The Spy Who Billed Me

The CIA's Black Sites Have Gone Green

In yesterday's hearing before the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, Director of Central Intelligence Mike Hayden admitted to using contractors in the CIA's secret prisons, the so-called black sites, an issue that was first raised last summer on The Spy Who Billed Me.  From yesterday's exchange:

FEINSTEIN:  I'd like to ask this question: Who carries out these [enhanced interrogation] techniques?
Are they government employees or contractors?

   HAYDEN: At our facilities during this, we have a mix of both
government employees and contractors. Everything is done under, as
we've talked before, ma'am, under my authority and the authority of
the agency.
   But the people at the locations are frequently a mix of both --
we call them blue badgers and green badgers.

   FEINSTEIN: And where do you use only contractors?

   HAYDEN: I'm not aware of any facility in which there were only
contractors. And this came up...

   FEINSTEIN: Any facility anywhere in the world?

   HAYDEN: Oh, I mean, I'm talking about our detention facilities.
I want to make something very clear, because I don't think it was
quite crystal clear in the discussion you had with Attorney General
Mukasey.

Today Senator Feinstein has asked Attorney General Muskey whether the use of contractors in coercive interrogation techniques (i.e. enhanced interrogation techniques) is legal.  Specifically, Senator Feinstein asked:

Does the Department of Justice agree that such interrogations are an inherently governmental activity? 

What are the Department’s views on the legality of using contractors to perform interrogations involving so-called “Enhanced Interrogation Techniques”? 

And what are the Department’s views on whether contractors are protected by the provisions of the Detainee Treatment Act that protect U.S. Government personnel from retroactive liability for using officially authorized interrogation techniques?

Whether or not interrogation with enhanced techniques is an "inherently governmental activity" is an excellent question and we all know that inherently governmental activities at the CIA have been handed over to green badgers to such an extent that the Agency is no longer able to perform them.  Or as D/CIA Hayden put it, "In many instances, the individual best suited for the task may be a contractor.” 

 

An important dimension embedded in this question is whether these inherently governmental functions have been handed over to private individuals or corporations.  Senator Feinstein missed this fine point when quizzing D/CIA Hayden.  It's a critical distinction that the Senator needs to understand, that CIA contractors, "green badgers," come in two flavors, namely corporate and individual, the latter is referred to as an “IC” for Independent Contractor.  The corporate green badgers work for a company under contact with the CIA.  IC are directly contracted by the Agency.  (Rare exceptions to these two distinct types do exist--I do know of one case of a "double green" who is a SpecTal green badger at the Agency half time and the other half time he's contracted directly to the Agency as an IC.) 

The Agency has a long history of directly hiring its alumni and other specialized experts individually as ICs, even in very sensitive areas, to make up for staffing shortfalls.  The real shift since 9/11 has been the rise of corporate or industrial contractors who now dominate the Directorate of Intelligence and the National Clandestine Service to such extents that they could not function without them. 

This seems to be what Hayden was explaining:

HAYDEN:  This is not where we would turn to Firm X, Y or Z, and say, This is what we would like you to
accomplish. Go achieve that for us and come back when you're done. That is not what this is.

This is a governmental activity under governmental direction and
control, in which the participants may be both government employees
and contractors, but it's not outsourced.

FEINSTEIN: I understand that.

HAYDEN: OK. Good.

FEINSTEIN: Is not the person that carries out the actual
interrogation, not the doctor or the psychologist or supervisor or
anybody else, but the person that carries out the actual
interrogation a contractor?

HAYDEN: Again, there are times when the individuals involved are
contractors, and there are times when the individuals involved have
been government employees. It's been a mix, ma'am.

 

The interesting questions about the black sites that Senator Feinstein missed involve the extent of corporate involvement.  Senator Feinstein needs to ask the D/CIA:

Are the contractors involved in the enhanced interrogation techniques industrial or individual? 

Are industrial contractors involved in the facilities management of the black sites?

Are industrial contractors involved in black site security and detainee custody?

Have industrial contractors conducted renditions to black sites?  Has their involvement included providing security for the operation and physical handling of the detainee?

And the big question, which companies have performed these services?  (Hint:  Rounding up the usual suspects will not help much this time.)

It's a sad commentary on our government and the press that this important issue was first raised by a work of fiction and a blog and it's still a blog that is asking the most probing questions.

When and if these questions are finally asked and answered, it's then time to probe a little deeper and see if outsourcing the black sites is really a good idea for the US taxpayer.  Then perhaps Senator Feinstein will begin wondering just how cost effective firm fixed-price facilities management contracts can be if the contracts are based on a large surge capacity, but the companies are now only holding a handful of detainees in the sites.  By my napkin math, that would mean the CIA is paying millions for unused "surge" capacity, capacity that's likely to exist largely on paper.

 

The answer to these questions will be very interesting and I am confident they will raise greater questions of accountability, particularly as the public and Congress become aware of the extent of corporate involvement in the covert War on Terror as well as the covert side of the war in Iraq.  The question should be called about how far contractors should be involved in our government's dirty work, particularly activities that many believe are skirting the edge of the Constitution. 

