Section I - INTELLIGENCE HIGHLIGHTS

Ex-President Uribe Denies Ordering Colombia's Intelligence Agency to Spy on Judges, Foes. Former President Alvaro Uribe has denied before a Colombian congressional committee that he ordered the country's domestic intelligence agency to spy on judges, journalists and political foes.

Uribe said during a 3�-hour appearance that any accusations against him are based on false testimony and ill will.

More than 20 agents of the DAS intelligence agency have been imprisoned for alleged roles in the spying. Two have pleaded guilty in exchange for reduced sentences. [Read more:  WashingtonPost/18August2011] 

Former Army Translator Gets 18 Months in Prison. A former military translator and Iraqi native convicted of making false statements to the U.S. government when he sought national security clearance was sentenced Thursday to 18 months in federal prison.

Issam "Sam" Hamama, 61, was convicted in January on three counts of making false statements to the FBI and on his application for a security clearance when he had denied having any contact with a foreign government. He was acquitted, however, of secretly working as an Iraqi agent in the U.S.

The government sought a 6 1/2-year prison sentence for the former Detroit-area resident, who now lives in El Cajon, Calif., while his defense attorney said he should only serve probation. [Read more:  AP/19Augusgt2011] 

Ex-CIA Officer: Leak of bin Laden Op Details 'Abhorrent.' The sheer amount of classified information about the operations and methods used by the Navy SEALs who killed Osama bin Laden is shocking and "abhorrent," retired CIA officer Frederick Rustmann told Newsmax.TV.

Rustmann expressed shock over recent reports that the Obama administration may have shared classified information with a movie company making a film about the bin Laden mission.

"Frankly, I find it abhorrent," he said. "The number one job of a case officer or intelligence officer is to protect sources and methods. When we don't do that we jeopardize all future operations. I read an article in the New Yorker recently which outlined the operation from start to finish. It did everything but name names.

"I can't believe that people would do that for political purposes. I think it's horrible," Rustmann said. "When I joined the agency quite a long time ago Richard Helms was the director. Under Mr. Helms there was no public relations department, no public affairs department. Whenever the press would call for a comment from the agency, the agency would say "No comment.' It's a secret organization, they do secret work. It's covert. Everything we say to the press goes out to our enemies. It's a very, very bad thing to do."  [Read more: Reske&Fleitz/Newsmax/19August2011]

Iran Jails US Hikers for Spying. An Iranian court has sentenced two American hikers held for two years on spy charges to eight years in prison for spying and entering the country illegally, according to a state media report.

Josh Fattal and Shane Bauer, both 29, were arrested in July 2009 while hiking in northern Iraq near the Iranian border. A third hiker, Sarah Shourd, was released on bail in September 2010 and returned to the United States.

The Islamic Republic of Iran News Network's website says Bauer and Fattal have been sentenced to three years each for illegal entry into Iran and five years each for spying for the United States. [Read more:  CBC/20August2011] 

Computer Lab's Chinese-made Parts Raise Spy Concerns. A U.S. supercomputer laboratory engaged in classified military research concluded a recent deal involving Chinese-made components that is raising concerns in Congress about potential electronic espionage.

The concerns are based on a contract reached this summer between a computer-technology firm and the National Center for Computational Engineering at the University of Tennessee, whose supercomputers simulate flight tests for next-generation U.S. military aircraft and spacecraft, and simulate submarine warfare for the Navy.

The storage system for the contract calls for using software from U.S. cybersecurity firm Symantec installed over devices made by Huawei Technologies, a Chinese telecommunications giant that U.S. officials have said has close ties to China's military. Huawei and Symantec formed a joint venture in 2008, with Huawei owning 51 percent of the shares of the enterprise.

Last week, four Republican senators and one member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence urged the Pentagon and Energy Department in a letter to review the contract for potential risks to national security.

The lawmakers' request highlights tensions between the intelligence community and high-technology companies on how sensitive computer servers, microchips and software that are designed or produced in foreign countries can provide foreign intelligence services backdoor access to sensitive information systems. [Read more: Lake/WashingtonTimes/16August2011]

British Spy Agency Called in to Crack BlackBerry Encryption. It wouldn't be the first time that British spooks have cracked a seemingly impossible code.

British intelligence service, MI5 has been drafted in to assist its sister service, GCHQ in cracking the BlackBerry encryption code, in order to find those responsible for disseminating messages which perpetuated riots in London earlier this month.

While the encryption between Messenger devices is yet to be cracked, police resorted to old fashioned methods to access the BlackBerry Messenger service - by confiscating phones of those caught rioting.

Amid further disruption across London, the Guardian report that Scotland Yard officers were able to physically access BlackBerry messages, hours before the attacks were meant to take place.

Police would, in case of further riots, find it greatly beneficial to access real-time communications of BlackBerry users, to track where protests and riots may take place. On the other hand, the legalities involved are tetchy.

BlackBerry Messenger is heavily encrypted - and it is not clear whether Research in Motion, the manufacturer of the young-focused smartphones, is able to hand over the encryption keys. Further to this, it is not clear whether the BlackBerry maker even stores Messenger data on its servers, making further arrests by police difficult.

Earlier this year, GCHQ's government testing service announced that BlackBerrys are secure enough for government use - leading to questions as to whether BlackBerrys are in fact crackable. [Read more: Whittaker/ZDNet/17August2011]

Sharing Intelligence Helps Contractors Strengthen Cyber Defenses. A new pilot program in which the Defense Department shares classified threat intelligence with defense contractors or their commercial Internet service providers is showing promise in increasing their cyber defenses and preventing enemy intrusions into sensitive government networks, Deputy Defense Secretary William J. Lynn III said today.

Lynn shared initial findings of the Defense Industrial Base Cyber Pilot with attendees here at the Defense Information Systems Agency's Customer and Industry Forum.

About midway through the 90-day pilot, launched in partnership with the Homeland Security Department, Lynn said the pilot is bearing fruit among about 20 participating companies that operate DOD networks.

"Already, the pilot has shown us hundreds of signatures we wouldn't previously have seen... and stopped hundreds of attempted intrusions, Lynn reported. He noted that loading these signatures onto existing systems dramatically increases cybersecurity.

"So in the coming months, we are looking at the possibility of deepening the defense industry involvement in this pilot [and] bringing more and more companies" into the program, he said.

Lynn called intelligence the "special sauce" that enables participating companies to improve their cyber defenses. DOD shares threat intelligence provided by U.S. Cyber Command and the National Security Agency, along with expertise so they can employ it for network defense.

The companies, in turn, use the intelligence and expertise to protect networks they operate for DOD. [Read more: Miles/AFPS/16August2011]

Intel Panels to Take Stock of Post-9/11 Progress. The House and Senate intelligence committees held a series of dramatic public hearings after the Sept. 11 attacks a decade ago, sessions that laid bare the failures of the nation's intelligence and law enforcement agencies to detect or prevent the al-Qaeda plot.

The two panels announced Wednesday that they are planning a reprise of those joint sessions to coincide with the 10-year anniversary of the attacks, this time focusing on how the terror threat has changed and whether the United States' defenses have kept pace.

