Georgetown Security Law Brief

Intelligence analysts lose valuable resource as al-Qaeda magazine goes quiet

02/10/12: The Washington Post reports that al-Qaeda’s glossy online magazine, Inspire, hasn’t been seen since its creators were killed in a US drone strikes last fall, but the terrorist group’s loyalists aren’t the only ones lamenting its demise. US intelligence analysts miss the publication, too, at least to the extent that it provided a window into the thinking of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, as the Yemen-based group is known. “It was something that helped us gain insight into the group,” said a US defense official involved in tracking AQAP, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Ex-CIA officer may be exploring guilty plea in leak case

02/09/12: POLITICO reports that former CIA officer John Kiriakou, charged last month with leaking the identities of other CIA officers involved in the interrogation of terrorism suspects, may be exploring the possibility of entering a guilty plea in the case, court records suggest. Normally, prosecutors have 30 days to obtain a grand jury indictment after filing a complaint. However, on Tuesday, the government and Kiriakou's defense attorney, Plato Cacheris, filed a joint motion seeking to extend that deadline. The motion contained no mention of plea discussions, but such extensions are often sought to accomodate plea negotiations.

CIA digs in as Americans withdraw from Iraq and Afghanistan

02/08/12: The Washington Post reports that the CIA is expected to maintain a large clandestine presence in Iraq and Afghanistan long after the departure of conventional US troops as part of a plan by the Obama administration to rely on a combination of spies and Special Operations forces to protect US interests in the two longtime war zones, US officials said. US officials said that the CIA’s stations in Kabul and Baghdad will probably remain the agency’s largest overseas outposts for years, even if they shrink from record staffing levels set at the height of American efforts in those nations to fend off insurgencies and install capable governments.

The Pentagon’s new view of warfare

02/07/12: The Washington Post reports that when Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta introduced the Obama administration’s new strategic guidance he made his first point that the military will be smaller and leaner, but it will be agile, flexible, rapidly deployable and technologically advanced. The Obama administration has moved into the era of satellites and drones for intelligence and stand-off air attacks (Libya). If ground forces are needed, local, allied or United Nations troops can be used, some with the help of US Special Forces teams for training or direction (Central African Republic). To go it alone, drones (Pakistan, Yemen), and again those Special Forces (Pakistan for Osama bin Laden, January’s Somalia rescue). 

US said to target rescuers at drone strike sites

02/06/12: The New York Times reports that British and Pakistani journalists said Sunday that the CIA's drone strikes on suspected militants in Pakistan have repeatedly targeted rescuers who responded to the scene of a strike, as well as mourners at subsequent funerals. The report, by the London-based Bureau of Investigative Journalism, found that at least 50 civilians had been killed in follow-up strikes after they rushed to help those hit by a drone-fired missile. The bureau counted more than 20 other civilians killed in strikes on funerals. The findings were published on the bureau’s Web site and in The Sunday Times of London.

Petraeus sticks to message during Congressional hearings

02/04/12: The Washington Post reports that in his first extended public appearance as as CIA director, David H. Petraeus this week did more than display his well-known discipline for staying on message. He did his best to bring other government voices back on message as well. After Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta generated confusion with his remarks on plans for the US military drawdown in Afghanistan, Petraeus went into clean-up mode. “First of all, let me just say that I think the, quote, announcement . . . was more than a bit overanalyzed, shall we say,” Petraeus told the House Intelligence Committee. 

Surveillance drone crashes in Somali capital

02/03/12: ABC News reports that witnesses say a surveillance drone has crashed into a refugee camp in the Somali capital. Drones have been used by the US to attack or observe al-Qaida-linked militants in the Horn of Africa nation. Refugees and soldiers in Mogadishu's Badbado camp say they watched the drone crash Friday into a hut made of sticks, corrugated cans and plastic bags. Sacdiyo Sheikh Madar, a refugee at the camp, says African Union peacekeepers came to remove it. Police officer Ali Hussein says the drone was shaped like a small plane. A similar drone crashed into a house in Mogadishu last year.