Unfortunately, it's an election year, which means that if the larger questions are actually posed, they are likely to become highly politicized.  Not all corporate involvement is bad.  Some of the corporations that are integral in the CIA's blackest work are doing an excellent job for reasonable profits given the high risk they assume.  Personally, I worry more about the health of the Agency over the long term since it has lost the capacity to perform critical intelligence functions, let alone the ability to train the next generation of public servants to do so.

2008 Terror Day Planner: Download Yours Today

The National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) has once again issued the National Counterterrorism Day Planner.  (The calendar is a whopping 24.5 MB, so only click on this link if you have the most robust of broadband connections--or a lot of time on your hands.  The basic content can be found here.)

The calendar itself is an interesting barometer of what the NCTC perceives as the greatest threats to the US in terms of groups, individual terrorists and types of threats.  It's no surprise that Bin Laden once again is the "Terror-mate" of the year, capturing the #1 position.  As expected, al-Zawahiri captured the #2 slot. 

The big upset was #3:  Abu Ayyub al-Masri, a relative new comer who does not even make the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorists list.  His high ranking is indication of how counterterrorism resources have lost their focus, thanks to Iraq.  Although Al-Masri only has $1 million on his head, this master of the Iraqi  vehicle-borne improvised explosive device (VBIED), edged out #4 al-Badawi who carries a $5 million bounty for his role in the USS Cole bombing as well as #5 al-Liby who also has a $5 million reward for his role in the East Africa US embassy bombings.

#6 Atiyah Abd al-Rahman is the other big upset, part of the $1 million club who beat other others in the elite $5 million set.   How did he do it?  One of the Administration's favorite four-letter words:  Iran.  According to the calendar, al-Rahman, "is the al-Qa'ida emissary in Iran...He recruits and facilitates talks with other Islamic groups to operate under al-Qa'ida."  The calendar also warns us that he "should be considered armed and dangerous."  You think?

Rounding out the top 10 are two members of the $5 million level and another newcomer who beat out several other $5 million scumbags.

#7 el-Maati (possible terrorist threats against the US, $5 million dollar man)

#8 al-Bahri (al-Qa'ida trainer, $5 million)

#9 Adam Gadahn (the American who has been in multiple al Qa'ida videos as a recruiter, $1 million.) 

#10 al-Quso (USS Cole attack planner and $5 million tango.)

Interestingly, Mullah Omar the former Taliban leader who carries a $10 million price on his turban, dropped to the #19 slot in October.

And not that politics would ever play into something like this, it is notable that two of the three non-Islamic terrorist groups that are profiled both are thorns in the Turkish government's side:  the PKK and the obscure Revolutionary People's Liberation Party/Front.  It almost seems as if someone is trying to make nice with the Turks--or at least convince them we share similar counterterrorist concerns.

The technical pages provide counterterrorism hints that, well, if our CT professionals need them, we are seriously f**ked.  The sage advice includes how to spot a "terrorist document:"

1. Physically altered passports 

2.Passports with serial numbers that are watch-listed as lost or stolen 

3.Handwritten documents that are easily forged or altered 

4. Multiple passports used by the same person with variations in the spelling/structure of the name and of date of birth 

5.Ambiguous or contradictory information submitted to consular or border control officials.

6.Absence of supporting documents to corroborate passport information

7. Passports with glued-in photographs

What about pages glued together because they did such a kindergarten glue job?  Then there's that telltale sign of UBL's name crossed out and "John Smith" scrawled over it.

My favorite nugget of wisdom came from a section "Radicalization: Myths and Reality:"

MYTH: There are visible “signs” of radicalization. 

REALITY: Changes in appearance during different stages of radicalization often are the same changes seen in individuals who are not being radicalized...

Beards?  Wrinkles?  Male pattern baldness?

Given that the NCTC is primarily staffed by contractors, it's a safe assumption that this important CT tool was created with heavy contractor involvement.  What I want to know is which contractors were involved in the production of this calendar and how many billable hours did they rack up? 

This Waterboarding May Be Monitored for Purposes of Quality Control

   Monday night ABC aired an interview with former CIA case officer John Kiriakou who was personally involved in the interrogation of al Qaeda's Abu Zubaydah.  He details the interrogation process, including waterboarding.  I'm told by a senior member of the Intelligence Community that this is the best information to date on the current state of Agency interrogation techniques and it is highly accurate.

Particularly fascinating was the discussion of email between the interrogators in the black site and CIA headquarters requesting permission simply to slap the terrorist:

"It wasn't up to individual interrogators to decide, 'Well, I'm gonna slap him.' Or, 'I'm going to shake him.' Or, 'I'm gonna make him stay up for 48 hours.' 

"Each one of these steps, even though they're minor steps, like the intention shake, or the open-handed belly slap, each one of these had to have the approval of the deputy director for operations," Kiriakou told ABC News. 

"The cable traffic back and forth was extremely specific," he said. "And the bottom line was these were very unusual authorities that the agency got after 9/11. No one wanted to mess them up. No one wanted to get in trouble by going overboard. So it was extremely deliberate."

