Shut up old man! - TTG

A couple of days ago, Colonel Lang asked a question about HUMINT support to SFOD Delta in light of the recent raid on Barisha.

PL> Woolsey just said on Fox that CIA was the main support for the raid. Do the two of you agree with that?

TTG> I personally think Woolsey is talking out his ass. DoD and JSOC in particular has developed a lot of capability in this area. DIA was doing the same. We had people integrated into the various task forces in Afghanistan and Iraq for years. CIA is still involved, but not to the extent it was decades ago.

I listened to the Woolsey comment today. I am now even more convinced he was talking out his ass. He represents the old CIA attitude of undeserved superiority and misplaced disdain for military intelligence. It’s a common attitude for a lot of these old fossils. I’ve seen it many times.  It was annoying. Well, times have changed. As I told Colonel Lang, military intelligence has changed dramatically in recent years. I witnessed a lot of these changes first hand working at DIA. I will be careful about what I say since many of the details of these changes remain classified. I will say only what I can find in unclassified, printed documents. Here are three documents you can review yourselves at your leisure.

https://www.esd.whs.mil/Portals/54/Documents/FOID/Reading%20Room/Administration_and_Management/09-F-0656_DoDD_5200.37_Management_and_Execution_of_Defense_Human_Intelligence_02-09-2009.pdf?ver=2017-05-15-135557-533

https://fas.org/irp/doddir/army/fm2-22-3.pdf

https://info.publicintelligence.net/CALL-CommandersGuideHUMINT.pdf

The first document is the culmination of a multi-year struggle by DIA and USD(I) to provide better and more timely HUMINT support to the commands and task forces operating in Afghanistan and Iraq. We created a new category of controlled collection operations called military source operations (MSO). The most significant change wrought by the creation of MSOs is that ultimate approval/coordination lies with USD(I) for the most sensitive category of MSOs. Other MSOs are approved at lower DoD levels. Prior to this, all controlled collection operations required CIA coordination/approval. CIA didn’t like this change, but DIA, the Army and the combatant commands loved it.

The remaining two documents are Army publications. They discuss a new prominence for HUMINT operations at the combatant command and joint task force (JTF) levels. A robust J2X is established at these levels to oversee and control HUMINT operations. In addition to controlled HUMINT operations, the J2X controls debriefing and interrogation operations. DIA also began to emphasize this full range of HUMINT in support of joint commands in Afghanistan, Iraq and other regions where JTFs operated. This included various JSOC JTFs.

Now back to Woolsey’s comments. He was fishing for nice words from Trump for his old CIA. He still lives in a world where CIA dominated the HUMINT world, a world where everyone only thinks of the CIA when HUMINT is mentioned. I still see this. People look at me cross eyed when I tell them I worked for DIA. They say, “What’s DIA? Do you mean CIA?” At least we got a mention from Woolsey. He did say, “I’m sure there were other agencies involved, Defense and so forth, too, but the CIA pulled the main strings on human intelligence there and it was brilliant.” Shut up, old man. I don’t buy it. I’m sure the CIA was represented in the J2X and had collectors and analysts involved, but HUMINT support to these JTFs are now a DoD affair.

So who did provide the key HUMINT support to the raid on Barisha? According to Polat Can, it was the YPG. Polat Can is a senior adviser to the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and former Representative of the People’s Protection Units (YPG) to the International Coalition. I wouldn’t be surprised if my old unit was involved with the YPG Huminters. We did a lot of that kind of liaison work in support of Delta and ST6. We often passed ourselves off as CIA when he did so. It saved a lot of questions.

Here’s Polat Can’s account on twitter:

@PolatCanRojava   SDF Senior Advisor  (28 August)

1- Through our own sources, we managed to confirm that Al Baghdadi had moved from Al Dashisha area in Deir Al Zor to Idlib. Since 15 May, we have been working together with the CIA to track Al Baghdadi and monitor him closely.

2 - One of our sources was able to reach the house where Al Baghdadi was hiding. Al Baghdadi changed his places of residence very often. He was about to move to a new place in Jerablus.

3 - Our own source, who had been able to reach Al Baghdadi, brought Al Baghdadi’s underwear to conduct a DNA test and make sure (100%) that the person in question was Al Baghdadi himself.

4- More than a month ago, the decision was made to eliminate Al Baghdadi. However, the US withdrawal and the Turkish invasion prompted us to stop our special operations, including the pursuit of Al Baghdadi. The Turkish invasion caused a delay in the operation.

