Countering AQ Ambitions in Libya

Pundits seem to be overwhelming for or fanatically against all actions. I see no point in arguing over whether the U.S. should have initiated a No Fly Zone (NFZ) in support of the Libyan opposition.  It’s over, and the West should now concentrate on its interests; one of them being the denial of an AQ safe haven in Eastern Libya.
Hopefully, I’ve been a little more measured in the past three posts and I’ll try to outline some reasonable policy and military actions the West can take now to thwart what few AQ-LIFG-Rebel Opposition linkages there are in Libya.

Shout-Outs: Analysts of Terrorist Internet Use

I’ve observed maybe a hundred hours of “Terrorist Use of the Internet” classes/presentations over the past nine years.  Additionally, I’ve perused several hundred documents on “Terrorist Use of the Internet” and have seen every cable/TV news outlet broadcast of some form of “Terrorist Use of the Internet” story.
A standard “Terrorist Use of the Internet” briefing will have a lot of ‘scary’ pictures and ‘scary’ videos designed to shock the audience.   These presentations usually include:

European Missile Defense: sacrificing the Russian queen for an Iranian pawn

As a former senior Russian defense official reveals that Russian and US missile defense technologies are fully compatible, will NATO ignore the opportunity for full cooperation with Russia? "In the period from 2003 to 2008, we carried out several computer exercises in the format of the Russia-NATO Council in which we specifically studied aspects of compatibility of our means of early warning and interception,” Lt. Gen. Yevgeny Buzhinsky, a former senior member of the Defense Ministry's international relations department, and now a consultant at PIR Center (the Russian Center for Policy Studies). “The conclusion was that they are compatible," he confirmed. "There are no technical problems of compatibility.”

Britain armed Gaddafi, now have designs on rebels

Britain is facing accusations from the International Criminal Court over the weapons it's sold to Gaddafi while the UK is considering arming more Libyans – rebels this time. The rebels say they lack the ammunition needed to fight off the forces of Colonel Gaddafi. In the meantime, it is believed Gaddafi was planning to use force to crackdown on protesters long before the uprising began, and the UK was its main arms provider.
That explains why the Libyan security forces have been putting down unrest in the country with plenty of rubber bullets, tear gas and other ammunition to a considerable degree British made. The UK was still selling arms to Libya just four months before Colonel Gaddafi turned them on his own people, with government ministers approving a deal for sniper rifles, bullets and tear gas.

How a big US bank laundered billions from Mexico’s murderous drug gangs

On 10 April 2006, a DC-9 jet landed in the port city of Ciudad del Carmen, on the Gulf of Mexico, as the sun was setting. Mexican soldiers, waiting to intercept it, found 128 cases packed with 5.7 tons of cocaine, valued at $100m. But something else – more important and far-reaching – was discovered in the paper trail behind the purchase of the plane by the Sinaloa narco-trafficking cartel. During a 22-month investigation by agents from the US Drug Enforcement Administration, the Internal Revenue Service and others, it emerged that the cocaine smugglers had bought the plane with money they had laundered through one of the biggest banks in the United States: Wachovia, now part of the giant Wells Fargo.

Cyberdéfense : la France est-elle bien protégée?

Quelques semaines après le piratage du système d’information du ministère des Finances, ZDNet.fr a invité les journalistes spécialisés Jérôme Saiz et Jean-Marc Manach pour analyser le plan de communication mis en place par le gouvernement dans cette affaire et détailler l’évolution du dispositif de cyberdéfense de l’Etat.

Si l’attaque des systèmes d’information de l’Etat est monnaie courante, celle révélée le 7 mars dernier par l’Agence nationale de la sécurité des systèmes d’information (Anssi) revêt un caractère particulier. Pour Jean-Marc Manach, journaliste à Owni.fr et spécialiste des questions de sécurité, la précision du ciblage des haut-fonctionnaires du Ministère des finances est exceptionnelle. Mais ce qui l’est davantage, c’est le plan de communication déployé autour de cette affaire. "Avant le 7 mars 2011, la sécurité informatique, c’était comme Tchernobyl, les problèmes s’arrêtaient aux frontières. On avait jamais entendu parler d’affaires d’espionnage informatique." ironise-t-il.

Libye : Quelles sont les actions de la DGSE sur le terrain?

Les sources ouvertes affirment que des agents de la CIA, du MI-6 britannique et de la DGSE opèrent actuellement sur le sol libyen. Jean-Jacques Cécile, journaliste spécialisé défense et ex-membre des services de renseignement militaire explique quel rôle les agents français sont susceptibles de tenir sur le terrain.


Libye : Quelles sont les actions de la DGSE sur... por Nouvelobs

Petraeus pourrait devenir patron de la CIA

Le commandant des forces internationales en Afghanistan, le général américain David Petraeus, a de « fortes chances » de devenir le patron de la CIA, a affirmé lundi la radio publique nationale (NPR). Petraeus, qui a l’intention de quitter son poste de commandant des forces internationales en Afghanistan cette année, « accepterait ce job (directeur de la CIA) si on le lui offrait », a ajouté la NPR, citant des sources gouvernementales anonymes. Leon Panetta, l’actuel directeur de la CIA, pourrait remplacer le secrétaire à la Défense Robert Gates qui a l’intention de se retirer cette année. Le Pentagone n’a pas commenté ces informations.

Brazil latest base for Islamic extremists

With preparations for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil and the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro well under way, security experts have expressed fears that terrorists are “taking advantage” of weaknesses in the country’s laws. Brazil has not passed any specific anti-terrorism legislation, does not recognize Hizbollah or Hamas as terrorist groups and disbanded the Federal Police’s anti-terrorism service in 2009. Now, Veja, a weekly news magazine, has had access to reports compiled by the service as well as documents about the terrorist threat sent to Brazil by the FBI, CIA, Interpol and the US Treasury. It says the papers show 21 men linked to Islamic extremist groups including al-Qaeda, have been using Brazil for various purposes including controlling inflows of money and planning attacks.