"The ten year anniversary of 9/11 is an opportunity to take stock of the progress made in the Intelligence Community in the past decade," Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.), the chairman of the House intelligence committee, said in a statement.

The hearings - the first combined public sessions since the 9/11 inquiry - are scheduled to get underway Sept. 13, with Director of National Intelligence James Clapper in the center witness chair.

The committee said it will also call witnesses from other agencies including the CIA. [Read more: Miller/WashingtonPost/17August2011]

Western Agencies Eager for Crack at Gadhafi Archives. Western intelligence agencies believe there is a "treasure trove" of material in Libyan intelligence archives, and they may have already prepared to exploit it once Moammar Gadhafi's regime finally falls.

Current and former U.S. intelligence officials point to the possibilities of what could be found in the files, among them:

- The intelligence service's (and Gadhafi's own) role in the 1988 bombing of PanAm 103 and UTA 772 months later, which killed 430 people in the air and on the ground, as well as their role in the 1986 LaBelle Disco bombing in Berlin, which killed two U.S. soldiers and wounded 79 others.

- Support for various terrorist groups, including Palestinian groups, the Irish Republican Army, the El Rukns street gang in Chicago and individual terrorists like Carlos the Jackal and Abu Nidal.

- A purported 1981 assassination plot against U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

- Gadhafi's financial support for the Pakistani nuclear weapons program in the 1980s and the relationship between Libya and Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan a decade later, as well as Western countries that supported Gadhafi's chemical and biological weapons programs.

There may also be materials on U.S. intelligence operations against al-Qaida, which began under President George W. Bush after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. A steady stream of U.S. intelligence and law enforcement officials visited Libya over the last decade as relations between the two countries got better. [Read more: Windrem/MSNBC/22August2011]

Spy Tipoffs Welcomed by SIS. Australia's top spy agency has made it a little easier for the public to dob in people they suspect of being spies or posing threats to national security.

The New Zealand Security Intelligence Service (SIS) has changed its website so the public can provide details online.

The service introduced a free telephone number 10 years ago that people could ring if they suspected any suspicious activity.

''Our new online contribution form is a modern tool to gather useful information from willing members of the public, which is one of the roles of NZSIS,'' said director of security Dr Warren Tucker.

''The online form will be an accessible way for people to contribute information of national security that they believe may be of interest to the NZSIS.''

He said the SIS was a civilian government agency which contributed to New Zealand's safety and security.

''We gather and evaluate intelligence about current and emerging issues, events and threats relevant to New Zealand's national security and global interests.'' [Read more: FairfaxMedia/18August2011]

Al-Qaeda Group Behind Attack. US intelligence reports show that a new al-Qaeda linked group may have perpetrated the terror attacks that killed eight Israelis near Eilat on Thursday, the Washington Times reported, citing intelligence and counterterrorism officials.

Monday's report says a US government assessment has concluded that the terror groups that may have been responsible for the attacks are the Popular Resistance Committees, which Israel has accused, Jaish al-Islam, or a new group affiliated with al-Qaeda based in Sinai. [Read more: Ynet/23August2011]

Section II - CONTEXT & PRECEDENCE

Colombia's Operation Stairway and the Secret Agent Who Carried it Out. Alba Luz Florez, a secret agent with Colombia's central spy agency, recalled preparing diligently for her mission. At first, she was told only that it was a matter of national security.

She left her family for a safe house and took on a new identity. She underwent three months of intense training on how to develop informants. Then she and planners in the intelligence agency mapped out every step of an operation that called on her to infiltrate the Colombian Supreme Court in the search of evidence linking its justices with the criminal underworld.

"Everything I could learn about the court was of utmost importance to the agency," Florez, 33, said in an interview with The Washington Post.

Florez said she never questioned the motivation behind the operation, which prosecutors now say was designed to cripple the court's investigation of corrupt congressmen, most of them allies of then-President Alvaro Uribe. Indeed, the intelligence agency - the Department of Administrative Security, or DAS - was under the control of the president. [Read more:  Forero/WashingtonPost/20August2011] 

The Union's Spy Game. At the outset of the Civil War, neither the Union nor the Confederacy had a centralized military intelligence department - and yet the need for information on enemy troop movements, political developments and even simple things like geography was immediate. In the breach, they turned to a motley crew of amateur spies who were as untrained and untested as the soldiers who met on the early battlefields at Bull Run and Wilson's Creek.

Despite the equally jumbled espionage operations in the North and the South, the Confederacy had several advantages. Even before the South seceded, secessionists had established spy rings in Washington, a hotbed of southern sympathizers, which gave them access to vital information at some of the highest levels of government. The South also benefitted from the stream of critical intelligence that came its way from the many former Union officers who swore their allegiance to the South after secession. And while the Union faced an enemy with a loosely assembled government still in its infancy, the Confederacy opposed an established and well-known target.

The outbreak of war led to an explosion in intelligence-gathering activity and innovation. Codes and code-breaking were all the rage. Spies on both sides wiretapped telegraph lines and flew hot-air balloons linked to cables for real-time aerial reconnaissance. In fact, the South proved surprisingly adept at building an intelligence network, using a system of couriers to get intelligence to Richmond and then share it with generals in the field. Union generals, in contrast, each had to build his own intelligence capability, a task that understandably was not always their number-one priority.

Which is not to say the Union didn't make progress. In late July, after the defeat of Union troops at the First Battle of Bull Run, President Lincoln appointed 34-year-old George B. McClellan as the commander of the Union Army of the Potomac to protect the capital from attack. McClellan, nicknamed "the young Napoleon" for his early victories in the war, hired his friend and former business associate Allan Pinkerton to collect tactical information.

Pinkerton was an obvious choice. [Read more: Lineberry/NYTimes/15August2011]

The Espionage Act: Why Tom Drake was Indicted. Nearly two years before 9/11, America's largest intelligence agency was tracking three of the Al Qaeda hijackers. But that information, obtained by the National Security agency, wasn't analyzed in a way that could uncover the plot.

Inside the super-secret NSA, several analysts and managers believed that the agency had a powerful tool that might've had a chance to head off 9/11, but it wasn't used.

As Scott Pelley first reported in May, one of those agency insiders was Thomas Drake, who thought that taxpayer money was being wasted on useless intelligence gathering projects while promising technology was ignored.

Drake tried to get the word out but, as a result, he was charged under the Espionage Act and accused of betraying his country. Drake says that the only thing he betrayed was NSA mismanagement that undermined national security.

After a long career in U.S. intelligence, Drake never imagined he'd be labeled an enemy of the United States. As a young airman, he flew spy missions in the Cold War; in the Navy, he analyzed intelligence for the joint chiefs at the Pentagon.

Later, he worked for defense contractors in the highly technical world of electronic eavesdropping. He became an expert in sophisticated, top secret computer software programs and ultimately rose, in 2001, to a senior executive job at the NSA.

Drake told correspondent Scott Pelley his first day on the job was Sept. 11, 2001.

"NSA went into immediate crisis management mode. We had failed to protect the United States of America," he told Pelley.

Asked if he felt that was a failure of the NSA, Drake told Pelley, "The entire national security establishment - it was a failure, a fundamental systemic breakdown."

