"Clap On, Clap Off": Is the light on at the DNI?

"Clap on, Clap off . . . way off on Muslim Brotherhood"

When Congress is in session, crowds in the gallery, when allowed to observe, are reminded to hold their clapping until the session concludes.  If only the White House could have held its Clapper until the end of a hearing on Capitol Hill today.  Instead, the Obama administration made the unfortunate decision to allow Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper to answer questions and deliver his assessments of the situation in Egypt without the much-needed benefit of a teleprompter.  

 DNI Clapper, as widely reported, testified that the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt had worked peacefully for the "betterment of the political order" and, in a whopper that would have caused Pinocchio great nasal growth pains:

"The term 'Muslim Brotherhood' ... is an umbrella term for a variety of movements, in the case of Egypt, a very heterogeneous group, largely secular, which has eschewed violence and has decried Al Qaeda as a perversion of Islam."

 So far out in left field was this assessment, that the White House rushed to correct DNI Clapper's mind-boggling inaccuracy.  A DNI spokesman clarified later today that DNI Clapper was aware the Muslim Brotherhood is a religious, not secular, organization, but that it had largely operated in Egypt in a secular manner under Hosni Mubarak's rule in that country.  What he failed to explain in the hearing was WHY Mubarak kept the Muslim Brotherhood under his thumb for 30 years.  The reason of course, is that the Brotherhood, when speaking to gullible Western media, portrays itself as a minor secular political party with no clout in Egypt, dedicated to building hospitals and other social projects to save humanity.

The peaceful hospital-building political party, the Muslim Brotherhood, no doubt welcoming Egyptian voters on election day in September 2011. 

When one speaks with Egyptians and other citizens in the Middle East, or if one watches Al Jazeera for 10 minutes, one can learn very quickly that the reason the Brotherhood builds hospitals is because the Brotherhood creates a demand for emergency medical facilities by fomenting terrorism and anti-Semitism with a violent tinge to it.  People get hurt around the Brotherhood.  Ask Anwar Sadat whether the Brotherhood "eschews violence", and it might help explain why Mubarak used an iron fist to limit the group's activities in Egypt for decades.  Read the words of the Brotherhood's supreme religious leader and decide for yourself if the "secular political party" is a benign entity as DNI Clapper testified today.  Judge for yourself if the Brotherhood, in its ideology and goals, is any different than al Qaeda, which the Brotherhood allegedly claims is an abomination of Islam.  For a group that is so tightly embracing Hamas that it is impossible to determine where Hamas ends and the Brotherhood begins, its faux condemnation of al Qaeda is ripe with comedic value
beyond anything even the Onion could concoct.

What is most disturbing about DNI Clapper's testimony isn't simply that it was inaccurate, which it clearly was, but that it is in direct conflict with assessments of the Brotherhood produced by the CIA, FBI, Homeland Security, and a host of other intelligence and law enforcement agencies, not merely in the U.S. but among all of our key allies across the globe.  Simply stated, no agency in an allied country has ever assessed the Muslim Brotherhood as anything but a terrorist organization that has participated in violence, directly and through financing and recruitment.  DNI Clapper must know this.  The CIA's and FBI's assessments of the Brotherhood are nothing like what DNI Clapper presented today.  It is no wonder he is backing away from his testimony at a speed only Usain Bolt has experienced among mortals.

We must wonder why DNI Clapper, who should know very well the intelligence (that is the "I" in DNI, after all!) the CIA, FBI, and others have gleaned about the Brotherhood, would testify that the group is of little concern and is a bit player in the "revolution" taking place in Egypt since January 25.  Members of Congress in attendance at today's hearing should obtain for themselves the assessments of the Brotherhood from the intelligence and law enforcement agencies DNI Clapper is supposed to listen to, and brief the Obama administration accordingly.  Clapper clapped on about the humanitarian achievements of this terror-sponsoring group, and then he clapped off when one of his staffers with access to simple intelligence sources, such as Google, discovered that no one in the intel industry, except perhaps himself, believed a word of the fiction that the Brotherhood is benign.  Clearly his testimony was politically motivated. Somehow, in all of this Clapping on and off, we must hope and pray that a light came on somewhere in the administration to reveal the very real threat to Egypt and Israel the Brotherhood presents, and that no real political power will be afforded it before or after Egyptian elections are held to replace Mubarak.

Judge Ignores Probable Cause in Patriot Act Scolding

U.S. District Courts on the west coast are notorious for their liberal rulings and anti-government bias. We speak from experience in making that statement, having attempted in years past, usually fruitlessly, to meet their wildly erratic standards for probable cause even for investigations of terrorism or what are termed “terroristic threats” in many jurisdictions. Courts similar in ideology to the one that refused to protect the Pledge of Allegiance’s “one nation under God” wording routinely bend over backward to protect criminal and terrorism suspects from the dreaded Patriot Act. Federal law enforcement agencies in California, Oregon, and Washington find it increasingly difficult to find U.S. Attorneys willing to prosecute their cases regardless of the available evidence because the district judges are loathe to issuing search or arrest warrants, regardless of the severity of the crime or a suspect’s likelihood to flee once he has discovered he is under surveillance or his home or vehicle have been searched.

The political bias of the west’s federal district courts have made them overtly hostile to virtually all provisions of the Patriot Act, and cases brought before them that were investigated under expanded law enforcement authority provided by the Patriot Act are viewed by these judges as golden opportunities to strike at the hated act and more importantly, the president responsible for it, whom they almost unanimously despise.

It was with that underlying opportunistic mentality that U.S. District Judge Ann Aiken heard Brandon Mayfield’s lawsuit against the U.S. Government for violating Mayfield’s constitutional guarantees against unreasonable searches and seizures. Mayfield was the Oregon lawyer and converted Muslim whom the FBI mistakenly identified as one of the terrorists responsible for the Madrid rail bombing in 2004. That terrorist attack killed nearly two hundred and was the highest priority investigation for international law enforcement, including the FBI, which was tasked with running latent fingerprints found on a detonator at the scene of the bombing through its print matching database known as AFIS. The AFIS system is not exclusive to the FBI, as most federal agencies now use electronic fingerprint scanners when processing suspects, and all prints are transmitted to the central AFIS database.

Unfortunately for all parties involved in the Madrid investigation, AFIS identified a number of possible matches to the fingerprint found on the detonator. Through human error by FBI forensic specialists Mayfield’s prints, which were in the system due to his prior U.S. military service, were identified as a positive match. Nineteen days elapsed between Mayfield’s identification as a suspect in the bombing and the FBI’s discovery and announcement of its fingerprint error. Mayfield was the top media story after his arrest and according to his lawsuit his reputation and legal practice suffered irreparable damage due to the government’s mistake. The government settled a portion of the lawsuit and apologized to Mayfield.

Not satisfied with the punitive damages paid by the government in its settlement, Mayfield demanded as part of the settlement to retain the right to challenge provisions of the Patriot Act that he felt had been abused during the FBI’s investigation that mistakenly implicated him. Judge Ann Aiken clearly relished this opportunity to rule in favor of this sympathetic figure and wrote a scathing chastisement of President Bush (referred to as the anonymous Executive Branch) and the reviled Patriot Act and the equally despised Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which allows for warrantless wiretaps in terrorism investigations under certain circumstances but was not a creation of the Bush administration. FISA has been with us since the 1970s and was legislatively approved by a Democrat controlled Congress at the time. Despite this clear distinction, Aiken ruled that two provisions of the Patriot Act violated constitutional protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.

There is no question that the FBI made a mistake in its matching of Mayfield’s fingerprint with those found in Madrid. Yet, according to the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL), a decidedly liberal organization, if the FBI used warrantless wiretapping, electronic surveillance, or searches during its investigation of Mayfield, it did so under the authority of FISA, not the Patriot Act. Judge Aiken took it upon herself to strike at the Patriot Act in a case where the powers granted by the Patriot Act do not appear to have been abused. The NACDL reported:

All of the trains involved in the March 11 bombings left from or had traveled through the Acala de Henares train station, in Madrid. Shortly after the bombings, in a van parked in the vicinity of the station, Spanish National Police discovered a blue plastic bag containing detonation materials similar to the devices used in the bombings. On this bag, a number of latent fingerprints were observed.

