AFIO Weekly Intelligence Notes #45-05 dated 21 November 2005

CIA RUNS COUNTERTERRORIST OPS WITH FOREIGN SERVICES

DDIR/CIA PAYS A CALL ON COL. QADHAFI

EU INVESTIGATING ALLEGED CIA SECRET PRISONS

SECTION II - CONTEXT AND PRECEDENCE

BND SAY US EXAGGERATED CURVEBALL�S IRAQI CLAIMS

JOHN LEHMAN BLASTS INTEL REFORM BUREAUCRACIES

GREATER RESOURCES URGED FOR INTEL SHARING

SECTION III - CYBER INTELLIGENCE

US BEATS OFF ATTEMPT TO TAKE AWAY ITS CONTROL OF INTERNET

EX-MI5 DG CALLS ID CARDS USELESS AGAINST TERRORISM

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH DOCUMENTS ME NET CENSORSHIP

SECTION IV -- BOOKS, SOURCES, AND ISSUES

Books

OCCUPIED BAGHDAD THROUGH INFORMED EYES

RUSSIA IN CHECHNYA

Issues

FREEH LASHES OUT AT 9/11 COMMISSION ON ABLE DANGER

SECTION V - CAREERS, NOTES, LETTERS, QUERIES AND AUTHORS SEEKING ASSISTANCE, CORRECTIONS, OBITUARIES, COMING EVENTS

Notes

CIA, MI VETS WANT ROVE�S CLEARANCE SUSPENDED

DOD WILL PROBE FEITH�S ROLE IN IRAQ INTEL

NSA TO MOVE SOME HQ ELEMENTS TO SAFER AREAS

BAER'S BOOK BASIS OF HOLLYWOOD FILM

CIA SAYS CASTRO HAS PARKINSON�S, DICTATOR DENIES IT

CAROLINA AIRPORT ALLEGEDLY USED FOR RENDITIONS

TURNER CALLS CHENEY "VEEP FOR TORTURE"

Queries

CRYPTOLOGIC FOUNDATION SEEKS DONATIONS OF HISTORICAL ARTIFACTS

Obituaries

TONY COLSON

HENRY WALDO DEARBORN

MICHAEL THWAITES

1 December 05 - San Francisco, CA - AFIO Jim Quesada Chapter holds Luncheon
3 December 05 - Orange Park, FL - AFIO North Florida Chapter Meeting
5-7 December 05 - Chantilly, VA - The MASINT Association 4th Annual MASINT Conference
7 December 05 - Las Vegas, NV - AFIO Las Vegas Holds Special Event at Nellis AFB
12-13 December 2005 - Miami, FL - Narco Terrorism and Personnel Recovery
13 December 05 - Tampa, FL- AFIO Suncoast Chapter Meeting
13-14 December 05 - Chantilly, VA - AFCEA Hosts their Fall Intelligence Symposium at the National Reconnaissance Office
16 December 05 - New York, NY - AFIO New York Metro Chapter Meeting -Intelligence Challenges in the Post 9/11 World.
19 January 2006 - Colorado Springs, CO - AFIO Rocky Mountain Chapter holds USAF O'Club Meeting
27-28 January 06 - Springfield, VA - Conference on "INTELLIGENCE AND ETHICS"
17-20 February 06 - Arlington, VA - The Intelligence Summit - 2006
4 March 06 - Orange Park, FL - AFIO North Florida Chapter Meeting
8 March 2006 - College Station, TX - Future of Transatlantic Security Relations
7-9 May 06 - Bethesda, MD - 2nd Annual INTELCON Exhibition and Symposium
3-8 September 2006 - Oxford, England - Spies, Lies & Intelligence Conference

SECTION I - CURRENT INTELLIGENCE

CIA RUNS COUNTERTERRORIST OPS WITH FOREIGN SERVICES -The CIA has established Counterterrorist Intelligence Centers in more than two dozen countries where US and foreign intelligence officers work side by side, according to current and former American and foreign intelligence officials, the Washington Post reported on 18 November.
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/18/AR2005111802824_5.html 
The NCTC, which manages the CTICs and all other counterterrorism efforts, bought SUVs, night-vision equipment, automatic weapons and push-to-talk radios for countries where intelligence services were starved for even basic material, the Post said in a lengthy article.
The agency sent instructors in surveillance, data analysis and Special Forces tactics to teach hostage rescue, VIP protection and counterterrorist assault. Foreign countries sent officers to the CIA's training school for weeks-long courses in counterterrorism operations and analysis.
The NSA is a partner in the joint centers and has established a Foreign Affairs Directorate that handles sharing information and equipment with 40 countries. As a result, the CTICs have access to highly classified intercepts once shared only with the nation's closest Western allies.
The CTICs make daily decisions on when and how to capture suspects, whether to send them to other countries for interrogation and detention, and how to disrupt al-Qa�ida's logistical and financial support.
According to the Post, the network of centers reflects the agency�s most successful strategy in combating terrorism abroad: persuading and empowering foreign security services to help. Virtually every capture or killing of more than 3,000 suspected terrorists outside Iraq since 9/11 resulted from foreign services working alongside the agency, the DDO told a congressional committee in a closed-door session earlier this year.
The initial tip about where an al-Qa�ida figure is hiding may come from the CIA, but his arrest is usually organized by one of the joint centers and conducted by a local security service, with the CIA nowhere in sight,
Beneath the visible diplomatic surface, development of these liaisons is recasting US dealings abroad. Hence, while the White House has stepped up criticism of the Uzbek dictator Islam Karimov, joint counterterrorism efforts with Tashkent continued until recently. In Indonesia, as State Department provided small amounts of assistance to the military as it made progress on corruption and human rights, the CIA was pouring money into Jakarta and developing intelligence ties there after years of tension. In Paris, as US-French acrimony peaked over the Iraq invasion in 2003, the CIA and French intelligence services were creating the agency's only multinational operations center and executing worldwide sting operations.
The CIA has operated the joint intelligence centers in Europe, the Middle East and Asia, according to current and former intelligence officials. In addition, the multinational center in Paris, codenamed Alliance Base, includes representatives from Britain, France, Germany, Canada and Australia.
Officers from host countries serving in the CTICs are vetted through background checks and polygraphs. They are usually supervised by the CoS and augmented by officers sent from the NCTC. (DKR)

