US Al Qaeda Reality Hits Dems on NSA Bill

Is there anyone in the American intelligence community who does not think there are al Qaeda and other terrorist cells organizing and operating in the United States? Since 9/11, hasn't this been the single greatest suspicion among Americans? The fear of such cells lurking in America's shadows was sufficient to prompt a Time magazine cover dedicated to it in August 2004. In my career, especially since 9/11, my employer has wisely worked under the assumption that there are active terror cells in America, and we have worked closely with other government agencies to develop counterterrorism programs and security planning reflecting that belief. Perhaps because of this long held position in my workplace, it amazes me that news headlines like “Al Qaeda Cell May Be Loose in U.S.” are met with shock, fear, or even surprise by readers. That headline, from today’s New York Sun, frankly tells Americans nothing that should cause surprise, particularly to anyone who even remotely follows trends and developments in the War on Terror.

I do not mean to single out the New York Sun or the author of the above-mentioned article, Eli Lake, for criticism. The Sun and Lake in particular, have been referred to and frequently praised by Capital Cloak for fine coverage of the War on Terror and Operation Iraqi Freedom. Lake in this article was merely reporting what one of his reliable Washington sources told him about new evidence that al Qaeda had been in contact electronically with sympathizers or potential operatives inside the United States. Lake reported, in part, as follows:

E-mail addresses for American individuals were found on the same password-protected e-mail chains used by the United Kingdom plotters to communicate with Qaeda handlers in Europe, a counterterrorism official told The New York Sun yesterday. The American and German intelligence community now believe the secure e-mail chains used in the United Kingdom plot have provided a window into an operational Qaeda network in several countries.

"Because of the London and Glasgow plot, we now know communications have been made from Al Qaeda to operatives in the United States," the counterterrorism official said on condition of anonymity. "This plot helps to connect a lot of stuff. We have seen money moving a lot through hawala networks and other illicit finance as well." But this source was careful to say that at this point no specific information, such as names, targets or a timeline, was known about any particular plot on American soil. The e-mail addresses that are linked to Americans were pseudonyms.

Lake’s report is important not for the fact that it appears to confirm the presence of al Qaeda cells in America, something that virtually everyone in the intelligence community has assumed for years. What makes Lake’s information important is its timing. Over the weekend, as the most significant final pre-recess action taken by Congress, the House and Senate approved a bill strengthening and expanding government authorization to monitor international telephone and electronic communications without a warrant between Americans and foreign suspects.

These are the same Democrat-controlled House and Senate bodies that have relentlessly and obviously disingenuously accused the White House of abusing the NSA’s warrantless domestic surveillance program. There have been hearings, misrepresentations of the Bush administration’s motives, and cries of violations of civil liberties from the left since the program was leaked to and eagerly exposed by the New York Times. Now it appears that the intelligence gleaned from the thwarted London and Glasgow plots in July was sufficient to convince the virulent leaders of the anti-Bush Congress, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, that all those warnings about potential terrorist cells in America were not merely presidential bluster.

Neither House nor Senate Democrats were personally pleased to pass this expanded surveillance powers legislation, and they continue to grumble about it in the media. After all, it was Pelosi who stated in January 2006 that, “I would not want any president — Democrat or Republican — to have the expanded power the administration is claiming in this case.” Yet now, when faced with the reality of actual email evidence of al Qaeda cells receiving communications from the bomb plotters in London, even the liberal left wing in Congress realized the surveillance was distasteful to them but ultimately necessary for survival.

As a safety net for the Democrats, the powers authorized in the bill were extended only for a six month period, in which we can expect rancorous debate over domestic surveillance, further accusations that the president is abusing civil liberties, and likely revisions of certain aspects of the bill. That six month period also indicates, however, that Congress felt the threat to the homeland was sufficiently grave in the next six months to merit special preventive measures. That fact, in and of itself, is telling.

The following is an excerpt from the New York Times’ description of the new legislation approved Saturday night by Congress and signed into law yesterday by President Bush:

Congressional aides and others familiar with the details of the law said that its impact went far beyond the small fixes that administration officials had said were needed to gather information about foreign terrorists. They said seemingly subtle changes in legislative language would sharply alter the legal limits on the government’s ability to monitor millions of phone calls and e-mail messages going in and out of the United States.

They also said that the new law for the first time provided a legal framework for much of the surveillance without warrants that was being conducted in secret by the National Security Agency and outside the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the 1978 law that is supposed to regulate the way the government can listen to the private communications of American citizens.

