t2 b21 lederman- open sources 2 of 2 fdr- robert d steele- emails re osint 784

8/14/2019 T2 B21 Lederman- Open Sources 2 of 2 Fdr- Robert D Steele- Emails Re OSINT 784

1/19

Page 1 of3

Lorry FennerFrom: OSS CEO Robert D. Steele [[email protected]]Sent: Tuesday, March 23, 2004 7:07 AMTo: Kevin ScheidCc: Gordon Lederman; Lorry FennerSubject: Personal Suggestion on Forthcoming Testimony of Albright Etc.

Kevin, as you may be aw are, I am the #1 Amazon reviewer for national security non-fiction, and could be said tohave one of the broadest, and most current, overview s of both past national security policy history in DC, as wellas a very good appreciation for what wo rld-class experts are saying our national security policy *should be*.Attached is a list of just the best 13 of the hundreds of books I have reviewed, the titles themselves giving yousome background.The forthcoming testimony of Albright, among others, gives the 9-11 Commission a unique opportunity to beclearly non-partisan by bringing out the fact that 'both* the Clinton and the Bush Administrations andbureaucracies (but more so the political appointees of both parties) were in *denial*, in "old-think", and shuttingout the voices that called for new ways of doing business.Within the Clinton Administration ! condemn Albright and Sandy Berger for refusing to allow intelligence goforward to Clinton that stressed the points Clark was trying to make: that it was a clear and imminent threat thatrequired strong response. I also condemn George Tenet for not being serious about terrorism (his own peopleignored his so-called declaration of war, changing nnthinn ahnnt thair dollars manning, or strategy) and also notbeing serious about Global Coverage or sub-state actors. I jwh o wrote thestudy, and Joe Mazzafroat JHU APL, who read it, and I, are all available to talk about how George was told that $1.58 or $10M peryearper lower tier country or topic, would provide an "insurance policy" on the many threats that were NOT beingcovered byclassified capabilities. Below are two quotes from the study that George ordered LOCKED UP in June1997, "never to be spoken of again": ;T w o quotes from this repor t ' s executive s u m m a r y : I

There are widespread concerns regarding the adequacy of the current and projected . . , . . , . .level of e f f o r t on open sources, ho w open source information is viewed by some senior intelligence managers, and how the CIA manages open Source acquisition as a service ofcommon concern. iThere is a need for a fundam ental look at the intelligence role, resources andmanagement of open sources. This also is one area of intelligence that cries fo r"business process reform. " We ought to look very seriously at supporting a comm ercialindustry of open source "knowledge providers "from which we acquire processedknowledge,_pot information services, an d which ca n b % used to respond to consumerswhen "facts on file "might meet their needs. \, despite the profound and professional recognition of thWe problems

solutions a m o n g the w isest wi thin our com m uni ty , the leadership decided not to pursue this -. ^ .- W ; r>course o f action. ; . i - .In my view, there were and are three THEMES that the 9-11 Cominission can usefully pursue toward its ' non-partisan conclusions, all of them dealing with paradigm changes that neither Clinton nor Bush teamswere able to acknowledge. i

'jt-Threat spectrum changed in the 1990's, with convention and nuclear states dropping to less than 10%1the threat, and non-state actors with capabilities for catastrophic attacks becoming the most imminent. . ,.

' j ' . - ; , . '

3/23/2004 9/11 Closed by Statute . . : ' . , .


2/19

.9/ll Closed by Statute

threat (the worst threat cases are non-traditional non-human but of human origin: 59 states with plaguesor epidemics, mass refugees, water scarcity, energy crises, ethnic crime, and corporate corruption thatdeprives-states of needed revenue's).--.....ane briefing prepared byTom CIA, LtGen/ Intelligence, options also changed, in that OSJKlT as thp attanhftri twn-nVmyself with Dorf-Gessaman and Arnie Donahue from O MBylNormanWood and-Oick Kerr commenting, also changed. The traditional reliance on spies and satellites

finally saw its last effective days, as the spies become button down bureaucrats working with foreignliaison rather than unilateral operations, and the satellites went deaf in part because of smarter securityon the part of the targets'ln part because w ene yer kept up with the needed processing to make.sense.ofthe collection (NjMA Commlsjon Dec 99, trlis is their main point). OSINT, multi-lingual 24/7 OSINT, could~hpve oeen a stop-gap ana life"saver w hile wewent about recreating a truly deep and clandestine service,ar?d creating a deep and broad processing capability, and creating a broader analytic capability thatharnessed the knowledge of external experts, but George and Joan and Charlie, and before themWoolsey and Deutch, were like children with a toy they did not understand but w ere thrilled to have inhand. They did nothing because none olthem was a real intelligence professional, all of them w ereloos.ely-educated and closed off from the real world, and all of them labeled people like me "gadaflys" or"lunatics" or "meddlesome, loud-mouthed agitators." Me and about 15 other published authors-lsuppose I was the most confrontational--! amalso the one one to have SSCI Chairs write forewords toboth their books.