Holder says CIA interrogation probe nearing end

02/03/12: POLITICO reports that the Justice Department's investigation into the deaths of two detainees in CIA custody should conclude soon, Attorney General Eric Holder said Thursday. Holder made no mention of proceeding with prosecutions in the cases and suggested they would be closed. "There were ....things that were done during the course of those interrogations that are antithetical to American values, that resulted in the deaths of certain people," Holder said during testimony before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. "That investigation has run its course. We are at a point where we are about to close those investigations."

German intelligence agency criticized for spying on lawmakers

02/02/12: The Los Angeles Times reports that that Germany’s intelligence service, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, is in a bad spot. First, the office came under fire after the revelation that a group of neo-Nazis had allegedly committed at least 10 killings, despite decades of intelligence monitoring. Then, the newsweekly Der Spiegel reported last month that 27 members of Parliament, all with a left-wing party, have been under observation by the intelligence service.

ACLU sues to force release of drone attack records

02/01/12: The Washington Post reports that the American Civil Liberties Union asked a federal court Wednesday to force the Obama administration to release legal and intelligence records related to the killing of three US citizens in drone attacks in Yemen last year. The lawsuit, filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York, charged the Justice and Defense departments and the CIA with illegally failing to respond to requests made in October under the Freedom of Information Act.

US Muslims seek clemency for condemned US-Iranian

02/01/12: The Helena Independent Record reports that an American Muslim group appealed Tuesday to Iran's supreme leader to show clemency for an ex-US military translator with dual citizenship condemned to death on accusations of being a CIA spy. A letter Tuesday from the Council on American-Islamic Relations asks Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to spare the life of Amir Hekmati.

After Obama’s remarks on drones, White House rebuffs security questions

02/01/12: The Washington Post reports that White House spokesman Jay Carney rebuffed questions Tuesday about whether President Obama had violated intelligence restrictions on the secret US drone program in Pakistan when he openly discussed the subject the day before. He suggested that nothing Obama had said could be a security violation: “He’s the commander in chief of the armed forces of the United States. He’s the president of the United States.”

Intelligence chief sees Al Qaeda likely to continue fragmenting

01/31/12: The New York Times reports that the nation’s top intelligence official said on Tuesday that continued pressure from the United States and its allies will likely reduce Al Qaeda’s core leadership in Pakistan to “largely symbolic importance” over the next two to three years as the terrorist organization fragments into more regionally focused groups and homegrown extremists. The assessment by the official, James R. Clapper, the director of national intelligence, was contained in prepared remarks to the Senate Intelligence Committee at the panel’s annual hearing to review global threats to the United States.

Libyan detainees sue former MI6 chief over their rendition

01/31/12: The Huffington Post reports that two former Libyan detainees, Sami Al Saadi and Abdel Hakim Belhadj, at the center of claims that British spies were involved in rendition and torture, are launching legal proceedings against the former director of counter-terrorism at MI6. The two men claim that evidence of the UK's role in the couple's rendition is detailed in a number of documents held by the Libyan security services, which came to light after the fall of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi's regime.

Opinion: Drones for human rights?

01/31/12: The New York Times features an opinion piece by Andrew Stobo Sniderman and Mark Hanis, in which the authors contend drones are not just for firing missiles in Pakistan. In Iraq, the State Department is using them to watch for threats to Americans. Snider and Hanis believe it’s time we used the revolution in military affairs to serve human rights advocacy.  With drones, they say, we could take clear pictures and videos of human rights abuses, and we could start with Syria.

Ex-CIA officials assail ID of agents

01/31/12: The Washington Times reports that former intelligence officials use “reprehensible” and “egregious” to describe the alleged acts of a former CIA officer charged by the government with betraying his own when he revealed the identities of two overseas operatives to the media. These former officials reject the image of John Kiriakou as a high-minded “whistleblower” who sought to expose official wrongdoing or a botched intelligence operation.

Commentary: Questions for the intelligence community

01/31/12: The Washington Post suggests that there are some questions that members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence should ask the heads of the intelligence community when the panel meets Tuesday morning for Congress’ first public assessment in 2012 of worldwide threats. Afghanistan is the only country where substantial numbers of US forces are fighting. President Obama and the NATO coalition have set 2014 as the date for all foreign combat forces to withdraw and the Afghan army and police to take over security responsibilities.