Kiriakou believed that the closed circuit camera were real-time for others to watch the progress of the interrogation; he didn't realize they were being taped for quality control.  While some companies might video tape their employees to make sure they're not dozing off on the job, the Agency was spying on its own to make sure its officers didn't double gut punch terrorists without Headquarter's lawyers signing off.

If you'd like to waterboard, press or say 'one'...

Given that the destruction of the monitoring tapes has caused such embarrassment for the Agency, I'm sure some CIA old-timers are wondering if all the political correctness has done anything other than hamstring the Agency and its officers with red tape. 

 

Although he wasn't trained in waterboarding, Kiriakou was present when it was used and he experienced the technique firsthand in training.  He discusses it in detail.  What he describes as the way the Agency controls and administers waterboarding, it is virtually impossible to die because you can always give up and pretty much do so after a few seconds.  Not to mention that water is not actually going down your throat:

KIRIAKOU:

You're on your back with-- your feet at a slight incline. There's some cellophane or material over your mouth. And then they pour water on this cellophane. You can't breathe. And it feels like the water's going down your throat. And then you begin choking it. It-- induces the gag reflex.
BRIAN ROSS:
But the water's not actually going into your mouth?
KIRIAKOU:
No.
BRIAN ROSS:
Or through your nostrils?

KIRIAKOU:
No.   It just feels like it is.
BRIAN ROSS:
It feels like it is 'cause of the pressure onto the-- onto the cellophane.
KIRIAKOU:
Correct.

In the old fashioned way, as taught to the military in SERE school, the process is much more prolonged and subjects the individual to real physical danger.  The rest of the world waterboards the old fashioned way--they clamp your nose and pour water down your throat until you give up or die.  In contrast, this is almost civilized--almost. 

And Kiriakou claims this waterboarding-lite works:   Zubaybah cracked in about 30 seconds.  The information he subsequently gave was used to disrupt several al Qaeda plots and saved countless lives.

Kiriakou is a very interesting guy.  He clearly believed waterboarding was the right thing to do at the time, but now  believes it was wrong, BUT thinks it could be okay to use it again.  He's not someone who's made the typical break from the Agency and is telling all because he's 100% convinced atrocities occurred.  He thinks waterboarding was safe, effective and saved lives.  By going on national television he's burning his career in the industry (yes, he's retired, but case officers rarely *really* retire).  He's also alienating himself from all old Agency friends and colleagues by violating the code of silence, particularly on such a sensitive topic, damned to the world of talking heads.  This is not what someone does when they just kinda think waterboarding was wrong, but might be okay again, just like it was before on Zubaydah when it turned out with hindsight to have been wrong. 

Now after watching the interview with Kiriakou, I suspect that many Americans will begin to weigh thirty seconds of a physician-monitored Saran wrap-induced terrorist discomfort against the hours we go through at airports because of terrorists.  This might be exactly what the Bush Administration is hoping for by allowing this spy to come in from the cold.   Perhaps Kiriakou isn’t really violating the ethics of the shadows.   Perhaps he’s sacrificed himself to save the Agency and his president.   Kiriakou may well turn out to be the Ollie North of the rendition program--or just the next former case officer chasing a big book deal.

Exclusive: Intel Outsourcing at Heart of Gonzales Controversy

At the heart of the Constitutional dispute over domestic spying between current Attorney General Gonzales and former Attorney General John Ashcroft is corporate America. Almost all of the government data mining has been outsourced to corporations. The data mining controversy isn’t about the US government spying on Americans. It’s about the government using big corporations as a Constitutional workarounds to spy on Americans. It’s not the government that actually sifts through our emails and phone records but companies such as Lockheed Marin, Raytheon,  SAIC and Booz Allen Hamilton and their subcontractors. 

On Sunday, July 29^th, 2007, the New York Times reported that the dispute between Gonzales and Ashcroft involved data mining and its threat to privacy and noted, “It is not known precisely why searching the databases, or data mining, raised such a furious legal debate.” The reason is most likely the growing use of corporations to perform critical intelligence functions and how these corporations can be used to circumvent legal restrictions upon the government. Outsourcing shifts the legalities or apparently that was what Gonzales was hoping. 

In most cases, corporations are contracted to provide full traffic and pattern analysis services with the US government providing the targets. However, in some instances, contractors actually prepare the target list then conduct the data mining themselves. Not only can corporations be used to violate civil liberties where the government is prohibited, they also have the potential to spy on our email and phone records for their own corporate or client needs. The potential for abuse is tremendous, and, just like with corporate involvement in the President’s Daily Brief, there are no serious mechanisms to guard against this. And some of the very same tools they’re using for data mining could be adapted to monitor for misuse. Of course, abuse on the level of the Administration using corporations to conveniently ignore US law needs Congressional oversight. 

Over the past five to ten years, most government intelligence functions have been outsourced to corporations, with seventy percent of the intelligence budget now going to contractors. As the Associate Director of National Intelligence recently admitted in the Washington Post  in response to my article there, “we could not accomplish our intelligence missions without them [contractors].” The National Security Agency (NSA) which is responsible for monitoring communications has been at the forefront of intelligence outsourcing and has even handed over some of its own management and administrative structures to industrial contractors.