^3J>Firially, the CommunkatmsjBDyJrnDiTient changed diamaticaliv. and the US Government did not keep'''up, either within the 1C or within the USG or within the homeland environment of federal to statecommunications and computing. Mike Nelson, Gore's guy for, the National Information Infrastructure, ,.liked to say that we hadwere looking at 1990's information technology with 1970's-legal spectacles/-.,!'/ /modified that to say that we were mired dgwjn.wJttLl 970's information technology managed by 195Q's.mindsets. The CIA decision in 1988 to gcTwitFTtheIBM PS 2 as its 'standard" terminal, precisely becauseit was a finmhtprminaianri easy to control from a sec urity point of view, captures this internal idiocyperfectly.! hO S WR had been spending $8M a year onJ^NIX and object orientedprogramming, and he was at the forefron t of the Internet revolution--he'!anqr" Identified the 18functionalities needed for an analytic toolkit,_and he was CLOSED DOWN bvl idiot -3ectsloTi7 ine security people, not just at CIA, but across the board, are still stupid, trying to keep real-world information out because it makes it harder for them to protect the trivial 2% of the information that isreally secret. And in all of this, we continued to neglect immigration control, getting terrorist names to ': *state troopers, and inter-agency'sTTaling.So, in my view, 9-11 was a catastrophic failure of governance as a who le. There were no mean-spirited .^_,or incompetent people involved, only people that were "good enough" for business as unusual and NOTgood-enough to rise to the triple challenge thajjaced America in the 1990's: the challenqej ejTiergmgand non-traditional threats not subject to spies and satellites: the challenge and-Opportunitv offhe InternetjmdOSINT revolution: and trie-Challenge of networked form s of goêinnanra.acr.o.ssJederaLand state :nines, insfealfofIhe traditional "command and control" model of top down fiat governnanceÎ wrote about all these things in 1988-1992, and no one wanted to listen. I am still writing about themtoday, and still, today, no one wants to listen. It will take another 9-11, not only here in the US but also.in fej!the.UK, before the public wakes up to the fact that Bush has been stone-walling the 9-11 inquiry arid we < ' " ' ' .have wa sted 2-3 years during which I and others could have led draconian and constructive changes that' ( [ today would give us the follow ing ready for action: . ; .. ;.;."; ' ' - ' ; ? !1) Global O SINT network with full sharing across all countries and all seven intelligence tribes2) Deep clandestine serv ice using third country indigenous case officers on detal to regional multinationalstations3) Massive all-source compartmentedprocessing at NSA integrating both intelligence and operationalinformation' '4) Massive $1008 a year peacekeeping, educational, water, and other assistance program s to stabilize

_ the world' j5)..$1-2B a year Palestinian-Israeli D MZ and schools, water, and food program, a 30-year commitment;>r'#tf"witrfnew land taken from Jordan and water guarantees to Palestine as well as Israel ' . ' ' 6) Homeland security intelligence centers in every state and every city over 250,000, and cadres of state ' i,and'1oâTinglljgence,an.d.counterintelligence professionals ready to spot, assess, and neutralize terrorists fk

3/23/2004


3/19

.embedded locally7) Substantial application of OSINT and data mining toward revenue recovery fromjrnjaort-export pricingfraud and the many other forms of corporation corruption that are depriving the US Government ot ~~roughly $5006 to $1 trillion a year in needed funds for social programs and the recapitalization ofeducation, infrastructure, etc.We get the government we deserve. The people have been inattentive. The 9-11 Commission has anopportunity to educate AmericaQnHHi>*ho fongi-oee in the next two weeks, and I hope you will bestrong in this task. Remember whai bidmeabout Albright. Remember what I have toldyou about George {I have a copy of the unclas draft of the study). They let us down because they werecocky, arrogant, insular, in denial, and unwilling to listen to people like me. The Bush people continue tobe in denial, and the best thing you can do is to shatter the out-dated paradigms and call into questiontheir grasp of reality. The paradigms have'changed, VVashington has not. Break the glass!

Best wishes,Robert';

. ' *; '

9/11 Closed by Statute- "

3/23/2004


4/19

Page 1 of 1

Lorry FennerFrom: Robert David S teele [bear@ oss.net]Sent: Friday, May 07, 2004 2:37 PMTo: Gordon Lederman; Kevin Scheid; Lorry FennerSubject: GE Model is Good Idea, with Two Major Caveats

Kevin, you guys are on to something with the GE model, provided you can rip the national elements out ofdefense, but I wish to respectfully pu t forward two major caveats:1) The OSINT and Outreach elements of the 1C must have fully independent status and be COMPLETELY opento foreign as well as uncleared dom estic and private sector alliances. If you allow the Cold War secu rity model toundermine these two elements, all is lost. I recommend that you examine a new agency that pulls USIA out ofState, combines it with State and the Federal Research Division, as well as the global DoD OSINT Program(regional centers) and you will have something that works.2) The sucking chest wound in the 1C, apart from the stove-pipes, is the corresponding focus on bilateral secretrelationships and foreign liaison at the strategic level rather than multinational regional *tactical* clandestine andsecret technical teams that go after targets of common concern.If I and several other practitioner authors can be allowed to testify to the Commission AFTER you establish yourconclusions, as part of a "Friend of the Court" internal review process, I think you will hit a home run.Best of luck to all of you,Robert