DDIR/CIA PAYS A CALL ON COL. QADHAFI - DDir/CIA Albert M. Calland III visited Libya, earlier this month for secret meetings on ways to expand that country's role in fighting terrorism, the Los Angeles Times reported on 17 November.
Accompanying VADM Calland were other CIA officials who met with Muammar Qadhafi and his brother-in-law and intelligence aide, Abdullah Sanusi, three sources with knowledge of the trip confirmed.
Sanusi has been tried in absentia and convicted in France for the bombing of a civilian jetliner over Africa that killed 170 people, He is barred from traveling to most European countries and from entering the United States, a senior State Department official told the Times.
Sources familiar with the talks between the Libyans and Calland described them as positive and fruitful, according to the Times. Qadhafi offered his full assistance in going after al-Qa�ida and its affiliates, the sources said.
A senior US official said, "One of the most effective tools in the war on terrorism is our relationships with our allies, even nontraditional ones. Libya, geographically, is in an important area for the intelligence community."
Calland's trip marks a significant advance in relations between the US and Libya, which remains listed by State as a state sponsor of terrorism.
Along with Libya, the CIA has established close counterterrorism partnerships with Uzbekistan, Egypt, Sudan and a number of other countries that the Bush administration also accuses of widespread human- rights abuses. (PJK, DKR)

EU INVESTIGATING ALLEGED CIA SECRET PRISONS - The European Parliament, meeting in Strasbourg on 14 November, launched an investigation into allegations the CIA ran terrorist detention camps in Europe, UPI reported.
news.monstersandcritics.com/europe/article_1062449.php/CIA_camps_row_heats_up_in_Europe
Responding to attacks on the United States and the EU Commission, Commission Vice-President Franco Frattini said there was no evidence the agency had been hiding terror suspects at secret bases. He also said the commission had no powers to launch an investigation into the affair. "We are in a position to put questions, but can we seize classified files of the CIA? No, sorry, that is not possible," he said. (PJK, DKR)

SECTION II - CONTEXT AND PRECEDENCE

BND SAY U.S. EXAGGERATED CURVEBALL�S IRAQI CLAIMS - German intelligence officials responsible for Curveball, one of the most important informants on Saddam Husayn�s suspected WMD, say the Bush administration and the CIA repeatedly exaggerated his claims during the run-up to the war in Iraq, the Los Angeles Times reported on 20 November.
www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-curveball20nov20,0,1753730.story?coll=la-home-headlines
Five senior BND (Federal Intelligence Service) officers told the Times they warned US intelligence authorities that the Iraqi defector never claimed to produce germ weapons and never saw anyone else do so.
According to the Germans, President Bush mischaracterized Curveball's information when he warned before the war that Iraq had at least seven mobile factories for biological poisons. Then-Secretary of State Powell also misstated Curveball's accounts in his pre-war presentation to the United Nations on 5 February 2003, the Germans said.
Curveball's German handlers for the last six years said his information was often vague, mostly second-hand and impossible to confirm. "This was not substantial evidence," said a senior German intelligence official. "We made clear we could not verify the things he said."
German authorities, speaking about the case for the first time, also said that the informant suffered from emotional and mental problems. "He is not a completely normal person," said a BND analyst.
According to the lengthy Times article, the paper�s investigation involved interviews since May with about 30 current and former intelligence officials in the United States, Germany, Britain, Iraq and the United Nations as well as other experts. According to the Times, its investigation showed that US bungling in the Curveball case was worse than official reports have disclosed.
The White House ignored evidence gathered by UN weapons inspectors shortly before the war that disproved Curveball's account. Bush and his aides issued increasingly dire warnings about Iraq's biological weapons before the war even though intelligence from Curveball had not changed in two years.
CIA officials accepted Curveball's account although they could not confirm it or interview him until a year after the invasion. They ignored multiple warnings about his reliability before the war, punished in-house critics who provided proof that he had lied and refused to admit error until May 2004, 14 months after the invasion, the Times said.
Curveball now lives under an assumed name in southern Germany. The BND has provided him with a furnished apartment, language lessons and a stipend that allows him to live without working. His wife has emigrated from Iraq, and they have an infant daughter.
Curveball could not be interviewed for the Times report. BND officials threatened last summer to strip him of his income, housing and protection if he agreed to meet with The Times.
CIA officials now concede that Curveball blended fact, research on the Internet and what his former co-workers called water-cooler gossip. His motive, the Times reports CIA officials as saying, was to simply obtain a German visa. (DKR)