The Mainstream Media is missing the biggest part of the story, that systemic changes due to the outsourcing of critical intelligence functions open up new possibilities for circumventing the Constitution. 

Finally the MSM Gets it: The Outsourced War

The Washington Post's Steve Fainaru has just published what is unquestionably the best piece to date on contractors and the Iraq War.  Finally, the mainstream media gets it:  private military is fighting the Iraq War where insurgents make no distinction between contractors and regular military.  Fainaru writes:

"Private security companies, funded by billions of dollars in U.S. military and State Department contracts, are fighting insurgents on a widening scale in Iraq, enduring daily attacks, returning fire and taking hundreds of casualties that have been underreported and sometimes concealed, according to U.S. and Iraqi officials and company representatives."

Parallel to the more visible surge by the big military, Fainaru reports of a shadow surge, escalating contractor presence:

"While the military has built up troops in an ongoing campaign to secure Baghdad, the security companies, out of public view, have been engaged in a parallel surge, boosting manpower, adding expensive armor and stepping up evasive action as attacks increase, the officials and company representatives said. One in seven supply convoys protected by private forces has come under attack this year, according to previously unreleased statistics; one security company reported nearly 300 "hostile actions" in the first four months."

The military intends to outsource at least $1.5 billion to private military corporations this year and this outsourcing includes base security.  Even more shocking is:

The Army has also tested a plan to use private security on military convoys for the first time, a shift that would significantly increase the presence of armed contractors on Iraq's dangerous roads.

Could it be that the Army may be conceding that if it can't get the Marines to protect them, Blackwater is the next best thing?   Private military corporations, Fainaru reports, "provide personal security for at least three commanding generals, including Air Force Maj. Gen. Darryl A. Scott, who oversees U.S. military contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan."

And, although private military is prohibited from engaging in offensive combat, the distinction between offensive and defensive combat really becomes a matter of semantics for after action reports:

U.S. officials and security company representatives emphasized that contractors are strictly limited to defensive operations. But company representatives in the field said insurgents rarely distinguish between the military and private forces, drawing the contractors into a bloody and escalating campaign.

Claims that contractors only engage in defensive operations have always struck me as akin Clinton being able to truthfully state that he didn't have sex with Monica because his lawyer had negotiated oral sex out of the definition of sex.  Technically, they might not be engaged in offensive combat, but...

"The military are very conscious that we're in their battle space," said Cameron Simpson, country operations manager for ArmorGroup International, a British firm that protects 32 percent of all nonmilitary supply convoys in Iraq. "We would never launch into an offensive operation, but when you're co-located, you're all one team, really."

As I've been writing here over the past ten months, a revolution has occurred in how America fights her wars.  Wars both covert and overt have been OUTSOURCED.  Up until now reading about it in the mainstream media has been akin to reading the reports of the six blind men in the old proverb, each feeling up part of an elephant, describing only his part and arguing about what it really was.  Today the Washington Post figured out it was dealing with the back half of a privatized elephant.  It will be interesting to see if they follow this through to find that the national security pachyderm has also outsourced its brains to the likes of SAIC, Abraxas, BAH and others.

Steve Fainaru has demonstrated that he's the best journalist covering this national security revolution.  Congratulations to the Washington Post and Fainaru.  Well done.

*****

Since OUTSOURCED is about a private military corporation that is deeply involved in the Iraq War, it seems fitting to give another preview:

A rapid pop of automatic gunfire erupted from the direction of the insurgents’ compound.

“You have men down there?” Camille never let personal issues compromise her professionalism. When the shooting started, the private militaries were all on the same side.

Hunter nodded as he ordered his shooters on the dune to give them cover fire. The medium machine gun roared.

“You’re rolling with me,” Camille shouted. “I don’t want you out of my sight. Radio your troops to fall in behind us.” She turned and sprinted toward the Cougar. When she reached the back of the vehicle, three hands reached out to help her up.

 

GENGHIS handed Camille her carbine as she pushed her way to the front of the vehicle. She spoke to the shift leader, a bullet-headed ex-cop. “NOONER, inform Ops at Camp Raven that Lightning Six is now assuming command. Then move us into the tango compound.” Camille looked back at Hunter and decided not to blow his cover. “Rubicon, order your troops to rescue your men, then assume positions outside the walls to provide backup. We’ll call for them if needed.” Camille pointed to the concrete wall encircling the compound. Green tracers came from all over the compound, crisscrossing as they fired at imaginary targets. “We’re crashing their party. NOONER, take us in right there—about five meters to the right of the gate.”

“I’m not sure what the vehicle can do—I don’t know it well enough yet,” NOONER said.

“It’s got a Caterpillar 330 horsepower engine and Iraqis don’t use rebar in their concrete. Do the math. As soon as we’re in, I want a man at each firing port and one at each roof hatch. We’re going to tour the compound and light it up before dismounting. Brace yourselves. Now!”

Camille plopped to the floor and bear hugged the nearest legs. The Cougar’s engine revved, then she heard a loud crash, then felt a jolt like a plane hitting sudden turbulence. The ride immediately smoothed out.