5/10/2004


5/19

Lorry FennerFrom: Kevin ScheidSent: Saturday, April 17, 2004 7:46 AMTo: OSS CEO Robert D. Steele; Gordon Lederman; Lorry FennerSubject: RE: Deficient staff understanding of OSINT

Robert,Thanks for your comments. You wouldn't believe the fight I went through at 3:00 AM tokeep any mention of open sources in our staff statement. Then when I succeded, I gotblasted from the community about how critical I was. The fact that we mention it in thisforum gives us an opening to debate it. Please stay tuned. We're far from over.Kevin

Original MessageFrom: OSS CEO Robert D. Steele [mailto:[email protected]]Sent: Fri 4/16/2004 5:28 PMTo: Gordon Lederman; Kevin Scheid; Lorry FennerCc:Subject: Deficient staff understanding of OSINTReport 11, page 8, tells me that the staff still does not understand OSINT. You are usingthe severely deficient FBIS view of OSINT. Proper OSINT includes networks of experts

9/11 Classified Information

LET ME HELP YOU. Nice to see OSINT mentioned , dangerous to realize your poor grasp of it.


6/19

Lorry FennerFrom: OSS CEO R o b e r t D. S t e e l e [[email protected]]S e n t : S a t u r d a y , A p r i l 1 7 , 2004 10:23 PMT o : Gordon Lederman; e v i n S c h e i d ; Lorry ennerS u b j e c t : F B I p r o b l e m sBelow from the same FBI source that told me CIA and NSA are still withholding vital UScitizen names that take FBI 1-3 months to recover, message by message.hi robert - well, sometimes you have to watch cspan to learn what's going on at your ownagency - i heard mo testifying about hiring rand and mitre as consultants, so that mayexplain her lack of response although a lack of response is still rude in my view - i'mworking on some intel reform proposals while there looks like an opportunity to make somechanges so if i end up interacting with her on these i'll scope out the situation - the900 analyst thing is a total puff cloud as far as i'm concerned - we're losing analystsinstead of amassing them - but that's another story - i almost quit every month but i'mhanging in there - not going to let a broken system break me!Problem #1: Maureen has hired RAND and MITRE to cover her ass. Both of them areresponsible for destroying the early efforts to create a serious OSINT problem, RAND byover-pricing and turning off the all-source analysts on the idea of outsourcing only toget trash back, and MITRE by pushing the CIA toward an in-house technical solution calledthe Open Source Information System (OSIS), instead of a global help desk with the abilityto reach out to the real world. MITRE cheated the government when they charged the USMC$10M for the system they installed at the Marine Corps Intelligence Center--!'m stillangry about it. RAND wants to sell man-hours, MITRE wants to sell technology thatdisplaced data capture and outreach.Problem #2: FBI is lying to you if they are saying the analyst numbers are gettingbetter.Problem #3 : FBI is being deceptive if not unethical if they are failing to tell you ofthe grevious problems they are having in getting proper information from CIA and NSA--between chicken managers and dim-witted lawyers, the system is playing it safe on thecitizen privacy side and we are NOT at war on terrorism. EO 12333 clearly establishesthat US citizens known to be agents of a foreign power or supporting terrorism directlycan and should be identified in message traffic. According to my source, as of lastmonth, fully two years after 9-11, it is still not being done and FBI analysts are tearingtheir hair out trying to get NSA and CIA to fix their practices.You can do something with this!!!! Ashcroft is a liar.Side note: Tenet is a jerk. Not only will we not have a decent clandestine service infive years if we persist in keeping the a ge limit to 35 instead of hiring old dogs withrich foreign area experience, but a really bright person would have conceptualized how tojump start a new special multinational clandestine service that drew on the Malaysians,Indians, Russians, and South Africans, among many others, and creating small regional taskforces with the best new commercial technology (CIA and FBI and NSA are about ten yearsbehind what I can buy o ff the shelf today).You are doing holy work. Don't let up. Let me know if I can help.


7/19

^...."19/11 Closed by StatuteLorry Fenner : / j \:Sent: Saturday, December 20,200312:37 PM / jTo: Gordon Leaerman: Kevin Scheid; Lorry Fenner/ jSubject: | .. .. |Accepts Contact onGlobal Coverage Study that DCI Locked Away

