Reforming the Reform

Enough with the dots, already. As the story of the Underwear Bomber shows, the problem with U.S. intelligence is that it knows too much -- and understands too little.

BY CHRISTIAN CARYL | JANUARY 23, 2010

Now that the dust has settled a bit from the abortive Christmas Day terrorist attack, and as top officials are being hauled up to Capitol Hill to be raked over the coals, it's probably a good opportunity to take stock. The incident is said to have thrown various failings of the U.S. intelligence community into stark relief. President Obama himself has spoken of "systemic failures" and vowed to shake things up.

But are the changes he's proposing really the ones that are needed?

First off, let's get a few things straight. Most stories about the failed attack presume that the intentions of the would-be bomber, the Nigerian Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, should have been clear to U.S. security officials from the outset. He paid cash for his ticket -- a huge "red flag," we're told. He allegedly purchased a one-way ticket and didn't check any bags. What's more, his father had informed the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria that Abdulmutallab had become disturbingly radical in his Islamic beliefs. Surely, we're told, it should have been obvious from these various pieces of information that he was about to try to blow up a plane. Someone didn't "connect the dots."

Let's start with paying in cash. Abdulmutallab purchased his ticket at the KLM office in Accra, Ghana. Ghana is not exactly a country awash in credit cards. Until fairly recently as little as 5 percent of the population had bank accounts, and most transactions in the country are still handled in cash. So it's hard to imagine why paying for a plane ticket in cash there should have set off alarm bells. As for the one-way ticket and the lack of luggage, on closer inspection neither of these seems to be precisely true. Recent reports show that Abdulmutallab actually purchased a round-trip ticket for his trip from Lagos to Detroit, and it also appears now that he took baggage with him on board the plane. (Again, it's relatively normal these days for people to prefer carry-ons to checked bags, even on longer flights. It's hard to see how doing that could be turned into a criterion for potential terrorist activities.)

So what about that ominous warning from Abdulmutallab's dad? This also turns out to be a case of less than meets the eye. There's actually nothing unusual about people being fingered as terrorists; it happens all the time. Afghans and Iraqis learned a long time ago that accusing someone of harboring designs on the security United States can be a great way of making trouble for a rival. It's precisely for this reason that U.S. embassies around the world have made a habit of insisting upon corroboration of such claims by additional sources before issuing alerts about possible "terrorists." In the wake of the failed Detroit bombing, one U.S. intelligence official pointed out to the Washington Post that Abdulmutallab's dad never mentioned anything about his son being a terrorist, "let alone planning an attack." Given the vagueness of the father's warning, it's hard to see how any of America's intelligence agencies might have assumed that the son was a suicide bomber in the making. (Or, as the florid bureaucratese of President Obama's in-house review would have it: "Hindsight suggests that the evaluation by watchlisting personnel of the information contained in the State cable nominating Mr. Abdulmutallab did not meet the minimum standard of the watchlist.")

 SUBJECTS: INTELLIGENCE
 

Christian Caryl is a contributing editor to Foreign Policy. His column, “Reality Check,” appears weekly on ForeignPolicy.com.

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SIR_MIXXALOT

2:06 PM ET

January 25, 2010

Dot this....US foriegn policy

CIA veterans know best...............................

http://thehill.com/special-reports-archive/699-homeland-security-january-2010/75531-when-troops-and-cia-officers-die-for-a-fantasy

excerpt:
No U.S. soldier, Marine, or CIA officer has been killed by an Islamist fighter who took the field because America has women in the workplace, beer is available in ample supply, and there are early presidential primaries in Iowa every fourth year. Indeed, Islamists motivated by such issues would not rise to the level of a lethal nuisance; they certainly could not stymie the U.S. military in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The young Nigerian in Detroit and the Jordanian bomber in Khost and his wife have told America’s Marines, soldiers, and CIA officers what they already surely sense, but what their political leaders deny. Both attackers cited motivations that pivot on U.S. support for Israel against the Palestinians; U.S. occupation of Muslim lands; and U.S. attacks on their fellow Muslims. The three individuals’ words echo the components of U.S. foreign policy named by bin Laden in 1996 as the causes of war — which also include U.S. support for Arab tyrants and exploitation of Muslim energy resources — and which polls show 80 percent of the world’s Muslims identify as attacks on their faith.