The troops opened the roof hatches and hot air rushed inside. She shoved in her earplugs as she scrambled to the nearest firing port. She turned the steel plug counterclockwise, then let it fall onto the seat. Bullets plinked against the fortified walls, then seconds later the sharp echo of her troops’ automatic gunfire drowned everything out.

She poked the XM8 through the firing port and looked outside through its night vision scope. A dozen insurgents scattered across the courtyard like ants swarming around a disturbed nest. They sprayed the Cougar with their AKs, but they might as well have been using squirt guns. The rounds didn’t penetrate.

She aimed the XM8. A trickle of sweat rolled between her breasts and she itched underneath the bulky body armor. She slowly squeezed the trigger, then stopped before firing. She didn’t feel even the slightest tinge of fear that she, the predator, could become prey and without that sense of danger, she didn’t want to do it, not from the comfort of her air-conditioned Cougar. But she knew she couldn’t risk her men sensing even a hint of compassion because it would be all over for her—even if she did pay them eight hundred bucks a day.

With only a few seconds delay, she targeted and fired, retargeted and fired, dropping one bad guy at a time. It was almost fun. Hell, it was fun. And the world was a better place without them, she told herself as she dropped out the empty mag and snapped in a full one.

*****

Don't forget to read the entire Washington Post article.  It shouldn't be missed.

UPDATED: Outsourcing Friday

(For those of you who've already read this,  pls. see the update added as the last section.  Happy Father's Day weekend everyone!)

 

Since it's Friday, rather than finishing up a heavier post I'm working on that takes a closer look at that infamous PowerPoint, reading between the lines (and it is actually a very telling document) I decided to give OUTSOURCED a proper introduction.  I've included snippets for the past few days, but they were chosen due to topicality, not to do the book justice.  So here's a short passage, followed by a discussion of the backstory behind the book.  Have a great weekend!

 

 

OUTSOURCED

PART ONE
PRIVATE WARS

The worrisome thing isn’t what Halliburton and other big contractors are supposedly doing behind the scenes. It’s what they’re doing in plain sight. National defense, the blood-and-iron burden of government, is increasingly becoming a province of the private sector.
--THE NEW YORKER, January 12, 2004

 

CAMP TORNADO POINT, ANBAR PROVINCE, IRAQ

Her nose burned as she inhaled the dry air, heavy with diesel fumes that barely masked the stench of the burn pit and the overpowering fragrance of night-blooming jasmine. To Camille Black it was the sweet scent of life on the edge, the smell of money, the perfume of Iraq. She coughed dust and smiled as she circled her new mine-protected personnel carrier, a six-hundred-thousand-dollar Cougar, admiring it as if it were a Ferrari. In this part of Iraq, it was her Ferrari. Its V-shaped underbelly made it look more like a boxy boat than a small troop transport, but it could channel away blasts that would rip open an armored Humvee. As she watched several troops saying short prayers and kissing pictures of loved ones, she ran her hand along the vehicle’s side and sent off her own lonely prayer. She felt a blister in the desert-tan paint and she pretended to care.

Without warning, Drowning Pool’s “Bodies” blared over the Cougar’s sound system, heavy metal shifting the mood. All at once, the men put away their photos and got in each other’s faces, shouting the song’s angry words about letting bodies hit the floor. “Three! Four!” They counted with the lyrics, laughing and smiling, pumping themselves up for the night’s combat mission, a mission that she, too, was supposed to be part of, even though at the moment it didn’t feel that way to her. When the song was over, the operators slapped each other on the back in a bravado of brotherhood—a brotherhood that Camille had grown up with.

She admired the men. Some of the operators wore the short beards and moustaches favored by Force Zulu and Delta Force and others sported shaved heads typical of Navy SEALs. All but one had more wrinkles than their active-duty counterparts and they all had fatter paychecks, Black Management paychecks that she signed. They were the rock stars of the Iraq War. And they were hers.

The men’s bodies moved with the heavy metal rhythm of combat as they groomed one another, inspecting each other’s equipment, cinching their buddies’ gear and slapping duct tape over loose straps. None of them seemed to notice as she walked into the shadows on the other side of the Cougar, smiling. There she quietly sang “Bodies” to herself as she felt for her extra magazines of ammo to make sure everything was there and accessible. She touched her USP Tactical pistol, then her knife to confirm positions and she tightened her webbing. After she checked her XM8 assault rifle, she was geared up, ready for action. And she was amped.

She circled back around the vehicle. By then the men had already crammed themselves and their war gear into the back of the Cougar, ready for a preemptive raid on what Black Management intelligence suspected was an insurgent safe house. As Camille approached the crew door, one by one each man stopped inspecting his weapon and stared.

But no one spoke to her.

She grabbed a rung and started to climb aboard. Her body armor and gear weighed her down, but she was determined to board without assistance—not that any was offered to her. It stung. All of her life she had trained with Special Forces operators and she knew what they thought about women accompanying them into combat. No matter how many times she had proven herself in battle, they never quite trusted her. She remained an interloper in their shadowy male world, the very one that she was raised to inhabit. She hoisted herself up, barely able to get her center of gravity far enough inside.