Twho when I knew him was in charge of the ftdlv of holies. theF

J He was probably th$ highest SIS rank when he retired.He is willing to engage with all of you. Note that he and I share a concern aboutstandards and the unwillingness of the 1C leadership / t o ; respect the value of standards.The report that exists and that you must demand of Georae Tenet *soonest* is called"TheChallenge ofGlobal Coverage", authored by| ;|under contract from the Scientificand Technical Analysis Corporation, dated July 199y.' The unclassified version, which Ihave a copy of but ask that you not reveal that, is;141 pages not counting perhaps 100pages of slides. The codeword version that George has locked away in his safe is onlyslightly longer and the codeword does not make a real difference {but I have not seen thecodework version. /The bottom line on this report is that in June 199.7 George Tenet, who commissioned thereport, decided that he did not want to invest energy in finding $1.5B for a globalcoverage "safety net" against the lower tier countries that did not qualify for "hardtarget" levels of investment. Had he done so, we/would have had a vastly better grip onYemen, Sudan, Afghanistan, Central Asia, Indonesia, etcetera. George also has chosen toallow Joan Dempsey to stifle OSINT. Both of them should be held accountable for these twospecific decisions that killed a major intelligence opportunityglobal coverage via OSINTin 29 languages done by people without clearance^ who had both the language and theforeign area expertisebefore it could be born./You will be making a *very* serious mistake if ijhe Chairman does not demand a copy of thisreport through a written communication that leaves no doubt you know of its existence.

Original MessageF r om : ! I" . . . . . . . .To : " Robert David Steele" Sent: Saturday, December 20, 2003 11:41 AM

Subject: Re: URGENT--9-11 Commission and Global Coverage Study

> Hi, Robert. I am willing to engage with Kevin any way that would suit> you or him, but in any case would like you to remain involved in any> contact I might have with him. However, my knowledge is so dated now> (study completed in 1997) that he may consider it irrelevant, though I> hope not. Certainly the details are, but the concepts are not. Most> important, from my point of view, is the work my team did to try to> establish a set of explicit standards for global coverage. My biggest> disappointment was that the very idea of standards was anathema to the> Community's so-called leaders. I would LOVE to engage with Kevin on> that. By the way,I have not done any contract work for two years and> no longer have clearances.>> Please let me know what transpires on this.>> Unfortunately, we are nowhere near Wyoming. For reference, take out a

> love to see you and have great guest quarters. Would be happy ..fro pick1 ..--""

9/11 Personal Privacy


8/19

Page 1 of 1

Lorry FennerFrom: Robert David Steele [bear@ oss.net]Sent: Friday, December 19, 2003 3:34 PMTo: Lorry Fenner; 9-11 Com Kevin Scheid; Gordon LedermanSubject: Promised Papers

Herewith:1) One page summary for Scowcroft of over all needed intelligence reforms2) One page summary for Scowcroft of specific homeland security reforms3) My advice to Senator Roberts (which he either ignored or staff blocked it from reaching him)4) Tw o page executive briefing on OSINT5) One page budget for $125M DoD OSINT Program I could execute immediately6) List of top 20 books on intelligence reform7) List of dirty dozen national security books for holiday readingThe URL for all 430 or so of my reviews, all mixed up together by A mazon, but a good readin two hou rs covering inform ation society and intelligence (oldest ones), emerging threat,international relations, dissent and blowback, and US leadership failures, is at:htq3://www.amazon.conVexec/obidos/tg/cm/member-reviews/-/AlS8AJIin06M9K/l/reP/o3Dcm%5Fmp%5Frv/Q02-0299204-0956873 (although I am ranked 53, that is in relation to all those thatreview fiction, movies, and music. For national security, I am #1 and no one is close behind.My collected lectures, which you really need cable or Tl to get easily, and including myvarious lectures o n the literature sorted w ith pictures but not the detailed reviews you c anread at above URL, are at: http://www.oss.net/extra/news/?module instance=1 &id= 1516What I want:I would be glad if in the course of our continuing exchange, we could worktogether to craft a 30 minute brief to the Members of the Commission on OSINT--perhaps 15 minutes on what OSINT is and how it could have helped avoid 9-11,15 minutes on why we failed to further OSINT from 1988-2003, and 15 minuteson a specific OSINT program that would not only provide an immediate improvementto existing capabilities, but w ould also be a safety net on transnational threats pendingimplementation of reforms. As part of that, we would agree on how you want thefinal report to address OSINT, and I will help you get in touch with others, flesh outyour talking points, and scrutinize your conclusions.I hope all three of you stay in touch...we have a very long 25years ahead of us.

Best wishes,Robert

12/21/2003


9/19

Pagel ofl

Lorry FennerFrom: Robert David Steele [[email protected]]Sent: Friday, December 19, 2003 3:44 PMTo: Lorry Fenner; 9-11 Com Kevin Scheid; Gordon LedermanCc: Authors Robert Baer; Authors Steve Emerson; Hill Yossef BodanskySubject: To introduce 3 brilliant authors 9-11 commission MUST interview on O SINT

Robert Baer is the definitive expert, not only o n the failure of clandestineoperations in the Arabian region (his first book), but on the failure to doopen sources at all (his second book).Steve Emerson did the PBS do cumentary on jihad in Am erican in 1994that was ignored by all and was brilliant in its execution and findings, andis the author ofAmerican Jihad, which charts thecontinuing presence inthe US of the cells illustrated in the attached.Yossef Bodansky is on the Rep ublican Task Force on Terrorism and wrotethe definitive book, prior to 9-11, on "bin Laden: the man wh o declaredwar on America". Yossef used *only* open sources to w rite the book.If you do not interview these three people your findings on OSENT in relationto 9-11 will be severely deficient.