On March 17, the digital image of at least one of these latent fingerprints, Latent Fingerprint No. 17, was electronically transmitted to the FBI crime lab in Quantico, Virginia. After receiving the digital image of Latent Fingerprint No. 17, the FBI’s Latent Print Unit conducted an examination of the latent print by running it through its AFIS database. The AFIS database search produced 20 possible matches. FBI Senior Fingerprint Examiner Terry Green manually compared the potential matches with the digital image of Latent Fingerprint No. 17 and found a “100 percent” match with the fourth ranked print on the list. The source of the matching print was identified as being an American citizen and former Army lieutenant, Brandon Mayfield. Green’s match was purportedly confirmed by two other FBI fingerprint examiners.

It is not presently known how many of the twenty potential AFIS candidates were examined and whether there were any dissenters within the FBI’s Latent Print Unit. Nor is it known whether the identification process was influenced by information pertaining to Mayfield’s religious adherence to Islam or activities as a lawyer prior to the match being officially declared.

On or about March 20, the FBI reported its findings to the United States Attorney’s Office in Portland, which then commenced an investigation. On April 2, the FBI sent a letter to the Spanish authorities informing them of the identification of Mayfield. However, in a memo dated April 13, the Forensic Science Division of the Spanish National Police responded to the FBI that the purported match was “conclusively negative.”

On April 14, “rumors that Spanish authorities were questioning whether the print matched Mayfield” became known to the prosecutors in Portland. On April 16, the prosecutors became aware that the Spanish authorities “couldn’t confirm the FBI’s match.” On April 21, a representative from the FBI Latent Print Unit flew to Madrid and met with ten members of the Forensic Science Division of the Spanish National Police (SNP). At this meeting, the FBI representative presented the Spanish police officials “with a three-page document detailing their position that the prints from the bag belonged to Mr. Mayfield....”

...At some point in March or April, the FBI began surveillance of Mayfield. Based on a number of extraordinary events at his home and certain redactions in the district court search warrant affidavits, it strongly appears that he was subjected to “sneak and peek” and electronic surveillance under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The government has declined to confirm or deny the use of FISA warrantless surveillance procedures.

In its submissions to the district court, on May 6, in addition to a material witness arrest warrant, the government sought issuance of broadly drafted search warrants for Mayfield’s law office, home, and personal vehicles.... Relying principally on the FBI’s identification of the digital image of Latent Fingerprint No. 17 as being Mayfield’s fingerprint, United States District Judge Robert E. Jones issued the requested material witness arrest warrant and search warrants.

The NACDL recognized that although the government refused to acknowledge the use/non-use of FISA authority in this case, it also obtained traditional search warrants from District Court Judge Jones, who clearly determined that based on the fingerprint match the FBI had probable cause to believe Mayfield had handled the Madrid detonator and thus searches of his home, vehicles, and law practice were reasonable.

Judge Aiken, however, chose to ignore these facts and relied on emotional anti-Patriot Act fervor so abundant in her district. According to the AP story:

U.S. District Judge Ann Aiken ruled that the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, as amended by the Patriot Act, "now permits the executive branch of government to conduct surveillance and searches of American citizens without satisfying the probable cause requirements of the Fourth Amendment."

…Mayfield claimed that secret searches of his house and office under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act violated the Fourth Amendment's guarantee against unreasonable search and seizure. Aiken agreed with Mayfield, repeatedly criticizing the government.

…The Mayfield case has been an embarrassment for the federal government. Last year, the Justice Department's internal watchdog faulted the FBI for sloppy work in mistakenly linking Mayfield to the Madrid bombings. That report said federal prosecutors and FBI agents had made inaccurate and ambiguous statements to a federal judge to get arrest and criminal search warrants against Mayfield.

These AP excerpts are critical, because none of the court documents established that Mayfield was subjected to warrantless searches or eavesdropping. On the other hand, the court documents reviewed by Judge Aiken included traditional search and arrest warrants and affidavits presented to and approved by a fellow District Court Judge. The Justice Department admitted that the fingerprint mishap was “sloppy” and there were some inaccuracies in the affidavits the warrants were based upon, but the key here is that warrants were issued through routine judicial action in addition to or instead of FISA or the Patriot Act. Thus while Judge Aiken preaches from her political pulpit about the evil Patriot Act and its “extra-Constitutional” powers given to the executive branch (i.e. President Bush), in this case there is only tangible evidence that the FBI obtained probable cause warrants from the federal judiciary, not from anyone in the executive branch. Apparently she was so eager to inject her political views into the national debate over the Patriot Act that she could not restrain herself to wait for a case where FISA or Patriot Act provisions clearly had been violated.

The NACDL and the AP versions were in agreement that the FBI conducted searches of Mayfield’s home, law practice, and vehicles, all with traditional probable cause warrants. Likewise, the arrest warrant for Mayfield was supported by a probable cause finding by Judge Jones. Rather than condemn the Patriot Act or FISA, Judge Aiken should have limited her criticism to judicial colleague Judge Jones if she genuinely believed there was no basis for probable cause and explained to the nation why Jones was wrong to issue probable cause warrants. Alas, it is easier to assault a controversial legislative act and an unpopular president than it is to look your colleague in the eye after ignoring his good faith issuance of warrants. Judge Aiken’s written decision provided a political lecture instead of legal justification, and FISA falsehoods rather than facts.

Technorati Tags: Patriot Act Brandon Mayfield Judge Ann Aiken FISA FBI Madrid Bombing Search and Seizure Unconstitutional

Senseless in Seattle: Self-Inflicted Profiling Angst

It must be confusing to be an FBI agent these days. For years now, the practice of profiling, AKA stereotyping, has been officially forbidden, driven underground in the law enforcement community by political correctness and ACLU lawsuits. Fighting the War on Terror with agents blindfolded to race, religion, ethnicity, and other characteristics is becoming increasingly challenging, made more so by the ironic fact that even when the FBI forgoes profiling in potential terrorism investigations it is still criticized by the very groups it strives not to offend. The FBI’s recent release of photos of two unknown men observed conducting what may have been pre-attack operational planning on several ferries in Washington’s Puget Sound area generated an ironic response from Seattle’s Muslim and Arab-American community leaders.

The context of this incident is important to consider. The FBI, after interviewing ferry passengers and staff, was unsuccessful in identifying the two men, who were observed showing interest in critical and restricted areas of the ferries. So unusual was their behavior that ferry staff and passengers reported it to a ferry captain, who photographed the pair. That photo, obtained from the captain, was turned over to the FBI and subsequently released to the news media along with a request for anyone with information about the two men to contact the FBI. The FBI did not refer to the men as Muslims, Arabs, or even Middle Eastern.

That last fact made the swift and emotional response from Seattle’s Muslim and Arab-American community leaders all the more ironic. Their chief complaint was that they had worked hard to establish cooperative relations with the FBI in Seattle, but the FBI had damaged the tenuous partnership by releasing the ferry suspects’ photos without first consulting Muslim and Arab-American leaders. As reported by the Seattle Times:

Dozens of Muslims and Arabs have complained to community leaders about the photographs. The fallout has led to a meeting planned today between Muslim- and Arab-American community leaders and law-enforcement officials.

"We need to get some type of apology from them and figure out how to get back to where we were," said Rita Zawaideh, head of the Arab-American Community Coalition.

Remember, the FBI merely provided the photos to media sources because it wanted to interview the two men regarding their behavior on the ferries, not because of their appearance. Usually when government agencies are criticized in the media by hyper-sensitive groups, they turn tail and flee from the possibility of lawsuits and accusations of profiling. Fortunately, David Gomez, a supervisor in the FBI’s Seattle Field Office stood his ground and accused Seattle’s Muslim and Arab-American leaders of stereotyping in precisely the same manner they so loudly object to from law enforcement:

Gomez said the agency needs to address certain sensitive issues, but "people in those communities have to get over this sensitivity toward feeling victimized."

