Civil Liberties and National Security
By George Friedman
Stratfor: Geopolitical Intelligence Report - May 16, 2006

USA Today published a story last week stating that U.S. telephone companies (Qwest excepted) had been handing over to the National Security Agency (NSA) logs of phone calls made by American citizens. This has, as one might expect, generated a fair bit of controversy -- with opinions ranging from "It's not only legal but a great idea" to "This proves that Bush arranged 9/11 so he could create a police state." A fine time is being had by all. Therefore, it would seem appropriate to pause and consider the matter.

Let's begin with an obvious question: How in God's name did USA Today find out about a program that had to have been among the most closely held secrets in the intelligence community -- not only because it would be embarrassing if discovered, but also because the entire program could work only if no one knew it was under way? No criticism of USA Today, but we would assume that the newspaper wasn't running covert operations against the NSA. Therefore, someone gave them the story, and whoever gave them the story had to be cleared to know about it. That means that someone with a high security clearance leaked an NSA secret.

Americans have become so numbed to leaks at this point that no one really has discussed the implications of what we are seeing: The intelligence community is hemorrhaging classified information. It's possible that this leak came from one of the few congressmen or senators or staffers on oversight committees who had been briefed on this material -- but either way, we are seeing an extraordinary breakdown among those with access to classified material.

The reason for this latest disclosure is obviously the nomination of Gen. Michael Hayden to be the head of the CIA. Before his appointment as deputy director of national intelligence, Hayden had been the head of the NSA, where he oversaw the collection and data-mining project involving private phone calls. Hayden's nomination to the CIA has come under heavy criticism from Democrats and Republicans, who argue that he is an inappropriate choice for director. The release of the data-mining story to USA Today obviously was intended as a means of shooting down his nomination -- which it might. But what is important here is not the fate of Hayden, but the fact that the Bush administration clearly has lost all control of the intelligence community -- extended to include congressional oversight processes. That is not a trivial point.

At the heart of the argument is not the current breakdown in Washington, but the more significant question of why the NSA was running such a collection program and whether the program represented a serious threat to liberty. The standard debate is divided into two schools: those who regard the threat to liberty as trivial when compared to the security it provides, and those who regard the security it ... [ Read More (1.8k in body) ]

Friedman, as he does frequently, cuts right to heart of the matter here, I think.

A few notes :

But can one live with the threat from al Qaeda more readily than that from government power? That is the crucial question that must be answered. ... In the long run, is increased government power more or less dangerous than al Qaeda?

Part of what makes this such a difficult question to answer is that the results of unchecked (or poorly checked, which ends up being the same thing on a slightly longer time scale) government power are relatively well understood. We don't know exactly how things would pan out, but we have a pretty good idea of the kinds of things that would happen. Some of those ideas have been overblown by movies and the like, but I still feel like people have a decent grasp of what an exremely powerful government can do. On the other hand, we don't have a good idea of precisely how dangerous Al Qaeda is in the long run, or exactly how much effort on our part is required to reduce the threat to a reasonable level.

(this leaves out the question of what a "reasonable level" of threat really even is, which is largely what Friedman calls us to discuss. My point it that even if that consensus is had, I don't think anyone has a good feel for how to achieve that level.)

Of course, those who favor increased government power to conduct security operations believe the threat from Al Queda to be the most extreme. They have visions of nuclear annihilation and rampant islam. Many of them probably have visions of joyous liberals dancing with the terrorists, given what can be read on any given day around the internets.

I concede that the other side may sometimes minimize the danger somewhat, but it's tough to guage in a climate where *any* disagreement with a particular course of action by the administration is met with cries ranging from "obstructionist" to "traitor". I honestly and objectively don't think the left minimizes the threat as much as the right overhypes it.

The left *is*, however, extremely scared of an environment in which the government has broad powers of surveillance and the power to act on what they find. They, shit, I'll admit it, *we* fear political reprisals when the point *should* be catching terrorists. As it happens, we're starting to see some evidience that this happens. The extremists in Right Blogistan, of course, not only admit this, but glory in it. Moderate Republicans (a dying breed) and *actual* conservatives (likewise) are almost as uncomfortable with it as I am.

On both sides of the issue, it seems to us, there has developed a
fundamental dishonesty. Civil libertarians demand that due process
be respected in all instances, but without admitting openly the
catastrophic risks they are willing to incur. Patrick Henry's
famous statement, "Give me liberty or give me death," is a
fundamental pr... [ Read More (0.4k in body) ]

Decius wrote:
Stratfor: Geopolitical Intelligence Report - May 16, 2006

Civil Liberties and National Security

By George Friedman

....
Now flip the analysis. Americans can live with child molesters,
deadbeat dads and stolen car rings more readily than they can live
with the dangers inherent in government power. But can one live
with the threat from al Qaeda more readily than that from
government power? That is the crucial question that must be
answered. Does al Qaeda pose a threat that (a) cannot be managed
within the structure of normal due process and (b) is so enormous
that it requires an extension of government power? In the long run,
is increased government power more or less dangerous than al Qaeda?
....

My answers to these questions are, a) no, and b) not even close.

Let me explain why I say so. 9/11 demonstrated not that we are horribly vulnarable to attack (we are in some ways) but that we simply failed to use the abilities already there. We had the reports from the flight schools, we had Zacharias "I'm an assclown" Moussaoui in jail. We had the reports about Al-Q's previous plans to ram an airplane into the Eiffel Tower. We had a couple of the actual hijackers on watch lists. The FBI had information from Afghanistan that Al-Q was planning an attack. The daily brief was ignored. And those are just the ones that come to mind off the top of my head.

All of those were found under due process, what wasn't there was the lack of turf battles to properly coordinate all the information or a sharing and referencing structure to get all of the information together. Maybe if those things had been in place it still might have happened, but the bottom line is the different services not sharing information and not organizing it any cohesive way meant preventing it was a lost cause.

Due process found all of this stuff, it just didn't get it all together until after the fact.

To answer the second question, is Al-Q a threat that requires an extention, unless they get their hands on an ebola strain that jumps around like a cold, or something out of Resident Evil, the answer is not even close. The concern is "Oh my God, they have a nuke." First, the problem there is, where would they get it from? Probably from the breakup of the Soviet Union. Okay, I know it's been a while but one of the things we were working on was working with Russia and the other ex-Soviet countries to secure their arsenals. We seem to have forgotten about doing that since we're bogged down in Iraq, and the Russians don't trust us anymore either (and neither does anyone else on the planet).

Besides, there are much easier ways to get similar effects. Noted on the Daily Show last night, was the comment about CNN being "the most trusted name in AAAAAHHH!!!!" There's a nice big liquified natural gas tanker sitting in Boston harbor. All you need to blow that thing sky high and a big chunk of Boston with it would be at most, a Cesna and a couple jerry cans full of gasoline, and you probably don't even need the Cesna. And that's if your goal is to kill people. There are any number of ways to cause massive havoc I can think of, most of them would be much worse than a nuke, and all of them would be substantially easier to pull off.

Defending against Al-Q and other organizations doesn't take new tools. It takes cooperation among beaurocracies, and intelligent security, neither of which is in any greater supply now than it was five years ago. That we have two ongoing occupations and all kinds of crap going on domestically and we're STILL no safer than we were five years ago, and likely LESS so, tells me we will get hit again. It could easily be as bad as or worse than 9/11, and we are no better prepared to deal with it than we were then as Katrina demonstrated.

What's missing is a brain.