JOHN LEHMAN BLASTS INTEL REFORM BUREAUCRACIES - "Since Sept. 11 there's been no real action to fix our Government's most glaring failure: the dysfunctional intelligence bureaucracies whose incompetence exposed us to surprise attack." This was the charge leveled by 9/11 Commission member and former Navy secretary John Lehman in the Washington Post on 16 November.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/15/AR2005111501316.html
"Not a single person has been disciplined, and most have been promoted," Lehman wrote, referring to those he sees as responsible for the intelligence failure surrounding 9/11.
The bipartisan commission approved 41 recommendations for urgent reform with priority given to the need to rebuild the bloated and failed intelligence bureaucracies, he wrote, and Congress acted quickly on the commission�s recommendations, passing the Intelligence Reform Act last December.
"We wanted a strong national intelligence director to smash bureaucratic layers, tear down information �stovepipes� and rewrite personnel policy to bring in the best people -- not only from the career bureaucracy but from the private sector -- to act quickly and decisively on the president's priorities."
Such improvements could not happen without a clean, strong top-level management structure, wrote Lehman. DNI Negroponte, he said, was perhaps the finest career diplomat in government; but the administration reached all the way back to the McNamara years to create a huge new staff to sit atop the old, still bloated bureaucracies instead of a lean structure as recommended by the commission.
"The result is that little has changed -- except that a new bureaucracy has been created," he said. While the 9/11 Commission identified the urgent need for better people, nearly every person in this new bureaucracy has been drawn from the career services. Far from bringing in outsiders with fresh perspectives, the bureaucracy has, in effect, repelled all boarders.
"Negroponte and his deputy, Gen. Michael Hayden, are trying to implement some of our reform recommendations, such as the use of much more open-source intelligence (e.g., reading foreign newspapers). But in every case the implementation creates another box on the organization chart and yet another layer of bureaucracy."
The 9i/11 Commission proposed that every head of an intelligence agency report to one of the DNI's deputies with one of his deputies responsible for making sure that each agency followed his direction.
But the new ODNI has a principal deputy director, four deputy directors, three associate directors and no fewer than 19 assistant deputy directors. "If you are, say, the director of the National Reconnaissance Office, who is your boss -- the assistant deputy director for national technical means? Or is it the assistant deputy director for acquisition or the associate director for science and technology? From whom do you need to get approval to build a new satellite? And whom do the president and Congress hold accountable?"
"The administration just does not seem to get it. It appears to have a childlike belief that creating a new bureaucracy is the solution to every problem. Creation of the Department of Homeland Security has not improved our homeland intelligence. The bureaucratic method was amply demonstrated when DHS held 150 firefighters for three days in Atlanta while people died in New Orleans, so that the firefighters could be given the requisite instruction in avoiding sexual harassment. That's all about process, not results."
"Reform requires inspiring leadership, bold vision and, above all, decisive action. We have not seen it," Lehman concludes. (DKR)

GREATER RESOURCES URGED FOR INTEL SHARING - The Bush administration and Congress must provide more resources to make it easier for federal officials to share intelligence with state and local officials, 9/11 Commission Vice-Chairman Lee Hamilton told the House Homeland Security Intelligence Subcommittee on 15 November, Congress Daily reported.
www.govexec.com/dailyfed/1105/110905cdam2.htm
"Congress has authorized, but not yet appropriated, funding for the [information-sharing] program manager's office," said the former Congressman.
Hamilton, along with William Crowell, a member of the Markle Task Force on National Security in the Information Age, said lawmakers and the White House need to empower the manager�s office with more, dedicated resources.
Hamilton and Crowell spoke after John Russack, the newly appointed information sharing program manager, testified. He told the panel that DNI Negroponte had given his office $9.6 million in fiscal 2005 funding to set up shop, but that Congress did not designate a specific 2006 funding level for it and it did not have its own line in the intelligence budget.
Russack estimated his office needed $30 million a year to facilitate information sharing. "I have a feeling I will get at least $20 million," said Russack about his 2006 allocation.
Hamilton and Crowell said the administration and Russack's office lack a sense of urgency to get on with the job. Hamilton observed that Russack's testimony focused on future initiatives. "What capabilities do they have now?" Hamilton asked. "The terrorists aren't going to wait."
Russack told the subcommittee his office has set up two pilot programs to determine policy, technology and security needs for information sharing. One initiative provides New York FBI field officials with e-mails and alerts on handheld wireless devices about relevant intelligence.
Russack said he would like to have a dozen similar pilot projects by the end of next year and expand the New York initiative to metropolitan police in that city and Washington.
His office also wants to create an electronic directory of sources for federal agencies with lists of professionals across the federal government as well as state and local governments, the private sector and academia. (Elizabeth B., DKR)

