PoliticalWarfare.org

Will Barclays Bank be the next target of patriot hackers?

Now that hackers and web activists have gone after online supporters of Wikifreak Julian Assange, one must ask, Will Barclays Bank and other British firms be next?

Barclays is a big British bank that is housing a legal defense fund for Assange. According to Assange's London defense team, Barclays is housing an account called "FSI - Julian Assange Defence Fund." 

The account is run by the accounting firm Hazlems Fenton. Assange's defense firm is Finers Stephens Innocent LLP. Account data is as follows: 

Name of Account: "FSI - Julian Assange Defence Fund"

Account number: 93842452

Sort code: 20-77-67 BIC/Swift code BARC GB22

IBAN: GB86 BARC 2077 6793 8424 52 

It will be interesting to see what happens to those who are helping Assange after his friends launched denial-of-service attacks on American and other financial houses and service providers who clamped down on Assange. Will there be reciprocity?

How dictators censor us

Dictatorial regimes and movements continue to censor the American media through implicit or explicit threats of retaliation. Anne Applebaum notes the problem in her Washington Post column that:

• Yale University Press censored a book about the Danish cartoons of Muhammad, the founder of Islam, and didn't include important cartoons that the author had included in the manuscript.
• GQ buried a story (first broken in the US by David Satter) in its September 2009 issue that pointed to the former KGB as being behind a series of bombings of Russian apartment buildings that Vladimir Putin used as a pretext to invade Chechnya; the story was purged or never posted on GQ's website and censored out of its Russian-language edition.
• Google has merrily censored its Chinese-language search engine to come up with few if any significant results on the Tiananmen Square massacre, Taiwan or democracy.

"These three incidents are not identical," says Applebaum. "Yale Press refused to print the cartoons because the university fears retaliatory violence on its campus. Conde Nast [publisher of GQ] refused to promote an article on the Russian secret service because it fears a loss of Russian advertisers. Google refuses to let its Chinese users search for 'Tiananmen' and other taboo subjects because Google wants to compete against Chinese search engines for a share of the huge Chinese market. All three companies exhibit greatly varying degrees of remorse, too, from Conde Nast (none) to the Yale Press (a lot) to Google (ambivalent: Google founder Sergey Brin initially argued that the company would at least bring more information to China, if not complete information).

"Nevertheless, the three stories lead to one conclusion: In different ways, the Russian government, the Chinese government and unnamed Islamic terrorists are now capable of placing de facto controls on American companies -- something that would have been unthinkable a decade ago. In a world that seems more dangerous and less profitable than it did in the pas t, either greed or fear proved stronger than these companies' commitment to free speech."

Incidents like these are nothing new. One almost forgets that CNN ran deliberately biased coverage of Saddam Hussein's regime as the price its executives paid for the dictator's permission to operate a "news" bureau in Baghdad (a la Peter Arnett). Harvard University is notorious for its apparent faustian bargain with Chinese benefactors to water down its academic skepticism of the Beijing regime - and to invite People's Liberation Army intelligence officers to Cambridge as part of an "exchange" program. And so much more.

The spies from SAIS

Why is it that the most notorious Cuban spies in Washington have a connection with the same graduate school of international affairs?

Ana Belen Montes (pictured at left), the convicted Cuban spy who infiltrated the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), is a graduate of the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). Former SAIS Professor Walter Kendall Myers (pictured at right) has a PhD from SAIS, and was a faculty member there from 1971 until his arrest on June 4, 2009.

Myers and his wife, Gwendolyn Steingraber Myers, were open sympathizers with the Castro government, as was Montes.

A Myers lecture at SAIS raised suspicions about him.

Of course, thousands of patriotic Americans have graduated from or taught at SAIS, so there might not be any connection at all. But one has to wonder: Why would a place that fancies itself as the premier graduate school in international affairs not offer a counterintelligence studies program? Why would a school like SAIS not prepare its graduates to defend themselves against recruitment by hostile foreign intelligence services?

A look at the Johns Hopkins University course catalog shows that the institution does not offer counterintelligence courses. The only mention of counterintelligence in the course catalog is part of a course on "Competitive Intelligence," but that offering is at JHU's Carey Business School, not SAIS.