While it is hard for Americans to hear, we are at war with a steadily growing number of young men and women in the Muslim world because of what the U.S. government has done in that arena since 1945. The current slate of U.S. foreign policies toward the Islamic world generates the basic and most compelling and uniting motivation for our Islamist enemies.

Should some of these policies be changed? I surely think so

 

SAM GARDNER

3:10 PM ET

January 25, 2010

Just get real

Still 3 % of the population believes Elvis lives, they say, this is a staggering 180 million people, if this statistic would be valid on the scale of the world.

The raving lunatics will always be with you. While there was some heroism in the hijackings of Black September, Al Quada has brought this to the level of your neighborhood sociopath adolescent. They don't fight, they just face their existential lonely angst while fumbling in their underwear (like so many lonely teenagers fumble). Alone on a long haul flight.

Moreover the success rate of suicide bombers is relatively low. Most succeed in one aspect though: the one who pulls the wrong string on the wrong moment dies in an explosion of gore.

Meanwhile ancient Islam theologians were against the use of trebuchets in middle age warfare, as they kill indiscriminately, and as a Muslim, you should never kill innocents.

 

VITO

11:08 PM ET

January 25, 2010

ummmmmmmm why are we ignoring this?

Israeli firm blasted for letting would-be plane bomber slip through

By Yossi Melman, Haaretz Correspondent

?
The Israeli firm ICTS International (not to be confused with ICTS Europe, which is a different company), and two of its subsidiaries are at the crux of an international investigation in recent days, as experts try to pinpoint the reasons for the security failure that enabled Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab to board Northwest flight 253 and attempt to set alight explosives hidden in his underwear.

A Haaretz investigation has learned that the security officers and their supervisor should have suspected the passenger, even without having early intelligence available to them.

At this time, ICTS and the Dutch security firm G4S are hurling recriminations at each other, as are the authorities at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam, the Federal Aviation Authority and U.S. intelligence officials.

The failure was a twin flop: An intelligence failure, which U.S. President Barack Obama has already stated, in the poor handling of information that arrived at the State Department and probably also the CIA from both the father of the would-be bomber and the British security service; and a failure within the security system, including that of the Israeli firm ICTS.

The ICTS daughter company, I-SEC, has another daughter company - called PI (Pro-Check International). The firms provide security services to airports: consultation, instruction, training, inspection and supervision.

Two decades ago, ICTS adopted the system used in Israel, namely of profiling and assessing the degree to which a passenger is a potential threat on the basis of a number indicators (including age, name, origin and behavior during questioning). At the same time, a decade ago, the company developed a technological system called APS (Advanced Passenger Screening).

This system is based on a computerized algorithm, and is fed passenger information from the airline company. The system was offered to the Israel Airports Authority and the Shin Bet in the past, but rejected. According to the company's Web site, most of the large airlines in the United States use the system.

However - in real time - the system of ICTS failed. Even if U.S. intelligence failed and the name of the Nigerian passenger was not pinpointed as a suspect for the airline, he should have stirred the suspicion of the security officers. His age, name, illogical travel route, high-priced ticket purchased at the last minute, his boarding without luggage (only a carry on) and many other signs should have been sufficient to alert the security officers and warrant further examination of the suspect.

However, the security supervisor representing I-SEC and PI allowed him to get on the flight.

ICTS was established in 1982 by former members of the Shin Bet and El Al security. Menachem Atzmon, who has been chairman of the board of directors since 2004, holds the controlling shares in the firm.

The ICTS headquarters are in the Netherlands and the company is traded in the New York Stock Exchange. Some senior managers are Israeli, including the joint managing director Ran Langer.

Another important figure is Doron Zicher, general manager of I-SEC. Zicher has been in charge of operations in the Netherlands for more than two decades and has served as adviser to the Dutch Justice Ministry, which is responsible for setting guidelines for airport security.

The company prides itself on employing 1,300 persons and providing security services to airports in 11 countries including France, Britain, Spain, Hungary, Romania and Russia.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1141434.html

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jQz8o58w82oYBCdo0uqNkxIvPc2w

http://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/General+News/44543/Israeli+Firm+Blew+it+Regarding+Terrorist+With+Underwear+Bomb.html