Unfriendly act
Unfriendly act
Posted 11:22pm (Mla time) Jan 28, 2005
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the January 29, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
THE UNITED States has traveled far from the days of Herbert Hoover, when US Secretary of State Henry Stimson shut down the cryptonalytic office (which was in charge of intercepting written intelligence), saying, “Gentlemen do not read each other's mail." As secretary of war to Franklin D. Roosevelt, Stimson presided over some of the most famous code-breaking efforts in the history of espionage, such as the breaking of the Japanese code "Purple." By the time Stimson retired, the United States, which established the Office of Strategic Service (precursor of the CIA) under his watch, ran one of the most efficient and vast spy networks in history.
Under President Harry Truman, who established the CIA, American intelligence efforts concentrated on two kinds of spying: the gathering of "humint" (human intelligence) and "elint" (electronic intelligence). With the development of spy satellite and jet planes, and the computer, Americans have gotten to increasingly rely on elint.
But as far back as the Reagan years, conservative critics of US intelligence methods, such as Donald Rumsfeld, increasingly felt that the CIA was devoting far too many resources to elint rather than humint -- not least because of an executive order dating back to Gerald Ford making assassination illegal as a means of promoting American interests. There are fairly strict guarantees of congressional oversight on CIA activities that Rumsfeld and his allies feel are too tight. The CIA, in Rumsfeld's opinion, is "understaffed, slow-moving and risk-averse."
The result is the creation of a rival spy service directly under Rumsfeld, within the Department of Defense, exempt from congressional oversight and other requirements that, in his view, have turned the CIA into an over-careful and ineffective agency. The name of the new organization -- Strategic Support Branch -- betrays it as a throwback to the cloak-and-dagger and more ruthless days of the World War II OSS. "Designed to operate without detection and under the defense secretary's direct control,'' the Washington Post said, "the Strategic Support Branch deploys small teams of case officers, linguists, interrogators and technical specialists alongside newly empowered special operations forces," giving Rumsfeld the "full spectrum of humint operations."
The new agency has, according to American media, actually been in operation for two years now. The Post quotes Gen. Richard B. Myers, chair of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, as saying that the focus of the intelligence initiative is on "emerging target countries such as Somalia, Yemen, Indonesia, Philippines and Georgia."
It is Rumsfeld's zest for undercover operations in nations not actually inside the theater of operations of US military forces, like the Philippines, that has caused great concern here at home. Filipinos are quite familiar with the controversial history of CIA operations in this country, particularly during the anti-Huk campaigns, when American success was so spectacular that they thought it could be duplicated in other places such as Vietnam (it couldn't).
Today the question facing Filipinos concerns the declared intent of the United States to engage in a new, lavishly funded and apparently risky espionage effort on a declared major ally, especially since the US Department of Defense has traditionally undertaken intelligence gathering in locations identified as war zones. Now, the entire planet seems to have become a war zone in Washington's eyes.
Where does the Philippine stand? And to what pressures -- both official and unofficial, both traditionally sanctioned, such as parties and person-to-person talks, and unsanctioned, such as blackmail, bribery, and snooping on telecommunications and the mail -- will Filipinos and their leaders be subjected to?
The country needs reassurance on this point. The United States has, time and again, punished with deportation or imprisonment, American and foreign nationals, whether from enemies such as the Soviet Union or allies such as Israel, caught engaging in espionage in US territory. All countries engage in espionage, but every country considers espionage aimed against it a crime deserving harsh punishment. Does the Philippine government intend to give the United States free rein to spy on Filipinos, and to an extent that goes beyond what is expected even of the CIA? Even more important, is such spying going to be done with the active assistance of the Philippine government or without its knowledge?
Sharing intelligence is what allies do. Spying without consulting or informing an ally is, to put it mildly, an extremely unfriendly act.
Posted 11:22pm (Mla time) Jan 28, 2005
Inquirer News Service
Editor's Note: Published on page A14 of the January 29, 2005 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer
THE UNITED States has traveled far from the days of Herbert Hoover, when US Secretary of State Henry Stimson shut down the cryptonalytic office (which was in charge of intercepting written intelligence), saying, “Gentlemen do not read each other's mail." As secretary of war to Franklin D. Roosevelt, Stimson presided over some of the most famous code-breaking efforts in the history of espionage, such as the breaking of the Japanese code "Purple." By the time Stimson retired, the United States, which established the Office of Strategic Service (precursor of the CIA) under his watch, ran one of the most efficient and vast spy networks in history.
Under President Harry Truman, who established the CIA, American intelligence efforts concentrated on two kinds of spying: the gathering of "humint" (human intelligence) and "elint" (electronic intelligence). With the development of spy satellite and jet planes, and the computer, Americans have gotten to increasingly rely on elint.
But as far back as the Reagan years, conservative critics of US intelligence methods, such as Donald Rumsfeld, increasingly felt that the CIA was devoting far too many resources to elint rather than humint -- not least because of an executive order dating back to Gerald Ford making assassination illegal as a means of promoting American interests. There are fairly strict guarantees of congressional oversight on CIA activities that Rumsfeld and his allies feel are too tight. The CIA, in Rumsfeld's opinion, is "understaffed, slow-moving and risk-averse."
The result is the creation of a rival spy service directly under Rumsfeld, within the Department of Defense, exempt from congressional oversight and other requirements that, in his view, have turned the CIA into an over-careful and ineffective agency. The name of the new organization -- Strategic Support Branch -- betrays it as a throwback to the cloak-and-dagger and more ruthless days of the World War II OSS. "Designed to operate without detection and under the defense secretary's direct control,'' the Washington Post said, "the Strategic Support Branch deploys small teams of case officers, linguists, interrogators and technical specialists alongside newly empowered special operations forces," giving Rumsfeld the "full spectrum of humint operations."
The new agency has, according to American media, actually been in operation for two years now. The Post quotes Gen. Richard B. Myers, chair of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, as saying that the focus of the intelligence initiative is on "emerging target countries such as Somalia, Yemen, Indonesia, Philippines and Georgia."
It is Rumsfeld's zest for undercover operations in nations not actually inside the theater of operations of US military forces, like the Philippines, that has caused great concern here at home. Filipinos are quite familiar with the controversial history of CIA operations in this country, particularly during the anti-Huk campaigns, when American success was so spectacular that they thought it could be duplicated in other places such as Vietnam (it couldn't).
Today the question facing Filipinos concerns the declared intent of the United States to engage in a new, lavishly funded and apparently risky espionage effort on a declared major ally, especially since the US Department of Defense has traditionally undertaken intelligence gathering in locations identified as war zones. Now, the entire planet seems to have become a war zone in Washington's eyes.
Where does the Philippine stand? And to what pressures -- both official and unofficial, both traditionally sanctioned, such as parties and person-to-person talks, and unsanctioned, such as blackmail, bribery, and snooping on telecommunications and the mail -- will Filipinos and their leaders be subjected to?
The country needs reassurance on this point. The United States has, time and again, punished with deportation or imprisonment, American and foreign nationals, whether from enemies such as the Soviet Union or allies such as Israel, caught engaging in espionage in US territory. All countries engage in espionage, but every country considers espionage aimed against it a crime deserving harsh punishment. Does the Philippine government intend to give the United States free rein to spy on Filipinos, and to an extent that goes beyond what is expected even of the CIA? Even more important, is such spying going to be done with the active assistance of the Philippine government or without its knowledge?
Sharing intelligence is what allies do. Spying without consulting or informing an ally is, to put it mildly, an extremely unfriendly act.
posted by Dante at 9:53 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home