Many passengers have been stopped and questioned recently, as the ferry system has stepped up security once the FBI concluded the men might be watching the system. The stops are based on activities, not skin color, Gomez said.

Two days ago, a Seattle Times photographer, who is white, was stopped and questioned after taking photographs near the Mukilteo ferry terminal.

The FBI didn't take the photos of the two men to the Arab- and Muslim-American community because the agency doesn't know if the men are Middle Eastern, Gomez added.

"That seems potentially prejudicial to me, and in some ways worse than simply putting [the photos] out the way we did," Gomez said. "It is not us saying these guys look Middle Eastern."

Thus without knowing whether the ferry suspects were Middle Eastern, the FBI followed the most prudent and politically correct course possible in its quest to identify and locate the two men: it simply released the photos without guessing at the pair’s religious preference or ethnicity, and asked for the public’s help in identifying the two men because they were acting suspiciously on a public conveyance considered an attractive potential terrorist target. The FBI played its cards right in this situation, because had it taken the photos to Seattle’s Muslim and Arab-American community leaders asking for assistance, those leaders could have accused the FBI of assuming the two suspects were Muslim or Middle Eastern based on appearance only, a classic cry of profiling. The complaint of Rita Zawaideh that the FBI had consulted with leaders prior to other releases of suspect photos intentionally omits a crucial element: in those prior instances the FBI had already obtained through investigation some indication that those suspects were in fact Muslims of Middle Eastern descent.

The nature of the cooperative relationship previously established between the FBI’s Seattle office and Seattle’s Muslim leaders should be reexamined. While it is not uncommon for law enforcement to approach such leaders when there is some indication a suspect has ties to a particular religious or ethnic community, it would be unusual for a law enforcement agency to feel obliged to allow those leaders to preview all alerts or lookouts (BOLOs) prior to public release when an agency does not know the religion or ethnicity of a suspect. It would be irresponsible to share such law enforcement sensitive data, and it would be profiling. Should the FBI be required to select leaders from every conceivable ethnic or religious group, who will review suspect photos prior to public release? In a nation so diverse, suspects would have long since fled before the FBI could “consult” with representatives from an endless number of cultural communities.

By their own outrage at the FBI’s failure to consult them before releasing the suspects’ photos, Seattle’s Muslim leaders revealed their own penchant for profiling, clearly becoming angry after viewing the photos on the Internet and coming to their own conclusion that the two suspects were in fact Muslim and Middle Eastern based solely on physical characteristics. Had the FBI come to those same conclusions based on the same criteria, an ACLU lawsuit would have arrived at the FBI’s Seattle office before the ink had dried from its printing. Law enforcement agencies face a serious quandary, forbidden from officially teaching agents the art of profiling while simultaneously condemned for carefully avoiding it.

Seattle’s Muslim and Arab-American leaders did not need law enforcement profiling training to conclude from a photo that the ferry suspects were likely Middle Eastern Muslims. Unlike law enforcement, those leaders are allowed to judge by color rather than character. Their response conjured memories of the peasant mob in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, who when asked by Sir Bedevere how they knew a village woman was a witch replied, “Because she looks like one!” Apparently Seattle’s Muslim leaders applied the same logic when they viewed the ferry suspects’ photos. To its credit, the FBI withheld such superficial judgment, preferring instead to wait for investigative leads that might establish the suspects’ ethnicity.

Technorati Tags:
FBI, Seattle, Ferry, Terrorist Targets, Muslim Leaders, CAIR, Profiling, Arab-Americans, David Gomez, Rita Zawaideh, Terrorist Attack Planning, Puget Sound, War on Terror

FBI's Terror Cold Shoulder to ICE Justified

Congressmen and citizens are outraged that six years after 9/11, government agencies investigating suspected terrorists continue to stonewall each other. Specifically, allegations citing a lack of cooperation on terror investigations between Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and FBI agents sparked a Senate Judiciary Committee investigation conducted by the Inspector General offices of the Departments of Homeland Security and Justice. The results of that joint investigation into failed cooperation were the focus of an AP report picked up by Fox News yesterday, and after reviewing the story Americans likely developed feelings of sympathy for victimized ICE agents while simultaneously forming harsh judgments of the FBI for its seeming refusal to share information on terror investigations with ICE. Both of those conclusions are wrong. While the FBI certainly holds its terrorist information close to the vest due the sensitive and even classified nature of those investigations, the FBI sometimes does so for good reason.

A news story today, seemingly unrelated to the AP story described above, served to illustrate why the FBI may have been reluctant to work closely and share sensitive investigative details with ICE agents. The Washington Times article, “U.S. Agents Accused of Aiding Islamist Scheme,” opened with the following paragraphs:

A criminal investigations report says several U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services employees are accused of aiding Islamic extremists with identification fraud and of exploiting the visa system for personal gain.

The confidential 2006 USCIS report said that despite the severity of the potential security breaches, most are not investigated "due to lack of resources" in the agency's internal affairs department.

"Two District Adjudications Officers are allegedly involved with known (redacted) Islam terrorist members," said the internal document obtained by The Washington Times.

The fact that USCIS employees have provided Islamic radicals with visas, travel documents, and counterfeit identification, as reported by the Times, should have spurred Congress to act quickly and decisively to establish effective oversight of USCIS. Instead, Congress allowed USCIS to investigate itself, and in typical “fox guarding the hen house” fashion, to date it has conducted no investigations.

Although USCIS and ICE are technically separate agencies, ICE is the law enforcement arm of USCIS and the two agencies utilize a free flow of information including joint access to Customs and Immigration computer databases. In reality, USCIS and ICE are the law enforcement equivalent of conjoined twins, separate entities that share the same organs and would not survive if separated. Infection, or in this case corruption, in one was certain to spread to the other, and it did so. The Times further reported:

Another investigation involved more than seven USCIS and Immigration and Custom's Enforcement (ICE) employees — including special agents and senior district managers — who were moving contraband via "diplomatic pouches" to the United States from China.

ICE — the original investigating agency — downgraded the criminal investigation to a managerial problem, and the case was never prosecuted, a source close to the investigation said.

Given this relationship it is easy to see why FBI agents conducting counterterrorism investigations are reticent in their cooperation with ICE or flatly decline to share investigative data. If an agent cannot be sure that the information he has been asked to share with ICE will not end up in the hands of USCIS or ICE employees in a position to aid Islamic radicals, he would be justified in withholding that information.

Further reinforcing the FBI’s suspicions of ICE/USCIS is the troubling fact that in March USCIS established an Office of Security and Integrity to crack down on internal corruption, but as of today’s Times report, none of the sixty-five vacancies for internal investigators first advertised in March had been filled. With that shoddy record of internal corruption reform hanging over its head, it is no wonder that the FBI and other agencies targeting potential terrorists in America are more than a little reluctant to collaborate with ICE/USCIS.

Placed in the context of ICE/USCIS corruption and assistance with legal identification documents for Islamic radicals posing as Hispanics, The AP story accusing the FBI of failing to cooperate with ICE/USCIS should be looked at in a different light. The first two paragraphs, that yesterday created the impression that the FBI was simply being irrationally uncooperative toward ICE on terror investigations, make much more sense today to those unfamiliar with the core issue between the two agencies:

Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents ignored or dropped leads and at times entire cases involving terrorist activities because of disputes with the FBI, says a report by federal officials released Monday.

In examining 10 cases that began at ICE and were taken over by the FBI, the inspectors general of the Homeland Security and the Justice departments found that seven suffered from lack of cooperation until they were taken over by the Joint Terrorism Task Forces, which the FBI controls.

