re: "Making Sense of Chaos "

Sean Osborne, Associate Director at Northeast Intelligence Network ("Investigating threats to our homeland") mixes good information with some obvious ideological axe-grinding.

Money quote(s)"

"(T)his administration’s blatant “ideologically motivated” incompetence and deliberate “strategic dementia” is leading the world down a path to an apocalypse which the Iranian Ayatollah and his sock puppet so fervently dream of. Indeed, all that will soon be left is for the Iranian’s to step in to fill the vacuum the Obama Administration is creating."

That's a little alarmist, at least in terms of Iran's ability (note, I don't say desire) to step up to anything.

"Unlike the Inept-in-Chief, his Ikhwan advisors and appointed incompetents in the U.S. State Department who have been attempting to micromanage the crisis in Egypt via remote control, there are other forces at work that have real boots on the ground in the former land of the Pharaohs."

Well, I suppose it's some progress that the author differentiates between the "appointed incompetents" at State from us career ones.

"When Obama & Company declared that the transition from Hosni Mubarak’s rule to whatever is supposed to come next had to begin “now” with Mubarak’s immediate resignation, they utterly failed to account for specific provisions of the Egyptian Constitution."

That, for me, echoed similar miscomprehensions about Honduras' constitution.

(Is it really too much to ask that States' country desk officers keep a translation of "their" country's constitution somewhere handy?)

re: "Suddenly, States Have Authority Over Aliens"

Federale ("Federal Service Guarantees Citizenship") examines some of the technicalities differentiating consular and diplomatic immunities.

Money quote(s):

"(N)ow that the Punjab State government in Pakistan has arrested an American diplomat and are holding him in violation of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961, the radical left is on the war path, defending the right of a State government to arrest and hold a diplomat.

As is usual with the left, they deceive their readers. They claim that the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations of 1963 authorizes the arrest"

&

"(D)espite the selective quotations from the Reds, Davis is not a consular officer, but a diplomatic officer, covered by Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations of 1961, which is quite stricter regarding arresting and holding diplomats as opposed to consular officers. But Counterpunch and their writer Dave Lindorff are either too dumb to know the difference between a diplomatic officer and a consular officer or they know and act to deceive"

Be sure to read the final paragraph: training matters; "Lack of training kills."

re: "The Country’s In The Very Best Of Hands"

Rand Simberg at Transterrestrial Musings ("Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!") bundles some smart analysis and then brings the snark.

Money quote(s):

"It makes me long for the robust, intelligent foreign policy of Jimmy Carter."

re: "Failure of Analysis "

George Smiley at In From the Cold ("Musings on Life, Love, Politics, Military Affairs, the Media, the Intelligence Community and Just About Anything Else that Captures Our Interest") gives, as always, an educated assessment.

Money quote(s):

"The United States maintains close ties with both the Egyptian military and its intelligence services. In fact, the nation's recently-appointed vice-president, Omar Sulieman, has been described as "the CIA's man in Cairo," a reference to his lengthy tenure as head of Egyptian intelligence and close ties to his American counterparts.

In other words, Egypt is not a country where the U.S. intelligence community is without sources."

"(I)f that weren't bad enough, our Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper, had his own howler on the same day. In his own testimony before Congress, General Clapper said the Muslim Brotherhood "is largely secular;" has "eschewed violence," and is "pursuing social ends."

By days end, Mr. Clapper was walking back those remarks. True, the Brotherhood operates hospitals and social programs in Egypt, but there is ample evidence that many of its factions are active participants in terrorism and still want to wipe Israel off the map. Needless to say, Clapper's comments raised a lot of eyebrows in Washington--and beyond.

But this goes beyond two senior spooks making laughably bad calls on a critical subject. Most individuals in the positions held by Mr. Panetta and Mr. Clapper are very guarded in their comments, knowing the potential impact of their words. And, in virtually all cases, there public remarks reflects the intelligence community's assessment of a particular situation.

So, in that sense, the observations of the CIA Director and the DNI (likely) reflected the consensus of our intelligence community."

&

"(R)emember: the former Air Force General isn't paid to study terror groups in depth; his assignment is to run the nation's intel bureaucracy. His remarks on the Muslim Brotherhood reflect the "consensus" of the intelligence community, i.e., all those well-educated analysts whose sole job is to attain expertise on the Brotherhood, Al Qaida, or other other Muslim terror groups.