Best wishes,Robert

12/21/2003


10/19

Page 1 of 1

Lorry FennerFrom: Robert David Steele [[email protected]]Sent: Friday, December 19, 2003'4:22 PMTo: Gordon Lederman; Kevin Scheid; Lorry FennerQC. [9/11 Closed by StatutefSubject: Absolute Essential Interview for 9-11 Look at OSINT

With this email I wish to reiterate the point I made in our interview--I am a third of the OSINT knowledgebas ^ ^ ^ ^ ^ Isa..third, and the rest of the world (OSINT bosse ^ * *"'Mn -""I |e(e;}-ar& in theageregate-tfae finailhirdYon::::::absolutely must intervie\^| |whose email is in he cc.....Ideally, I recommend that after working with you.and agreeing on thefinal emphasis rtiat in r lnHcc nsrNrr as onexjf th e "big idea" solutions,I would like to seel land I testify to the Members onC-SPAN to get "the word" out more broadly and efficiently.

9/11 Closed by Statute

12/21/2003


11/19


12/19

P a g e 1 of2/9/11 Closed by Statute

Lorry FennerFrom: Robert David Steele [[email protected]: Saturday, December 20,2003 5:58 AMTo:

Cc:9/11 Personal Privacy

Subject: OSINT Testimony and On or Off-the-Record Advice on OSINT Early Warning of 9-11Dear Colleagues, / / \ u a r e t h e world leaders in OSINT., Yesterday I provided staff testimony

to th e 9-11 Commission on thr. higt^n/.Vif nsrNTT shortly I w i l l prepare, w ithback and forth td] |a "chronology" of the OSINT effort from1988 to date, drawing on the 30 volumes of OSS Proceedings and my own files.T he Com mission does not appear to have th e funds, the time, nor the inclination

to order an OSINT retrospective, which is what I would normally recommend, sow e have to do this on a voluntary and ad hoc basis. \e question they are asking is this: "If the US G overnment had taken OSI

seriously in 1988-1992 wh e n Steele tried to push it from the inside, or from 1992-2001, when! [was brief ly empowered an d then disenfranchised,would this have helped prevent 9-11?" A related question, in line w ith m y adviceto them that they use this opportunity to educate for the future rather than belaborthe past errors (which we al l knew prior to 9-11 ), is this: "Can a properly fundedan d manag ed OSINT program help prevent future surprise? Should it be unilateralor multinational in nature?" ;I have told th e senior staff , all in the cc, that they must at a minimum look atw ha t Steve Emerson an d Yossef Bodansky did prior to 9-11, as evidence of how

much could be known from open sources in Arabic; and I have em phasized th eimportance of Robert Baer*s retrospective look at wha t we chose *not* to \t in the way of open sources across Arabia and in relation to the opan d religious fundamentalists. They m ust of course interview! |in depth an d inquire specif ically about why his Open Source Investment Strategy,brilliantly conceptualized in the mid-199 0's and constantly refreshed but refusedin th e late 1990's an d early 2000's, did not get implemented.

Now I ask you, adding th e internationalpeople I mo st respect: can you eithersuggest an y lines of inquiry, or offer an y concise comm ents, ideally w ith somevery brief examples, that w ould be helpful to the senior staff in composing th eOSINT section of the final report?I am including several vendors in the cc, against th e possibility that they mig htw ish to do an internally-funded report to the 9 -11 Com mission, much as we didso successfully for the Aspin-Brown Commission. Looking at bin Laden an dAl Qaeda, and at Saudi Arabia and Wahhabism, is it possible to show in a retrospectivew ay just how loud th e signals w ere?Incidentally and in passing, th e literature on early warning, including Be n Gilad'sne w book that I just favorably reviewed at Amazon, suggests that it is never th eabsence of signals th at causes surprise, but rather the absence of open minds. Thisis one reason wh y I believe that the US Intelligence Com munity will never be healed

12/21/2003


13/19

Page 2 of 2

no r effective until we 1) have a DCI with a very open mind willing to listen to all theintelligence reformers as well as sponsor multinational approaches to intelligence;and 2) a comprehensive re-education and continuing education of all intelligenceprofessionals, across collection, processing, analysis, and support functions, onthe "new rules for the new craft of intelligence" as set forth in my second book.

Time is short. Anything you can send to the 9-11 senior staff, ideally with a copyto m e, would be helpful. I am ready to integrate everyone's contributions into aconcise consolidated report, if you will permit m e that honor.The benefit to all is this: the Commission is inclined to make OSINT one of its

"big ideas", one of a very small number of strategic recommendations. We did wellwith Aspin-Brown but the US Government was not ready to listen. I believe we havea better shot now at getting OSINT firmly into every Congressional mind-set. I seekyour inputs for the sake of getting OSINT off the ground in the 21st Century. I promisethe vendors this: if the Commision does not cite your contributions in the final report,I will myself highlight them as an OSS.Net headline with pointers to your sites. Pleasedo help in this worthy endeavor.