SECTION III - CYBER INTELLIGENCE

U.S. BEATS OFF ATTEMPT TO TAKE AWAY ITS CONTROL OF INTERNET - The United States has won a fight to stay in charge of the internet, despite heavy international opposition, the BBC reported.
news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4441544.stm
In an eleventh-hour agreement ahead of a UN internet summit, held 16 to 18 November in Tunis, negotiators agreed to leave the United States in charge of the net's addressing system. Instead, an international forum will be set up to discuss net issues, although it will not have any binding authority.
About 10,000 delegates, including world leaders, technology experts and campaigners, attended the World Summit on the Information Society.
China and Iran were among countries that pushed for an international body under UN auspices to oversee the net.
The US argued that such an arrangement would stifle technological advance and increase censorship by undemocratic regimes.
The Tunis deal leaves day-to-day management of the net in the hands of the California-based Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers which answers to the US government.  Icann will keep its current responsibilities for overseeing domain names and addressing systems, such as country domain suffixes, and managing how net browsers and e-mail programs direct traffic. (DKR)

EX-MI5 DG CALLS ID CARDS USELESS AGAINST TERRORISM - Dame Stella Remington, former Director General of MI5, has declared ID cards the British government plans to introduce to be useless in combating terrorism, the Daily Telegraph (London) reported on 17 November.
www.opinion.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/11/17/uid.xml&sSheet=/portal/2005/11/17/ixportaltop.html
She told the Association of Colleges annual conference in Birmingham she did not believe MI5 was pressing for the introduction of ID card and that the cards would not make Britain safer from terrorism.
"If we have ID cards at vast expense," she said, "and people can go into a back room and forge them, they are going to be absolutely useless." Dame Stella retired as head of MI5 in 1996.
The British government estimates introducing the biometric cards would cost �5.8 billion ($10 billion). Critics claim the bill could reach �40 billion ($68.6 billion). (DKR)

HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH DOCUMENTS ME NET CENSORSHIP -- The watchdog body Human Rights Watch issued a report on 15 November documenting Internet censorship in the Middle East and North Africa.
The 144-page report, "False Freedom: Online Censorship in the Middle East and North Africa," lists online censorship and cases in which internet users have been detained for their activities in countries across the region, including Tunisia, Iran, Syria and Egypt.
The report is based on an examination of thousands of Websites and interviews with dozens of writers, bloggers, computer experts and human rights activists.
Websites in Arabic or Persian can reach an audience of millions, free of charge, within minutes, said Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. "However, faced with dissent on the internet, many Middle Eastern governments are trying to stuff the genie back into the bottle."(DKR)

SECTION IV -- BOOKS, SOURCES, AND ISSUES

Books

OCCUPIED BAGHDAD THROUGH INFORMED EYES - Anthony Shadid, Night Draws Near: Iraq's People in the Shadow of America's War (Henry Holt, 448 pp. $26)
Shadid, an American Arabic-speaking journalist of Lebanese background, won the Pulitzer Prize in 2004 for his reporting on Iraq for the Washington Post.
Here he describes life as he saw it in the streets of Baghdad outside the air-conditioned Green Zone to which most Americans in the city are confined. The time he writes about begins in the days leading up to the invasion and ends with an epilogue on the January 2005 elections.
The people he describes vary from educated professionals for whom the 1970s were the last years of a vanished golden age to terrified Iraqi police who have taken their jobs out of desperation to feed their families and who live in fear of being killed as collaborators with the Americans, those Americans who promises of prosperity and public order proved empty..
Shadid brings a historical sense to his reporting and an informed eye for detail that enlivens Baghdad for the reader and makes the city perhaps the most commanding character he sketches. (DKR)

IN CHECHNYA - Moshe Gammer, The Lone Wolf and the Bear. Three Centuries of Chechen Defiance of Russian Rule (University of Pittsburgh Press, paperback, 272 pp. 27.95).
Gammer is senior lecturer in Middle Eastern and African history at Tel Aviv University and author of Muslim Resistance to the Tsar: Shamil and the Conquest of Chechnya and Dagestan.
In the present work, he recounts the broader period of Russo-Chechen conflict, from early Russian expansion into the Caucasus in the 16th century down to the current, apparently interminable war. He provides a comprehensive study of modern Chechen history and fed the passions of separatism.
For Americans, the conflict in Chechnya resonates in key areas: The land has become a training ground for Islamist militants; destabilizing violence is spreading to other Muslim lands in the Caucasus at a time when the region and its neighboring Caspian fuel resources are of increasing interest to the West; and the brutality and stubborn ineffectiveness of Russian war-making indicates the enduring indifference, not to say hostility, of Vladimir Putin�s Russia to Western political and social values. (DKR)

