national security

Meghan O’Sullivan, Harvard's Director of Geopolitics (and former deputy national security adviser for Iran and Afghanistan) warns, "The US should have already panicked." As she notes, major American economic and political interests are at stake. The erasure of the Syria-Iraq border by a group that is considered too radical for al-Qaeda, the takeover of Iraq’s second largest city by IS, the kidnapping of international diplomats, and the declaration of an Islamic caliphate in large parts of Iraq and Syria – each one of these should be a major signal about the gravity of the situation. The Sectarian Divide remains key...

The Untold Story In the NSA Spying Scandal: Blackmail

“I was absolutely shocked by what I read... What was so surprising was that those whom we thought we could trust really disappointed me. I cannot go into it any more than that. I had to sign an oath that what I read had to remain confidential. But the information I read disappointed me greatly.”

For an administration in its sixth year, juggling presidential optics is nothing new. And with some rare exceptions, the public relations team around the president has remained consistently stubborn about refusing to let the never-ending stream of political, economic or international crises affect Mr. Obama’s daily schedule. The current myriad incidents are no exceptions: Moments after making a grim statement about Ukraine on Friday, the president popped into the East Room, where the first lady, Michelle Obama, was holding a mock state dinner for children to promote her Let’s Move nutrition initiative. “My big thing,” he confessed to the kids, “chips and guacamole!” There was plenty of laughter all around.

Yesterday, we laid out extensively what the official Ukrainian case was when it came to "proof" that Russian separatists had launched the Buk missile which allegedly took down flight MH-17; we also highlighted several glaring inconsistencies and questions that still remained open after the "incriminatory" YouTube clip release. So far, any international response has been muted to this hastily prepared evidence of Russian involvement, although the day is still young. So what about the Russian side? Below we present the key arguments made by Russia to suggest that not it, but Ukraine, was responsible for taking down the Malaysian Boeing.

Thanks to Edward Snowden, we now have proof about an incredible set of tools used by the British equivalent of the NSA, known as the GCHQ, or Government Communications Headquarters. These tools will essentially confirm every single conspiracy theory you could have ever imagined when it comes to propaganda on the Internet. It allows British intelligence officers to: “manipulate the results of online polls, artificially inflate pageview counts on web sites, ‘amplify’ sanctioned messages on YouTube, and censor video content judged to be ‘extremist.’”

One thing that has become crystal clear since the Edward Snowden revelations, is that much of Congress has no problem at all with unconstitutional spying. Rather, they are primarily upset it was exposed and are dead set on making sure no other whistleblower can ever do the same. Enter CISA, or The Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act.

Forget Generalities ... Let's Talk Specifics

Vested interests are threatened by the losses generated by small financial fires, so these are systemically suppressed. As a result, the fallen deadwood piles ever higher, creating more fuel for the next random lightning strike to ignite. Once the deadwood piles high enough, the random lightning strike ignites a fire so fast-moving and so hot that it cannot be suppressed, and the entire financial system burns to the ground. So go ahead and keep defending the Status Quo as the best system possible, or believe Elites will keep suppressing fires forever because they're so powerful, or whatever excuse, rationalization or justification you prefer. It won't matter, because the firestorm won't respond to words, beliefs, ideological certainties, reassurances or official pronouncements. It will do what fires do, which is burn all available fuel until there's no fuel left to consume.

On the heels of John Kerry's accusation that Russia's behavior does not belong in the 21st century, Germany's Angela Merkel has come out swining against the escalating spying scandal with the US (which saw allegations that the US had recruited two Germans to sell secrets this week). During an interview with ZDF, the German leader blasted “that we have different perceptions on the work of intelligence services," adding that "we don’t live in the Cold War anymore." The White House's response, so far, a shrug of 'business-as-usual' from Josh Earnest; which fits with Merkel's conclusion: "I think it's not that easy to convince the Americans ... to completely change the way their intelligence services work."

With threats and promises over cyber-crimes fleeting back and forth between the US and China, it appears - through the 'back-channel' of the nation's state broadcaster CCTV - China has stepped it up once again. As AFP reports, China has accused US technology giant Apple of threatening national security through its iPhone's ability to track and time-stamp a user's location. While not exactly a 'new feature' of the phones, the timing of China's public lambasting reflects the escalating mutual distrust between the US and China over the extent of cyber-espionage.

This week was interesting to say the least and it is ending with a bang.  We are covering a number of brief subjects this week.  I hope you enjoy them.

Spying On – and Blackmailing – Politicians, Generals, Judges, Lawyers and Citizens

It just hasn't been a good week for the CIA. A year after Edward Snowden revealed that the US was bugging Angela Merkel's cell phone, first one then, moments ago, Suddeutsche Zeitung revealed that a second "spy case" involving the US (read CIA) have been revealed. According to SZ, an unidentified man working in military-related area likely to be questioned today over suspicion of spying for a U.S. intelligence service in Germany. The home and office of the suspect were being searched in Berlin area.  SZ adds that the case is more serious than unrelated allegations against double agent at BND Federal Intelligence Service that emerged last week. In the meantime, the US ambassador to Germany went to the foreign ministry for a "talk" - perhaps it is to remind the local just how extensive Angela Merkel's DDR file is, and just what would be revealed about her proximity to the Kremlin if  push came to shove.

Want to hear the worst idea in the history of horrible ideas? How about we take the industry responsible for destroying the U.S. economy and wrecking the lives of tens of millions of people, and then allow it to create a “government-industry cyber war council.” It appears that trillions in taxpayer bailouts simply wasn’t enough for Wall Street. Noting that it can seemingly get whatever it wants whenever it wants, the industry is now positioning itself to overtly control U.S. “cyber” policy. What could go wrong?