5- All intelligence and access to Al Baghdadi as well as the identification of his place, were the result of our own work. Our intelligence source was involved in sending coordinates, directing the airdrop, participating in and making the operation a success until the last minute

6 - All armed groups and elements surrounding the village of Barisha were Daesh (ISIS) terrorists, operating under various names. In the airdrop operation, all their military posts and positions were targeted.

7- Terrorist Abu al-Hassan was on a special mission to Jerablus to secure Al Baghdadi’s transfer to his new home. There was a plan B to target Al Baghdadi in his new home if he had moved before the planned strike in Barisha. Abu al-Hassan was closely monitored by SDF intelligence

TTG

Comments

[Leith]

Isn't Woolsey a neocon? And even though he led the CIA for two years, he was never an insider, just a lawyer with experience in arms control, a tourist. It's mox nix to me which agency was the main support. Everyone is going to claim a piece of a successful operation as Tacitus once said, or words to that effect. It is just when an op fails that nobody claims the lead. But I agree that the CIA does like to hog credit. In Nam half or more of the CIA personnel were TDY from the Army or Marines.

I would hope that the CIA would concentrate on Daeshi/al-Qaeda ratlines in and out of Turkey.

[Leith]

CENTCOM confirmed that the DNA analysis was done in a DIA lab.

[J]

Woolsey is a brown noser who always had (and still has apparently) his head up somebody's backsides. That's seems to be the trend regarding the NEOCONS like Woolsey and Bolton.

I've been saying for 'years' that IMO the CIA needs to be disassembled and all its 'stuff' transferred to DIA where at least the national interests trumps politics. The CIA is a political runner, no longer an Intelligence runner. Jut look at how Tenet (and when she was SecOState Hillary) left CIA agents out to dry, like the one recently brought back to our beloved U.S. by Gina (God Bless Gina's soul).

There are a lot of good hard working devoted CIA agents, it's the CIA bureaucracy IMO that has become dry-rot and needs to be disassembled.

Time for a cup-o-java with a whiskey chaser.

[turcopolier]

All

When this creep was DCI and I ran Defense HUMINT I spent half my time wheedling coordination/approval out of the CIA and they often lied and cheated claiming previous interest in sources that we were required to reveal to them for coordination. The worm has turned...

[turcopolier]

TTG

The great liberation occurred after 9/11 when the AUMF (essentially a declaration of war) removed Defense HUMINT from CIA oversight and interference.

[turcopolier]

j

Woolsey is an arch neocon, a member of the inner group of “gentlemen”. These guys have only feigned party affiliation and are loyal only to the neocon group. They spread themselves across both parties.

[turcopolier]

All

The original Woolsey statement was at https://www.foxnews.com/person/b/shannon-bream nine items down.

[Harlan Easley]

Is Neocon just a Euphemism for a World Government ideology?

[The Twisted Genius]

Harlan, I consider a neocon to be a strident US nationalist totally committed to US world domination.

[turcopolier]

TTG

No. Neocons seek world domination under their rule. The US is just a tool for them.

[ISL]

Dear Colonel, ... and Israel always seems to be a top neocon priority - often subsuming US interests.

[turcopolier]

ISL

The neocons see Israel as yet another tool.

[Diana C]

Knowing nothing about the workings of intelligence agencies, I find this thread quite informative.

What popped into my mind is that somehow the "talking heads" of the media need to be made better informed about who should or should not be allowed to be "talking head" on the major stations.

As a largely uninformed person in these matter, living out here in the West, my idea of what "DIA" stands for is Denver International Airport. So, I am now happy to know that it can mean what it means to you on this blog.(it's why I come to this blog, to learn things.)

I know we cant count on the organizations of CNN and its ilk to get it right, but at least maybe FOX can get a heads up about who should be considered an expert and who should not. I do know that with the likes of Hannity, FOX will always get a NEOCON perspective. Perhaps the people there can at least tell us openly that we are getting that perspective when we listen to some of their sources.

I am just finally feeling some relief that I no longer see much of Yosemite Sam Bolton.

[mac]

TGG,

I wonder if the definition must not also include 'totally committed to Israel?' Do u see the neocon record as having advanced US security interests in any meaningful way? Thinking of their record,I understand it to have not strengthened the Pax Americana.

[ex PFC Chuck]

It seems to me some of the neocons conflate Israeli national interests as perceived by the Likkud party and its allies as ipso facto national interests of the USA. e.g. Douglas Feith of the Bush 43 administration.