Issues

FREEH LASHES OUT AT 9/11 COMMISSION ON ABLE DANGER - Former FBI Director Louis Freeh lashed out in the Wall Street Journal on 17 November at the 9/11 Commission for finding �not historically significant� the MI operation Able Danger�s identification in February 2000 of Mohammed Atta as a Qa�ida agent operating in the United States.
www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110007559
Why, Freeh asked, were military officers assigned to Able Danger prevented from sharing this critical information with FBI agents, even though appointments had been made to do so?
"There are other questions that need answers," Free said. "Was Able Danger intelligence provided to the 9/11 Commission prior to the finalization of its report, and, if so, why was it not explored? In sum, what did the 9/11 commissioners and their staff know about Able Danger and when did they know it?"
If confirmed, the Able Danger intelligence was undoubtedly the most relevant fact of the entire post-9/11 inquiry, Freeh wrote. "Even the most junior investigator would immediately know that the name and photo ID of Atta in 2000 is precisely the kind of tactical intelligence the FBI has many times employed to prevent attacks and arrest terrorists. Yet the 9/11 Commission inexplicably concluded that it �was not historically significant.�
"This astounding conclusion--in combination with the failure to investigate Able Danger and incorporate it into its findings--raises serious challenges to the commission's credibility and, if the facts prove out, might just render the commission historically insignificant itself. "
Freeh described Thomas Kean, chairman of the 9/11 Commission, as reacting to Able Danger with the standard Washington PR approach. Freeh also referred, among other things, to what he called major conflicts of interest within the commission concerning obstructions to information-sharing within the IC.
According to Freeh, the conclusion of the final 9/11 Commission report, released on 22 July 2004, that American intelligence agencies were unaware of Atta until the day of the attacks now looks embarrassingly wrong.
"Yet amazingly, commission leaders acknowledged on Aug. 12 that their staff in fact met with a Navy officer [Capt. Scott Phillpott] 10 days before releasing the report, who �asserted that a highly classified intelligence operation, Able Danger, had identified Mohammed Atta to be a member of an al-Qa�ida cell located in Brooklyn."
The commission, said Freeh, should have interviewed the 80 members of Able Danger, as the Pentagon did, five of whom said they saw the chart showing Atta.
"But this would have required admitting that the late-breaking news was inconveniently raised. So it was grossly neglected and branded as insignificant. Such a half-baked conclusion, drawn in only 10 days without any real investigation, simply ignores what looks like substantial direct evidence to the contrary coming from our own trained military intelligence officers.
"No wonder the 9/11 families were outraged by these revelations and called for a �new� commission to investigate."
"The 9/11 Commission gets an "I" grade--incomplete--for its dereliction regarding Able Danger. The Joint Intelligence Committees should reconvene and, in addition to Able Danger team members, we should have the 9/11 commissioners appear as witnesses so the families can hear their explanation why this doesn't matter," Freeh concluded. (DKR)

SECTION V -- CAREERS, NOTES, LETTERS, QUERIES AND AUTHORS SEEKING ASSISTANCE, CORRECTIONS, OBITUARIES, COMING EVENTS

Notes:

CIA, MI VETS WANT ROVE�S CLEARANCE SUSPENDED - Sixteen former CIA and MI officers urged President Bush on 15 November to suspend Karl Rove's security clearance following revelations that he played a role in outing CIA officer Valerie Plame, Knight Ridder Newspapers reported.
"We are asking that you immediately suspend the clearances of all White House personnel who spoke to reporters about (Plame's) affiliation with the CIA. They have mishandled classified information and no longer deserve the level of trust required to have access to this nation's secrets," the IC veterans wrote Bush.
Rove, who spoke to at least two journalists about the issue, hasn't been charged with wrongdoing in the case, but is believed to still be under investigation. The White House declined to comment on the evening of 15 November, saying it involved an ongoing legal matter.
Of the former officials who signed the letter, at least three were Plame's classmates in training at the CIA. They also urged Bush to make clear that he would not pardon anyone convicted in the outing of Plame. "If you take these steps you will be sending a clear message that your first priority is the nation's security, rather than your aides' well-being," they wrote.
Rove, according to court papers, spoke with columnist Robert Novak in July 2003 about the fact that Plame was a CIA employee. Novak revealed Plame's identity in a column on 14 July 2003.
The letter to Bush was singed by former CIA case officers Robert Baer, Vincent Cannistraro, Philip Giraldi, Melissa Boyle Mahle, Jim Marcinkowski, John McCavitt, David Rupp and Bill Wagner; former CIA analysts Brent Cavan, Melvin Goodman, Mike Grimaldi, Larry Johnson and Ray McGovern; retired Army Col. A. Dale Ackels; former DIA officer W. Patrick Lang; and Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski (USAF ret.). (DKR)

DOD WILL PROBE FEITH�S ROLE IN IRAQ INTEL - DoD acting IG Thomas Gimble has agreed to review the prewar intelligence activities of former DoD undersecretary Douglas Feith, Congressional officials said on 17 November, Reuters reported.
abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory?id=1324204
Democrats have accused Feith of manipulating information from sources including Iraqi politician Ahmad Chalabi to suggest links between Saddam Husayn and Usama bin Ladin's al al-Qa�ida network.
Congressional officials expect the review to look at whether Feith and his staff bypassed the CIA by giving the White House uncorroborated intelligence that sought to make a case for war with Iraq in the months leading up to its invasion.
Feith was DoD policy chief until he left for the private sector earlier this year. He was not immediately available for comment.
Officials said DoD told the Senate its review would begin sometime in November. One official estimated it could take at least six months. (DKR)