Obama opens up about drone strikes in Pakistan

01/31/12: The Los Angeles Times reports that President Obama offered a vigorous defense of using unmanned aircraft to kill Al Qaeda operatives and other militants in Pakistan's tribal areas and, in the process, officially acknowledged the highly classified CIA drone program that US officials had refused to discuss in public until now. "I think that we have to be judicious in how we use drones," Obama said, adding that they have been used for "very precise, precision strikes against Al Qaeda and their affiliates."

Scholarship: Special issue of the Journal of National Security Law & Policy released

01/30/12: The Journal of National Security Law & Policy (JNSLP) is pleased to announce the publication of its special issue, Vol. 5:2, examining “Shadow Wars.” Articles examine the law and policy regarding US  paramilitary operations, including use of drones, payment of contractors to spy, and training of local operatives to chase terrorists in what The New York Times has described as a “shadow war against Al Qaeda and its allies.”

Opinion: With its deadly drones, the US is fighting a coward's war

01/30/12: The Guardian features an opinion piece by George Monboit. He argues that if, as the US air force says, a drone’s missiles are less likely to kill civilians than those launched from a piloted plane, it must also be true that such easier and less risky deployments are more frequent.  Monboit notes that this danger is acknowledged in a remarkably candid assessment published by the UK's Ministry of Defence, which maintains that the undeclared air war in Pakistan and Yemen "is totally a function of the existence of an unmanned capability – it is unlikely a similar scale of force would be used if this capability were not available."

DOJ defends keeping Bin Laden death photos secret

01/27/12: The Blog of Legal Times reports that the US Justice Department has asked a federal judge to keep secret photos showing the death of Osama bin Laden, saying the images are classified because of their potential to incite violence against the United States. The department filed court papers this week in a FOIA suit in Washington asking US District Judge James Boasberg to keep the photos out of the public domain. The DOJ asserts the photos reveal specific military and intelligence activities, methods and techniques.

Big Brother will be watching US intelligence world

01/26/12: The Denver Post reports that the top US intelligence official declared Thursday that it will take roughly five years to put in place new measures to stop another WikiLeaks-style exposure of classified information.  Director of National Intelligence Jim Clapper said officials are working to "tag" information to be able to track back to which intelligence staffers shared it—something prosecutors could have used to help prove allegations that Bradley Manning copied thousands of war-related records that were leaked to the website Wikileaks.

Commentary: Did international law motivate the “capture-if-feasible” element of the Awlaki legal opinion?

01/23/12: Opinio Juris features a piece by John C. Dehn concerning Newsweek’s report that the Obama administration is finally going to reveal a bit more about its legal authority to target and kill US citizens (in armed conflict or national self-defense) without a prior judicial adjudication. After a prolonged internal debate, reportedly pitting the State and Defense Departments’ head lawyers against others on the President’s national security team, the Attorney General may soon provide details in a public statement. The time and place of that statement is still unclear or undetermined.

Court says review of security clearance dispute is “prohibited”

01/23/12: Secrecy News reports that a government agency’s decision to revoke an employee’s security clearance cannot be reviewed by a federal court even if the decision is based on ethnic discrimination or religious prejudice or other unconstitutional grounds, a court said last week. Judge James C. Cacheris of the Eastern District of Virginia dismissed a lawsuit brought by Mahmoud M. Hegab, a budget analyst at the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA).  Mr. Hegab alleged that his security clearance had been revoked by NGA “based solely on [his] wife’s religion, Islam, her constitutionally protected speech, and her association with, and employment by, an Islamic faith-based organization.”

Four Russian diplomats leave Canada as spy case heats up

01/20/12: The New York Times reports that Four Russian diplomats have left Canada just days after a naval intelligence officer was charged with passing government secrets to a “foreign entity.” The four men, who were based at the Russian Embassy in Ottawa, disappeared at some point on Thursday from an online database of accredited diplomats compiled by Canada’s Department of Foreign Affairs. A note from the department indicates that the online registry is updated daily. But the Russian Foreign Ministry, in a Twitter message, denied numerous reports in the Canadian news media that the men were expelled by Canada for their involvement with Sub-Lieutenant Jeffrey Paul Delisle, who was charged last weekend with passing government secrets over the last four and a half years.