The men were tightly packed on benches along the side walls and they seemed to spread out a little more as she searched for space.

“Like it or not, boys, you need to make room for me.”

“Put yourself down right here, sweetie.” An operator grinned at her as he patted his thigh.

“You really want a lap dance from a woman with a Ka-bar knife strapped to her ankle?” Camille smiled as she pointed to the Marine combat knife her father had given her for her sixteenth birthday. “I’m game if you are.”

He elbowed his buddy and they scooted aside. Camille Black took her place among the operators, pleased with herself.

***

 

 

OUTSOURCED:  The back story

Over two years ago I heard the first reports of contract soldiers--mercs or whatever you want to call them--in Anbar province in Iraq, claiming to be working for "State" even though it was obvious there were no diplomats in Anbar.  These tier-one operators--former SEALs and their ilk--reportedly sometimes disappeared for days at a time.  It didn't exactly seem they were part of a VIP protective security detail.  Fire in my belly told me I had a novel to write.

I scrapped the book I had sold to my publisher and began work on OUTSOURCED.  At that point in history, it appeared to be a very foolish thing to do, to write about a war that seemed to be over and a country where troop withdraws were expected soon.  In Iraq purple fingers were pointing into the air, fresh from polling booths, and the White House, media and Beltway pundits believed it pointed to the future, a smooth transition to democracy.  At that time the only ones familiar with that lawless part of Iraq were the Marines trying to keep it from further devolving into chaos, but the general sentiment was one of optimism and excitement at the progression of Iraqi democracy. 

A wise author never writes about actual politics and current events because they're such a fast moving target.  The publishing process is so slow, the novel is likely to be dated well before it goes into the galley stage, let alone hits the bookstores.  I don't do well with conventions and I'm a risk taker by nature, so I delved into the shadows of the War on Terror to learn everything I could about what was really going on.

As fiction author, I was able to get people to talk to me who would have shunned a reporter or nonfiction writer. From frontline players to boardroom executives, I’ve worked with SEALs, Marines, mercenaries and other creatures of the night.  I've talked to countless veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.  This book is the product of the generosity of strangers who have taught me everything from how to hotwire a Black Hawk to how to handle road rage in Iraq.

I’ve also been threatened and at times have been afraid, but for the most part I've been warmly welcomed.   I've been on a mission, fueled by passion, to reflect the reality of the War on Terror with all of its nuances and shades of gray and portray it in ways that cause the reader to reexamine his beliefs.  For this reason, I was so personally touched when I read in the first online reviewers wrote:

Hillhouse has accomplished something very few have: she has forced me to reexamine my own relationship with the government, including who I support and why. Who in charge is really looking out for our interests? And even if they are, is it moral for me to bask in our safety and prosperity when it comes at such a tremendous cost? Whatever answers I eventually settle out in my own head, the process of answering them will have proven extremely valuable.

It's said that a good mystery novel is one where the cop doesn't just work on the case, the case works on him.  With OUTSOURCED, I didn't just work on the novel, the novel worked on me.  I came out of it with a much deeper understanding of the immorality we throw our troops and intelligence officers into and expect them to behave morally.  I'm slower to judge, quicker to listen and perhaps lost some of my own morality along the way as I've been forced to live the moral and emotional hell of Iraq along with them.  To write a character well, I have to become that person, see the world through his or her eyes and when writing about the War on Terror, it's a particularly emotionally draining, albeit schizophrenic experience.  When a bad-ass Marine friend who has done two Iraq tours told me there were places he had to put the book down and walk away because it was too real, I knew I had done my job.

As the project progressed,the Iraq War quickly developed  in the directions I was already writing about:  Private corporations began taking on a a larger and larger war effort and CIA outsourcing trends continued unabated.  And the turf wars between the Agency and the Pentagon continue, despite claims on both sides that they've finally learned how to play together.  Through rigorous analysis, I've tried to stay one step ahead of the headlines, but early into the project, the headlines did catch up with me.  I was writing about fictional secret CIA prisons when Dana Priest broke the story of the black sites.  I've sweated it out on other headlines, hoping to get the novel out before someone broke some other major stories structured into the novel I have little doubt are true.

The War on Terror has revolutionized covert and overt warfare and OUTSOURCED is the first novel about this transformation.  It's the first book--fiction or nonfiction--about the outsourcing of intelligence and it's the first novel about private military corporations.  And this week, exactly two years after the first sentences were written, OUTSOURCED is in bookstores.  Two years later, we still don't know what those contract soldiers are doing, working for "State" in the wilds of Anbar...

 

INTRODUCING CAMILLE BLACK

CAMILLE BLACK, President and CEO, Black Management

Camille Black is the only female to ever run a private military corporation. Camille was raised by a single father, a recon Marine and her childhood was a Marine boot camp. By the time she was in her teens, she was competing against Secret Service and Marine snipers at long distance marksmanship competitions where she caught the attention of CIA case officer Joe Chronister. Chronister recruited her to join the Agency, convincing her that the paramilitary Special Activities Division (SAD) offered her something the Marines never would: the opportunity to become a real tier-one operator like the SEALs and Delta Force soldiers. On her eighteenth birthday, she broke her father’s heart and left the Marine recruiter’s office with Chronister.

