012, she gave a speech claiming the government was propagating a “major lie” about the strength of the Taliban and Al Qaeda in Afghanistan. “You’re not listening to what the people who are fighting you say about this fight,” she said. “In your arrogance, you think you write the script.” The speech came on the heels of her report “The Longest War,” about General John Allen’s struggles in Afghanistanand with his superiors in the Obama administration.

Among her colleagues at 60 Minutes, there was shock that Logan’s expression of her political opinions in public was met with no blowback from management. But it was her CBS bosses who had helped arrange the speech. While Logan spoke without notes, David Rhodes, the president of CBS News, was sitting in the audience listening.

Logan’s quoted remarks are political in only one sense: they were critical of a government headed by Barak Obama. When Bush was president, such these sort of remarks were both common and widely praised. Logan said exactly the sort of thing that David Halberstam said during the Vietnam War. Halberstam is an icon for journalists yet Logan is becoming a pariah?

Why?

LBJ vs. BHO.

That’s just how journolisters roll.

The most often voiced criticism of Logan is that she respects the military and does patriotic stories.

“She was part of the military culture, taking some of the same risks, imbibing its worldview.”

“Her proximity to the top brass and her devotion to military interests”

“The number of segments Logan did for 60 Minutes ramped up under Fager. Almost all of them focused on military figures and assorted heroics: “Staff Sgt. Giunta’s Medal of Honor”; “A Relentless Enemy”; “Combat in Afghanistan”; “The Silver Star”; “Kidnapped in Basra”; “Ambush in Afghanistan.””

“Enmeshed in the social world of former and current military personnel.”

This is what made Logan a pariah at CBS and within the MSM.

Two telling insights into the worldview of reporters:

First Robert D. Kaplan from 1996:

Fort Leavenworth and the Eclipse of Nationhood

"The military," Major Kellett-Forsyth told me, "is in the nation-state world. The media represents the postmodern, or transnational world. Overseas, [U.S. soldiers] sit down with each other. The American media sits down with foreign journalists: that's its socialization group."

David Gelernter from 1998:

Between lawmen and reporters on the whole it is impossible, however, not to notice this difference: Most lawmen seem to hate criminals, and most reporters couldn't care less.

As Hagan makes clear, the old guard at “60 Minutes” and CBS News hated Logan and the sort of stories she did. In the MSM, this criticism is seen as fatal for Logan’s reputation. For the nation as a whole, however, it may be a badge of honor.

After all, no one can accuse Mike Wallace of being too patriotic:

“Don’t you have a higher duty as an American citizen to do all you can to save the lives of soldiers rather than this journalistic ethic of reporting fact?” Ogletree asked. Without hesitating Wallace responded: “No, you don’t have higher duty...You’re a reporter.” This persuaded Jennings, who changed his view: “I think he’s right, too. I chickened out.”

UPDATE:

Joe COncha is a stand up guy.

Joe Concha to Howard Kurtz: Lara Logan ‘Deserves Better’ from CBS News

Brian Stelter, on the other hand, continues to play the fool.

CBS’ Benghazi Problem

Andrew McCarthy connects the dots on Benghazi

Absolute must read:

Obama’s ‘Blame the Video’ Fraud Started in Cairo, Not Benghazi

The Obama administration’s “Blame the Video” story was a fraudulent explanation for the September 11, 2012, rioting in Cairo every bit as much as it was a fraudulent explanation for the massacre in Benghazi several hours later.

We’ll come back to that because, once you grasp this well-hidden fact, the Obama administration’s derelictions of duty in connection with Benghazi become much easier to see.

Related:

Susan Rice and Benghazi

From this we learn three critical facts: 1. Susan Rice is a diplomat who had no qualms about considering domestic politics when making diplomatic decisions. 2. She is an Obama loyalist who was an early passenger of the Hope and Change Express. 3. Her loyalty to Obama made her quite willing to kneecap her old patrons the Clintons.

So, are we to believe that the White House ignored all that when they chose Susan Rice to go on the Sunday shows to deflect blame after the disaster at Benghazi?