Part of the failure at the NSA, the largest U.S. intelligence agency, was in its old technology. The agency eavesdrops on the communications of the world. But in the 1990s it was becoming ineffective, overwhelmed by the explosion of digital data. [Read more: Silber&Messick/CBS/22August2011]

Face of Defense: Motivated Marine Succeeds in Afghanistan. Marine Corps Cpl. Austin Barton of Charleston, S.C., keeps his "ear to the ground" here as he monitors enemy activity to inform and safeguard his fellow service members.

Barton serves as the combat operations center watch chief with the 2nd Marine Division's intelligence section here, analyzing activity in the division's area of operations and briefing the intelligence section. He also acts as a liaison to ground commanders.

"I focus on what is going on in the battle space on a constant basis - where the enemy is, where they are attacking," Barton explained. "I have to analyze that and provide [an] operational picture to the intelligence section. While doing that, I also provide an intelligence picture to the operations side."

Barton was recognized as his battalion's noncommissioned officer of the 3rd quarter for fiscal 2011, but he had built a reputation for being a stellar Marine before deploying to Afghanistan in February, said Marine Corps Staff Sgt. Richard Pinner, the collections chief for the division's intelligence section.

Knowing this, Pinner said, Barton's supervisors wanted him to assume high-profile tasks and responsibilities typically reserved for much higher-ranking Marines.

"He was put in the combat operations center, which is not a desirable billet; however, it's something that has to get done," said Pinner, who hails from Pensacola, Fla. "He was performing the duties and tasks of a lieutenant."

Barton, 22, has served in the Marine Corps for five years. He is a former rifleman who switched to the intelligence field when he re-enlisted. His infantry experience, Barton said, has given him an ability to see through the eyes of Marines on the ground without actually being there, a skill that prepared him well for the intelligence field. [Read more: Bellegarde/AFPS/18August2011]

Section III - COMMENTARY

Army Fights to Overcome Data Onslaught. When Army Maj. Gen. Michael Flynn took over in June 2009 as the top U.S. military intelligence official in Afghanistan, he was on a mission to shake things up in the intelligence community. Just six months into his new job, Flynn co-authored a highly critical report published by the Center for a New American Security, recommending sweeping changes to intelligence operations in Afghanistan, which according to the report were "only marginally relevant" preventing pivotal information from making it to those who needed it most.

Then, in July 2010, Flynn issued his coup de grace - a scathing Joint Urgent Operational Need (JUON) statement - warning that intelligence analysts in theater did not have the tools required to fully analyze the tsunami of data being thrown at them. This shortfall, he argued, prevented analysts from providing U.S. and coalition commanders with a full understanding of the operational environment in Afghanistan, resulting in missed opportunities and loss of lives. 

Flynn's JUON was an urgent request for help in the form of a "theater-wide web-based advanced analytical platform to store, organize, access, retrieve and enable full understanding of intelligence and information from multiple large disparate data sets." Answering the call was the Distributed Common Ground System-Army (DCGS-A), the service's cornerstone system for intelligence processing, exploitation and dissemination, said Army Col. Charles Wells, DCGS-A project manager.

Wells said that intelligence data generated in Central Command's area of responsibility, which includes Afghanistan, is growing at a "geometric rate." To handle the data onslaught, DCGS-A takes sensor data from all its sources - signals, imagery or human intelligence - and brings it all together as a common data format in a fused environment, making multisource intelligence analysis possible.

When Wells met with Flynn in Kabul in September 2010, the military intelligence chief emphasized to the colonel the vital importance of ensuring sharing of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) data among the more than 40 coalition partners engaged in operations in Afghanistan. As a result, the Griffin software includes the DCGS Integrated Backbone (DIB), which supports real-time ISR data query and retrieval capabilities across coalition and security domains, giving coalition partners the ability to query U.S. intelligence data while also providing U.S. analysts access to coalition data.

Ironically, U.S. forces are in most need of the DIB. [Read more: Slabodkin/DefenseSystems/16August2011]

From "The Farm" to FarmVille. In an experiment on crowdsourcing intelligence, Applied Research Associates, Inc hopes to see if it can build better intelligence collectors and analysts than the CIA produces on "The Farm", its field academy for clandestine officers, with a tool that bears more resemblance to Facebook's popular social networking game FarmVille. ARA recently launched the Aggregative Contingent Estimation System (ACES), a website funded by the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA) where users can vote on future social, political, scientific, economic, and military developments similar to an online poll, with the results then aggregated into predictions and probabilities. IARPA hopes to use ACES to test the value of crowdsourcing for national intelligence.

If ACES can attract a following as large, serious, or devoted as the Facebook farming simulator, it just might work. [Read more: Gourley/SysConMedia/15August2011]

U.S. Spies Totally Confused by Wall Street, Too. In the last few weeks the stock market has gone ballistic, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average swinging up and down by 400 points seemingly every day. Top-notch economists are scratching their heads; Wall Street traders are hysterical. Even the U.S. intelligence community is flummoxed. So those spies have decided to take matters - or markets - into their own hands.

Iarpa, the intelligence community's way-out research division, thinks it can make sense of the stock market. But first, it needs some help. At a recent conference, Iarpa introduced a new program to develop tools to help analysts "quickly and accurately assess petabytes of complex anonymized financial data."

The Markets Analysis and Testing of Contextual Hypotheses Enhancement System, or Matches, program would help spies analyze massive amounts of data to spot indicators of market behavior, find relationships between seemingly unrelated transactions across hundreds of global markets, and provide insight into specific events and general financial trends.

This might be tricky, to put it lightly. Iarpa acknowledges that analysts are bombarded with masses of "messy" financial data every day, from billions of transactions all over the globe. Right now the intelligence community doesn't have many computational tools to sort through all that noise, unlike the financial industry, which enjoys a variety of "highly sophisticated technologies for market analysis."

Iarpa is perhaps just slightly jealous.

So it's looking for a novel approach, using fine-grained data sets, theory-based mathematical and behavioral models, and automated tools to "provide insights into the financial context of a specific event that has taken place somewhere in the world." That means everything from the Greek debt crisis to the latest Ponzi scheme. [Read more: Groeger/Wired/22August2011]

Section IV - Obituaries, Books and Documentaries, and Coming Events

Obituaries

Jerome W. Greiner. Jerome W. "Jerry" Greiner, 82, died peacefully in his sleep at his home in Vienna, VA, August 14, 2011.

Jerry was born in Michigan and attended the University of Detroit on a football scholarship, where he earned All-Conference honors in 1949. After graduation he was drafted by the Detroit Lions and later had a short stint with the LA Rams.

He joined the CIA in 1951 and proudly served in Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. He retired in 1977 and went on to teach and coach at The Bullis School and Harker Prep. Jerry loved coaching his four sons in Vienna youth baseball, twice winning the town championship. During baseball season he would answer only to "Coach," a nickname that followed him the rest of his life.

Jerry enjoyed many blessings. His reputation as an outstanding athlete, the satisfaction of his career as an intelligence officer, and the convictions and practices of his religious faith were all sources of pride. Overall, however, his most cherished treasures involved his family. He is survived by Virginia, his wife of 48 years, and sons Michael, Nicholas, Justin, and Jeremy; their wives Khristie, Jennifer, Denise, and Sarah; 11 grandchildren, and six nieces and nephews.