Years later, on the eve of the Iraq War, Camille learned that it was old mentor Joe Chronister who was blocking her transfer to the CIA’s paramilitary SAD. She left the Agency, mortgaged everything she had to start her own private military corporation and realize her dream of going into combat with tier-one operators as one of them. She landed some Pentagon and Agency contracts, but couldn’t attract the top professionals because they didn’t trust a company run by a woman, even though she was a legend due to her counterterrorism work for the CIA.  After recruiting the highly respected operator from the SAD to join her, top players flocked to Black Management.  Black Management's growing  intelligence division holds multiple personal services contracts for "green badgers" with the CIA.

Camille was engaged to her high school sweetheart USMC Master Sergeant Hunter Stone, but two weeks before their marriage she learned that he had been killed in action in Iraq. Two years later she discovers that he was still alive and had faked his death to get out of the wedding. This, along with evidence that he really staged his death so he could marry another woman, helped Joe Chronister convince Camille to accept a CIA contract to kill Stone, who was also suspected of collaborating with terrorists. Camille Black divides her time between Black Management forward operating bases in Iraq and Afghanistan and her corporate headquarters in McLean, Virginia.

 

UPDATE:

First, a housekeeping note.  WTOP radio in DC just confirmed for this Monday at 7:35 a.m. EDT.  See the previous post for details.

This is an unusual post to update, I realize, but this is best way to respond to a comment Tyler posted this in the comments section:

Ms. Hillhouse- please keep up the good work; your blog is one of a kind and never ceases to impress or educate me. I picked up a copy of Outsourced yesterday and look forward to diving in. 

I do have to say though...an XM8? For a woman who wants to be respected, she might as well have gotten into that Cougar wearing makeup and high heels! ;p

Thanks, Tyler.   I was only going to put the short except here as I didn't want to over to it, but since you caught that, read on...

 

OUTSOURCED (continued)

 

In the twenty minutes since they’d left the base, no one had spoken to Camille. The Cougar’s air conditioning was fighting the summer heat, but it was a losing battle. The air was warm and stale and the ride hard. A man with a scar the entire length of his right forearm sat across from her, staring at her, calculating something. She looked him in the eyes and he wouldn’t look away or even blink.

His dark eyes looked intelligent, the wrinkles around them, experienced. He was bald and most of his face was clean-shaven, but taunting the Black Management dress code by several inches was a long narrow moustache and a thin veil of a beard that outlined his jawbone and came to a point well below his chin. As she studied him, she realized he could only be the operator known as Genghis.

Genghis studied her weapon. The lightweight assault rifle was a next generation kinetic energy system that the Army had hoped would replace the Vietnam-era M4 and M16 carbines until Pentagon politics killed the program. Camille loved its sleek design, molded polymer casing and clear plastic magazine. To her the XM8 seemed more like something used to blast space aliens rather than Iraqi insurgents. It had outperformed her expectations on the firing range and she couldn’t wait to field test it, but more importantly, it was cool, jock-cool and it made her feel that way, too.

Genghis cleared his throat. “That’s one sexy kit. Haven’t seen that before here in the sandbox.” 

The men stopped talking among themselves and watched. Camille handed him the rifle. He weighed it in his right hand.

“Light enough for a girl, I see. So what’s a little lady doing all dolled up with an XM8?”

“Accessorizing.” 

“I know who you are.” His teeth were stained from chewing tobacco. He tossed her the carbine. “There’s never been a finer warrior than your daddy. Everyone agrees the Malacca incident never would’ve happened if Charlie had still been with his team where he belonged. It was a helluva blow to the unit when your mommy died and he chose to leave the Corps to raise his little princess.”

“He raised a warrior, not a princess.”

“We’ll see, won’t we?” Genghis reached for an empty plastic water bottle and spat tobacco juice into it. Brown sludge oozed down the side of the container and she turned away.

Has the CIA Outsourced the Black Sites?

OUTSOURCED, published today by Forge Books, raises the question, has the CIA outsourced the secret CIA prisons, the black sites? 

Let's look at the possibility a little closer.  We already know that in the CIA's National Clandestine Service--the division responsible for the black sites--the majority of employees and functions are outsourced.  We also know from open sources that this outsourcing includes the most sensitive program in the CIA:  the non-official cover (NOC) program, which is at least partially in the hands of Abraxas Corporation.  The NOC program recruits, screens and trains what is popularly known as deep undercover spies.  These true name NOCs (as opposed to Plame, a NOCC, NOC of Convenience) have no visible ties to Washington or to the Agency.  They infiltrate foreign governments, corporations and, we hope, terrorist organizations.  This program is arguably the CIA's greatest success and its greatest weapon against an asymmetrical opponent in the War on Terror where good  human intelligence is sometimes the only way to discover the inner-workings of a terrorist organization.  And key components of the NOC program have been outsourced.  We can safely conclude that if the NOC program can be privatized, no function of the CIA is off-limits to private industrial contractors.  The NOC program broke the ultimate outsourcing taboo, paving the way for the outsourcing of the black sites.