Examined through the lens of the AP story only, the FBI seemed overly territorial at a time when information sharing between agencies is considered the most critical tool in the War on Terror. Yet when viewed together with today’s Times report on USCIS/ICE corruption, the puzzle pieces fall into place. It should surprise no one that the FBI was more comfortable cooperating when the investigations were taken over by an investigative task force under its own control, and through which it could track the dissemination of sensitive information. That level of operational security (OPSEC) is essential to any agency responsible for national security-related information.

There are always two sides to a story, and in the case of alleged FBI non-cooperation with USCIS/ICE, it takes the melding of two stories to form a complete explanation for why that non-cooperation may have been justified and continues to occur. It is rare to find an example of a situation in which information sharing between agencies may not be in the best interests of America. However, until USCIS/ICE produces tangible evidence of internal corruption reform including indictments, employment terminations, arrests, and prosecutions, the FBI would be wise to continue its tight controls over terrorism-related investigations.

Technorati Tags:
FBI, USCIS, ICE, Islamic Radicals, Aiding Terrorists, Information Sharing, Joint Investigations, Government Corruption, Congressional Oversight, OPSEC, War on Terror

Did FBI Call ABC but not Border Patrol?

The ABC News Blotter reported yesterday that Iraqis are being smuggled from Mexico across the Rio Grande River into New Mexico by a human smuggling ring, and this ring has been in operation for more than a year, according to an FBI intelligence report issued last week. This ABC story received significant attention in Internet news forums, but reader commentary at The Blotter web site and one of my favorites, Lucianne.com, was focused almost exclusively on our porous borders and the Bush administration's crusade for amnesty at the expense of national security through secure borders. These criticisms were, of course, perfectly valid, but when I read Brian Ross' Blotter piece, I observed something different and troubling that unless rectified, will almost certainly lead to continued vulnerability to terrorist attacks. Here is the portion of Ross' report that caught my attention:

An FBI intelligence report distributed by the Washington, D.C. Joint Terrorism Task Force, obtained by the Blotter on ABCNews.com, says the illegal ring has been bringing Iraqis across the border illegally for more than a year.

Border Patrol officials in the area said they were unaware of the specifics of the FBI's report, and federal prosecutors in New Mexico told ABCNews.com they had no current cases involving the illegal smuggling of Iraqis.

The FBI report, issued last week, says the smuggling organization "used to smuggle Mexicans, but decided to smuggle Iraqi or other Middle Eastern individuals because it was more lucrative....

If Ross' source is accurate, the FBI distributed this Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) report last week to agencies that are participating members of the Washington DC JTTF. That list would include most federal agencies with counterterrorism and law enforcement functions, including Department of Homeland Security components such as Customs and Border Protection (CBP), as well as many local and state law enforcement agencies. Yet when contacted for information about the Iraqi smuggling ring and the FBI's information about its existence, Border Patrol officials "were unaware" of the FBI report. Is this another example of the FBI keeping its terrorism investigation details close to the vest? It should concern all Americans that Brian Ross can obtain a copy of a restricted document about the smuggling of Middle Easterners into New Mexico, but the Border Patrol in New Mexico cannot.

What was the lesson from 9/11 if not the importance of information sharing among government agencies? I have decried the lack of openness in the intelligence and law enforcement communities in previous posts and there is ample blame to go around, but here we find ourselves nearly six years after 9/11 and the lead agency charged with investigating terrorism learns of a ring smuggling Middle Eastern individuals into America and no one bothers to tell the Border Patrol? The media should not be tasked with notifying law enforcement agencies about illegal activities that likely have a terrorist nexus. Brian Ross is not an FBI agent or counterterrorism specialist, yet when he contacted the Border Patrol in New Mexico, they received first notice of the FBI report from a journalist.

To make matters worse, the new National Intelligence Estimate issued yesterday made it quite clear that al Qaeda in Iraq has expressed significant interest in possibly attacking the U.S. homeland with Iraqi operatives to be placed in America. I'm sure it is just coincidence that the smuggling of Iraqis from Mexico into New Mexico has been occurring for over a year. Are they really "refugees fleeing the violence in Iraq" as Brian Ross claims, or are some of them the proverbial wolf in sheep's clothing?

Do you feel safer knowing that those sworn to protect you work harder to avoid communicating with each other than they do to warn each other of newly obtained intelligence? This is a problem that must be stopped before an attack that could have been detected early is brought to terrible fruition.

Technorati Tags:
Border Patrol, Border Security, Human Smuggling, Iraqis, New Mexico, FBI, Information Sharing, National Intelligence Estimate, Al Qaeda in Iraq, Brian Ross

"Sneaky Bastard" Iran: Too Late to Stop Nukes, May Have Ties to JFK Bombers

I thought the quote of the day winner would be an easy choice today, but now there is real competition. I highlighted Newt Gingrich’s blunt assessment of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff’s “bow to reality” approach to illegal alien amnesty in an earlier post today. In case you missed that quote, here is a portion of it: “but we hire leaders to change reality to fit our values, not to change our values to fit their failures.”

As eloquent and well constructed as Newt’s quote was, it may have been upstaged by a far less eloquent but certainly impassioned remark, an assessment of Iran provided by former FBI counterterrorism head Kenneth Piernick to the New York Sun. To provide a brief summary of the context for Piernick’s statement, the FBI, in its investigation of the recently disrupted plot to destroy New York’s JFK Airport, the FBI is reportedly attempting to determine why one of the plotters was attempting to flee from Guyana to Iran through anti-American Venezuela before being captured. According to the suspect’s wife, he stopped in Guyana to obtain an Iranian visa, but the FBI is seeking further information about the suspect’s Iranian ties. The New York Sun reported that the suspect currently has two sons “studying” in Iran.

When asked for his opinion about whether the JFK attack plotters may have had ties to the Iranian mullahs and President Ahmadinejad, Piernick made it clear that he would not be surprised if such a connection were identified:

"The fact of the matter is that the Iranians are a bunch of sneaky bastards. They are going to take care of anyone who hurts us. I am not at all surprised that they might have been trying to provide him cover to get out of the region," he said in a telephone interview.

Given Iran’s continued march toward nuclear weapons and Ahmadinejad’s taunting of America, maybe the choice for best quote of the day is not so difficult after all.

While Iran may have been “sneaky” by quietly assisting the JFK attack planners, Ahmadinejad roared like a lion at America and other nations who have vowed to stop Iran from developing nuclear weapon capabilities. Ahmadinejad warned the world today that it “is too late” to stop Iran’s nuclear program, and that further international sanctions against the regime will only make the future more difficult for the west. As reported by Fox News via AP, he added that more sanctions would be as unwise for the west as “stepping on a lion’s tail”:

”We advise them not to play with the lion's tail," Ahmadinejad said, prompting applause from a room of reporters, Iranian officials and foreign dignitaries at a Tehran news conference.

"It is too late to stop the progress of Iran," Ahmadinejad said. "Iran has passed the point where they wanted Iran to stop."

It would appear that neither the subtle (UN sanctions) nor the sneaky (covert ops) approaches have worked for the U.S. in slowing down or destroying Iran’s suicidal nuclear quest. The Bush administration has demonstrated that it is good at “bowing to reality” on one important national security issue, immigration, and wants to throw up its arms in surrender through amnesty. The world must hope that this administration has more backbone on this national security issue by preventing through all available means the reality of a nuclear Iran. Bowing to that reality by granting Iran nuclear amnesty would result in the end of reality for Israel, America, and freedom.

Ahmadinejad Photo by AP

Technorati: Ahmadinejad Kenneth Piernick FBI Counterterrorism JFK Airport Terrorist Plot Bush Administration Mullahs Iranian Nuclear Program

"Sanctuary" Nearly Fatal For Fort Dix

At first glance, the plot by six recently converted Islamic terrorists to attack Fort Dix in New Jersey with automatic weapons seemed like a ridiculous idea. Why attack a target that was defended by armed security and had, within the confines of the military base, tactical response teams that could respond with significant force and firepower to repel the attack? How did they decide to target Fort Dix?