Straws in the wind: The Boston bombers, US intelligence, and the new Cold War

Steve Sailer connects the dots that Fox News ignores:

FBI: Boston Bomb Brothers were Putin's fault

Read the whole thing. No, really, read to the end--you’ll thank me.

The MSM is uninterested (or afraid) to dig into the connection between the Tsarnaev clan and US intelligence.

Okay. Still, you know, the Russkies did have reasons not to totally trust U.S. intelligence services when it came to the Tsarnaev family.

After all, the Bomb Brothers' Uncle Ruslan used to run a Chechen rebel front organization funneling donations from Al-Qaeda to the fight against Russia out of the house of his (now) ex-father-in-law, retired CIA insider Graham E. Fuller.

This line from the Times story is open to many interpretations; none of them are particularly reassuring to Russia or Putin:

At the time, American law enforcement officials believed that Mr. Tsarnaev posed a far greater threat to Russia.

At a minimum, this suggests that the US government was indifferent to the terrorist threat posed by American citizens when the target was Russia.

A reasonable man might wonder of this indifference is evidence of hypocrisy in the Bush-Obama rhetoric surrounding the war on terror.

Throw in the Tsarnaev’s connection to US intelligence and the stench of hypocrisy grows thick and heavy.

Next straw: more questions than answers.

The Chechens' American friends

The Washington neocons' commitment to the war on terror evaporates in Chechnya, whose cause they have made their own….

The anti-Russian animus of the MSM is so strong that this contradiction never gets an airing. The victims of Beslan are sent down the memory hole.

There is also a Ukrainian nexus.

Edward Jay Epstein wrote a fascinating book on unsolved crimes. When investigating the death of ex-KGB agent Alexander Litvinenko and the murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya Epstein found himself deep in the conspiratorial currents of Russian politics and its western annex.

According to Novaya Gazeta, the Moscow-based newspaper for which Politkovskaya reported, Pavlyuchenkov claimed in his pretrial testimony that Politkovskaya’s murder was ordered by two London-based enemies of Putin, billionaire Boris Berezovsky and Akhmed Zakayev, an organizer of the Chechen revolt (which coincides with Putin’s theory that the murder was staged as a provocation).
……
[Alexander Goldfarb] told me that Berezovsky had provided $ 50 million to dissident elements in Ukraine who participated in what became known as the Orange Revolution.

This seems important, but I don’t know what it means

EXCLUSIVE: FBI had human source in contact with bin Laden as far back as 1993 U.S. learned of plans to finance terror attacks

In a revelation missing from the official investigations of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, the FBI placed a human source in direct contact with Osama bin Laden in 1993 and ascertained that the al Qaeda leader was looking to finance terrorist attacks in the United States, according to court testimony in a little-noticed employment dispute case. “It was the only source I know in the bureau where we had a source right in al Qaeda, directly involved,” Edward J. Curran, a former top official in the FBI’s Los Angeles office, told the court in support of a discrimination lawsuit filed against the bureau by his former agent Bassem Youssef.

For those paying attention, Edward J. Curran was the FBI agent who was known as the Executioner during the FBI’s witch hunt inside CIA. Said witch being Robert Hanssen who was not even in the Agency but worked for the Bureau.

See here:

Revisiting the Hanssen case

Robert Hanssen: 9/11's forgotten man

Just one from my notebook

Jami Floyd on ABC 20/20, 28 November 2001:

Since September 11, the word ‘terrorist’ has come to mean someone who is radical, Islamic, and foreign. But many believe we have as much to fear from a home-grown group of anti-abortion crusaders.

It’s work like that which earned Floyd the Maggie Award for Outstanding Coverage of Reproductive Rights and Health Issuesfrom Planned Parenthood and a spot as Legal Contributor on AlJazeera America.

Richard Jewell may finally get the recognition he deserves

Welcome Instapundit readers. Why not take a minute to check out the archives (please?).

You might also be interested in this post: Criminal justice and the Rosenhan Experiment

BTW I'm on Twitter @leadandgold_cdh. Thanks for stopping by.