With warm regards to all,Robert

12/21/2003


14/19

Lorry FennerFrom: Robert David Steele [bear@ oss.net]Sent: Sunday, December 21, 2003 4:19 AMTo: Tom AtleeCc: Journals ForPo! Moises; A uthors Paul Ray; Gordon Lederman; Kevin Scheid; Lorry Fenner;FORUM Nathan Newman; DEAN Forum Bob J.; DEAN Forum Gabe Wachob: DEAN ForumJon Lebkowsky;CIRC Michael Cudahy; R e f o r m e r s Jock Gill; Cl/l 9/ii c l o s e d by s t a t u t e |Subject: Co-Intelligence, Open Source Intelligence, and the Future of Am ericaDear Tom Atlee, author of The Tao of Democracy: Using CO-INTELLIGENCE to create a worldthat works for all:I am including some additional folks in my answer because you have asked some importantquestions and I believe that my answers, and our future collaboration, bears on both the9-11 Commission's future findings, and on a generic solution to how America a) understandsthe world; b) engages the world in honorable dialog;c) allocates America's tax dollars across the varied instruments of national power withless emphasis on a hostile military and more emphasis on what I wrote about in the late1980's: peaceful preventive measures; and d) acts in attitude to the rest of the world.Your answer to me on my invitation to speak at OSS '04, along with Jonathan Schell(Unconquerable World), William Greider (Moral Capitalism), Ambassador Mark Palmer(Breaking the Real Axis of Evil [Dictators]), and Herman Daly (Ecological Economics) wasmost open-minded and thoughtful, and I hope that my answers are helpful in moving all ofus forward together.I, Jock Gill (former assistant to President Clinton for communications) and \lCudahy (former campaign leader for Goldwater and Reagan), all told Governor Dean and hisstaff three months ago that they needed to get their policy and outreach acts together,and to put together a national security policy that was *neither* Clintonesque (denial ofterrorism, deception of the public, delay in addressing global needs) nor neo-Nazi neo-Con(unilateral bully boy tactics alienating billions while costing billions we cannotafford).I have proposed to Moises Nairn, executive editor and publisher of Foreign Policy, the needfor a "people's national security policy" section in the next issue, which I conceptualizeas one page summarizing key reforms in intelligence and national security along the linesof the attached, but broadening it to include the wisdom of all the authors named above; aone-page line up of a "dream team" of advisors on foreign and national security that wouldinclude the authors I have mentioned plus others such as Joe Nye, George Soros, andseveral others, none of whom, with the exception of Nye, is remotely associated with thebeltway; and a two-page recommended reading section which now that I think of it, shouldbe one page, and the first page of the four pages should be a people's intelligence reformsuch as I provide in my lecture on "9-11, US Intelligence, and the Real World", athttp://www.oss.net/extra/news/?module_instance=l&id=1516>> The idea of "open source intelligence" is intriguing and launches my> thinking into realms highly relevant to co-intelligence, to which I> haven't given adequate attention, given their importance. It seems> the time has come. My focus on the dialogue/deliberation dimensions> has eclipsed the informational dimensions, when they are, of course,> highly interrelated. The two meanings of "intelligence" dance> together here.>> Let me know if I'm picking up your intention correctly: I have a> sense that you are speaking of "intelligence services" serving the> whole society rather than only elite powerholders, and of creating new> internet-empowered intelligence gathering and distribution functions> to informationally empower democratic awareness, dialogue and> decision-making around key issues. Am I close?>This is exactly right. I hope my NEW CRAFT OF INTELLIGENCE reaches you in time to read onthe airplane, but I will tell you now that it take national intelligence to the next