[The Twisted Genius]

Mac, the overlap between neocons and Zionists is pretty remarkable, although I don't see them as the same thing. It's a symbiotic relationship. Neocons are stridently anti-communist, sharing that same disdain for pacifists. Although Colonel Lang and I disagree on this point, neocons espouse a warped authoritarian view of America and conservative American culture. They believe the entire world should either accept those views or be forcibly subjugated.

[turcopolier]

TTG

We agree on the overlap but, as you say, these are distinct groups. You seem to want to pin neoconism on the conservative side of US politics, but this is, in fact, an international movement with arms in the UK and Israel. In fact the neocon movement has Trotskyite roots. Do you see that somewhere in American conservatism?

[Johnb]

My observation is that the American Conservative Blog provides some of the most radical challenge to ruling neo-con orthodoxy and by so doing is fulfilling a role of small c conservatism.
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/
If I have understood correctly a principle concern of the Colonel and his correspondents is the sustaining of Constitutional order in the operation of power within the United States, something those living outside the United States also have more than a passing interest in.

[JerseyJeffersonian]

Well, some chat has it that Bolton will be called to testify in the "impeachment inquiry", so he is still playing his role in undermining Constitutional order. Surprise!

[jd hawkins]

"I wonder if the definition must not also include 'totally committed to Israel"?

I certainly do!

[J]

Both John Brennan and John McLaughlin have openly bragged on camera regarding their treason to the U.S.:

https://summit.news/2019/11/01/thank-god-for-the-deep-state-intel-traitors-admit-they-want-to-take-out-trump/

Time that AG Barr arrested both Brennan and McLaughlin, and made them do the perp walk.

[English Outsider]

TTG - I remember it being said on SST in the past that one of the problems was that Human Intelligence - which I take to mean anything from a cocktail party at the Embassy to penetrating organisations - had lost out to Signals Intelligence. The former sort risking embarrassing blowback, whereas the second was comparatively risk free.

It was rumoured on some sites that the reason the Russians managed to swap their forces around in the Crimea unnoticed was that the orders didn't go out by means of normal channels. Typewritten messages sent by motorbike rather than encrypted communications - that type of communication giving no hint, by an increase of signals traffic etc, that anything was about to happen.

If that's so there'd have been no one from any Western Intelligence agency standing around at some quayside thinking "Rather a lot going on here. Something must be up." Instead, dozens of people sitting at computer screens noticing nothing much amiss. And one assumes the Russians were similarly careful in advance of the extraordinary moves they made in Syria.

Your article is, I think, more about Intelligence for local operations in the field than in Intelligence on a wider scale, but presumably the same applies there. Given that highly skilled experts are two a penny when it comes to anything to do with IT, whereas it must be difficult to get trained and experienced personnel for HUMINT in the field, does this not indicate a lack when it comes to field operations as well? Not in the case you're discussing, obviously, but generally?

Setting aside moral considerations the various Western interventions one reads about all have one thing in common. They are incredibly ham-fisted. "Designed to fail", in retrospect, when one looks at the results and at the little information that comes out about how they were done. Is the shift from HUMINT to SIGINT one reason for that?

In addition to that, the Israelis are reckoned to be strong in HUMINT. Many linguists, exceptional local knowledge, not too bothered by the ROE's that are set out in the documents you link to. There will also presumably be French and UK agencies who've retained at least some of the links they had in the area from colonial days and who have built on those links since.

Any information from such sources could well be tailored to suit the objectives of those passing the information on. Could this also account for Western interventionist operations often looking, as said, ham-fisted in retrospect?

[turcopolier]

EO

There is a deep underlying tension between SIGINTers and HUMINters in the business. The barons of the IC of course don't care about that. They don't do the work. They just politic for budget and promotion. The US government and media prattle endlessly about the need for really good HUMINT but the business itself is mysterious and somehow repugnant to Americans. CIA was repeatedly purged of skilled HUMINTERS from the time of Carter on, and the institution has never really recovered its skills in recruiting and running foreign penetrants. Military Intelligence, long struggled in the HUMINT field against the CIA's belief that MI was "the real enemy," rather than the USSR but they have grown stronger and stronger and as I said the post 9/11 AUMF was the great moment of liberation. Before that DIA ran good operations at the strategic level but it was a continual struggle to deal with Langley.

[J]

The Israelis are not as strong in HUMINT as they try to make the world think they are. They're good propagandists when it come to touting their own horn.

[anon]

Good links.