‘Wolf Of Wall Street’s Leonardo DiCaprio & Jonah Hill Plan Re-Team In Story Of Richard Jewell; Labelled Hero, Then Falsely Vilified As Bomber At 1996 Atlanta Olympics

EXCLUSIVE: Fox has closed a deal to acquire rights to Marie Brenner’s 1997 Vanity Fair article “The Ballad Of Richard Jewell”, which will be developed for Jonah Hill to play the title subject. Jewell was the security guard who discovered a backpack in the Olympics compound in Atlanta in 1996. Initially hailed a hero for reporting the suspicious knapsack and then helping clear bystanders from the area before it exploded, Jewell was subsequently vilified just three days later as a potential suspect, his life and reputation torn apart in the advent of the 24 hour news cycle. Leonardo DiCaprio will play a lawyer Jewell knew casually, a Southern attorney who mostly did real estate closings and seemed in over his head, but he guided Jewell through a hellish Twilight Zone that went on even after the FBI officially cleared Jewell’s name three months later.

I blogged about the article that is the basis for the movie here:

Richard Jewell (III)

Several other posts on Richard Jewell:

Richard Jewell R.I.P

I wish i had found this before

Richard Jewell and the FBI

Benghazi: Not a closed case by a long shot

Thomas Joscelyn

The New York Times Whitewashes Benghazi

David D. Kirkpatrick of the New York Times has published a lengthy account of the September 11, 2012, terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya. While much in Kirkpatrick’s report is not new, the piece is receiving a considerable amount of attention because of this sweeping conclusion: “Months of investigation by The New York Times, centered on extensive interviews with Libyans in Benghazi who had direct knowledge of the attack there and its context, turned up no evidence that Al Qaeda or other international terrorist groups had any role in the assault.”

But how much effort did Kirkpatrick expend to uncover any possible al Qaeda ties? Judging by the Times’s glaring omissions, not much.

Kirkpatrick’s piece totals more than 7,000 words and yet he fingers only one suspect out of the dozens who took part in the attack. Another suspect, an ex-Guantanamo detainee, is briefly mentioned, but only then to dismiss the notion of his involvement.

Three from Powerline:

Fools and knaves: New York Times edition

The Times story is a transparent attempt to provide cover for Hillary Clinton’s upcoming run for POTUS in 2016. I find it incredible that the Times produced such a lengthy story filled with statements that are so easily refuted by facts that are readily available to anybody with half a brain and an Internet connection. There are so many misstatements that it is hard to know where to begin.

Ansar al Sharia and their link to Al Qaeda…Downplaying the important connection between Al Qaeda and Libya in general as well as Ansar al Sharia specifically is perhaps the most appalling thing about the story the Times tells. The links are deep and extensive which I will demonstrate. The Al Qaeda presence in Libya, contrary to the Time reporting, is wide and deep.

Why won’t Obama target Benghazi ringleader?

The Times has identified Islamic militia leader Abu Khattala as the ringleader in the attack. Yet, as West notes:

Not one sentence in the article explained why the administration allows Khattala to strut freely around Benghazi today. President Obama authorizes drone strikes to kill dozens of Islamists each year. Why is Khattala off-limits? That is the real story.

It certainly is one of them.

David Kirkpatrick doubles down on bogus

David Kirkpatrick of the New York Times continues to claim that, notwithstanding the reporting of his own newspaper, claims of an al Qaeda connection to the Benghazi attack are “bogus” or, alternatively, “tenuous” (which is it, David?). How does Kirkpatrick square his claim with the Times’ reporting? By mischaracterizing that reporting.

A story in search of a reporter: How the Tsarnaevs came to America

Steve Sailer:

CIA, Russian privatization, Hay-Adams hotel kitty-corner from the White House, Chechens ... the full story behind how the Tsarnaevs got to live in America seems like it would pretty interesting if it ever comes out. But, few others find the topic interesting

Shocking story of the day

Interpol Chief after Kenya Mall attack: Maybe armed citizenry isn’t so crazy after all

Interpol Secretary General Ronald Noble said today the U.S. and the rest of the democratic world is at a security crossroads in the wake of last month’s deadly al-Shabab attack at a shopping mall in Nairobi, Kenya – and suggested an answer could be in arming civilians.