Norwegian security chief resigns after intel gaffe

01/19/12: The Palm Beach Post reports that the chief of Norway's domestic intelligence service hastily resigned from her post after disclosing classified information in an open hearing in Parliament, apparently about Norway's intelligence activities in Pakistan, officials and media reports said Thursday. Janne Kristiansen, head of Norway's PST security service, "expressed herself in a way that could be interpreted as a breach of confidentiality," Justice Minister Grete Faremo said. Norwegian media reported the classified material was mentioned in her answer to a question from a lawmaker about Norway's contacts with Pakistani security and intelligence agencies.

Feds say ex-NSA analyst had top-secret-plus info on home computers

01/18/12: POLITICO reports that computers seized from a retired National Security Agency analyst's home in 2007 contained information that is classified at a level beyond "top secret," officials said in court filings Tuesday. A prosecutor and a senior NSA official made the claim to a federal court in Baltimore in response to a motion ex-NSA analyst Kirk Wiebe filed in November, demanding that the Federal Bureau of Investigation return items seized from Wiebe's Westminster, Maryland home four-and-a-half years ago. "Documents contain information that is currently and properly classified TOP SECRET//SI/REL to USA, FVEY."

Pakistani death squads go after informants to US drone program

12/29/11: The Los Angeles Times reports that Militant groups lack the ability to bring down the drones, which have killed senior Al Qaeda and Taliban commanders as well as many foot soldiers. Instead, a collection of them have banded together to form Khorasan Mujahedin in the North Waziristan tribal region to hunt for those who sell information about the location of militants and their safe houses. Pakistani officials and tribal elders maintain that most of those who are abducted this way are innocent, but after being beaten, burned with irons or scalded with boiling water, almost all eventually "confess." And few ever come back.

China reveals its space plans up to 2016

12/29/11: The Denver Post reports that China plans to launch space labs and manned ships and prepare to build space stations over the next five years, according to a plan released Thursday that shows the country's space program is gathering momentum. China has already said its eventual goals are to have a space station and put an astronaut on the moon. It has made methodical progress with its ambitious lunar and human spaceflight programs, but its latest five-year plan beginning next year signals an acceleration.

China launches own GPS system

12/27/11: The Wall Street Journal reports that China has begun operating a homegrown satellite navigation service that is designed to provide an alternative to the US Global Positioning System and, according to defense experts, could help the Chinese military to identify, track and strike US ships in the region in the event of armed conflict. The Beidou Navigation Satellite System started providing initial positioning, navigation and timing services to China and its "surrounding areas" on Tuesday, Ran Chengqi, a spokesman for the system, told a news conference.

Secrecy defines Obama’s drone war

12/20/11: The Washington Post reports that since September, at least 60 people have died in 14 reported CIA drone strikes in Pakistan’s tribal regions. The Obama administration has named only one of the dead, hailing the elimination of Janbaz Zadran, a top official in the Haqqani insurgent network, as a counterterrorism victory. The identities of the rest remain classified, as does the existence of the drone program itself. Because the names of the dead and the threat they were believed to pose are secret, it is impossible for anyone without access to US intelligence to assess whether the deaths were justified.

Rights groups accuse Europe of CIA flights coverup

12/20/11: The San Francisco Chronicle reports that a majority of 28 mostly European countries have failed to comply with freedom of information requests about their involvement in secret CIA flights carrying suspected terrorists, two human rights groups said Monday. London-based Reprieve and Madrid-based Access Info Europe accused European nations of covering up their complicity in the so-called "extraordinary rendition" program by failing to release flight-traffic data that could show the paths of the planes. The groups said only seven of 28 countries had supplied the requested information.

United States limits the intelligence value of drones

12/18/11: The Corvallis Gazette Times reports that a US official says Iran will find it hard to exploit any data and technology aboard the captured CIA stealth drone because of measures taken to limit the intelligence value of drones operating over hostile territory. The official also said Saturday that despite Iran's latest claims to have hijacked the RQ-170 Sentinel and brought it down near the eastern Iranian city of Kashmar, the US is convinced that the drone malfunctioned. "The Iranians had nothing to do with it," the official said.