NSA TO MOVE SOME HQ ELEMENTS TO SAFER AREAS - NSA plans to move headquarters' elements to more secure locations away from public access in response to potential dangers from a suicide airline or truck bomb attack, the Washington Times reported on 18 November.
www.washingtontimes.com/national/inring.htm
The agency complex at Fort Meade, MD, is visible from nearby roads and is situated only a short distance from Baltimore-Washington International Airport.
The agency is moving some of its most sensitive operations to less vulnerable positions on the Fort Meade Army base.
The relocation plan calls for putting new facilities on a 400-acre area in the center of Fort Meade that is currently used by the Army for two golf courses. (DKR)

BAER'S BOOK BASIS OF HOLLYWOOD FILM - A Warner Bros. film is about to be released based on See No evil, the book by Robert Baer recounting his experiences as a CIA field officer in Beirut and Iraq. Star George Clooney portrays Baer in Syriana, the Daily Telegraph (London) reported on 14 November.
www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2005/11/14/bfbaer14xml
Baer's story has been livened up considerably to make it more cinematic, the Telegraph said, but retains his points about the corrupt influence of oil money on relations between the West and the Middle East and the failure of the CIA to do its job properly.
According to the Telegraph, the film presents a dark, gritty view of a beleaguered, middle-aged agent who must outwit his enemies while coping with ineptitude and corruption on his own side.
Fluent in Arabic, Persian and French, Baer quit the agency after almost 20 years, believing he was no longer being asked to protect his country so much as to help sustain its addiction to oil. "That's the idea behind Syriana," he said. Of his days as a spy, he says, "My paranoia was almost always focused on the CIA. There were constant mole hunts. Someone was always out to get you."
He now shares his life with his second wife, Dana, whom he met while both were working for the agency in Bosnia. He readily admits that Dana and he had been having an affair while he was still married to his first wife, the mother of his three children. He now thinks he was wrong to assume he could do his job for years and still maintain a reasonably normal family life.
About Iraq, he says: "We destroyed the glue that held that country together. We went in blindly and trusted in theories that were created in the hothouse of Washington, but couldn't survive outside of it. There was no real plan, just all these theories."
The film is to be released in some cities on 23 November and nationwide on 9 December, Warner Bros. said.
( syrianamovie.warnerbros.com ) (PStephenM, DKR)

CIA SAYS CASTRO HAS PARKINSON�S, DICTATOR DENIES IT -The CIA recently concluded Fidel Castro suffers from Parkinson's disease and has warned US policymakers to be ready for trouble if his health erodes over the next few years.
www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,17268517^663,00.html
But Fidel, giving a five-hour long speech, dismissed the report as wishful thinking, the BBC reported.
news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/4448048.stm
The non-fatal but debilitating condition would mean Castro, 79, may be entering a period when mental functions start to deteriorate.
Castro's brother, Raul, head of the armed forces, has been designated as his successor, but Cuba analysts fear the possibility of a tumultuous period during which an incapacitated Castro refuses to give up power.
Rumors that Castro has Parkinson's have been around since the mid-1990s. (DKR)

CAROLINA AIRPORT ALLEGEDLY USED FOR RENDITIONS - Protesters gathered at an airport some 30 miles from Raleigh, NC to demand that local officials investigate a company they claim has housed planes used for CIA renditions, AP reported on 19 November.
www.the-dispatch.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051119/APN/511190670&cachetime=5
About 60 protesters, some traveling from St. Louis and Chicago, gathered at Johnston County Airport where 14 were arrested for trespassing.
The protestors asked for an investigation into allegations against Aero Contractors that provides planes and pilots for charter flights. Company officials have denied the charges. (PJK, DKR)

TURNER CALLS CHENEY VEEP FOR TORTURE -- ADM Stan field Turner (USN ret.), DCI under President Carter, called Dick Cheney a vice-president for torture, the Washington Times reported.
www.washingtontimes.com/upi/20051117-113523-1781r.htm
Turner said he does not believe President Bush's statements that the United States does not use torture and noted secret prisons allegedly used in eastern Europe for certain high-level terrorist suspects.
"I'm embarrassed the United States has a vice president for torture," Turner said of Cheney. "He condones torture, what else is he?" (DKR)

Queries:

CRYPTOLOGIC FOUNDATION SEEKS DONATIONS OF HISTORICAL ARTIFACTS: One of the major functions of the National Cryptologic Museum Foundation is to assist the museum in acquiring artifacts, records, manuscripts, posters, books and other items related to cryptology. It also looks for period items, such as newspaper headlines, to enhance cryptologic exhibits. This past fiscal year, the foundation arranged for the donation and acquisition of artifacts valued at over $250,000. The items include one of the world�s most extensive personal collections of rare books and papers on cryptology (the Dr. David Kahn collection); the personal papers of Navy Captain Laurance Safford; two U.S.-built five-rotor Hebern cipher machines; two Russian-built burst encoders; a WWII Gibson Girl emergency radio; numerous WWII-era security posters; and an Omaha Beach landing map that still bears the classified cover-term TOP SECRET BIGOT. Sources for these acquisitions include private donors, private collectors, commercial dealers, eBay and former intelligence community members and contractors. The foundation would be most interested in any information you have about similar items and where they might be found. Please send an E-mail either to Dave D�Auria at davedauria@comcast.net or to David Hamer at dhhamer@comcast.net. You may also send information to the foundation itself at cryptmf@aol.com or phone (301) 688-5436, fax (301) 688-5619.