In an exclusive interview with ABC News, Noble said there are really only two choices for protecting open societies from attacks like the one on Westgate mall where so-called “soft targets” are hit: either create secure perimeters around the locations or allow civilians to carry their own guns to protect themselves.

Related:

Lessons and preparations

Lessons from Mumbai

Armed citizens and al Qaeda swarms

Mall Shooting and future terrorism

Shutdown theater and Nixon’s Ghost

Andrew McCarthy:

Funding Jihadists while Denying Military Benefits
We can fund al-Qaeda but we can’t fund the families of our war dead?

Here is where we’re at: The Republican establishment the guys who told us that for a trillion dollars and several thousand American casualties, we could build “Islamic democracies” that would be reliable U.S. allies in the War on Terror say it is Ted Cruz who is “delusional” and the effort to stave off Obamacare that is “unattainable.”

These self-appointed sages are, of course, the same guys who told us the way to “stabilize” and “democratize” Libya was to help jihadists topple and kill the resident dictator who, at the time, was a U.S. ally, providing intelligence about the jihadists using his eastern badlands as a springboard for the anti-American terror insurgency in Iraq. That’s probably worth remembering this week, during which some of our new “allies” abducted Libya’s president while others car-bombed Sweden’s consulate in Benghazi site of the still unavenged terrorist massacre of American ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other U.S. officials 13 months ago.

Not to worry, though. So successful do they figure the Libyan escapade was, GOP leaders are backing a reprise in Syria. It is there, we learn from a Human Rights Watch report issued this week, that our new “allies,” the al-Qaeda-rife “rebels,” executed a savage atrocity just two months ago. Sweeping into the coastal village of Latakia, the jihadists slaughtered 190 minority Alawites. As the New York Times details, “at least 67 of the dead appeared to have been shot or stabbed while unarmed or fleeing, including 48 women and 11 children.” More than 200 other civilians were captured and are still being held hostage.

McCarthy raises several key issues that are lost in the MSM’s breathless horse race coverage of the shutdown.

I found this one especially interesting:

And, you’ll be pleased to know, supporting the Syrian “rebels” is a high enough priority that it’s not part of the 17 percent of the federal government affected by the “shutdown.”

And this:

You know, there’s also a 1996 law on the federal books that makes it a felony to provide material support to terrorists. It’s not vague. In fact, it’s clear as a bell, according to the many federal courts that have applied it in sentencing scores of jihadist-abettors to hundreds of years in prison.

Don’t you find it strange, don’t you think the public at large would find it strange, that in a shutdown Obama has instigated in order to enforce the Obamacare law Americans don’t want, he so skews the rest of our law that his administration says we can fund al-Qaeda but we can’t fund the families of our war dead?

In his 1977 interview with David Frost, Richard Nixon offered this defense of his actions:

When the President does it, that means it is not illegal.

That answer has taken on an almost mythic status on the Story of Watergate. On one hand we have the arrogant Imperial President who recognizes no limits on his power. On the other, we have a brave band of reporters and special prosecutors who set out to prove that no man, not even the President, is above the law in America.

The battle is joined, Nixon is toppled, and the Rule of Law is saved in America.

So, if that is true, how is it possible for this Administration to support al Qaeda terrorists in Syria?

Accountability and its impersonators

An interesting piece by David Ignatius:

A case study in accountability

For a case study in accountability (and the lack of it), contrast the Marine Corps’ decision this week to fire two generals for inadequately protecting a base in Helmand Province with the CIA’s lack of any similar disciplinary measures after a comparable disaster in December 2009 when a suicide bomber invaded a base in Khost, Afghanistan.

The column stands out as an example of the decadence and corruption of the MSM.