If the "smart guys" in the spook world believe the Muslim Brotherhood is morphing into a mainstream political group, we are in trouble."

re: "Dumbest thing said yet about Muslim Brotherhood"

Uncle Jimbo at Blackfive ("the paratrooper of love") doesn't mince words.

Money quote(s):

"That is so incandescently stupid that he and everyone who vetted or helped prepare his remarks should be fired, preferably out of cannons and not the circus kind. How the Hell are we supposed to make any coherent policy when our DNI is so monumnetally ill-informed that he makes Biden look wise. Every single statement he has made about the Mo Bros is not just wrong, but completely ass-backwards. I weep for our complete lack of anything even vaguely resembling a competent intelligence apparatus."

(I would invite the reader to read something I wrote about this here.)

When discussing Egypt's MB, what it is, what it does, remember this:

"(T)he MB (like Hamas, like Hezbollah) uses the disfunction or disinterest of the legal government and authorities wherever they are to buy legitimacy by providing social services. In other words, they go secular and they do so in a very deliberate, very public way. It's not fake, the medical or social safety net they erect is quite real, and in an environment (such as Egypt) where the overtly political and violent aims of the MB are quite ruthlessly quashed, this sort of thing is much less likely to get one a date with the security ministries interrogators."

re: "The Peculiar Case of US Embassy Luxembourg – Three Wrongs Don’t Make It Right"

Patricia Kushlis at WhirledView and I talked about making public diplomacy better (in the comments thread).

re: "There's Willful Blindness, and Then There's Willful Stupidity"

Andrew C. McCarthy at The Corner ("a web-leading source of real-time conservative opinion") puts a smackdown on the DNI.

Quote(s):

"James Clapper, the head of intelligence for the United States of America, has explained to Congress that the Muslim Brotherhood is “largely secular.” It further has “eschewed violence,” decries al-Qaeda as a “perversion of Islam,” and really just wants “social ends” and “a betterment of the political order in Egypt.”"

&

"If this is what $40 billion–plus buys you, maybe Representative Ryan can make up the rest of that $100 billion by eliminating the intelligence community."

I don't happen to know the DNI personally, but a lot folks in the IC whom I do know speak of him with respect.

I haven't read the whole testimony, but one thing I can tell you is that what someone from the IC briefs an open meeting with the media present is not what he or she briefs behind closed doors where everyone inside has the appropriate security clearance. Unclassified briefings are, necessarily, somewhat dumbed-down, and they are so for very good reasons. Such reasons as not exposing the crown jewels of your best sources or means of collection, &tc., so as to make your source's lives shorter and riskier or to make it easier for an adversary to fool or evade your intelligence capabilities.

(The reader may recall, or is invited to discover, why it is that Osama Bin Ladin no longer uses a cellular or satellite telephone.)

That being said, the MB (like Hamas, like Hezbollah) uses the disfunction or disinterest of the legal government and authorities wherever they are to buy legitimacy by providing social services. In other words, they go secular and they do so in a very deliberate, very public way. It's not fake, the medical or social safety net they erect is quite real, and in an environment (such as Egypt) where the overtly political and violent aims of the MB are quite ruthlessly quashed, this sort of thing is much less likely to get one a date with the security ministries interrogators.

With that in mind, it may be that reporting on the DNI's testimony is a little slanted, a little incomplete, and that maybe all that shocked reaction on the part of committee members was just the slightest, teensiest bit stage-managed.

(Not that there's ever any stagecraft and drama practiced in the public eye on Capitol Hill. Perish the thought.)

re: "Re: Will the Pentagon Always Be Able to Evacuate Americans from Hotspots?"

Michael Rubin at The Corner ("a web-leading source of real-time conservative opinion") responds to Mark Krikorian's comments.

Money quote(s):

"(T)he Congress certainly should acknowledge that evacuation is no longer a responsibility of the U.S. government, and the State Department should stop encouraging every Tom, Dick, and Harriet from registering at the U.S. Embassy. What is needed is to enter into the debate with eyes wide open. When a crisis hits — for example, the 2006 Israel-Hezbollah War — we should simply tell Americans that they should hunker down, and that the advantages of being citizens of a superpower are less than what they once were."

Yeah, that's going to take some of that "courage" stuff we see so much of on Capitol Hill.