“This more or less legalizes the N.S.A. program,” said Kate Martin, director of the Center for National Security Studies in Washington, who has studied the new legislation.

Previously, the government needed search warrants approved by a special intelligence court to eavesdrop on telephone conversations, e-mail messages and other electronic communications between individuals inside the United States and people overseas, if the government conducted the surveillance inside the United States.

Today, most international telephone conversations to and from the United States are conducted over fiber-optic cables, and the most efficient way for the government to eavesdrop on them is to latch on to giant telecommunications switches located in the United States.

By changing the legal definition of what is considered “electronic surveillance,” the new law allows the government to eavesdrop on those conversations without warrants — latching on to those giant switches — as long as the target of the government’s surveillance is “reasonably believed” to be overseas.

This change was necessary because much of the infrastructure of the world’s largest telecommunications companies is housed in the United States, particularly the switch and server backbone that powers the Internet globally. The vast majority of the world’s email, even point to point between foreign countries, passes through servers located in America. In all respects, the bill was a necessary and prudent expansion of government surveillance powers to monitor international communications, and regardless of their motives or their half-hearted passage of the measures, Congressional Democrats should be applauded for doing the right thing to protect Americans by coming to terms with President Bush on this issue, even if it is only a temporary fix.

While no one in the intelligence community was surprised at the report of email communications between European al Qaeda and American operatives, it provided a wake up call to Congress that the War on Terror and the threat of attacks in the United States, are not merely “bumper sticker” slogans of the Bush administration. There were active al Qaeda cells in America more than one year prior to 9/11, and it is logical to conclude that there were others at that time and now who merely await activation and instructions from leadership. The activation and instructions will likely come in some form of long distance communication; email, telephone, instant messenger, or similar. Thanks to the president’s vigilant insistence on the power to monitor such communication and Congress’s reluctant cooperation, our chances of intercepting key messages have increased, and that makes America safer than it was just last week prior to this legislation.

It should be remembered that these expanded surveillance powers will not necessarily prevent any plans that have already reached the execution phase with a predetermined date or time, but they will prove crucial to detecting developing plots and in identifying suspected cell members.

It was not surprising to read of communications between al Qaeda and its operatives in America. The real surprise was that Congressional Democrats took so long to realize the importance of the government surveillance program in protecting America from attack. When the president’s critics do the right thing, even grudgingly, for national security, we all benefit.

Technorati Tags:
Al Qaeda, Al Qaeda in America, FISA, NSA, Wiretap, Electronic Surveillance, Terrorist Cells, Bush Administration, Email monitoring

Recent Washington DC "Snow Jobs"

In honor of the first snowfall in Washington DC this winter, it seems appropriate to recognize recent DC “snow jobs” that recently blanketed the nation with a fine layer of obfuscation:

1. The John Warner, Susan Collins, and Norm Coleman “Snow Job” – Yesterday, these 3 illustrious (or is that blusterous?) Republican senators joined the Democrat chorus singing longingly for an end to President Bush’s attempt to liberate an oppressed people and help them along the path toward a stable representative democracy. According to these three, the President’s strategy for a surge of troops and renewed efforts to secure and hold Iraqi cities is flawed and doomed to failure.

They are simultaneously disappointed with the current situation, opposed to the idea of a troop increase, and politically petrified of casting senate votes to end the funding of the war and bring the troops home, as anti-war activists desire. What a quagmire these Republican ship jumpers find themselves in! What policy will achieve the goal of representative democracy for Iraqis and renewed American credibility as a formidable preserver of freedom? Victory! What is it Americans want to see, at least the half that place national security and America’s credibility over a desire to embarrass President Bush? Victory! To bluster about any other outcome being satisfactory is a “snow job” that must make Iraqis despair of ever achieving success and safety. Neither will occur unless America fights to win.

2. The Maxine Waters “American Money is too Precious to Give to Anyone but Americans Snow Job” -Radio host Jerry Doyle made a profound comparison during yesterday’s show. Doyle pointed out that Congresswoman Maxine Waters, D-CA, is co-sponsoring a resolution to gradually end funding for the Iraq War because America is allegedly not winning the war and thus it is a waste of taxpayer money. By that same logic, Doyle argued that the government should cut off federal funding of all gang task forces in Waters’ Los Angeles district, since millions of dollars have been spent to end the gang problem there but recent statistics indicate there are over 40,000 known gang members in Los Angeles, and those numbers are growing along with the violence and financial crimes they perpetrate.