Obituaries:

TONY COLSON -- A retired senior DIA intelligence analyst, he died, aged 61, on 11 November at Virginia Hospital Center in Arlington after cancer surgery in July, the Washington Post reported.
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/17/AR2005111701974_4.html
John Anthony Colson worked at DIA from 1978 to 2004. His areas of expertise included the Middle East and Latin America.
Born in Los Angeles and raised in Rome and Brighton, MA, he graduate from Boston College after serving in the Army. He also acquired a master's degree in Russian and East European history, then one in international relations from Tufts University's Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and another in Romance languages from the University of Georgia.
Fluent in Italian, Spanish, French and German, he sometimes served as an interpreter for foreign delegations.
He was a member of the Orders and Medals Society of America.
Survivors include his wife of 31 years, Lorraine Snow Colson, three sisters and a half brother. (DKR)

HENRY WALDO DEARBORN - A retired CIA cartographer, he died of prostate cancer, aged 87, on 27 October at his home in Reston. VA, the Washington Post reported.
www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/18/AR2005111802824_5.html 
Dearborn, born in Chicago and raised in Seattle, began his career as a commercial photographer. In 1940, he traveled to the Aleutian Islands to photograph the civil engineering and construction of a US naval air station. He joined the Navy at the start of World War II and served as a photographer, mainly in the Pacific. Some of his photos were published in newspapers and magazines.
After the war, he received a degree in geography from Syracuse University and worked as a graduate instructor at the University of Colorado. He was recalled to active duty in the Korean War, during which time he studied languages and became fluent in Russian, French and German.
In 1953, he began work at the CIA as a geographer, training officer and cartographer. At his retirement from the agency in 1979, he received the CIA Career Intelligence Medal for Exceptional Achievement.
Active in local affairs, he was a member of the Northeast Citizens Association in Alexandria, VA; the Correctional Services Advisory Board and the Alexandria Police and Jail Task Force.
Survivors include his wife of 60 years, Mona C. Dearborn; three daughters, Elizabeth Dearborn, Ellen Dearborn Storck and Nan Dearborn; and four grandchildren. (DKR)

MICHAEL THWAITES -- As Australian counterespionage chief, he was responsible for masterminding the defection of Vladimir Petrov, the Soviet rezident in Australia. Also an honored poet, Thwaites died at the age of 90 on 1 November, the Daily Telegraph (London) reported.
www.telegraph.co.uk/core/Content/displayPrintable.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/11/17/db1701.xml&site=5 
He entered the Australian Security Intelligence Organization in 1950 after the VENONA decrypts revealed Communist activity in Canberra. Petrov and his wife had been sent to Canberra by Laventri Beria and when Beria was summarily executed in 1953, Petrov feared he too would be purged if he returned to Russia.
While ASIO wondered whether Petrov�s defection could be an NKVD plot, Thwaites conducted six weeks' negotiations with him, largely in Sydney's red-light district, Petrov was offered money and asylum in exchange for documents and defected without telling his wife, Soviet agents tried to take her back to Russia by force until she was removed from a plane at Darwin in front of a noisy crowd.
Thwaites dealt with the defection and the issues its aroused in two books. One was Empire of Fear (1956), the Petrovs' life stories, which he ghosted while staying with them in safe houses. The other was his own account, Truth Will Out (1980), which explained much more without being permitted to mention VENONA. In it he declared that Soviet agents exposed were true believers in Communism and that Petrov's defection had led to the unmasking of 600 Soviet spies worldwide.
Michael Rayner Thwaites was born on 30 May 1915 at Brisbane. A love of poetry, kindled by his father, was encouraged at Geelong Grammar School by the headmaster, Sir James Darling. Thwaites recalled being beaten by Darling for throwing a ball into a window, and thinking between each stroke what a wonderful mind the headmaster had.
Thwaites attended Trinity College, Melbourne, and then, as a Rhodes scholar, New College, Oxford, where he won the prestigious Newdigate Prize for poetry.
During World War II, he served with the Royal Navy Volunteer Reserve in Atlantic convoys. Returning from a patrol to base in Belfast, Northern Ireland, he was astonished to receive a letter from John Masefield, the Poet Laureate, informing him he had won the King's Medal for Poetry.
After the war, Thwaites returned to Oxford, then became a lecturer in English at Melbourne University before being recruited into ASIO.
Thwaites underwent a religious experience in Belfast during the war which led him to become a life-long activist in Moral Rearmament.
His wife died in 1993. He is survived by three sons and a daughter, the pianist Penelope Thwaites, with whom he used to give recitals. (Brandon H, DKR)