Friends are invited to a wake Friday, August 19, from 5 to 7:30 p.m. at St. Mark Catholic Church, 9970 Vale Rd., Vienna, VA 22181. A Mass of Christian Burial will be celebrated Saturday, August 20, at 1 p.m. at St. Mark.

Please honor Jerry, not with flowers, but with a random act of kindness. He would smile at that. [Read more: WashingtonPost/17August2011]

Virginia L. Merchant. Virginia L. Merchant, 92, a military spouse who helped administer secretarial testing for the CIA in the early 1960s, died Aug. 7 at her home in Potomac. She died of cardiopulmonary arrest and congestive heart failure.

Mrs. Merchant's memberships included Metropolitan Memorial United Methodist Church in Washington, Little Farms Garden Club of Potomac and Friends of Montgomery County Animals, which raises money for animal protection projects and organizations.

She was a life member of the Women's Committee for the National Symphony Orchestra.

Virginia Lucille Muse was born in Omaha and raised in Norfolk. During World War II, she worked for the War Production Board and other war agencies while attending George Washington University.

She married in 1943 and accompanied her husband on his Marine Corps assignments before resettling in the Washington area in the early 1960s.

Her husband, retired Marine Corps Col. Robert A. Merchant, died in 1990. Survivors include a daughter, Virginia "Ginger" Merchant of Kerrville, Tex.; and a brother. [Read more: Bernstein/WashingtonPost/17August2011]

Books and Documentaries

Biography Claims Coco Chanel was a Nazi Spy. A new book about the life of Coco Chanel published in the United States on Tuesday aims to strengthen claims the French designer collaborated with the Nazis during World War II as a spy code-named "Westminster."

The book, "Sleeping With The Enemy: Coco Chanel's Secret War," by Paris-based American journalist Hal Vaughan, claims that not only was the designer the lover of a German officer, Hans Gunther von Dincklage, which has been well-documented, but they were spies who went on missions to Madrid and Berlin.

In addition, the book claims Chanel was deeply anti-Semitic.

"Vaughn reveals that Chanel was more than just a Nazi sympathizer and collaborator. She was a numbered Nazi agent working for Abwehr, Germany's military intelligence agency," publisher Alfred A. Knopf said in a statement.

It gives her Abwehr agent number as F-7124 and code-name as "Westminster," named after the Duke of Westminster with whom she had a love affair. She died in Paris in 1971, age 87.

She has long been speculated about as being a spy, but was released after being questioned about her ties to Nazi Germany by a judge in France. The book prints some excerpts of her court testimony. [Read more: Kearney&Thomas/Reuters/16August2011]

Carl Colby's Doc About His CIA Spy Father Gets Picked Up by First Run. First Run Features announced today that the company has acquired all U.S. rights to award-winning filmmaker Carl Colby's riveting documentary THE MAN NOBODY KNEW: IN SEARCH OF MY FATHER, CIA SPYMASTER WILLIAM COLBY, which takes a look at the rise and fall of legendary CIA operative William Colby, one of the most influential spymasters in American history who -- like most CIA officials -- keeps USG secrets from his own wife and children. The film, which will open in New York on September 23, 2011 exclusively at the Lincoln Plaza Cinema before a limited nationwide rollout throughout October, was produced by Jedburgh Films, Act 4 Entertainment's David Johnson and Guggenheim Productions' Grace Guggenheim.

The film is the Colby son's look at a father whose spy thrilller life is a probing history of the CIA, a personal memoir of a family living in clandestine shadows, and an inquiry into the hard costs of a nation's most cloaked actions. From the beginning of his career as an OSS officer parachuting into Nazi-occupied Europe, William Colby rose through the ranks of "The Company," and soon was involved in covert operations in hot spots around the globe. He swayed elections against the Communists in Italy, oversaw the coup against President Diem in Saigon, and ran the controversial Phoenix Program in Vietnam, which influenced today's legacy of counter-insurgency. But after decades of obediently taking on the White House's toughest and dirtiest assignments, and rising to become Director of the CIA, Colby defied the President. Braving intense pressure, he revealed to Congress and the nation some of the agency's darkest, most tightly held secrets and extra-legal operations. In the film his son asks a series of questions about the father who was a ghost-like presence in the family home - and the intelligence officer who became a major force in American history, paving the way for today's needed balance between security and secrecy along with liberty and morality. The film forges a mix of rare archival footage, never-before-seen photos, and interviews with the "who's who" of American intelligence, including former National Security Advisers Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, former Secretary of Defense and Director of CIA James Schlesinger, as well as Pulitzer Prize journalists Bob Woodward, Seymour Hersh, and Tim Weiner. Carl Colby searches for an authentic portrait of the man, like most great leaders, who remained masked even to those who loved him most. [Read more: Renninger/Indiewire/17August2011]

'The Liquid Bomb Plot.' American intelligence services took a hit, in some ways probably deserved, for the things they got wrong before Sept. 11, 2001.

So "The Liquid Bomb Plot" becomes a kind of equal-time documentary, painstakingly chronicling a case five years later where U.S. intelligence played a significant role, though not the lead role, in getting it right.

This time the terrorists did not succeed, and the multinational intelligence operation that thwarted them stopped a well-advanced plot that could have taken almost as many lives as the Sept. 11 attacks.

In 2006, a cell of terrorists based in London created an elaborate plan to simultaneously blow up at least seven airplanes flying from the U.K. to North America.

Their weapons would be soft-drink bottles, which at the time passengers could still bring onto commercial flights. The terrorists would drain the soda and replace it with a mixture of hydrogen peroxide that could detonate with enough force to blow a hole in the plane and, barring a miracle, kill everyone on board.

Yes, the discovery of this plot is the reason we can no longer bring more than small bottles of uninspected liquids on board commercial airplanes these days.

Anyone who watches this documentary is guaranteed to complain less about that restriction.

This two-hour documentary features dozens of top intelligence officials, some of whom admit they can't say much. But it's assembled so well that it plays like a scripted conspiracy thriller where the good guys race against time and disaster.

In fact, that's exactly what happened. And this time the good guys win. [Read more: Hinckley/NYDailyNews/19August2011]

'Counterstrike' Details U.S. Intelligence Agencies' Cyberwar Efforts in Iraq. The U.S. military has hacked and temporarily disabled Iraqi insurgent and terrorist-based websites, a little-known tactic that's part of a government "counterstrike" capability, according to a new book.

At least two sites were "knocked off the web" before Iraq's March 2010 national election after "the largest interagency meetings held since" the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, write New York Times reporters Eric Schmitt and Thom Shanker in "Counterstrike: The Untold Story of America's Secret Campaign Against Al-Qaeda."

The sites, including one sponsored by a "shadowy organization" called the JRTN, "were posting specific operational information that was considered a clear and emerging threat to the security of the vote," they wrote.

At least one site, hosted by a U.S.-based Internet service provider, was shut down after a visit from U.S. lawyers "presenting snapshots of virulent, extremist and violent web pages carried on their server," they wrote. The U.S. provider was not identified.