Media coverage of the foiled plot has offered a mixture of praise for the FBI and condemnation of everyone from President Clinton (for intervening in the former Yugoslavia and sheltering uprooted ethnic Albanians in New Jersey) to President Bush (for encouraging terrorism by our presence in Iraq). However, three sources offered even-keeled and informative reporting and analysis.

The first was a good general account of the plot and the arrest operation in the Washington Post yesterday that detailed each participant as well as how an alert video store clerk tipped off the FBI in 2006 after the co conspirators requested that a VHS videotape be converted into DVD format. The file contained video of the group training at a firearms range while calling for Jihad and importuning the name of “Allah.” The article also provided links to the criminal complaint and affidavit filed by the U.S. Attorney’s office and the FBI. Those documents present a complete description of the defendants, their actions, and their intentions.

The second source was a blog I read regularly, In From the Cold, the author of which often has unique perspectives, particularly on issues involving the military or military intelligence. In a post Tuesday titled “Terror Plot Thwarted,” the author, Spook86, addressed the knee-jerk question many likely had when they first read that the terrorists intended to attack a “secure” military base. Spook86 described some of the inner workings of military bases like Fort Dix, and focused on the security weaknesses that are common to all such facilities. Food delivery drivers bringing eagerly anticipated meals are a welcome and mundane sight at military bases and federal buildings for that matter, and entering the base under the guise of pizza delivery was a well selected tactic. Taxis, shuttle buses, food delivery, all of these are so common that they are rarely screened properly, especially if the driver is recognized by security guards. If you thought a military base on American soil was too secure to be a viable target for terrorists, you will reconsider that position after reading In From the Cold’s analysis of the plot’s potential success.

The third source, and certainly the most disturbing, was yesterday's Fox News story that reported the immigration/citizenship status of the terrorists. According to Fox News interviews with a federal law enforcement source, three of the terrorists were living illegally in the United States. While it may not be unusual for known terrorists to enter the United States illegally, the immigration pattern of these previously unknown terrorists will sound familiar to those who are concerned about America's porous borders. Three of the terrorists, the Duka brothers, were apparently smuggled into the United States near Brownsville, Texas in 1984, when they were children between ages 1-6, along with other family members. The family settled in New Jersey, and, to fit the hotly debated stereotype of so many illegal immigrants, worked various blue collar jobs into adulthood. Of the six terrorists arrested for plotting to assault Fort Dix, one was a cab driver, three were roofers, one worked as a 7-11 clerk, and one worked at his father's pizza restaurant. It was as a delivery driver that one of the terrorists obtained extensive knowledge of base operations. These blue collar hard working illegal aliens were seemingly assimilating into American society, just trying to find a better life than the one they left behind in their home country. Stop me if this story sounds familiar.

These young, hard working blue collar illegal immigrants, however, became enamored with the ideology and "heroism" of al Qaeda and were inspired by the recorded last "wills" of the 9/11 hijackers and according to the Fox report, the group watched video footage containing terrorist training instructions, including simulated and actual attacks on U.S. military personnel. In time, the group progressed from embracing ideology to actively plotting attacks on a variety of nearby targets, eventually escalating to the point where they attempted to purchase automatic weapons from an FBI informant who had infiltrated this illegal immigrant terrorist cell. That is when the FBI made its move. The outrageous aspect of this story is that these terrorists were known to local law enforcement (not as terrorists of course) long before they mutated into al-Qaeda wannabes, but because of city ordinances prohibiting police officers from questioning an individual's immigration or citizenship status, they continued living, working, and plotting in their neighborhood rather than being arrested, included in illegal immigrant databases, or deported. Fox News reported:

FOX News has also learned that there were 19 traffic citations against the Duka brothers, but according to a federal law enforcement source, because they operated in so-called "sanctuary cites," where law enforcement does not routinely tell the Homeland Security Department about illegal immigrants in their towns, none of the tickets raised red flags.

The terrorists in this case scouted multiple targets before choosing Fort Dix because of their familiarity with and proximity to it. If you live near a military base or government installation, be extra vigilant and report any suspicious activity immediately, because if you live in a "sanctuary" city, your city government has tied the hands of law enforcement and placed you in danger. It is no exaggeration when the President states that we must be right 100% of the time to prevent an attack, while the terrorists only have to get it right once. This group might have gotten it right had it not been for the DVD request and an alert store clerk’s willingness to take action. In this case, a Circuit City store clerk did more to protect homeland security than the local government. Rather than protect its citizens, local governments instead offered "sanctuary" to America-hating illegal immigrants who came alarmingly close to slaughtering many of America's finest at Fort Dix.

Tenet: Interrogations MVP of Terror War

Washington insiders are known for making startling revelations in the media immediately prior to the date on which their memoirs hit bookstore shelves. Former CIA director George Tenet is no exception. His book, At the Center of the Storm: My Years at the CIA, available for sale Monday, has already been a hot topic of discussion in the media, as portions of it have been leaked along with previews of Tenet’s appearance on CBS’ “60 Minutes” program to be aired Sunday. Speculation has run rampant that Tenet would anger the White House with his assessments of the War on Terror, but the NY Sun reported today that Tenet adamantly defended the Bush administration’s use of “aggressive interrogations” in a bold and straightforward manner uncommon among DC’s elite.

Tenet, addressing the issue of interrogations and alleged torture so ferociously opposed by Democrats, reportedly stated:

"I know that this program has saved lives. I know we've disrupted plots," Mr. Tenet said in a "60 Minutes" interview set to air Sunday before the release of his new book. "I know this program alone is worth more than the FBI, the Central Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Agency put together have been able to tell us," he said.

Consider that last sentence again carefully. In the estimation of a man who served as DCI under Presidents Clinton and Bush, aggressive interrogations, presumably including the technique known as “water boarding” (previously described by Capital Cloak here) have been the most effective tool in protecting America from terrorism. Interrogation of enemy combatants, so loudly denounced by war critics is more valuable than the FBI’s counterterrorism section and Joint Terrorism Task Forces found in every major American city. Aggressive interrogations yield more actionable intelligence than the NSA’s electronic and communications monitoring capabilities so feared by privacy scaremongers. Interrogations are worth more than CIA covert operations and intelligence analysts’ reports.

It is a remarkable statement from a man whose reputation and marketability are so closely intertwined with public perception of the CIA. The capture of these enemy combatants, and often the initial interrogations, are military rather than CIA operations, and thus Tenet is crediting Defense Intelligence (with additional assistance from CIA) for extracting more actionable intelligence than all other agencies and programs combined. When one considers the enormous flood of documents, captured transmissions, and reports from citizen informants currently swamping American intelligence agencies, one begins to realize how critical it is to obtain information directly from captured terrorists with firsthand operational knowledge of terror plots, terror leaders, names, aliases, locations, dates, times, and travel methods.

Theoretically, all of these pieces of a terror plot puzzle might eventually be put together by American intelligence. The NSA may capture a phone call in which vague references to an attack in America or Britain are made. Defense Intelligence may find laptop computers, surveillance videos, and maps on which targets are circled. The FBI may receive a warning from an anonymous citizen that Islamic men were talking about a bomb in New York. The pieces of the puzzle may be many and seemingly unrelated. That is complicated by the continued failure of intelligence agencies to share newly obtained information real time with each other, thus the chances of someone at one of these agencies putting the pieces together and discovering the big picture are slim indeed.

That entire puzzle process is typically avoided when enemy combatants are interrogated, and yes, interrogated aggressively. There is no need for a lucky analyst to discover a plot when the terrorists themselves, under moderate duress, reveal their plans and how to find the plotters. FISA warrants, privacy rights of Americans, the Patriot Act, FBI’s Carnivore, all the anti-terror tools liberals fear and despise are much less productive than direct capture and interrogation. That logic is at the heart of President Bush’s strategy to fight terrorists in the Middle East to prevent fighting them in America. He recognized long ago that taking the gloves off when interrogating captured al Qaeda operatives was the only sure way to infiltrate their organization and hit them before they hit America again. Of course, surveillance and other tools are still necessary for detection of so-called homegrown terrorists and should not be abandoned. Still, the arguments for aggressive interrogation, whether from President Bush, George Tenet, or former Defense Secretary Rumsfeld, have always been compelling and convincing.