The only advanced school I know about that offers counterintelligence studies for its international affairs grad students is the Institute of World Politics, where I teach. Our founder and president, by the way, holds advanced degrees from SAIS. But then, SAIS wasn't interested in his counterintelligence curriculum.

Makes me worry about the integrity of the SAIS program in Nanjing, China, and how the school is working to protect its students from being exploited by Beijing's aggressive espionage service. My hunch is that SAIS is doing nothing substantive to help its students defend themselves from being compromised or recruited by Chinese spies.

Why would any prospective American diplomat, intelligence officer, military officer or public official invest their time and money at a school that doesn't offer education in counterintelligence? And why would any grad school not want to educate their students to be aware of the counterintelligence threats out there? These are questions that potential graduate students should be asking when searching for a place to study for a master's degree or PhD.

The US must speak so the pirates understand

Piracy on the high seas has been a military issue for the United States since the founding of the Republic. President Thomas Jefferson waged our first foreign war to fight Islamic pirates in the Mediterranean.

So why is President Barack Obama dithering full-speed ahead, with the FBI impounding the pirated Maersk Alabama as a "crime scene"? Why doesn't the Navy have standing orders to kill any pirate who harasses an American ship or crewman on the high seas?

Islamist pirates preying on innocent shipping off Somalia operate under a defined command-and-control system, often through tribal elders on land.

Tribal elders "represent" the pirates and agreed to help free kidnapped Maersk Alabama skipper Richard Phillips of Vermont, as long as the US would allow the pirates to go free. This indicates the level of influence - if not control - the elders have over the criminal groups.

The US, with lawyers in command, insisted on arresting the pirates. The Somali elders said no deal. We should have agreed with the elders not to arrest the pirates. Then we should have made the exchange for the heroic freighter captain - and shot the pirates dead. That's how the law works in a lawless land.

Dispatching the pirates and their sponsors at the first provocation would allow President Obama to send the right political message in a language that Somali warlords and Islamist pirates understand.

Obama needs to do it right now, before it's too late: Keep your hands off American ships and crew, or you will die. But he shouldn't diminish the office of the American presidency by getting personally involved. He should let others send the message. If Obama lets four Somali pirates can tie his hands and neuter the US Navy, then he will be declaring open season on more American ships and on American interests and citizens around the world.

As for ships and citizen crews of other countries? If their governments support us in the war on terror, we should help them if we can. If not, it isn't our problem because their governments chose not to be our allies.

(Satirical "Hands Off Somali Pirates" art courtesy of the PeoplesCube.com.)

Fightback in Hollywood: Attend this weekend's film festival

There's a cultural revolution taking place in Hollywood, where anti-American orthodoxy is facing a challenge from an underground of new and established actors, directors and producers.

You can have a taste of it yourself and party with some of the people at the upcoming American Film Renaissance Festival. It takes place in the Washington, DC area from October 1-4.

Join actor/producer Robert Davi at the Sequoia restaurant in Georgetown after the screening of The Dukes on October 1; view the documentary Do As I Say on October 2, The American Carol on October 3, and the suspense thriller Dangerous Calling on October 4. Also on October 4: Drew Carey produced and hosts Shorts Block for Reason.TV; plus there's a showing of the documentary Blocking 'The Path to 9/11,' and the premiere of the satirical, funny, yet most un-funny U.N. Me about the United Nations by Ami Horowitz.

I've seen pre-screenings of most of these films in various stages of production. If you can see only one of them, go see my favorite, The American Carol.

The American Carol uses my favorite political weapon, ridicule, against the adversary. Produced by David Zucker (the guy behind Airplane!, The Naked Gun, Scary Movie 3 and 4, and a lot of other funny stuff) and featuring Jon Voight, both good friends of ours at the Center for Security Policy, The American Carol stars a fat slob filmmaking character named Michael Mallone who looks and behaves remarkably like Michael Moore.