If Waters favors pulling our troops out of Iraq because we cannot win there, and leaving the cities and nation for the terrorists to plunder, Doyle suggested, America should do the same with Los Angeles. The city will never solve the gang problem, so why try? Los Angeles residents should be forced to pull out and relocate (like Democrat suggestions for our troops to be “redeployed”). Thus the anti-gang strategy, like Waters alleges of Bush’s Iraq strategy, is a failure not worth further expenditure. Gangs that infiltrate and intimidate Los Angeles, like the terrorist thugs threatening Iraqi citizens, are not worth fighting. No expenditure of taxpayer money for programs that yield negative results can be justified in Waters’ opinion.

Instead of using the tired excuse of wasted taxpayer money to obscure her true objection to the war, Waters should propose a Congressional resolution declaring that Iraqi freedom from a murderous tyrannical dictator and an attempt to protect a fledgling democracy until it can sustain itself is unworthy of our national affluence and largesse. According to Waters’ previous statement to Congress, we should stop spending money to help a constitutional government in the Middle East and use it only to benefit our own people. She made the following Ameri-centric statement: “This conference report throws billions of dollars into the sands of Iraq, while at the same time this Administration and the Republican Congress call for drastic cuts to dozens of vital domestic programs. This is immoral and wrong. We should be investing in schools and health care for all Americans.”

I think all Americans would agree our schools are better and safer than those in Iraq and that the health care options available to Iraqis, where terrorists are detonating IEDs near hospitals, are a tad less comfortable than what we enjoy in America. Waters is very generous with precious American taxpayer money when she brings millions of dollars in federal funding to her pet causes in Los Angeles, such as failed public schools, failed gang task forces, and failed government welfare programs. Yet money to protect a democracy besieged by terrorists is too precious to share with non-Americans. Civil liberties, it seems, are only for Americans in Waters’ narrow vision of our world. For an avowed civil rights activist, that is quite a “snow job.”

3. The Tony Snow “Snow Job” – In a previous post this site railed against the Bush Administration’s decision to place the NSA domestic surveillance program under FISA court monitoring. Later that day on his radio program, Sean Hannity interviewed Tony Snow briefly about this decision and Snow responded in a very dismissive manner, as if Americans should not be concerned with this development. Snow assured listeners that the President would never give up any tools available to him in the Global War on Terror, and that the President continued to retain the power to legally authorize electronic surveillance of suspected terrorists in the US under exigent circumstances. The truly deep “snow job” came when Tony Snow denied that the FISA monitoring decision was a response to political pressure. According to Snow, the FISA situation was under review for two years and the administration was satisfied with the alleged reforms to speed and flexibility implemented by the FISA court review.

This begs the question, “what will the President do if the FISA court denies an application for surveillance but the President and his intelligence advisors are convinced the suspect must be monitored?” Unfortunately Sean Hannity did not ask this question. Instead he took Snow’s response at face value and then moved on to the upcoming State of the Union Address. If the President retains the power to legally authorize surveillance utilizing the NSA domestic surveillance program as Snow asserted, then why apply to FISA at all? If a FISA court denies an application for surveillance, the President can ignore that judgment and authorize it under his Constitutional powers as Commander in Chief, as Lincoln, Roosevelt, and other war time Presidents have done, only with less sophisticated surveillance methods.

If the FISA court judgment can be ignored under exigent circumstances, then ALL FISA court judgments are moot, since by definition, a war is an exigent circumstance and thus the President holds exclusive authority to approve monitoring of US citizens suspected of communicating with the enemy, which is the precise purpose of the NSA domestic surveillance program. Thus, if the President holds the legal power to authorize such programs, what motivations, other than political pressure, prompted this administration to reform and utilize the FISA courts which it has intentionally, legally, and justifiably circumvented since the Global War on Terror began? Snow’s dismissal of public concern over this decision signaled discomfort with the situation and a desire to move on to other issues in the interview. A “snow job” from Snow was understandable given the expected duties of his position, but it was disappointing nonetheless.


Technorati: Iraq War Global War On Terror NSA Bush Administration FISA Maxine Waters Tony Snow Sean Hannity John Warner Susan Collins Norm Coleman Jerry Doyle Los Angeles Gangs

The FISA Reversal: Bush Sees Clinton in His Mirror

The Bush administration’s domestic anti-terror policy is morphing rapidly into a mirror image of the Clinton administration’s and as in all mirrors, left is right and right is now left.