Liberal (and some conservative) critics of the Bush administration’s handling of the War on Terror and national security must face three difficult questions: You are opposed to the Patriot Act; you are opposed to the NSA domestic surveillance program; you are opposed to FBI’s carnivore and other Internet mining tactics; you are opposed to the war against al Qaeda and other terrorists in Iraq; you are opposed to holding enemy combatants for interrogation; you are opposed to any form of aggressive interrogation, including water boarding; you are in favor of illegal immigration; you are opposed to citizen ownership of guns; are there any anti-terror policies you support? How do you propose we obtain intelligence before terrorists strike America again? Would you prefer to be incinerated by a bomb or see a terrorist frightened into revealing the location of that bomb because he “thought” he was drowning?

While it may seem improbable to most Americans, lulled as they are into believing they are safe, men like George Tenet and President Bush confront such doomsday scenarios daily. Note the strain and sense of urgency Tenet felt in his daily work:

"We don't torture people," the former director told CBS. "The context is it's post-September 11. I've got reports of nuclear weapons in New York City, apartment buildings that are going to be blown up, planes that are going to fly into airports all over again, plot lines that I don't know. … I'm struggling to find out where the next disaster is going to occur."

Tenet has been criticized by many within and outside the intelligence community for his perceived failure to put the puzzle together to prevent 9/11. However, such criticism sheds light on the critics and their motives. Prior to 9/11 and the subsequent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, America relied solely on our intelligence agencies for understanding and penetration of terrorist groups. The War on Terror, however, through “aggressive interrogation,” has given America access to and understanding of the terrorists themselves. If American intelligence agencies could have received information in that manner prior to 9/11, Tenet and others would have had a much better chance to prevent the attack. Senators and Congressmen know this, but to keep the media spotlight on themselves they condemn these methods and list interrogation tactics among the list of reasons why the president is a “war criminal” or deserves impeachment.

Thankfully, Tenet recognized the overwhelming value and success of the interrogations at Guantanamo and other locations, and rose to defend the Bush Administration’s use of these tools to protect Americans from further terror attacks. Whether or not Tenet criticizes the administration for other perceived shortcomings remains to be seen, but he should be recognized for courageously and publicly warning against abandoning the tools and techniques that have proven most effective in thwarting terrorists: using their own knowledge against them.

One Voice Policy, Not FBI Cover-Up, Holds Smoking Gun in Reuters Story

Media outlets eager for more alleged examples of impropriety by members of the Bush administration are breathlessly reporting that an FBI agent was silenced by senior FBI leaders for commenting about the Congressional “investigation” into the Justice Department firings of 8 U.S. Attorneys in December. According to a Reuters report yesterday, Dan Dzwilewski, FBI Special Agent in Charge of the San Diego office, told a San Diego newspaper in January that the firing of U.S. Attorney Carol Lam would negatively impact ongoing investigations and that it was Dzwilewski’s opinion that the firing was done for political reasons. Lam had successfully prosecuted Republican Representative Randy “Duke” Cunningham in a corruption case in 2005.

When Senator Diane Feinstein’s (D-CA) staff contacted the FBI San Diego office regarding Dzwilewki’s comments, her staff was advised by that office that Dzwilewski had indeed made such comments to the San Diego Union-Tribune, but according to Senator Feinstein, as quoted by Reuters, “they also said they'd been warned to say no more." The media, believing this to be a smoking gun likely to further damage Bush administration credibility, presented this story under the gripping headline, “FBI agent told to keep quiet over attorney firings.” What should be the response of wise news observers? A shrug of the shoulders and a dismissive “so what?”

A more accurate headline would have been, “All FBI Agents, and for That Matter All Agents or Officers of All Agencies in Government, Including the Military, are Told to Keep Quiet About, well, Everything.”

Before I explain why this Reuters “silencing” hype should be downplayed, it will be helpful to provide the context by including Dzwilewski’s comments about Lam’s firing as they appeared in the San Diego Union-Tribune on January 13, 2007:

I don't think it's the right way to treat anybody. What's the decision based on?” Dzwilewski said. “I don't share the view of whoever's making the decision back there in Washington that they'd like her to resign. I feel Carol has an excellent reputation and has done an excellent job given her limited resources”. . . .

Lam's continued employment as U.S. attorney is crucial to the success of multiple ongoing investigations, the FBI chief said.

As for the reason for any pressure to resign, Dzwilewski said: “I can't speak for what's behind all that, what's the driving force behind this or the rationale. I guarantee politics is involved.”

Every government agency I have dealt with in my career, at all levels local, state, and federal, have a “one voice policy” that employees agree to abide by during their term of employment, and for many agencies that policy extends even into retirement or separation. Government and military departments and agencies have Public Affairs or Media Relations sections through which the “one voice policy” is expressed. I have never attended a briefing or participated in an operation or assignment where all participants were not reminded that they are not authorized to talk to the press, or represent the department or agency to the media. The reasons for a “one voice policy” are numerous, but all boil down to a single theme: the agency’s or department’s public image is critical to success; we all have our own opinions, but we do not all have access to “need to know” information, thus our personal opinions should not be published in the media, where they can taint the agency’s or department’s public image.

No one familiar with government or military protocols should be surprised that the FBI and presumably its parent Department of Justice warned the FBI San Diego office not to talk to the media about the firings or Dzwilewski’s comments. The warning, however, does not provide any smoking gun evidence of a cover-up or conspiracy. Instead, the warning was likely nothing more than a stern reminder, given the current anti-Bush witch hunt culture rampant in Washington these days, to utilize the “one voice” policy of the FBI as agreed by all employees, even special agents in charge.

The example of Special Agent Dzwilewski is a perfect example of why “one voice” policies exist. Dzwilewski, despite his senior position as an FBI Special Agent in Charge in San Diego, did not attend the Justice Department meetings and briefings at which the decisions to fire the 8 Attorney Generals were made. He also was not privy to the thought process that went into the decisions. His published comments quoted above clearly confirm that he disagreed with the reasoning behind Lam’s firing but did not know what that reasoning was. That did not stop him from “guaranteeing” that the firing was motivated by politics. Thus his opinion regarding Lam’s firing, even if proven later to be accurate, is missing the key ingredient of firsthand knowledge because he had only heard Lam’s (or the media’s) side of the story. The legal term for that is “conjecture based on hearsay”. The media term most applicable to that is “a ratings boost”.

Dzwilewski should have referred the San Diego Union-Tribune immediately to the FBI’s or Justice Department’s public affairs or equivalent sections rather than entangling himself in a political spider web designed to cocoon and paralyze the Bush administration. With no firsthand knowledge of the deliberations prior to the decision to fire these 8 attorneys, he was uniquely unqualified to speak, even unintentionally, as an FBI spokesman. Biting the hand that feeds you is unwise, and Dzwilewski bit his current employer and its parent department simply by opening his mouth and sharing his opinion.

I once worked an assignment with a Roswell, New Mexico Police detective who, despite appearing to be a normal, intellectually sound individual, insisted that aliens did in fact crash a spaceship in a Roswell field in 1947, and that our government arrived on scene, seized the alien craft, and continues to this day to conceal this fact from the American people. For the first hour or so, I believed he was joking, playing a corny but quaint prank on his government guest. After more than 8 hours of observing his behavior and studying his body language and voice inflexions, it was obvious to me that he truly believed the alien story (he was old enough that he could claim to have witnessed the government’s arrival and seizure of the spacecraft) and he openly shared it not just with me but with anyone who would listen.

This detective had an opinion about something, but that did not make it fact. Most people have a crackpot opinion about something, and many people have wild opinions of government conspiracies. Likewise, Dzwilewski had an opinion about Lam’s firing, but unlike the Roswell detective, Dzwilewski was not authorized to openly share that opinion with anyone who would listen, especially the news media, as explicitly explained in the “one voice” policy.