Ostensibly, Ignatius is writing about the handling of two successful Taliban attacks on US forces in Afghanistan. Yet he shorts the discussion of this crucial matter in order to bash conservatives over the government shutdown. Ignatius truncates his analysis of real and faux accountability and offers us a strained analogy to attack the Tea Party. He could have highlighted a serious problem with our national security apparatus; instead, he chose to join the Obama “Shut Down” Hallelujah Chorus.

Of course, if Ignatius had continued his critique of non-accountability, he ran the risk of antagonizing his sources.

Two items show just how rare Marine-style accountability is in Washington.

First, we have the back-story to the attack on FOB Chapman at Khost. As Joby Warrick revealed in The Triple Agent, the CIA officer in charge of the operation had been criticized for her actions (or inaction) in the months prior to 9/11.

Helgerson's report named individual managers who it said bore the greatest responsibility for failing to ensure that vital information was passed to the FBI. The report, never released in full, also recommended that some of the managers be reviewed for possible disciplinary action.

Jennifer Matthews was on that list.

The report ignited a furor at CIA headquarters as top agency officials pushed back sharply against Helgerson's call for individual accountability. It was unfair, Helgerson's critics argued, to tarnish a few managers for what had been a collective failure. The agency's director at the time, Porter Goss, decided the matter by formally rejecting disciplinary reviews. He then ordered that Helgerson's list of name remain classified.

The Khost disaster, therefore, is not an isolated failure but is symptomatic of deeper problems at CIA.

Second, there is no better example of accountability avoidance than the report of the Benghazi Accountability Review Board.

Administration's Benghazi Review Board Discredits Itself in Congressional Hearing

For nine months, top Obama administration officials have used the ARB report as something of a shield, portraying the probe as exhaustive and independent in order to deflect the many unanswered questions about Benghazi that remain. And because the new, discrediting information about the ARB comes from the ARB leaders themselvesin their own words, not those of their criticsdefenders of the administration will have a hard time dismissing it as partisan.

The hearings and transcribed interviews made clear that the ARB probe was neither exhaustive nor independent.

Is this Syria's future?

Bill Gertz:

U.S.: Al Qaeda-linked Group Behind Benghazi Attack Trains Jihadists for Syrian Rebel Groups

Ansar al-Sharia running training camps in Benghazi and Darnah

U.S. intelligence agencies earlier this month uncovered new evidence that al Qaeda-linked terrorists in Benghazi are training foreign jihadists to fight with Syria’s Islamist rebels, according to U.S. officials.

Ansar al-Sharia, the al Qaeda-affiliated militia that U.S. officials say orchestrated the Sept. 11 attacks on the U.S. diplomatic compound and a CIA facility in Benghazi, is running several training camps for jihadists in Benghazi and nearby Darnah, another port city further east...

Disclosure of the terror training camps also bolsters earlier intelligence assessments that Libya, following the death of Muammar Qaddafi, is now a focal point for al Qaeda terrorist activity in North Africa.

A scumbag is dead

Jacques Vergès

Jacques Vergès, who has died aged 88, was a controversial French barrister and one of the most secretive public figures in France, where he was known as “the Devil’s advocate” for his willingness to defend terrorists, war criminals and dictators.

For many years suspected by the French DST (counter-espionage service) of being involved in international terrorism, Maître Vergès always denied this allegation. But in 1995 East German secret police (Stasi) files were leaked in Paris, and they disclosed the lawyer’s long-standing links with the terrorist group led by “Carlos the Jackal”. His Stasi code name had apparently been “Paula”.

During the Reagan administration, CIA dismissed the idea that the Soviet-bloc was supporting terrorist groups. We now know that they were doing exactly that:

When Vergès returned to Paris in 1979 to resume his legal practice his first prominent clients were two members of the Revolutionary Cells, a group of West German terrorists based in Frankfurt, two of whose members had been arrested in possession of explosives in France. One of his clients, Magdalena Kopp, received a four-year prison sentence. She happened to be the mistress of Carlos, who promptly started a bombing campaign solely to obtain her release....

While these attacks were going on Vergès offered his services to the French government as a mediator with the Cells, one of whose members was also a Stasi agent.