1


15/19

level, with four quadrants:a) Restoration of history in 29 languages as the foundation for contextual understandingof the present and the future--including a massive digitization program of Islamic andChinese history and historical statements by their leadership, among others.b) Creation of new forms of multilateral intelligence joint endeavors among governmentsat first, then broadening to include NGOs, businesses, academia, and journalists (see c)that *share the cost and knowledge burden* of goind 24/7 "global coverage." This is tosay, we cannot understand the real world if we are not able to both monitor all opensource publications and broadcasts in an integrative culturally-sensitive manner, and alsointegrate all earth monitoring information from undersea to buoys to terrain and buildingmounted sensors to UAVs and remote satellites, regardless of which nation is managing thespecific system.c) Creation of a vastly more sensible definition of "national" intelligence to includewhat I call "seven tribes with seven standards". The national intelligence tribe,traditionally spies, needs to be broadened to include people in each of the functionaldepartments (e.g. Commerce) who are trained in the proven process of intelligence(requirements definition, collection management, source discovery and validation, multi-source fusion, compelling actionable presentation) and thus able to truly understand,taking Africa as an example, that our trade policy is killing that continent at the sametime that our aid policy is ineffective. US policies and activities toward Africa areignorant, fragmented, and dangerously counter-productive. So also with respect to energy,water, disease, migration, crime, and so on.d) Narrowly focused spies and secrecy. 90% of our secrecy is about bureaucratic turfprotection and avoiding accountability. We need to keep 10%. 90% of our spying isineffective and counter-productive. Not only do we need spies that are not easily found,but we need to do most of our spying in partnership with the local nations (e.g. Singaporeproviding Chinese case officers in South Asia, South Africa providing black case officersin Africa) and against targets of common interest, such as ethnic crime, corporatecarpetbagging and corruption, etc.Now, with that as the broader background (more detals in Chapter 11 of NewCraft)we come to Open Source Intelligence. Below is my definition of OSINT:Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) combines the proven process of intelligence (requirementsdefinition, collection management, source discovery and validation, multi-source fusion,and compelling actionable presentation) with a deep and broad understanding of what opensources of information(OSIF) are available in 29+ languages. While legally and ethically available, roughly 80%of those sources are not known to and not exploited by standard bureaucratic elements ofthe U.S. Government such as the Foreign Broadcast Information Service (FBIS) of theCentral Intelligence Agency. The Department of State, which has the statutoryresponsibility for collecting, translating, and interpreting open sources of informationrelevant to U.S. foreign policy and national security, gave up its responsibility and itscompetency in this arena during the Cold War. Internationally, a number of nations,notably Australia, Norway, South Africa, and Sweden, have created specialist units tofocus on OSIF/OSINT, with considerable success.There are some who say that because open sources are freely available, this is primarilyan analysis problem. That is not correct. As noted above, standard bureaucracies,especially those in English-speaking organizations, are completely unwitting of themajority of the sources that are available to them, or unwilling to spend the time, money,and knowledge needed to capture those sources--sermons in mosques, limited editionopposition press in hotbeds of Islamic fanaticism, brochures in Arabic from Islamiccharities (whose English-language brochures present a completely different face), and soon. Analysis of *all* sources (see other disciplines) is very important and at anelementary stage of its development. However, if collection and processing are nothandled responsibly, analysis is impossible. In the case of OSINT, as the US Governmentand FBIS in particular have proven incompetent, it needs to be a multinational endeavor,with regional centers that share the burden of collection, selection for translation anddigitization, and analysis.The current definitive guides to OSINT are the NATO Open Source Intelligence Handbook, theNATO Open Source Intelligence Reader, and the (NATO) Intelligence Exploitation of theInternet. The definitive historical history of OSINT in recent times is contained in the30 volumes of Proceedings from the annual OSINT conference sponsored by OSS.Net.


16/19

OSINT is politically very powerful because it offers the prospect of empowering the tax-paying public. In combination with other Internet initiatives such as MoveOn.org, itoffers the real possibility of creating citizen networks that are better-informed than anybureaucracy, and therefore able to act in unison to defeat special interests that rely onsecrecy combined with corruption to achieve their objectives.

It merits comment that on Wiki-pedia, to take just one example, there is a running battlebetween this definition, and a really stupid definition posted by the CIA's ForeignBroadcast Information Service (FBIS), whose bureaucratic employees are well-meaning butincredibly ignorant about the real world. They really think that because they have theresponsibility for open sources, they also have the competency. Two different things.The last paragraph of my definition, which will continue to be posted on Wiki-Pedia untilFBIS gives up, is what brings you and I together. Although defeating special interests isimportant, that is a tactical objective. The strategic objective is to "get it right"through democratic *informed* consensus. Our democracy has been sabotaged. It has becometoo driven by special interests, by the tyranny of the minorities (which some of the greatbooks recently point out is now down to single-member minorities that have LOTS of money,eg Bill Gates), and by politics instead of intelligence qua deliberative decisions withaccess to all relevant information.The Cold War and dictators (never mind energy, water, etc) are two good examples. The ColdWar led to a severe perversion of US foreign policy in that we did many very veryexpensive and very very bad things in the name of anti-communism. We began the Cold War bystealing all the Japanese loot buried in the Philippines and creating a massive covertslush fund that immediately restored both Nazis and Japanese imperials to power, and thathas been used to undermine governments around the world, most notably Italy. (See DerekLeebaert, Fifty-year World, and Peggy and Sterling Seagrave, Gold Warriors). Dictators,as Ambassador Palmer points out, number 44 today (Saddam was #45), and they are all the"best friends" of US administrations that place more emphasis on giving lip service tocounter-terrorism (eg Sudan gets to starve millions in a deliberate genocide, while pretending tohelp us on counter-terrorismas Noriega got to run drugs, while giving us nominal serviceon the wars in Central America, where we were on the wrong side with deadly results forthe people). If we can link open source intelligence to public civic activism andindividual fund-raising targeted on specific policy makers and issues, then I believe we"crack the nut."In summary, inspired by your question, I believe that we are about to start a new periodof democracy. Civil rights, environmental protection, gay liberties, human consciousness,these were all driven by people who *intuited* the correct policy and acted as theirconscience guided them, with great courage, in the face of institutionalized opposition.OSINT is "the Pope's divisions" and OSINT has the potential for empowering citizens, notonly in the US but elsewhere, in ways that have not yet been conceived, and at every levelof politics, economics, and culture.Happy trails. Will wait to hear from you and now I am going back to bed--your message hasbeen on my mind and I am glad to get an answer off. I hope that Foreign Policy willconsider giving us four pages in the next available issue, and that you, Paul Ray, JockGill, Michael Cudahy, and I might be able to cosign a "people's foreign policy" overview.