FBI Director Robert Mueller apparently felt similarly. During his grilling by Senator Feinstein over this alleged “silencing” of Dzwilewski, the FBI Director explained:

I do not believe it's appropriate for our special agents in charge to comment to the media on personnel decisions that are made by the Department of Justice.

Mueller captured the essence of the “one voice” policy in this sentence. First, he rebuked his Special Agent in Charge in San Diego for violating the “one voice” policy with the media, and consequently reminded all special agents in charge that they are not authorized to comment to the media. Mueller’s statement extends the reminder of the “one voice” policy to the entire FBI, including himself, by implying to Senator Feinstein that personnel decisions made by the Department of Justice are not an FBI matter and thus only the Justice Department, not the FBI, should comment on the motives, political or otherwise, for the firings.

The media spin on this aspect of the U.S. Attorney firings is nearly as hyperbolic as the media’s overall portrayal of the firings as a scandal. The Wall Street Journal editors recently published an insightful brief comparison of the Bush administration’s and Clinton administration’s firings of U.S. Attorneys. In that summary, the editors reminded readers that Bill Clinton fired all 93 U.S. Attorney’s upon taking office in 1993 and claimed that he was following precedent set by White House predecessors. This was, of course, historically inaccurate. More sinister though was the fact that among those fired was a U.S. Attorney investigating the White Water investment scandal in which Bill and Hillary Clinton were intimately involved. Another fired U.S. Attorney in that group was preparing to indict House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dan Rostenkowski, who later was convicted for mail fraud and pardoned by Clinton. No scandal in that, according to the media at the time.

Attorney General Gonzalez fired 8 out of 93, and the Democrats in Congress are now conducting hearings and investigations into the reasons for the firings. Never mind that all U.S. Attorney positions are political appointments and those who accept them serve at the pleasure of the President, please don’t cloud the issue with facts, as that would take away this “scandal” from the Democrats and the collusive media.

This Congressional “gotcha” investigation will likely continue until the media finds a better story. There remains the possibility that some kind of smoking gun evidence will arise and implicate highly placed administration officials. If there was any impropriety in the firings, punishment should be swift and appropriate. The fact that Bill Clinton fired 93 U.S. Attorneys, including two investigating Democrat scandals, without the media raising an eyebrow should not serve as an excuse if evidence is ever presented that this administration acted similarly. Moral equivalency is always wrong, and both parties should be striving to outdo each other in integrity and ethical behavior rather than living down to the low bar of expectations set by a previous administration.

Despite Reuters’ action thriller headlines about agents being “told to keep quiet,” the only smoking guns found in the San Diego FBI office appear to be at the firearms range.

Proposals Calling for New Domestic Intelligence Agency Based on MI5 Ignore Similarities with FBI

With every new story about “incompetence” or “intelligence failures” within our federal law enforcement or intelligence agencies, citizens and newspaper editors step forward to cry for a new intelligence agency to be established in the U.S. to replace the FBI as the lead agency for domestic counterterrorism investigations. In the wake of Friday’s released unclassified report revealing that the FBI under reported its use of National Security Letters (an exigent circumstance records request similar to an administrative subpoena), it did not take long for critics, unfortunately including the editors at the Wall Street Journal, to expand the rhetoric beyond the National Security Letter reporting issue and call for a new agency that will magically succeed where they perceive the FBI has failed.

According to the WSJ editors:

This is another fiasco for the FBI, which may simply be incapable of effective counterterrorism. Every independent group that has looked into the FBI--including the Robb-Silberman commission--has found that the agency is failing in that duty. Whatever discipline is handed out for this latest foul-up, the country needs to debate again whether domestic antiterror functions should be taken from the FBI and given to a new agency modeled after Britain's MI5. The FBI's culture of crime-fighting and case-building to win convictions may be incompatible with the prevention and intelligence demands of counterterrorism.

The WSJ editors omitted the important fact that the Robb-Silberman commission, while highly critical of the FBI, did not advocate the creation of a new agency to take over the FBI’s counterterrorism duties. The commission reported that the FBI had agreed to make significant changes to address its shortcomings by 2010, and thus withheld any proposal for a new agency until after 2010. Well into 2007, and with the FBI in the news again for administrative errors, it is unclear what, if any, progress the FBI is making toward restructuring itself before its detractors take the reigns of reform with relish in 2010.

Having experience in these fields, I am fully aware of the shortcomings of the FBI and other federal agencies in the effort to prevent and investigate terrorist activities and further to prosecute Americans linked to terrorism. Mistakes, at times grave but usually unintentional, have been and continue to be made by the FBI and other agencies. That is the nature of human intelligence and law enforcement, and these mistakes certainly deserve attention and scrutiny in the spirit of suggested improvement. However, to point to MI5 as the panacea model that will solve America’s domestic counterterrorism woes ignores two critical points: First, MI5 has experienced many of its own frequent and very public failures; second, forming new government agencies is almost never the answer to a governmental reform problem.

There are numerous examples of MI5 intelligence errors, including the infamous "Cambridge 5," a massive internal penetration of MI5 by Cambridge University students recruited and handled by the KGB. MI5 was also criticized for a perceived failure to warn Britains of the targeting of entertainment spots in Bali prior to the 2002 Bali bombing that killed 24 British Citizens, among many other victims. MI5 critics likewise believed the agency should have made connections among individuals later discovered to have perpetrated the London Tube bombings in July 2005. One of the bombers reportedly visited Britain just weeks prior to the attack but was never placed under surveillance by MI5. For a fascinating look into MI5 that FBI critics should examine is Spy Catcher: The Candid Autobiography of a Senior Intelligence Officer. These are merely two examples out of many in which MI5 was criticized for precisely the same shortcomings the FBI waded through after 9/11.

Perhaps MI5’s organizational structure is superior, but its efficacy is questioned by the British government and press with nearly as much zeal as the FBI experiences from Congress and the American media. It is a truism among intelligence and law enforcement personnel that your mistakes are front page news, while your successes are met with a shrug of the shoulders. Failure is always a bigger story than success. If you successfully identify and prevent an attack, you are simply told “thanks for doing your job.” If you make a mistake, the vultures immediately squawk for your duties to be given to someone else, preferably a new entity with no record of failure or success to tarnish its pristine reputation.

We have been down this road before, as recently as post 9/11 with the establishment of the behemoth Department of Homeland Security (DHS). DHS was ostensibly formed to collectivize agencies possessing national security and emergency response capacities and duties to “secure the homeland,” and improve coordination and efficiency of responses to national emergencies. Has it worked? Not according to a recent poll that declared DHS to be the least trusted agency within the U.S. government by the American people. Interestingly, public trust in the FBI, CIA, and NSA, despite media excoriations of FBI terrorist investigations, the CIA’s failure to locate and kill Bin Laden, and the alleged threat to privacy posed by the NSA domestic surveillance program, is higher than trust in DHS. Why the lack of confidence in DHS? The Department’s size, with 20+ agencies and 170,000+ employees, may influence skeptics to conclude it will never integrate fully or that some components have no direct role in securing the homeland, such as FEMA. Yet it seems clear that the more significant reason may be that Americans are wary of any new government department or agency (DHS was created in 2002) and are more apt to place their trust in agencies that have track records, even records rife with mistakes, to no track record at all. How long would it take for a new domestic intelligence agency to become operational and engender public trust? How many attacks will occur during such a fundamental reorganization?

Therein lays one of the significant arguments against the formation of a new American MI5 intelligence agency to take over the FBI’s domestic counterterrorism functions: Where will this new agency obtain its analysts and field operatives? What will be new about it other than its name and reporting structure? The learning curve in these fields is too long and the War on Terror too pressing to afford sufficient time for an entirely new agency to select inexperienced personnel and train them according to the new agencies techniques and standards. If such an agency were created, there would be an immediate need for experienced intelligence analysis staff, and the applicant pool would consist of the same analysts currently functioning within the FBI, CIA, and DHS. Through no fault of their own, these intelligence staffers would bring established organizational cultures, information sharing issues, and varying work ethics, thereby ensuring that the “new” agency would be anything but new in its ideas or preconceived intelligence estimates.