5-7 December 05 - Chantilly, VA - The MASINT Association 4th Annual MASINT Conference - "Progress through Partnership" at the National Reconnaissance Office in Chantilly, VA. The conference is classified SI/TK, open to U.S, Canadian, British and Australian citizens. For information contact Phil Edson at 571-214-2415, masintassoc@earthlink.net  or the AOC at https://www.myaoc.org/EWEB/dynamicpage.aspx?webcode=120505_MASINT 

7 December 2005 [Wed] - Las Vegas, NV - AFIO Las Vegas Chapter Meeting at 6 p.m. at Nellis Air Force Base Adversarial Threat Training Facility and Air Museum, hosted by Lt Col Peter J. Lambert, USAF Commander, 547th Intelligence Squadron (IS) In addition, Lt Col Lambert is permitting the Chapter Membership to Tour the ATTF Air Museum (a formerly classified facility) Please note that due to the Nellis AFB security requirements for attendance, we are required to submit the names of those (members and guests) planning to attend the meeting (and who do not have active or retired military ID) to our contact NOT LATER THAN 4 P.M. THIS THURSDAY, DECEMBER 1, 2005. You must RSVP so that all names are on the admit list with base security (even if a tentative) by 4 p.m. Thursday, so that you (and guests) names are added to list. No allowances for late RSVPs. The names will be submitted this Friday, in order to meet the 72-hour requirement (i.e., Monday RSVPs are too late). The Chapter will host Pizza with Salad after the general meeting at the ATTF. Place: The Adversarial Threat Training Facility and Air Museum, Nellis Air Force Base. All guests must use the main gate located at the intersection on Craig and Las Vegas Blvd. 5871 Fitzgerald Blvd., Nellis AFB, NV 89191 Phone: 702-644-2582  Again, due to Nellis AFB security requirements, you will need to RSVP no later than COB Thursday, December 1st. You may e-mail the chapter representative Christine J. Eppley at  EPPLEY@nv.doe.gov  or call her at 702-295-0073 if you have any questions. They look forward to seeing you!

12-13 December 2005 - Miami, FL - NARCO TERRORISM AND PERSONNEL RECOVERY - This conference is sponsored by the St. Mary's University Center for Terrorism Law. Keynote speaker will be Gen. Charles H. Wilhelm (USMC ret.). Panels will deal with Narco-Terrorism, Technology Issues, Personnel Recovery and Border Issues. Registration Fee is $195. For more information and registration go to www.stmarytx.edu/ctl or call 210-431-2219. (DKR)

13 December 05 - Tampa, FL- AFIO Suncoast Chapter meets at 11:30 a.m. at the Officers Club's, MacDill Air Force Base. The speaker at this meeting is Fred Wettering, a 36 year veteran of CIA, who served as the National Intelligence Officer for Africa. In addition to Africa, he served in Europe, the Middle East, and taught at the National War College. Details are available from COL Nathaniel Alderman, Jr., AldermanNJ@aol.com.

19 January 2006 - Colorado Springs, CO - The Rocky Mountain Chapter of AFIO will hold its next meeting at the Falcon Room of the USAF Academy's Officers Club. Richard (Dick) Durham will be the speaker on the subject of "SALT 1 and Intelligence Incidents". Meeting will start at 11:30 a.m. with lunch being served at 12:00 noon. Cost is the same $12.00 for either chicken or beef (a full lunch). Reservations must be made by January 16, 2006 to Dick Durham, 719-488-2884. or by e-mail to: Riverwear53@aol.com.

7-9 May 06 - Bethesda, MD - 2nd ANNUAL INTELCON [NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE CONFERENCE AND EXPOSITION] - To Emphasize Practical Applications and Techniques  INTELCON combines a high quality educational program which emphasis on practical applications and techniques, along with a full-scale vendor exposition of intel products and services, to attract a wide audience of intelligence practitioners and vendors from both the public and private sectors.
WHO: Dr. William A. Saxton, Conference Chair; Dr. Peter Leitner, Program Chair. Supported by a prestigious Program Advisory Group.
WHERE: Marriott Bethesda North Hotel and Conference Center in Bethesda, MD. For more information, contact: Conference: Dr. William A. Saxton, Chairman
DrWASaxton@aol.com; Tel. 561-483-6430; Exposition: George DeBakey at debakey@ejkrause.com and Barbara Lecker at lecker@ejkrause  of E.J. Krause and Associates; Tel. 301-493-5500 Web sites: www.IntelConference.US  (2006)

3-8 September 2006 - Oxford, England - Spies, Lies & Intelligence Conference - From the historical certainties of World War II, through the treacheries and ultimate triumphs of the Cold War, we have emerged into an age when "Terror" is the West's new political and security watchword. This five-day conference brings together authors, experts and intelligence practitioners of international standing and examines the evolution of intelligence, espionage and deception across more than half a century. Please direct all enquiries and bookings to: The Steward's Office, Christ Church OXFORD OX1 1DP. Tel: +44 (0)1865 286848 Email: conflict@chch.ox.ac.uk or to kerry.deeley@chch.ox.ac.uk   (DKR)