"Congress may conclude that the decline in capability is worth it. What Congress should not do is pretend that budget cuts will not undermine capabilities that many officials, rightly or wrongly, wish the military to have and then whine they did not know when, a year or two down the road, constituents demand assistance evacuating their loved ones."

re: "Re: Will the Pentagon Always Be Able to Evacuate Americans from Hotspots?"

Mark Krikorian at The Corner ("a web-leading source of real-time conservative opinion") takes a stab at answering Michael Rubin's question.

Money quote(s):

"(Y)our point about the thousands of Lebanese with dual U.S. citizenship raises an important point — why should a U.S. Marine, who enlisted to defend his fellow countrymen from harm, risk his life rescuing people who have not fully committed to the American nation? Dual citizenship — a “self-evident absurdity” in TR’s words — means, in this case, people who want to live in Lebanon, as Lebanese, and perhaps even vote there, but who also want to make sure that if things go bad someone else will risk his life to rescue them."

Lebanon blew up pretty quickly, as I recall. Lots of college and h.s. age kids visiting their grandparents back in the old country. And lots of naturalized U.S. citizens who decided their retirement dollars would stretch further back in said old country; not necessarily folks who've done anything wrong or falsely.

Americans take it as their God-given and Constitutional right that they can go anywhere without hindrance, that they can live and work where they please, and then if things go "South," Big Sam will come and get them. And their relatives back in each of those congressmembers' districts have the same assumption. So it would definitely behoove them to have Mr. Rubin's question somewhere in the back of their collective minds.

(Disclaimer: Like many people in my line of work, I participated, however tangentally, in support of the Lebanon evacuation. Collectively, we were able to help a lot of people get out of harm's way. It's a part of my life's body of work of which I'm justifiably somewhat proud.

And at the same time, as new reports about other country's dual nationals and legal residents came out, about how people who were supposedly refugees from Lebanon had moved back and were living off of the public assistance received, as refugees, from those European countries.... well, I'm sure we have our share of welfare and public assistance fraudsters too. But asking, or looking for answers, of such questions is way down on the to-do list when you're scrambling to organize an evacuation.)

re: "Will the Pentagon Always Be Able to Evacuate Americans from Hotspots?"

Michael Rubin at The Corner ("a web-leading source of real-time conservative opinion") asks a most excellent question.

Money quote(s):

"In Lebanon alone, the number of American citizens numbered in the tens of thousands, even though many hold dual citizenship and perhaps only a fraction would request assistance. Add Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen to the mix, and it becomes an open question whether the American military has enough forces in the region to evacuate American citizens should violence (or insurance companies) prevent airplanes from flying into unsettled countries."

"Cutting force projection not only affects future combat missions but also humanitarian relief whether in the form of evacuations or tsunami relief."

&

"(A) vote for cuts would not only undercut the ability to project force globally but would also remove the ability to protect American citizens should many countries simultaneously experience unrest.

Congressmen should also ask the State Department to explain how, in the aftermath of broad-based defense cuts, they will manage evacuations of American citizens absent the same level of military assistance that they can count on now."

re: "Give Appeasement a Chance"

Lex at Neptunus Lex ("The unbearable lightness of Lex. Enjoy!") correctly evaluates a bone-head idea.

Money quote(s):

"“Many” private contractors may not be protected by diplomatic immunity, but it is the asserted position of the US government that Davis certainly is. Following Mr. Harrison’s recommendations all they way to their logical terminus would leave US diplomats world-wide vulnerable to the savagely swinging moods of local streets.

That may sound like a logical way to order the foreign policy apparatus to Mr. Harrison, but I very much doubt the pin-striped pant set at State will agree with him."

re: "Gates of Vienna News Feed 2/7/2011"

Baron Bodissey at Gates of Vienna ("At the siege of Vienna in 1683 Islam seemed poised to overrun Christian Europe.We are in a new phase of a very old war.") has a follow-on development on the big news from Munich this week.

Money quote(s):

“British Prime Minister David Cameron followed up on his declaration that Multiculturalism has failed in the UK by ordering the removal of funding from suspicious Muslim community groups. Such groups have previously received state funds in a bid to reach troubled youth and discourage them from turning to extremism, but the prime minister believes they may be soft on terrorism.”

