There is always a lot of jockeying for prominence in the intel world. Sadly it means that our overall ability to know what is actually going on anywhere sucks Hoover (the vacuum, not the cross-dressing, turf-protecting FBI guy). There have been some recent rumblings about who is doing what in Afghanistan and here are a couple of pieces looking at just that. At Breitbart's Big Journalism, author Brad Thor points out some whining in the supposed "private intel operation" run by an AF employee. To that end, the latest axe-grinders granted access to the once venerable, now wrinkled Gray Lady’s anemic subscribership are Canadian Robert Young Pelton and anti-US military, ex-CNN News exec, Eason Jordan. In a piece yesterday entitled Contractors Tied to Effort to Track and Kill Militants, Messsrs. Pelton and Jordan vent their rage at losing a Department of Defense contract and take outrageous outrage to new heights by claiming that not only did they lose the contract, but that the people they suspect took over are doing an even better job: The contractor, Robert Young Pelton, an author who writes extensively about war zones, said that the government hired him to gather information about Afghanistan and that [Michael D.] Furlong improperly used his work. “We were providing information so they could better understand the situation in Afghanistan, and it was being used to kill people,” Mr. Pelton said. He said that he and Eason Jordan, a former television news executive, had been hired by the military to run a public Web site to help the government gain a better understanding of a region that bedeviled them. Recently, the top military intelligence official in Afghanistan publicly said that intelligence collection was skewed too heavily toward hunting terrorists, at the expense of gaining a deeper understanding of the country. Instead, Mr. Pelton said, millions of dollars that were supposed to go to the Web site were redirected by Mr. Furlong toward intelligence gathering for the purpose of attacking militants. Outrage! Set aside for a moment your shock at learning that a liberal media hack (who was forced to resign from CNN over remarks that U.S. soldiers were killing journalists in Iraq) and Pelton, a non-U.S citizen whose reporting from Afghanistan has been publicly challenged by the Army, ended up losing a D.O.D. contract, and consider how incredibly unprofessional and inappropriate it is for the New York Times to give these guys a platform. It is also dangerous and could well result in blood ending up on the hands of Pelton, Jordan and the two Times stooges who willingly wrote the article for them. From one of Tim Lynch's buddies over at Free Range International a look at the pecking order. Editors Note: Chim Chim wanted to provide his perspective on the recent CIA versus contractor story which exploded in the main stream media last week. He knows of what he speaks: I have been on both sides of the equation. I have sat in DoD meetings dealing with the Agency and Agency meetings dealing with DoD. The relationship has always been dysfunctional and in some cases downright hostile. One could chalk it up to a “language” issue but it really comes down to turf. Folks, “turf” in beltway speak means “Budget.” Budget means power and there in essence is the core of the problem. For the last 30 years, the Agency has resisted restructure or effective coordination because it has always felt that any concession would degrade their never ending battle for budget. Sure, you have the Intellicrats (I’ll take credit for this descriptive term). The Intellicrats job is to guard the “family jewels” or the sacred and God given mission of Intelligence. They see anyone else who engages in this endeavor as second class citizens at best and unworthy of attention. That is unless they do a good job… Then, whomever this effective and of course offending entity is… must be dealt with. Normally, when the Agency sees a viable network it will attempt to hijack it utilizing their imperial right of way. Failing to do that, they will “suggest” a task force or panel… (read that mini-hijack). Failing in both these endeavors, they will outright attack the network or capability. The first two, I have no problem with. I have done it myself and if still in, I would have suggested it in this case. The attacking and undermining of an effective network which is providing definitive product to the DoD (read that, the USA) is unconscionable. But, unlike most Americans who have shown shock at this behavior I understand the real reasons… and it is turf and budget. Anyone who has ever worked in a task force with multiple players from the Intel community will tell In case anyone wondered why we are generally clueless as to the truth on the ground anywhere, well...there you go.
Read the complete post at http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Blackfive/~3/O9hXQq8nc2U/intel-turf-wars.html
Posted
Mar 24 2010, 02:02 AM
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BLACKFIVE