The book, in chapters called "Terror 2.0" and "The New Network Warfare," sheds light on offensive U.S. cyber operations seldom discussed by U.S. officials. The book's cites tactics such as "overloading," without details. [Read more: Capaccio&McGarry/Bloomberg/19August2011]

Coming Educational Events

EDUCATIONAL EVENTS IN COMING TWO MONTHS....

MANY Spy Museum Events in September, and October with full details are listed on the AFIO Website at www.afio.com. The titles for some of these are in detail below and online.

24 - 26 August 2011 - Raleigh, NC - "Spies Among Us - The Secret World of Illegals" - theme of the 7th Raleigh Spy Conference

Special guests/speakers: Michael Hayden, former DCIA and DIRNSA; Michael Sulick, former Director of the National Clandestine Service, CiA
Returning presenters:
Brian Kelley, CIA & Professor at Institute of World Politics;
Nigel West - world-famous intelligence author/speaker - former Member of Parliament;
Dan Mulvenna - RCMP/CASIS
Writer's Roundtable to feature Douglas Waller, author of Wild Bill Donovan, about the founder of the Office of Strategic Services — the World War 11 forerunner of the CIA — will serve as anchor. Other authors on the roundtable are David Wise, often called 'the dean of intelligence authors,' to discuss his new book Tiger Trap: America’s Secret Spy War With America, and Kent Clizbe, author of Willing Accomplices, a book concerning the continuing influence of Soviet propaganda on Western academia and media and other noted writers in the field.

New to the conference this year: The Historical Collections Division of the Office of Information Services of the Central Intelligence Agency will present a few booklets of recently declassified secret documents, ranging from the Korean War, the Warsaw Pact, Air America, martial law in Poland, the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, and the papers of controversial CIA director Richard Helms. Officials from CIA’s Historical Division will be on hand in Raleigh to discuss their work and answer individual questions.

For more information: www.raleighspyconference.com
email: cyndi@metromagazine.com
Location: North Carolina Museum of History, Downtown Raleigh, NC

30 August 2011, 9 a.m. - 1 p.m. - Jupiter, FL - AFIO members invited by FBI InfraGard meeting on Critical Infrastructure Security - Public and Private Sectors
Topic: Critical Infrastructure Security Public and Private sectors
Venue: G4S Americas Complex, 1395 University Boulevard, Jupiter, Florida 33458
Google Map: http://tinyurl.com/3e6qcuu
Agenda:
8:00 - 9:00 AM: Registration
9:00 - 9:15 AM: Introduction and welcoming remarks.
9:15 - 10:00 AM: Mr. Ken Worster - Topic : Security Glazing: How to Play Defense Against Terrorism, Violent Crime, Forced Entry, and Violent Weather
10:00 - 11:00 AM: Mr. Joseph (Bob) Granger - Topic “Quantifying Risk: The Science of Putting a Price Tag on Vulnerabilities”
11:00 - 11:15 AM: Break
11:15 - 12:45 PM: Randy Atlas, Ph.D. AIA, CPP - Topic: Designing for security with crime prevention through environmental design
12: 45 - 1 PM: Q & A’s - Adjournment
Please contact SA Nelson Barbosa to RSVP at nelson.barbosa@ic.fbi.gov
305-787-6130 office

Wednesday, 7 September 2011, 6 p.m. - Las Vegas, NV - the AFIO Las Vegas Chapter hosts Ken Walther, CIA, on "Safe Houses & Listening Posts in Hostile Areas."

Arrive early and join us at 5 p.m. in the "Robin’s Roost" bar area for liaison and beverages

The featured speaker for the evening will be: Kenneth W. Walther on "Safe Houses & Listening Posts in Hostile Areas"

Conducting covert operations and gathering intelligence is part of our job in defending our country. A combination of HUMINT and Technical Operations yields high results in identifying an adversary or high priority target. Recently in the news was a compound in Abbotabad, Pakistan, that was identified as housing Osama Bin Laden. A lot of news coverage has focused on how the compound had been under surveillance for several months, including news coverage from Al Jezeera. http://english.aljazeera.net/news/asia/2011/05/20115664943840210.html Whether one believes the complete story, or not, the fact that remains is an observation post was used.

How does one set up a Listening Post or Safe House in areas where you would be a target as well? What are the precautions, alliances and risks your agents face by cooperating with the USG? How do you conceal your presence and establish a "cover for action"? This brief introduction to the real world of operations will shed some light into the world of intelligence gathering at the Technical Operations level.
Ken Walther worked as an undercover Technical Operations Officer for the Central Intelligence Agency for 27 years. He primarily worked in the Directorate of Science and Technology (DS&T) but also served in the Directorate of Operations (DO).

During his career with the CIA, Mr. Walther spent seventeen years serving on overseas assignments and his work led him to visit 102 countries. The total of twenty years experience overseas, between the CIA and military, allowed Mr. Walther to experience a variety of cultures, languages and operational activities. Living for extended periods in Asia, Africa, Central and South America and Europe were building blocks in a succession of intelligence operations against a variety of targets, to include: Counter-Terrorism, Counter-Espionage, Counter-Narcotics, Counter-Intelligence, & Arms Interdiction.

Prior to retirement, Mr. Walther was certified as a Senior Instructor at the CIA’s clandestine training facility, "the Farm". At retirement, the Agency allowed Mr. Walther to retire “open” and his cover was rolled back to day one. He was allowed to accept several awards that had been previously locked away because of his cover status.

Mr. Walther is a member of the Roger E. McCarthy Chapter Las Vegas, Association of Former Intelligence Officers.
If you are planning to attend the AFIO meeting please provide your name and birth date to Mary Bentley, Event Coordinator, (702) 295-1024 at BentleyM@nv.doe.gov

Friday, 9 September 2011, 6:30 p.m. - Washington, DC - Surveillance 101 with Eric O'Neill at the International Spy Museum
What if you were assigned to watch the most damaging spy in U.S. history? As a young operative in the FBI, Eric O’Neill was put into position as Robert Hanssen’s assistant with the secret task of spying on his boss, who was under suspicion of working for Russia. O’Neill’s background with the FBI was in surveillance, so he was up to the challenge. But how would you measure up? It’s your chance to find out. O’Neill is prepared to share his hard-earned expertise with you. This intense small group introduction to surveillance FBI-style will include learning the basics and conducting surveillance in the streets of DC. Will you be able to track the “Rabbit” without being “made?” You’ll learn how to snap clandestine shots and keep your target in view, so you won’t miss operational acts or clandestine meetings. O’Neill will lead the exercise and help you learn how to blend into the shadows for the best spy results!
Tickets:  $94.00 - Call Laura at the Spy Museum at 202-654-0932 to register.

12 September 2011 - Washington, DC - DACOR-DIAA Forum hosts speaker on Islamic Doctrine of Shariah.

Lieutenant General Harry Edward Soyster, USA (Ret.), and John Guandolo will speak on the Islamic Doctrine of Shariah. The speakers were on the team that wrote Shariah: The Threat to America. General Soyster was director of the Defense Intelligence Agency. He has served as Commanding General of the US Army Intelligence and Security Command, US Army Deputy Assistant Chief of Staff for Intelligence, and 24th Infantry Division chief of staff. He served in Korea and in combat in Vietnam. Following retirement, he became vice president for international operations for Military Professional Resources, Inc. John Guandolo advises internationally on the Global Islamic Movement. In the FBI, he served in the Counterterrorism Division, investigated narcotics trafficking, was the bureau’s liaison to the Capitol Police, and created and implemented the bureau’s Counterterrorism Training and Education Course. A Naval Academy graduate, he was commissioned into the Marine Corps and served in combat in the first Gulf War. This Forum is open to members of all Intelligence Community associations and their guests.