With best wishes,Robert


17/19

Page 1 o f 2

Lorry FennerFrom: OSS CEO Robert D. Steele Local Broadband [[email protected]]Sent: Monday, March22, 2004 2:53 AMTo: Gordon Lederman; Kevin Scheid; Lorry FennerSubject: Senator Graham as witness on OSINT specifically

http://listarchiyes.his.com/intelforum/intelforum.02

Senator GrahamonOSINTandRetrospectiveStudyTo\xSubject: SenatorGraham on OSINT and Retrospective StudyFrom: Robert David Steele Date: Thu,13 Jun2002 17:31:53 -0400Reply-to: intelforum@xxxxxxxSender: owner-intelforum@xxxxxxxxxxxxx

>Subject: R E: Comments o n Homeland Defense Agency>Date: Mon, 10 Jun 2 0 0 2 15:11:08 -0400>X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2653.19)>>Robert -->>Don't know if you saw this yesterday on CBS, but it made me think of you:>>GRAHAM: There's another issue here, and that is the intelligence>communities tend to put a very high value on that information which they>collect. The reality is that in today's world, you can learn about 85 to 90>percent of what you need to know in open sources -- in the newspapers, on>television, on the Internet. And we've tended to disparage that information>and not plumb it as fully as we should.>>And I think we're going to go back and start looking at what was available>in public, published materials during the period before September llth and>be surprised at how much, how many clues came from there.FYI, OSS would love to do such a study and we have already costed it out.The same team that identified 396 terrorist, insurgent, and opposition websites,in 29 languages, can do this study for $30,000. I am not holding my breathwaiting for a call from the 1C would any major media organization like tosponsor it with exclusive control of the results?

3/22/2004


18/19

. AOL.COM | MessageView Page 1 of 1/9/11 Personal Privacy

Subj: FW: Reality Check, PleaseDate: 4/27/2004 5:07:34 PM Eastern Daylight TrineFrom: "Gordon Lederman"To:


19/19

Gordon LedermanFrom: OSS CEO R o b e r t D. Steele [[email protected]]Sent: S a t u r d a y , A p r i l 17, 2004 10:23 PMTo: Gordon Lederman; K e v i n S c h e i d ; Lorry FennerS u b j e c t : F B I p r o b l e m sBelow from the same FBI source that told me CIA and NSA are still withholding vital UScitizen names that take FBI 1-3 months to recover, message by message.hi robert - well, sometimes you have to watch cspan to learn what's going on at your ownagency - i heard mo testifying about hiring rand and mitre as consultants, so that mayexplain her lack of response although a lack of response is still rude in my view - i'mworking on some intel reform proposals while there looks like an opportunity to make somechanges so if i end up interacting with her on these i'll scope out the situation - the900 analyst thing is a total puff cloud as far as i'm concerned - we're losing analystsinstead of amassing them - but that's another story - i almost quit every month but i'mhanging in there - not going to let a broken system break me!Problem #1: Maureen has hired RAND and MITRE to cover her ass. Both of them areresponsible for destroying the early efforts to create a serious OSINT problem, RAND byover-pricing and turning off the all-source analysts on the idea of outsourcing only toget trash back, and MITRE by pushing the CIA toward an in-house technical solution calledthe Open Source Information System (OSIS), instead of a global help desk with the abilityto reach out to the real world. MITRE cheated the government when they charged the USMC$10M for the system they installed at the Marine Corps Intelligence Center--!'m stillangry about it. RAND wants to sell man-hours, MITRE wants to sell technology thatdisplaced data capture and outreach.Problem #2: FBI is lying to you if they are saying the analyst numbers are gettingbetter.Problem #3: FBI is being deceptive if not unethical if they are failing to tell you ofthe grevious problems they are having in getting proper information from CIA and NSA--between chicken managers and dim-witted lawyers, the system is playing it safe on thecitizen privacy side and we are NOT at war on terrorism. EO 12333 clearly establishesthat US citizens known to be agents of a foreign power or supporting terrorism directlycan and should be identified in message traffic. According to my source, as of lastmonth, fully two years after 9-11, it is still not being done and FBI analysts are tearingtheir hair out trying to get NSA and CIA to fix their practices.You can do something with this!!!! Ashcroft is a liar.Side note: Tenet is a jerk. Not only will we not have a decent clandestine service infive years if we persist in keeping the a ge limit to 35 instead of hiring old dogs withrich foreign area experience, but a really bright person would have conceptualized how tojump start a new special multinational clandestine service that drew on the Malaysians,Indians, Russians, and South Africans, among many others, and creating small regional taskforces with the best new commercial technology (CIA and FBI and NSA are about ten yearsbehind what I can buy off the shelf today).You are doing holy work. Don't let up. Let me know if I can help.

t2 b21 lederman- open sources 2 of 2 fdr- robert d steele- emails re osint 784

Documents