"Mallone" wants to abolish the 4th of July as a national holiday and is treated, Scrooge-like, to haunting visits by three spirits - John Voight as George Washington, Kelsey Grammer as George S. Patton, and Trace Adkins as the Angel of Death - show him the true meaning of America and patriotism. It's hugely politically incorrect, especially concerning Islamist terrorists, among other things. Plus Bill O'Reilly's face-slapping cameo in a port-a-potty. Click here to see the trailer.

Trace Adkins, Robert Davi, Kevin Farley, Kelsey Grammer, Dennis Hopper, Leslie Nielsen, John Voight and James Woods appear in this hysterical satirical comedy. A pub crawl caps the screening at the Regal Ballston Common theater in Arlington, Virginia. Click here for ticket information.

Tanker war heats up

Interests relating to an enterprise partly owned by Russia is heating up a propaganda campaign aimed at the American public, and it's highly misleading.

The French-German-Russian aerospace consortium EADS has spent millions marketing an Airbus in the US as a next-generation aerial tanker for the US military.

It's a phony campaign. The propaganda effort tries to obscure the fact that the proposed KC-45 tanker is indeed a European aircraft, designed and manufactured by EADS of France, a company allegedly built on French industrial espionage against American aircraft manufacturers and subsidized by the French and German governments, and partly owned by the Russian government.

The North American subsidiary of EADS has teamed with a brand-name US partner, Northrop Grumman, and erased the Airbus name from the modified A330 airliner to make it look American. The plane will be assembled in Alabama of French, German and Spanish components.

Northrop Grumman's own online info page about the KC-45 admits the A330 part, but conveniently omits any reference to Airbus or EADS.

A domestic propaganda campaign has transformed the Airbus A330 tanker into the "Northrop Grumman KC-45." Northrop Grumman has been flooding Washington airwaves with ads touting the American-sounding aircraft. New, scrappy ads that trash Boeing are now being run in the name of a front group claiming to represent workers in Alabama (where the KC-45 would be assembled).

I'm no apologist for Boeing, but only note that the US aircraft giant has passively sat while a French-German-Russian conglomerate has horned in on its business with a grotesquely misleading campaign that can only be called deception and fraud.

(The "I am EADS" illustration, by the way, is a parody of part of the EADS propaganda campaign that sought to portray the company as an American firm.)

No war for (Russian and Chinese) oil!

Irony of ironies - with American troops dying almost daily amid "No War for Oil" protests, it's odd that nobody's even saying boo about Iraq's decision to allow the Russians and Chinese bid to drill for the very petroleum that the Americans liberated.

Worse still is the Bush Administration's apparent assent to Baghdad's snub of the sacrifices that the US, Britain and a few other Coalition countries made to free Iraq. It's outrageous to let the Russians, Chinese and others who were not part of the Coalition - and who indeed opposed Operation Iraqi Freedom - to reap the benefits. For some reason the administration doesn't agree.

Nobody who opposed the liberation of Iraq should be allowed to profit from the nation's reconstruction. I have yet to hear a single politician in Washington make that statement.

Congressman Henry Waxman's latest headline grab has been about a Texas oil company's concessions in Kurdistan. He ought to be focusing on who in the State Department or elsewhere let in the Russians and Chinese. But then, maybe that's asking too much. Waxman has never really objected much to anything that Moscow or Beijing has ever done.

While we're at it, the Chinese are buying up Afghanistan right from under our noses. The administration, Congress and some enterprising journalists ought to look at the huge mineral deals the Chinese have been doing there, while the State Department either approves or looks the other way. Beijing is profiteering from America's military sacrifice.

Rice and Bush stand by Blackwater

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice quashed any idea that the troubled Iraqi Interior Ministry would dictate who would protect US diplomatic personnel in Baghdad.

As Rice praised private security contractor Blackwater USA for its work in Iraq, she announced an inquiry into diplomatic security in that country.

President George W. Bush said he wants to establish the facts about whether or not Blackwater guards broke any rules. Blackwater patrols resumed in Iraq.

"We have needed and received the protection of Blackwater for a number of years now, and they have lost their own people in protecting our people in extremely dangerous circumstances," Secretary Rice told reporters today. She has ordered a probe of diplomatic security in Iraq.