DACOR members reserve directly with DACOR (202-682-0500, Extension 15). All others reserve by 5 September by mailing a check for $25 per person (payable to DIAA, Inc) to DIAA (Attn: Forum), 256 Morris Creek Road, Cullen, Virginia 23934. Give your name and the names of your guests, your email address, and your telephone number. To get a refund if you are not a DACOR member, you must cancel by noon on 8 September by email to diaalumni.org or by telephone to 571-426-0098. Event location is: DACOR Bacon House, 1801 F St NW, Washington, DC.

Tuesday, 13 September 2011, 5-6 p.m. - Hampton Roads, VA - The AFIO Norman Forde Hampton Roads Chapter Membership Meeting

Location: Tabb Library in York County. Main Meeting Room. (Directions follow) We will discuss a slate of new chapter officers, chapter plans for the Fall and other business matters. Please consider nominating yourself or someone else for the offices of chapter President, Treasurer and Secretary. Please rsvp: Melissa Saunders mwsaunders@cox.net

Wednesday, 14 September 2011, 11:30AM - Scottsdale, AZ - "Brainologist" to discuss "Infinite Possibilities of a Balanced Brain" at AFIO Arizona Chapter

Self-described 'Brainologist,' Lee Gerdes speaks on “Limitless: The Infinite Possibilities of a Balanced Brain”. Gerdes is the founder and CEO of Brain State Technologies®, and invented something he calls Brainwave Optimization™ to supposedly "heal from the life-limiting trauma he experienced as a result of a violent assault."
Using his knowledge as a mathematician, physicist, computer scientist, theologian and psychologist, Gerdes claims that he has arrived at a new understanding of how humans can better understand and access their inherent brain power.
He developed Brainwave Optimization, an advanced neuro-technology that, says Gerdes, has now been used to help nearly 34,000 people worldwide: soldiers, children with learning difficulties, addicts, insomniacs, prisoners and high-performance athletes and executives. Brainwave Optimization is purportedly a tool for achieving higher levels of cognition, clarity, balance and harmony. – and to overcome stress, anxieties, sleeplessness and addictions.
Gerdes will explain how his technology can help you “see” what’s happening inside your own brain and how the brain can change itself to help you move beyond current limitations.

RSVP no later than 72 hours ahead of time; in the past, not reserving or cancelling without prior notice (72 hours prior to the meeting) created much grief for those of us organizing the meeting and dealing with the personnel!
Event location: McCORMICK RANCH GOLF COURSE, 7505 McCormick Parkway, Scottsdale AZ 85258 ~ Phone 480.948.0260

WE ARE charged for the no-shows and please remember, we are a small organization with a humble coffer! We would therefore APPRECIATE that you all respond to this email to confirm your presence (or not).
Our meeting fees will be as follows: $20.00 for AFIO members; $22.00 for guests; $25.00 for AFIO Members with NO RSVPs as per the requested date; All NO SHOWS or last minute cancellations will need to pay for the lunch.
For reservations or questions, please email ON OR BEFORE September 12, 2011 Simone simone@4smartphone.net or simone@afioaz.org or call and leave a message on 602.570.6016

Wednesday, 14 September 2011, 7:00 p.m. - Washington, DC - Dinner with a Spy: An Evening with Jonna and Tony Mendez at the International Spy Museum.

Dine with Tony and Jonna Mendez, both former CIA chiefs of disguise, who will share their stories of how they used their artistry to enable intelligence officers and agents to slip away from surveillance, clandestinely infiltrate and exfiltrate denied areas, hide top secret information, and pass stolen secrets. Both officers spent their careers in the CIA’s Office of Technical Service, often compared to Q’s laboratory in the James Bond stories. The Mendezes will recount their extraordinary disguise exploits evading the KGB, Stasi, and DGI, and you’ll learn how George Clooney and Ben Affleck are immortalizing Mr. Mendez’s most famous exploit “The Canadian Caper” in a movie set to release in 2012. You will be one of only 20 guests at Zola for a three-course dinner and wine-pairing where you’ll talk with the Mendezes about their remarkable careers and their thoughts on today’s intelligence issues. Tickets:  $200 - Please call Laura at 202-654-0932 to register.

Thursday,15 September 2011, 11:30 am - Englewood, CO - AFIO Rocky Mountain Chapter hosts, from the FBI SAC James Yacone, Denver Division. SAC Yacone is a West Point graduate and has earned the Silver Star as a helicopter pilot during "Black Hawk Down". This is a joint meeting of the AFIO and Denver INFRAGARD. This is a one time event at Centennial Airport. There are seating limitations of 45 seats so we will accept reservations on a first come first basis. Event location: Centennial Airport in Englewood,CO. You will receive directions when you RSVP to Tom VanWormer at robsmom@pcisys.net or telephone him at 719-481-8273. The lunch will cost $12.00 pay at the door.

Wednesday, 21 September 2011, 6:30 pm - Washington, DC - "L'AFFAIRE FAREWELL" at the International Spy Museum

"One of the most important spy cases of the 20th century." –former French foreign minister, Hubert V�drine
This riveting film is loosely based on the real life story of Vladimir Vetrov, a high ranking KGB intelligence officer who revealed the USSR's efforts to steal technical, industrial, and scientific secrets from the West. From 1980 to 1982, Vetrov, using the codename "Farewell," secretly passed over 4,000 classified documents to the French. The materials exposed Soviet penetrations and the official list of Line X officers operating secretly in embassies around the world plumbing Western science and technology to keep the Soviets competitive. The 2009 French film L'affaire Farewell portrays the results of Vetrov's espionage—how it enabled Western intelligence to root out nearly 200 spies destroying Soviet ability to steal technology. The roll-up crippled Soviet technology efforts which had run on stolen Western research and forced the USSR into a weakened position at an extremely critical time during the Cold War. A post-screening discussion of this engaging thriller will be lead by International Spy Museum executive director Peter Earnest who served as a CIA case officer in Europe during the Cold War.
In French and Russian with English subtitles. Co-sponsored by Road Scholar organization.
Tickets: $9 – Cash bar. To purchase tickets visit www.spymuseum.org

Monday, 26 September 2011 - Boston, MA - CIA's Historical Collections Division Conference "Piercing the Iron Curtain: The Use of Technology to Resolve the Missile Gap" at JFK Presidential Library

Scope: The Missile Gap was an episode in American history that was in effect a misperception of the rate of soviet ICBM deployment relative to US ICBM deployment. The United States and USSR were in a race to develop long range missiles. Because of the tight Soviet security, the US had little evidence about the USSRs progress developing intercontinental ballistic missiles. At the outset, ignorance of the Soviet ICBM program abounded, projections of potential missile production became estimates, Soviet ICBM testing , Khrushchev's boasting, USAF mirror imaging, and setbacks in US ICBM development yielded wild estimates of a critical gap between US and the Soviet ICBM capabilities. CIA developed new collection, processing and analytic capabilities that ultimately solved the "Gap" issue—for all but the USAF. 185 documents. EVENT LOCATION: JFK Presidential Library, Boston, MA. Details about event to follow from AFIO as we get closer to event.