What the WSJ editors and others who have called for the creation of a new intelligence agency neglect to recommend is the need to give equal scrutiny to the possibility of restructuring the FBI by reassigning jurisdiction over many financial crimes to other federal agencies that are currently smaller and limited in scope, such as the Treasury Department, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF), and others. Thousands of FBI agents currently investigating white collar crimes could be freed from those cases and assigned to higher priority investigations, specifically domestic counterterrorism. If it is true, as a Washington Post contributor argued in 2005, that the FBI is 90% criminal investigation and 10% intelligence, then it would make more sense to move those percentages closer together and not lose whatever level of expertise exists in that 10%, than it would to simply take the 10% away and create yet another government agency. If after such a restructuring and narrowing of focus the FBI continued to prove inadequate to the task of counterterrorism, then a proposal to reassign such duties to a different or new agency should be considered.

Under reporting the number of National Security Letters it issued and inadequately training agents on what information could or could not be requested with the letters were clearly internal administrative errors. The Inspector General’s report declared that such errors were not criminal in nature and there was no evidence that any privacy rights were violated by the FBI’s issuance of the letters or the subsequent under reporting of the number issued. Yet critics are always poised to call for the most drastic remedies, and often use the symptoms of minor illnesses like under reporting to suggest the patient, in this case the FBI, has no hope for recovery. If occasional error or failure to connect the intelligence dots were considered symptoms of terminal illness in an agency, no intelligence or investigative agency, foreign or domestic, would have hope for survival, as all appear similarly afflicted.

The WSJ editors, though, did make an important statement regarding any proposed remedy to the FBI’s shortcomings:

The worst outcome would be if Congress limited the administrative subpoena power in order to punish the FBI. By all accounts, these "national security letters" have proven to be useful in tracking potential terror threats. In particular, the Bush Administration shouldn't now give in to any such demands merely to appease Congress or save the jobs of Messrs. Mueller or Gonzales.

Spy the News! concurs with this opinion and advises readers to watch the development of these issues, as Bush administration critics will seize upon National Security Letters as an alleged menace to personal and corporate privacy rights. The National Security Letters work, and despite media stories with alarmist headlines insinuating that the FBI was “snooping” on Americans and intentionally not reporting it, the only remedy that is needed in this case is an organized reporting system that tracks the number of letters issued and assures that agents are properly trained in what information they can and cannot obtain with this valuable tool in the War on Terror.

4 Hand Grenades, 1 handgun and a Partridge . . .

Yesterday, the FBI thwarted a plot by an Illinois man to acquire 4 grenades and a handgun, and detonate the grenades on December 22nd in the CherryVale shopping mall in Rockford, Illinois. The 22 year old suspect, Talib Abu Salam Ibn Shareef, claimed he wanted to conduct “violent jihad” during what he believed would be the busiest evening for Christmas shopping, as the 22nd would be the Friday of Christmas weekend. The date and target site were selected with the desire to inflict maximum casualties among shoppers. Shareef reportedly met with an undercover FBI agent in the mall parking lot and attempted to trade 2 stereo speakers for 4 grenades (which were of course inert) and a handgun.

It seems this self-proclaimed terrorist has not been monitoring the news lately, because he seems to have missed the Iraq Study Group (ISG) report, which should have pacified any terrorist who still believed our nation had the stomach to fight terrorists. Since the Iraq study group came to the laughable conclusion that we are creating terrorism by our presence in Iraq, and that if we leave Iraq, terrorists will stop plotting to kill Americans, their recommendation to tuck tail and flee Iraq in shame should have doused the flame of radical Islam roaring in Shareef. Apparently radical Islam did not get the congratulatory memo from the ISG granting victory to the terrorists, since they are still fomenting terrorist acts against America despite our obvious move toward a withdrawal. Will leaving Iraq end the radical Islamic desire to kill Americans? Of course not. Shareef is living proof of this fact.

The ISG also declared that settling the eternal war between Israel and its neighbors will end terrorism. Oh! I thought ending terrorism required something challenging, but if all it takes is ending the Palestinian-Israeli dispute, then we should have that wrapped up before Christmas, right James Baker? To the members of the ISG, if our tremendous military could not eliminate the “insurgents,” why should anyone believe the Iraqi military and police forces will succeed in protecting and preserving this newly established democratically elected government? We rushed to push Sadaam out of Kuwait because he was supplanting an existing government, not even a democracy. Now in Iraq, millions braved suicide bombers and IEDs and snipers to vote and establish a democracy, and you recommend leaving this fledgling government to protect itself because things are tough there? Sadly, the ISG proved that countless years of experience (who knew Sandra Day O’Connor was a military and counter-terrorism expert?) do not automatically produce wisdom to match.

What is surprising is that despite all of the political thriller books, television programs, and movies depicting small cells of terrorists in the USA carrying out acts like the one planned by Shareef, none have occurred. Yet. Israel has borne the brunt of shopping mall and restaurant bombings, largely due to its proximity to its enemies. We have been fortunate to avoid such widespread, small-scale attacks. Yet during our period of good fortune, our enemies have made deep inroads into American culture and have become experts in using our personal liberties to conceal their true intentions. The question no one wants to think about, the nightmare for the intelligence and law enforcement communities is “how many Talib Shareefs are there among us?” The chilling follow-up question is “can we catch them all before they strike?” As anyone in the intelligence or law enforcement field will admit, the answer is no. We cannot be right 100% of the time, and the resources are simply not sufficient (nor is the public willing) to secure all potential targets. One need only look at the public paranoia (encouraged by the MSM) over surveillance provisions of the Patriot Act to know we will eventually be defeated from within, not from without. No global power will land on our shores and conquer us. We will fold from within, as we have been doing since Vietnam and continue to do at an ever increasing rate in the War on Terror.

This raises a critical issue that receives insufficient attention. Since terrorism is a product of ideology, can we really wage war on it? Our military and intelligence personnel have discovered that killing “insurgents” does not serve as a sufficient deterrent when fighting an enemy that views martyrdom and suicide bombing as a path to eternal glory. They will never openly confront our far superior military on any battlefield, but will continue to strike with small scale but lethal tactics until they frustrate their mighty opponent in Iraq and convince the American public (with ample and gleeful assistance from the MSM) that the fight is not worth it (which has already been accomplished). Perhaps we have all forgotten that whether or not the Iraq Conflict is a cornerstone in the larger War on Terror, the name of the military operation there was, and remains, Operation Iraqi Freedom. The name is not “Operation Iraqi Freedom Unless it Becomes Difficult or Grave.” Iraqi Freedom. How long is too long to fight to preserve freedom?

Complicating the matter is the fact that conversion of young Islamic radicals to a Jihad-ready ideology is occurring at an alarming rate in America. The home grown terrorist poses enormous investigative and prosecutorial nightmares in a society based on individual liberties. The FBI and other agencies are relatively proficient at tracking persons with known terrorist ties who visit the US. However, as the Shareef mall grenade plot demonstrates, attacks planned by home grown terrorists usually are discovered only when an informant (a friend, neighbor, or family member) reports them to law enforcement. Many assassins and attackers in the planning stages cannot help but boast of what they intend to do. It is an often irrepressible human urge. Islamic radicals, if they discuss their planned attacks, will not boast to “infidels” but to others of their faith and, they hope, sympathetic brothers and sisters in that faith. This is the key to winning the War on Terror. Muslims need to demonstrate that they truly belong to a religion of peace by policing their communities and yes, informing on those with ties to radical factions espousing violence. Until this happens regularly and as a matter of course in predominantly Muslim communities, the potential for attacks like Shareef’s will only increase.

An eternal debt of gratitude is owed to the friend who contacted the FBI in time to prevent a Christmas tragedy in Illinois.

FBI CSAG Iraq Jihad James Baker War On Terror Iraq Study Group radical Islam