President George W. Bush said that he's saddened by the civilian deaths in the Sunday firefight, but added that he's going to wait for the facts to be established by an Iraqi-US commission. "The folks like Blackwater who provide security for the State Department are under rules of engagement. In other words, they have certain rules. And this commission will determine whether or not they violated those rules," the president said.

"Obviously to the extent innocent life was lost, I'm saddened. Our objective is to protect innocent life," added the president. "I want to find out the facts about exactly what took place there."

A top aide to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told CBS News that there's likely to be a face-saving way out of the problem.

Will Bush administration cave in to Iraqi corruption?

The whole world is watching how the Bush Administration will respond to the crooked Iraqi Interior Ministry's demand that the State Department fire the security company that has so effectively protected American diplomats, personnel and VIPs.

If the US government pulls Blackwater USA's contract to provide security in Iraq, it will be sending the following messages:

1. Extortion pays: If American security companies want to keep working for the US government in Iraq, they must pay bribes in the form of spurious "license fees" to the corrupt Iraqi Interior Ministry. (Blackwater, we are told, refused to pay such bribes.)

2. Terrorism pays: The US will reward terrorists - like Spain did after the Madrid bombings - by caving into demands that it change its policies in Iraq. If terrorists can goad Washington into removing its effective forces from the field, the terrorists win.

3. Political warfare pays: Foreign crooks and terrorists need only turn up the political heat on Washington to remove effective elements of the war effort from the fight.

4. The truth is worthless: Whether or not the Blackwater guards acted properly - initial US government reports say they did - means nothing. Cutting some kind of deal to appease inept Iraqi leaders is more important than establishing the facts.

5. Saving American lives doesn't pay: The administration will appear to be saying that US security companies might be better off financially if they protect their clients less aggressively and lose a few State Department officials once in a while.

6. When the chips are down, President Bush won't stand behind the Americans who risk all to protect his diplomats from terrorists in Iraq.

Stay the course, Mr. President. Ride this one out. Tell Prime Minister Maliki that his own Interior Ministry is a bigger threat to the Iraqi people than any American company could ever be. (Download iraq_interior_ministry_report.pdf .) The sooner he builds an honest, effective and service-minded army and security force, the sooner we Americans can leave. Until then, Blackwater and the others stay.

Shakedown gone bad?

Something reeks about the Iraqi Interior Ministry's announcement that it has pulled the permit of the Blackwater security company to operate in Iraq.

The Interior Ministry never issued such a permit to begin with. Blackwater and other firms have been providing security services in Iraq under terms set by the now-defunct Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA), and grandfathered in after the new Iraqi government took power. The operational item, CPA Order No. 17, became Iraqi law. The ministry has no say in the matter.

The controversy smells like political warfare-style retaliation after a failed shakedown. The spectacularly corrupt Iraqi Interior Ministry probably tried to get the company to pay millions in fake "license fees" and found that Blackwater doesn't pay bribes. Even Al Jazeera says in its Blackwater reporting that the Americans have no confidence in the Iraqi police, who are under Interior Ministry authority.

Time will tell about the exact circumstances of the September 16 attack on the State Department convoy and the subsequent shootout. But the versions coming from the Iraqi Interior Ministry and the US side differ markedly. The Interior Ministry says that Blackwater personnel shot people without provocation. A US government report obtained by Time magazine says otherwise.

According to the US report, gunmen ambushed the State Department motorcade "from several locations." The Blackwater security team "returned fire to several identified targets" and left the area after gunmen shot into the engine of one of its vehicles. Iraqi units then tried to prevent a second convoy from coming in and helping the stricken Blackwater team: the convoy was "blocked/surrounded by several Iraqi police and Iraqi national guard vehicles and armed personnel."

Now the Iraqi government is demanding that the US fire Blackwater and hire a new company for Iraq security.

Was the Interior Ministry's quick denunciation of Blackwater and its fake announcement that it had pulled a nonexistent permit simply retaliation against a company that won't pay off crooked officials? It sure looks that way.

That question should be part of any official and unofficial investigations.