27 September 2011, 5:30 - 8 pm - New York, NY - AFIO New York Metro features Dr. Draitser on "Stalin's Romeo Spy."

SPEAKER: Emil Draitser, Ph.D., Professor Russian Studies, Hunter College of the City of New York.
TOPIC: "STALIN'S ROMEO SPY" - His book about the remarkable rise and fall of the KGB's most daring operative Dmitri Bystrolyotov. Details at www.stalinsromeospy.com

Event location: "3 West Club" 3 West 51st St, New York City. Buffet dinner. Cash bar. $40/person. 5:30 PM Registration 6:00 PM Meeting Start

Reservations: Strongly Suggested, Not Required: Seating is limited. Replies/RSVP to afiometro@yahoo.com

Saturday, 1 October 2011, 1000 - 1430 - Salem, MA - AFIO New England to hear former Associate DNI/Collection, and CIA COA NYC on 9/11.

Our speaker will be Mary Margaret Graham, former Associate DNI for Collection, and CIA COS in NYC on 9/11. She was in the WTC when the planes hit. Ms. Graham is a veteran of the Clandestine Service and has had a variety of assignments overseas.
Our schedule is as follows: Registration & gathering, 1000 - 1130, membership meeting
1130 – 1200. Luncheon at 1200 followed by our speaker, with adjournment at 2:30PM.
Note, as this meeting is a one day event we have not made any hotel arrangements.
Our October 2011 chapter meeting will be held on Saturday 1 October at the Salem Waterfront Hotel located in Salem MA. The hotel web site is here: http://www.salemwaterfronthotel.com/. For directions to the hotel look here: http://www.salemwaterfronthotel.com/location.html
Information about Salem MA and local hotels can be found here: http://salem.org/

For additional information contact us at afionechapter@gmail.com

Advance reservations are $25.00, $30.00 at the door - per person.

Luncheon reservations must be made by 16 September 2011.

Mail your check and the reservation form to:

Mr. Arthur Hulnick, 216 Summit Avenue # E102, Brookline, MA 02446, 617-739-7074 or hlnk@aol.com

Wednesday, 05 October 2011, 8:15am - 3:10pm - Laurel, MD - General Membership Meeting of the National Cryptologic Museum Foundation.

Program: 0815-0900: registration & breakfast; 0900-0915: Welcome by NCMF President, Eugene Becker; 0915-0945: opening address by NSA Director or Deputy Director; 0945-1000: NCM update by Museum Curator Patrick Weadon; 1000-1115: panel discussion on "International Relations with Iran" by Amb Bruce Laingen and Kenneth Timmerman, author and investigative reporter; 1115-1200: Cyber Security Legal issues by Stewart Baker, former general counsel, NSA, author of Skating on Stilts; 1200-1300: lunch and auditorium video presentation of the 1997 Dedication of National Vigilance Park to commemorate the sacrifices of aerial reconnaissance crews;
1300-1400: keynote address by James R. Clapper, Director of National Intelligence; 1400-1410: break; 1410-1440: new museum project and capital campaign update by Lt. Gen. Ken Minihan, MG Rod Isler and Brig Gen Neal Robinson; 1440-1500 the role of the NSA Center for Cryptologic History by Col William Williams; and 1500-1510: closing remarks by Brig Gen Billy Bingham.
LOCATION: JHU/APL Kossiakoff Center - 11100 Johns Hopkins Rd, Laurel, MD 20723-6099 tel: 240-228-7574.
FEE: $15 to NCMF members, $40 per guest. NCMF fee includes breakfast & lunch, and a.m. Refreshments. Shuttle service is available from 0800-0900 and from 1500-1545. Handicap parking is limited.
A silent auction, vintage book sale, and the CWF [NSA's Civilian Welfare Fund] gift shop sale will be held in the lobby area through 1300. Cryptologic artifacts will be on display.
REGISTRATION: Mail registration form with your check or credit card information by 07 September 2011 to NCMF, PO Box 1682 Ft Meade Md 20755. Checks payable to NCMF are preferred method of payment.
Symposium assistance: please call (301) 688-2336 or 301-688-5436 or email: cryptmf@aol.com

Thursday, 6 October 2011, 6:30 p.m. - Washington, DC - American Traitors, Fathers and Sons: The John Walker and Jim Nicholson Family Spy Stories at the International Spy Museum.

How could you do this to your son?" –Mike Wallace to John Walker on 60 Minutes
When the family business is espionage, dynamics and dysfunction take on a whole new meaning. From inside a federal prison, former CIA operative Jim Nicholson directed his son Nathan on a global trek to collect the pension promised to him by his handlers for spying on behalf of Russia. From 2006 to 2008, Nathan smuggled his father’s messages to Russian intelligence officers on three continents in exchange for cold cash. The father-son exploits echoed those of notorious spy John Walker, the retired Navy communications specialist who in 1983 lured his pliable son Michael into his spy ring. The Walkers orchestrated one of the most devastating security breaches in U.S. history. Brian Kelley, a retired CIA counterintelligence operative, along with Bryan Denson, an investigative reporter for The Oregonian, will present the eerie parallels between Walker and Nicholson. Using video interviews with the spies and their sons, they will explain how Walker, who once declared, “Kmart has better security than the Navy,” and Nicholson, the highest-ranking CIA officer ever convicted of espionage, lured their sons into the “family business” of spying. Kelley and Denson will examine the human cost of treachery as inflicted by two traitorous dads on the sons who loved them.
Tickets:  $15.00. To register visit www.spymuseum.org

Thursday-Friday, 6 - 7 October 2011 - Laurel, MD - The NSA's Center for Cryptologic History hosts their Biennial Cryptologic History Symposium with theme: Cryptology in War and Peace: Crisis Points in History.

The National Security Agency’s Center for Cryptologic History sponsors the Cryptologic History Symposium every two years. The next one will be held 6-7 October 2011. Historians from the Center, the Intelligence Community, the defense establishment, and the military services, as well as distinguished scholars from American and foreign academic institutions, veterans of the profession, and the interested public all will gather for two days of reflection and debate on topics from the cryptologic past. The theme for the upcoming conference will be: “Cryptology in War and Peace: Crisis Points in History.” This topical approach is especially relevant as the year 2011 is an important anniversary marking the start of many seminal events in our nation’s military history. The events that can be commemorated are many. Participants will delve into the roles of signals intelligence and information assurance, and not just as these capabilities supported military operations. More cogently, observers will examine how these factors affected and shaped military tactics, operations, strategy, planning, and command and control throughout history. The role of cryptology in preventing conflict and supporting peaceful pursuits will also be examined. The panels will include presentations in a range of technological, operational, organizational, counterintelligence, policy, and international themes. Past symposia have featured scholarship that set out new ways to consider out cryptologic heritage, and this one will be no exception. The mix of practitioners, scholars, and the public precipitates a lively debate that promotes an enhanced appreciation for the context of past events. The Symposium will be held at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory’s Kossiakoff Center, in Laurel, Maryland, a location central to the Baltimore and Washington, D.C., areas. As has been the case with previous symposia, the conference will provide unparalleled opportunities for interaction with leading historians and distinguished experts. So please make plans to join us for either one or both days of this intellectually stimulating conference. Dr. Kent Sieg, the Center’s Symposium Executive Director, 301-688-2336 or via email at kgsieg@nsa.gov. Registration form is here.