One of the principal criticisms leveled against the Clinton administration’s handling of terrorist incidents including the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, the US Embassy bombings in Tanzania and Kenya, and the attack on the USS Cole was that terrorism could not be suppressed or countered exclusively through law enforcement investigations. Clinton’s critics, justifiably, have condemned him for not doing more to take the fight to the terrorists abroad. Clinton’s approach to terrorism, primarily consisting of arresting and prosecuting terrorists through our porous judicial system, appeared to be the antithesis of President Bush’s after 9/11.

Post 9/11, Bush adopted the pre-emptive strike doctrine and invaded Afghanistan, declared terrorists as “enemy combatants” who could be held captive indefinitely in a state of war, and implemented military tribunals to process terrorists captured in combat with US troops. Detainees were questioned and yielded valuable information on Al Qaeda leadership and cell structure. The NSA domestic surveillance program was effectively utilized to glean information from intercepted communications between terrorists abroad and their supporters/operatives in America. The Clinton and Bush strategies could not have been more diametrically opposed.

Today, however, the Bush administration’s domestic strategy for conducting the Global War on Terror (GWOT) has lost its unique bravado and in its place the soft Clinton approach has reemerged. Yesterday Attorney General Gonzalez announced that monitoring of international communications involving suspected terrorists in the United States will require authorization and oversight from a court established by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). After years of insisting that the President’s program was legal and that immediate discovery and disruption of terrorist plots within the US could not be accomplished through traditional court orders, the Bush administration has now reversed course under pressure from the newly empowered Democrats in Congress. What are the practical implications of this reversal?

The Bush administration now insists, with hypocritical confidence, that the secret FISA court will operate with much more flexibility and speed than a traditional court, and thus will not hamper the efforts of America’s intelligence agencies once a suspect has been identified. While Attorney General Gonzalez’s announcement touts FISA court speed and usefulness, the obvious question is why, if FISA courts do not hamper the rapid response needed for counterterrorist investigations, the administration has avoided them like the proverbial plague since 9/11? Administration officials have staunchly defended the NSA domestic surveillance program by arguing that under post 9/11 laws an early warning detection system was critical to national security and thus could be authorized by the President independent of a FISA court. Consider this explanation for the need to circumvent FISA courts in a letter sent by the Department of Justice to the House and Senate Intelligence committees in December 2005:

FISA could not have provided the speed and agility required for the early warning detection system. . . . There is undeniably an important and legitimate privacy interest at stake. That must be balanced, however, against the government's compelling interest in the security of the nation.

Does the President feel the “early warning notification” provided by the NSA domestic surveillance program is no longer needed? Is the government’s interest in national security less compelling now than it was in December 2005? The reversal by the Bush administration signals an abandonment of the aggressive domestic counterterrorist stance once championed confidently by the President. While Justice Department officials submit applications for surveillance (a subpoena equivalent) to the FISA court, American intelligence agencies will be missing communications between terrorists living among us and their international planners/financiers. The letter from the Justice Department further stated that “FISA has proven to be a very important tool, especially in longer-term investigations.” A FISA court may operate with a less glacial pace than a federal district court, but that should be of little comfort to those who understand that real-time communications interception is critical to identifying and thwarting imminent threats.

Like its predecessor, the Bush administration has placed America’s domestic safety in the hands of judges. In the case of FISA courts, the judges routinely rotate, resulting in decisions made by judges with no continuity or grasp of the full context of the application for surveillance presented before them. Rotating judges unfamiliar with established precedent will delay authorizing time-sensitive surveillance while researching previous applications, resulting in precisely the ponderous, inefficient review process the Bush administration has been intentionally and justifiably avoiding since 9/11.

Because we have been unsuccessful in infiltrating Al Qaeda and other advanced terrorist groups, communications intercepts are often the only advance warning available to our intelligence and law enforcement agencies. “Fighting the terrorists there so we won’t have to fight them here” may be a catchy slogan, but the reality is we ARE fighting them here and the administration’s reversal on domestic surveillance will open wider the window of opportunity for terrorists preparing for attacks in America. If we are serious about winning a Global War on Terror, further binding the hands, or in this case covering the ears, of our intelligence/law enforcement agencies is a dangerous step toward a counterterrorist strategy reminiscent of Clinton.

Technorati Tags: Alberto Gonzalez Attorney General Domestic Surveillance Program FISA Court FISA Bush Administration NSA Law Enforcement terrorism national security Bill Clinton Global War On Terror