This takes Angela Merkels comments about the failure of multiculturalism to another level entirely.

re: ""The Perfect Day" and Our Terrorist Opponent's Possible Plans For Future Attacks"

LTC (RET) Dave Grossman (author of On Combat) at Guns & Patriots puts some history into useful context for today.

Money quote(s):

"I have been told (by those conducting interviews with captured enemy combatants) that when we ask them "What is coming next?" they sometimes refer to the "Perfect Day." You cannot understand what they are talking about if you do not understand the historical reference.

The Sepoy Mutiny in India, in 1857, is an example of a "Perfect Day." This was a spontaneous uprising by Muslims (and Hindus), with everyone giving the British their "best shot." Nannies killed the kids, cooks poisoned the food, and shop owners murdered the British ladies as they came into the shop. And soldiers (sometimes complete units) killed their British officers and then used their weapons to attack the British.

The current politically correct term for the Sepoy Mutiny is "The First Indian rebellion." "

""The First Indian rebellion" is, to them, George Washington, Abe Lincoln, and the Alamo all rolled into one. And 99% of Westerners have never heard about it.

In their dreams and fond imaginations, this is what will happen across all of the "Crusader nations" who are in Afghanistan. Pick a day, and everyone gives it their best shot. If just one-in-a-thousand of the Islamic people in our nations answer the call to Jihad, it will still be thousands of attackers ... Some will opt for a "John Mohamed/Malvo" whacking people from the trunks of cars. Others for a Virginia Tech lone gunman in the school. Others will attack school busses, nannies will kill the kids, clerks will kill customers, cooks (in the elementary school?) will poison the cool-aid. Etc, etc.

The enemy thinks big, and we (with wishful thinking compounded by ignorance of their history) keep thinking small. The goal of this Perfect Day (in addition to terror) is to make us imprison (intern) our Islamic populations (as we did to the Japanese in WWII), thus making this a 'war against Islam' instead of the current war against terrorist groups and Islamist fundamentalists."

"This is their dream. Our goal is to prevent it through thru: careful study and understanding of their history and culture; assimilation (the French are an excellent example if what not to do in this area); and – most importantly – deterrence and detection, which is what I teach in my classes.

The enemy can be deterred! They fear one thing. They fear failure! They are not afraid to die: some of them want to die. But they desperately do not want to die for nothing! And our goal is to win a battle in the minds of millions of Islamic people in our nation, who are asking the key question: Can I succeed? Can I get a body count?"

&

"(S)tates like Illinois, and Wisconsin (the only two states with absolutely no concealed carry for anyone, anyhow, ever), or California, Massachusetts, and others (with very stringent and limited concealed carry laws) are the most likely targets for this kind of attack.

The time may come when (like Israel) we need armed riders on every school bus and armed guards in every school and ever daycare center. And the only way that we can do so is (like Israel) to depend on armed citizens and armed teachers to protect their children.

The millions of Americans who are buying guns are not foolish. I would submit that they are doing the one thing that individual citizens can do, and that is to arm themselves. This is America. When faced with a threat we don't take away rights, we give you more rights!"


-----

Hat tip to Col. B. Bunny at Eternity Road.

re: "Defense Budget Cuts"

James Joyner at Outside the Beltway ("an online journal of politics and foreign affairs analysis") takes Stephanie Guttman to school, batting her "low-hanging fruit" out of the park.

Money quote(s):

"(M)ost of the low hanging fruit has been plucked at this point. The only way to achieve real savings is to cut back on the operational tempo. If we expect our military to be able to deploy anywhere, any time and stay for years on end performing counterinsurgency or stability operations, then we’re going to have to expect to continue pouring absurd amounts of money into Defense."

re: "U.S. Policy in Mubarak's Egypt: Harder Than It Looks "

Abu Muqawama ("dedicated to following issues related to contemporary insurgencies as well as counterinsurgency tactics and strategy") at the Center for New American Security ("Developing Strong, Pragmatic and Principled National Security and Defense Policies") highlights some on-point thinking by Pincus.

Money quote(s):

"In short, it was relatively easy to predict the trainwreck on the horizon. It was difficult, by contrast, to use what leverage the United States had over Egypt to avert the disaster. "

re: "Our Friends in Islamabad"

Lex at Neptunus Lex ("The unbearable lightness of Lex. Enjoy!") has some news about the Raymond Davis case that I haven't seen anywhere else.

re: "My Optimism About Europe"

Daniel Pipes at DanielPipes.Org ("Although Mr. Pipes rarely writes about sex, this subject dominates the readership totals in all three of his formats: articles ") says:

"Perhaps alone in the coterie focused on the Islamist threat to Europe, I am cheerful these days. That's because I see the anti-Islamist reaction growing even more quickly than the Islamist threat itself."