7 - 9 October 2011 - Glens Falls, NY - NE Chapter of Naval Cryptologic Veterans Association (NCVA-NE) Fall Mini-Reunion.

Location: Queensbury Hotel, Glens Falls, NY. The registration cut-off date for any local members of the NCVA-NE is September 7, 2011. For additional information call (518) 664-8032 or visit website. Questions? Ask Victor Knorowski, 8 Eagle Lane, Mechanicville, NY 12118 e-mail: knork620@verizon.net or call him at (518) 664-8032

Wednesday, 12 October 2011, 6:30 p.m. - Washington, DC - Dana Priest on "Top Secret America" at the International Spy Museum

An expos� of what this Washington Post reporter claims is a new, secret “Fourth Branch” of American government.
When Dana Priest began researching a Washington Post series on national security following 9/11, she found a top-secret world that, to her, seems to have become so enormous, so unwieldy, and so secretive that no one knows how much money it costs, how many people it employs, or exactly how many agencies duplicate work being done elsewhere. Reporter Priest, author of Top Secret America, will reveal how she investigated this shadow world and the enormous consequences of this invisible universe of over 1,300 government facilities, nearly 2,000 outside contractors, and more than 850,000 people granted “Top Secret” security clearance. The result may be that the system put in place to keep the United States safe is, according to this journalist, putting the U.S. in greater danger. Priest will also screen some segments from the recent FRONTLINE documentary developed in conjunction with her book.
Tickets:  $9.00. To register visit www.spymuseum.org

Saturday, 15 October 2011 - Washington, DC - The OSS Society hosts the 2011 William J. Donovan Award Dinner honoring Adm Eric T. Olson, USN.

Admiral Eric T. Olson, Commander, U.S. Special Operations Command, has been selected to receive the 2011 William J. Donovan Award Dinner. By invitation only. Further information at www.osssociety.org

Thursday, 20 October 2011, noon - Washington, DC - A Vast and Fiendish Plot: The Confederate Attack on New York City - at the International Spy Museum

Ballroom to Battlefield Civil War Program
In 1864, Manhattan had a population of 880,000…a population that came perilously close to death on the evening of 25 November. Six Confederate saboteurs planned to destroy the North’s largest city with a string of 21 separate fires set simultaneously with the goal of engulfing the city in flames. This terrorist plot was the brainchild of the Confederate Secret Service. They had hoped to target a number of northern cities including Boston, Chicago, and Cincinnati to show how easily the Confederacy could strike at Federal cities. Clint Johnson, author of A Vast and Fiendish Plot, will explore this little-known plan for sabotage, explain its links to Canada, and reveal why the saboteurs ultimately failed. Johnson will also speculate on how the saboteurs could have accomplished what would have been the worst terrorist attack in American history.
Tickets:  Free.  No registration required. More information at www.spymuseum.org

Wednesday, 26 October 2011, noon - Washington, DC - MH/CHAOS: The CIA's Campaign Against the Radical Left and the Black Panthers

Operation MHCHAOS was the code name for a secret domestic spying program conducted by the Central Intelligence Agency in the late 1960s and early 1970s charged with unmasking any foreign influences on the student antiwar movement. CIA counterintelligence officer Frank Rafalko was a part of the operation. The New York Times revealed MHCHAOS in 1974, then Congress investigated, and MHCHAOS took its place in the pantheon of intelligence abuses. Rafalko, however, says in MH/CHAOS that the operation was justified and that the CIA was the logical agency to conduct it. He’ll defend his perspective with dramatic intelligence collected on the New Left and black radicals.
Tickets:  Free.  No registration required. More information at www.spymuseum.org

Thursday, 27 October 2011 - Washington, DC - CIA Historical Collections Division Conference: "A City Torn Apart; Building the Berlin Wall - 1961"

Scope: For nearly 50 years the German City of Berlin was the living symbol of the Cold War. The Soviets closed the Sector Border dividing East Berlin from West Berlin on August 13th, 1961, effectively establishing what become known as the Berlin Wall. This symposium focused on the events leading up to the establishment of the Berlin Wall. The period covered included the Vienna Conference on 3 June to the confrontation at Checkpoint Charlie on 27 October 1961. EVENT LOCATION: National Archives and Records Administration, Washington, DC. Contributors will include NATO, ARMY, JFK & LBJ Presidential Libraries, SHAEF, and State Department. Details about event to follow from AFIO as we get closer to event.

27 October 2011, 0930- 1715 - Newport News - AFIO Norman Forde Hampton Roads Chapter Third Annual Workshop on National Security and Intelligence: Energy Security

Location: Christopher Newport University, David Student Union, Newport News, Tabb Library, York County. Directions: From Norfolk take I-64 West. Merge onto US-17 North via Exit 258B toward Yorktown. Follow US-17 North approximately 2.2 miles to Victory Blvd/VA-171 East. Turn right onto Victory Blvd/VA-171 East. Turn right at the next traffic light onto Hampton Hwy/VA-134 South. Turn right at the next traffic light onto Long Green Blvd. Tabb Library is on the immediate right. It is across the street from the Victory YMCA. From Williamsburg take I-64 East. Merge onto Victory Blvd/VA-171 East via Exit 256B. Follow Victory Blvd/VA-171 East approximately 2 miles. Turn right onto Hampton Hwy/VA-134 South. Turn right at the next traffic light onto Long Green Blvd. Tabb Library is on the immediate right. It is across the street from the Victory YMCA. Registrations and questions to Melissa Saunders mwsaunders@cox.net or call 757-897-6268.

2 November 2011 - Simi Valley, CA - CIA Historical Collections Division Conference: "Ronald Reagan, Intelligence, and the End of the Cold War"

Scope: President Reagan and his use of intelligence in the formulation of US-Soviet policy. The symposium will feature high-level former policymakers, intelligence practitioners, intelligence analysts, and historians discussing how the Reagan Administration used intelligence in making policies to end the Cold War. As part of this event, the CIA is releasing a collection of some 200 declassified documents, including intelligence assessments, research papers, National Intelligence Estimates, high-level memos, and briefing materials provided to the Administration during this period. The collection includes several video briefings prepared by the CIA's Directorate of Intelligence and delivered to policymakers on such varied topics as the Soviet space program, the Andropov succession, the Chernobyl disaster, and the Moscow summit. 200 documents. Event Location: Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, Simi Valley, CA. Event Partners: Center for the Study of Intelligence, Ronald Reagan Presidential Library. Details about event to follow from AFIO as we get closer to event

For Additional Events two+ months or greater....view our online Calendar of Events

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