US drones allowed in Iraqi skies

12/17/11: The Washington Post reports that American troops are almost gone from Iraq, but that doesn’t mean the US military will cease its operations there entirely. Baghdad has given Washington permission to keep flying Predator drones on surveillance missions over northern Iraq, Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta said Friday. The unmanned airplanes, which operate out of Incirlik Air Base in Turkey, are being used to look for fighters from the Kurdistan Worker’s Party, or PKK.

Congress puts spy world on money diet

12/17/11: The Boston Globe reports that Congress is putting the spy world on a diet by trimming back planned growth in staff and high-tech surveillance programs. Next year's budget stays roughly the same as this year, at just under $80 billion, and the bill doesn't cancel any programs. But the bill passed Friday nixes many planned new hires and denies extra funding requested to expand some existing big-ticket items like multibillion-dollar spy satellites. Congress left alone plans for more staff for cybersecurity and tracking terrorist finances.

Colombia asks Panama to extradite former intelligence chief linked to espionage scandal

12/15/11: The Chicago Tribune reports that Panama's Foreign Ministry says Colombia has asked it to extradite former Colombian intelligence chief Maria del Pilar Hurtado to face conspiracy, wiretapping and abuse of authority charges. Hurtado headed Colombia's DAS domestic intelligence agency in 2007 and 2008. The agency was dissolved in October after it was caught spying on presidential foes, including judges, reporters and human rights activists, under former president Alvaro Uribe. Uribe governed from 2002 to 2010 and has denied knowledge of the abuses.

CIA will process request on Open Source Works

12/14/11: Secrecy News reports that in an abrupt reversal, the Central Intelligence Agency said that it will process a Freedom of Information Act request for documents pertaining to the establishment of Open Source Works, the CIA’s in-house open source intelligence organization. Intelligence historian Jeffrey Richelson had requested the charter of Open Source Works under the Freedom of Information Act, only to be told that the CIA could not confirm or deny the existence (or non-existence) of responsive records.  But Dr. Richelson said that CIA Information and Privacy Coordinator Susan Viscuso called him yesterday to inform him that the request would be processed after all.

Hezbollah names “CIA spies”

12/13/11: The BBC reports that Hezbollah broadcast what it said were the names of the American spies on a Lebanese television station, al-Manar, on Friday night. Video animations were used to show alleged meetings between CIA officers and informers at Starbucks and Pizza Hut. A CIA spokeswoman said the agency would not comment on "spurious claims". Al-Manar said the CIA had 10 officers in Lebanon, all using diplomatic cover to run intelligence networks in the country, which is Israel's northern neighbor.

Charter of Open Source organization is classified, CIA says

12/12/11: Secrecy News reports that Open Source Works, which is the CIA’s in-house open source analysis component, is devoted to intelligence analysis of unclassified, open source information.  Oddly, however, the directive that established Open Source Works is classified, as is the charter of the organization.  In fact, CIA says the very existence of any such records is a classified fact. “The CIA can neither confirm nor deny the existence or nonexistence of records responsive to your request,” wrote Susan Viscuso, CIA Information and Privacy Coordinator, in a November 29 response to a Freedom of Information Act request from Jeffrey Richelson of the National Security Archive for the Open Source Works directive and charter.

Opinion: China’s spies are catching up

12/11/11: The New York Times features an opinion piece by David Wise, concerning China’s development of a world-class espionage service, one he claims rivals that CIA. During the cold war, only a handful of FBI agents specialized in Chinese spy cases, and their work was not regarded as career-enhancing. Wise argues that Washington’s ongoing failure to make Chinese espionage a priority has allowed China to score a number of successes in its espionage efforts against the United States. China’s foreign intelligence service and its military intelligence agency actively spy on the American defense industry, our nuclear weapons labs, Silicon Valley, our intelligence agencies and other sensitive targets.

Police employ Predator drone spy planes on home front

12/11/11: The Los Angeles Times reports that North Dakota police say they have used two unarmed Predators based at Grand Forks Air Force Base to fly at least two dozen surveillance flights since June. The FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration have used Predators for other domestic investigations, officials said. The drones belong to US Customs and Border Protection, which operates eight Predators on the country's northern and southwestern borders to search for illegal immigrants and smugglers. The previously unreported use of its drones to assist local, state and federal law enforcement has occurred without any public acknowledgment or debate.