Read why.

re: "Quiet in Cairo"

Dr. Jerry Pournelle at Chaos Manor ("The Original Blog *") comments on a recent Wikileaks disclosure.

Money quote(s):

"WikiLeaks continue to show the consequences of empire by bureaucracy. They also have a consequence: it is always difficult to get ones foreign service to be candid with their bosses, and the senior State department career officials to be candid with their political masters. Now that everyone can see there is a real danger that anything they write or say can be part of a Washington Post -- or Fox News -- article for all the world to see, that becomes even more difficult. Few in Washington actually know what is going on overseas, because few in Washington and even fewer of those we send out as diplomatic officers know any history of either the world or the region to which they are sent; now they'll all learn and say less about what they find when they report. Welcome to the candid world. Open diplomacy openly arrived at."

-----

Agree with it, disagree with it; the point is still valid even if some of the criticism seems off-target. Outside of academia itself, it's hard to find a group of people so interested in the world and its history as my FSO colleagues.

re: "Are you smarter than a US diplomat?"

Curzon at Coming Anarchy ("Speak Victorian, Think Pagan") has issued a challenge.

re: "Nature Abhors a Vaccuum and So Does Politics: Muslim Brotherhood to Negotiate Directly With Government"

Thanks to Kat-Mo at The Middle Ground for the mention and the link.

(I think.)

Applicable quote(s):

"We need real contingency plans to act on instead of, as Consul at Arms says, "hope" and "expectations". "

re: "Smart Diplomacy and Finger Bowls"

MikeM at Confederate Yankee ("Because liberalism is a persistent vegetative state") has some things to say about the state of U.S. diplomacy.

Money quote(s):

"The credibility of the State Department under Mr. Obama is so small that it may not be detectable by an electron microscope. In fact, American diplomats seem most adept at insulting and denigrating America in foreign capitals and convincing our enemies that they have nothing to fear from America."

re: "Domino Theory of Democracy: Current Events Failure of Unified US Policy"

Thanks to Kat-Mo at The Middle Ground for the mention and the link.

Relevant passage(s):

"As the Consul At Arms points out, people are already pointing the finger, trying to figure out who to blame for not seeing Egypt's shake up and Mubarek's fall from power. There is already a cry that this was a massive failure of intelligence, but, as CAA points out, this is not an intelligence issue, but a policy failure."

re: "You've Been Asked To Assist With an Evacuation. Now What?"

Paul Mayer at DipNote ("U.S. Department of State official blog") tells us what it's like to "answer the call."

Money quote(s):

"What do you do when you when you're a State Department consular officer and you're asked to travel halfway around the world, on very short notice, to assist with a crisis the breadth of which is still unknown?

First, you ask permission. When I was asked on Sunday, January 30 whether I would be willing to fly to assist in the evacuation of U.S. citizens from Egypt, the first person I asked was my wife."

Damn skippy you do!

"After having endured separation when I traveled to Haiti in January 2010, my wife asked if I really wanted to go.

I did. I wanted to go because the duty to assist U.S. citizens in a crisis is one of the State Department's core responsibilities. Colleagues in the Bureau of Consular Affairs and the Operations Center's Crisis Management and Support office work and plan diligently for this sort of thing. They run exercises at embassies and consulates worldwide. They help you get prepared in advance, help you think how many people will need to travel, where they'll need to go, and how long they'll stay. They help us get the airplane tickets and they tell us where we'll be sleeping (even if it's on the floor of the embassy). They have our backs every step of the way."

Read the whole thing.

re: "Egypt: The Blame Game Begins. Sigh. "

Abu Muqawama ("dedicated to following issues related to contemporary insurgencies as well as counterinsurgency tactics and strategy") at the Center for New American Security ("Developing Strong, Pragmatic and Principled National Security and Defense Policies") demonstrates uncommon good sense.

Money quote(s):

"(I)t was inevitable that in Washington, people would start asking "Who Lost Egypt?" before it was even clear what, exactly, is happening there."

&

"(L)ong ago the U.S. government had identified the fall or death of Hosni Mubarak as a likely contingency to plan toward. Everyone knew this was going to happen eventually. So I think the blame being heaped on the intelligence community here is a little silly. Intelligence cannot predict the future, though it can assist policy-makers in gaming out possible contingencies, and I think our intelligence services did that here."

&

"Even when administrations have decided to pressure Mubarak, by the way, they have found that the ~$1.5b we give Egypt annually has been a largely ineffective source of leverage. (Though it has, I would argue, helped foster now-invaluable connections with Egypt's military. Those last two sentences should serve as a warning for any legislators out there threatening to cut our aid.)"

re: "ANOTHER MASSIVE INTELLIGENCE FAILURE"

Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit ("I can take vacations, etc., and not feel any gnawing need to be at the computer.") continues following the finger-pointing narrative.

Money quote(s):

"Considering what we spend, I don’t think we’re getting our money’s worth."

It's a point of view.

But it's a great big world out there, and U.S. interests stretch to pretty much all of it. Collecting, analyzing, disseminating, &tc., through all the means, covert and otherwise, is a non-trivial task, and one for which we are constantly re-assessing our ability and capabilities to accomplish.

And that's exactly the point, we're constantly evaluating how we do things and trying to come up with better ways to do it. That's how we learn from mistakes (when they're made) and improve.

re: "An Intelligence Failure In The Middle East?"

Doug Mataconis at Outside the Beltway ("an online journal of politics and foreign affairs analysis") critiques the inevitable casting about for a fall guy.

Money quote(s):

"(M)any in Washington are expressing disappointment that the U.S. intelligence community seemingly missed the warning signs"

You mean, like Tunesia's "Jasmine Revolution"? Or like the fact that Mubarak was almost 82?

" I’ve got to agree with Ed Morrissey that there’s really very little to this criticism, and it looks to me like we’re seeing people in power stake out their positions for a “Who Lost Egypt?” debate should that come to pass"

It's right there! Right where it's always been! It was never ours to begin with!

"(D)ocuments from the Wikileaks diplomatic cables dump show that the U.S. has been concerned for years about the question of who would succeed Hosni Mubarak, and that we spend the last several years providing behind the scenes support to dissident groups in Egypt"

I can neither confirm nor deny (even if I knew, which I don't) whether this last is true, especially since FSOs (and others) have been directly ordered not to access Wikileaks.

"(O)n some level, the idea that the intelligence community missed anything here is simply absurd."

Remember: no policy failures, only intelligence failures. Or, alternatively, diplomatic failures.

&

"Anyone in Washington who says they didn’t see this coming is either lying or they weren’t paying attention to the world around them."

re: "There Is No Place Like Home"

James R. Rummel at Chicago Boyz ("Some Chicago Boyz know each other from student days at the University of Chicago. Others are Chicago boys in spirit.") notices a recent personnel action.

Money quote(s):

"(S)ome of the diplomats assigned to her post actually requested reassignment to Afghanistan! Give up the cushy conditions in a modern European city, and trade it for the poverty and physical danger found in Kabul. Anything to get away from that harridan!

The author of the news article linked to above says that such is the danger when amateurs meddle in a field that clearly calls for career diplomats. I think it shows the danger of passing out important positions to political supporters without first bothering to ask if they are suited for the job."

It certainly doesn't sound good when career officers are jumping ship to Kabul and other rough neighborhoods to get out of Luxembourg. A lot of officers spend many years building up the kind of street cred and "equity" (by serving in tough posts) necessary to get a plum like Luxembourg.

Consider, for a moment, some of the likely French-speaking garden spots an officer might go just for the chance of a Luxembourg, Brussels, or Paris.

The thing about going to Kabul or other AfPak/Iraq posts is that it's sort of like hitting the Re-Set button or "Pass Go - Collect $200." These days you can link that service to onward assignment at, hopefully, one of your "dream posts" (think Paris, Brussels, Luxembourg-under-new-management).

re: "INTELLIGENCE FAILURE"

Glenn Reynolds at Instapundit ("I can take vacations, etc., and not feel any gnawing need to be at the computer.") demonstrates that the finger-pointing has already begun.

-----

Remember always the following:

There are no operational failures. Never a failure of policy. Never a failure of decision-making or leadership.