Cyber-intruder sparks massive federal response — and debate over dealing with threats

12/09/11: The Washington Post reports that the first sign of trouble was a mysterious signal emanating from deep within the US military’s classified computer network. Like a human spy, a piece of covert software in the supposedly secure system was “beaconing” — trying to send coded messages back to its creator. An elite team working in a windowless room at the National Security Agency soon determined that a rogue program had infected a classified network, kept separate from the public Internet, that harbored some of the military’s most important secrets, including battle plans used by commanders in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Inside Romania's CIA 'black site' prison

12/08/11: The Miami Herald reports that in northern Bucharest, in a busy residential neighborhood minutes from the center of Romania's capital city, is a secret that the Romanian government has tried for years to protect. For years, the CIA used a government building -- codenamed Bright Light -- as a makeshift prison for its most valuable detainees. There, it held al-Qaida operatives Khalid Sheik Mohammad, the mastermind of 9/11, and others in a basement prison until 2006, the year some were sent to Guantánamo Bay.

Surveillance tools not just for spy bureaus anymore

12/06/11: The Washington Times reports that specialized equipment and secret techniques that just a few years ago were the exclusive preserve of electronic government spy bureaus such as the NSA are now available to the highest bidders from companies in dozens of countries. The private companies offer equipment and services that can eavesdrop on cellphone calls, monitor Internet activity, tap into fiber-optic cable. Privacy advocates say there is nothing to stop foreign intelligence services from using the equipment to spy on their own people - or Americans.

New intelligence directive on congressional notification

12/02/11: Secrecy News reports that Director of National Intelligence James Clapper has issued a new Intelligence Community Directive on "Congressional Notification" that generally encourages “a presumption of notification” to Congress regarding significant intelligence activities. The November 16 directive, designated ICD 112, elaborates on the intelligence community’s responsibility to keep the congressional oversight committees “fully and currently informed” of US intelligence activities, which is required by the National Security Act.

Iran claims capture of 12 CIA spies

11/24/11: CBS News reports that an influential Iran parliamentarian has said that the country has arrested 12 agents of the American Central Intelligence Agency. Parviz Sorouri, who sits on the powerful committee of foreign policy and national security, that the alleged agents had been operating in coordination with Israel's Mossad and other regional agencies, and targeted the country's military and its nuclear program.

Intel analyst stripped of clearance settles with DIA, but still doesn’t know why he was fired

11/23/11: The Washington Post reports that the Defense Intelligence Agency has reached a settlement with a former analyst who was fired but never told why. John Dullahan, a 66-year-old Vietnam veteran and career Army officer, was stripped of his security clearance in 2009. Under a national security clause invoked by the Pentagon, he could not be provided with the information on the accusations that led to his termination, or attempt to contest the move under the normal appeals process.

Document trove exposes surveillance methods

11/19/11: The Wall Street Journal reports that documents it has obtained open a rare window into a new global market for the off-the-shelf surveillance technology that has arisen in the decade since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. The techniques described in the trove of 200-plus marketing documents, spanning 36 companies, include hacking tools that enable governments to break into people's computers and cellphones, and "massive intercept" gear that can gather all Internet communications in a country.

Pre-publication review as a secrecy battleground

11/16/11: Secrecy News reports that the Obama Administration’s uncompromising approach to punishing “leaks” of classified information has been widely noted.  But its handling of pre-publication review disputes with former intelligence agency employees who seek to publish their work has been no less combative. Government prosecutors are preparing to confiscate proceeds from the unauthorized publication of “The Human Factor: Inside the CIA’s Dysfunctional Intelligence Culture” by the pseudonymous Ishmael Jones, a former CIA officer.

The drone threat to national security

11/16/11: Scientific American reports on that advances in unmanned aerial vehicle technology have profound implications on modern warfare. Drones have transformed the way the US military wages war, making it possible to gather unprecedented amounts of aerial imagery using nearly undetectable platforms, and to strike at targets without putting pilots at risk. However, these capabilities can be exploited by anyone with access to suitably equipped drones. As UAVs continue to become more numerous, smaller, cheaper and more widely distributed in the global supply chain, they will become easier to get.