These are always successes.

Failures are always intelligence failures.

-----

"It's because of you people that I cannot get outside!

It's always your fault. You are not capable of handling...

To take orders from me, who is..."

re: "U.S. Foreign Service: on the front lines in Egypt"

Michael Singh at Shadow Government ("Notes From The Loyal Opposition") gives credit where it's due.

Money quote(s):

"Looking after the welfare of Americans abroad -- particularly during a crisis -- is one of the core missions of the State Department and a foremost responsibility of U.S. diplomats stationed overseas. U.S. diplomats are rarely noticed, much less celebrated, but their service and sacrifices deserve the American people's recognition.

When a crisis such as this erupts, the local U.S. Embassy will scramble to understand and report to Washington on events and offer its advice on U.S. policy. But it will also initiate a massive effort to account for and care for American citizens, both those who wish to leave and those who remain behind. Right now at the Cairo airport, our Foreign Service officers and other U.S. personnel are putting in days-long shifts to assist Americans who want to leave Egypt. The same officers who are responding to Washington's demands for analysis of opposition figures and the latest reports on protests in Tahrir Square are also comforting weary travelers, serving them food and water, and packing them on to evacuation flights.

Among those the officers have seen off are their own families, whom the State Department yesterday ordered to depart Egypt. The farewells are hasty -- families must leave quickly once the order is given -- and sometimes do not take place at all if the employee is needed elsewhere. The families do not know when they will be able to return, if at all, and must make accommodations for housing and schools on the fly. When their families are long gone, the officers stay on to perform vital work to advance U.S. national security.

The experience of the officers in Cairo is hardly unique -- many diplomats are stationed at embassies and consulates overseas where conditions do not permit their families toaccompany them. Alongside other civilians and of course members of the military, they make daily sacrifices to serve their country. Few Americans are actually aware of what they do, and fewer still will ever have need to call upon their help. But they are there when Americans require, and for Americans stranded in Egypt, that is a deep relief."

re: "Why the surprise?"

Richard at EU Referendum ("To discuss issues related to the UK's position in Europe and the world") keys on some areas of perennial interest to those in the intelligence professions.

Money quote(s):

"Diplomats and intelligence agencies, the strap to his piece reads, often tell ministers what they want to hear – and overvalue secret sources of information.

Secret intelligence services, naturally enough, writes Norton-Taylor, want to emphasise secret intelligence – a product which only they, in their special and privileged role, can offer. As a result, they have seriously underestimated what can be gleaned from "open sources". "

Yes and no.

There's such a thing as "intelligence fusion." That's where information from many types of sources and collection methods gets "fused" into an "all-source" product. Army folks may recall the acronym "ASAS," which is the All-Source Analysis System.

But I digress.

"All Source" intelligence includes open sources or "OSINT."

So if your analysts are on the ball, this gets included into your final product.

Ideally.

"Britain's diplomats and spooks, in common with all western intelligence agencies, also spectacularly failed to foresee the fall of the Berlin wall. Thus, he says, they must in future pay much more attention to "open sources", what they can hear on the Arab street, and what they can read, notably on the internet."

As the man says, this is something we can do better.

Lastly:

"Anyone who relies merely – or even mainly – on the MSM for their "take" on what is happening in this country, or for their general news of events, would end up very seriously ill-informed. Yet it remains the case that the political "set" in this country rely for their information on such conventional sources, and are still unduly influenced by the MSM.

However, we cannot leave it there, without also referring to what could be called mindset myopia. Our "élites" very often do not realise what is happening because they already think they know, and therefore do not avail themselves of credible information sources, because they believe they know better. They don't look for information because they don't see the need for it. And that is what really catches them out.

Either way, when our revolution eventually arrives – in whatever form it finally takes – our politicians and other agencies will also be caught by surprise. If they had the ability to see it coming, they would also have the ability to head it off.

Almost by definition, therefore, revolutions must always come as a surprise to those at whom they are aimed. The happen because those people are so out of touch that they are capable of being surprised."

Richard hits very close to a recurring dilemma for intelligence professionals: how do you get your policy-maker to value your product when they are already relying on other, outside sources, the ones they've learned to value throughout their political lives?

The case of a decision-level official who already assumes they know all there is to know is just too nightmarish to comtemplate. One needs to watch World War II movies to appreciate just what that does for a nation.