Now this is a national security issue potentially so dark, I'm going to use the privilege of being a fiction author and hide in those shadows for part of this discussion, so I'll quote OUTSOURCED.  Yes, this is just a literary discussion, firmly protected by freedom of speech and of the press. <wink>:

Chapter Sixty-Six

"The CIA has been hiding and interrogating some of its most important al Qaeda captives at a Soviet-era compound in Eastern Europe, according to the US and foreign officials familiar with the arrangement.  The secret facility is part of a covert prison system set up by the CIA nearly four years ago that at various times has included sites in eight countries."

--The Washington Post, November 2, 2005, as reported by Dana Priest

 

"The current transfers mean that there are now no terrorists in the CIA [black site/secret prison] program...[T]he Supreme Court's recent decision has impaired our ability to prosecute terrorists through military commissions, and has put in question the future of the CIA black site/secret prison] program."

--President George Bush, Address to the nation, September 6, 2006

 

And editorial snafu kept this third quote out of the final edition:

"Although 14 detainees were publicly moved from CIA custody to the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, scores more have not been publicly identified by the U.S. government, and their whereabouts remain secret."

--The Washington Post,  February 28, 2007, as reported by Dafna Linzer and Julie Tate

CAMP RAVEN, THE GREEN ZONE, IRAQ

<snip>

“There’s more," Iggy said. "I was talking to some old Agency compadres about the black sites—you know, the prisons. Seems the heat’s been on ever since that Post reporter broke the story that the Agency’s running its own gulag system. The Poles and Romanians kicked them out. That Supreme Court ruling extending the Geneva Convention to detainees really mucked things up.”

“Interesting, but what does that have to do with Hunter?” 

“Hold on. The Agency’s been scrambling to come up with a new way to keep control over prisoners and interrogations. Word is they’ve privatized.” Iggy raised his voice, trying to be heard over the roar of the generators. 

Camille stopped walking and looked at him. “You’re kidding? You mean the Agency is using contractors to run their secret prisons?” 

“Privately run prisons are a billion-dollar industry back home. Makes sense to me. They’re a proven concept.” 

“Let me guess, another sole-source provider contract so they didn’t have to open it up for competitive bids. Damn. I’d like to have had that one. We never get anything decent from them other than knuckle-dragger gigs from the SAD.” She hated prisons, but knew they could be a good way to diversify her company if they could somehow land a contract. She could always hire someone else to run them. 

<snip> 

The sun burned Camille’s face and she moved into the shade with Iggy. “Last I heard the Agency only outsourced torture to shifty governments, not private companies.” 

“They use their own guys for the heart-to-hearts. It’s the facility management they’ve outsourced, along with detainee transport. Remember the president’s speech about how the CIA was no longer in the business of black sites? He was telling the truth, more or less. The CIA isn’t doing it anymore—Rubicon is.” 

“Any idea what the money’s like?” 

“Margins are supposed to be terrific. I’ll make some calls and get the specifics.” Iggy’s Gargoyle sunglasses slid down his nose and he pushed them back into place as he started walking toward the helicopters. “You know, it’s brilliant. The Agency for once is actually looking ahead and positioning itself for the future. Bush isn’t going to be around forever. If the next president’s a bleeding-heart , first day in office, he’ll repeal the presidential finding that allows black sites. Even Clinton let us outsource interrogations to the Third World, so I’m sure that’ll still be an option, but so much of what they give you is self-serving shit. You need control of your own interrogations. That’s the beauty of outsourcing: you can do whatever the fuck you want. You don’t need a presidential finding because you’re not the SOB doing it—the contractor is. Things go south, the contractor went too far. And god only knows if any laws apply to them. Geneva Conventions sure as hell don’t. So much for that Supreme Court ruling. It’s a beautiful workaround.”

 

As recently as last week, the New York Times reported:

Six human rights groups on Wednesday released a list of 39 people they believe have been secretly imprisoned by the United States and whose whereabouts are unknown, calling on the Bush administration to abandon such detentions.

We already know that a key component of the rendition program, the rendition flights, have at least partially been outsourced.  A Boeing subsidiary was sued in late May for its involvement in these flights and the European Parliament has implicated Blackwater in some of the flights, although most of them are probably performed by CIA proprietary companies. 

If parts of the back site program have been outsourced for years, namely detainee transport, why not outsource the facilities management of the black sites?  Privatization would offer a convenient political workaround to the Supreme Court decision Hamdan v. Rumsfeld which extended the Geneva Convention to all detainees--despite Administration assertions that they were immune as "enemy combatants."  Outsourced black sites would explain the sudden policy reversal when President Bush acknowledged the black sites in September last year shortly after the Supreme Court decision.  He could then distance himself from the black sites if private contractors--not government employees were running them.  (Using private companies for purposes of deniability is not exactly a new page in the CIA playbook.) 

And if there really are the 39 or so unaccounted for detainees still in secret government facilities, as human rights groups claim, this would also indicate that President Bush was more or less telling the truth when he said , "there are now no terrorists in the CIA program." 

Some might be worried about how running black sites could ever pass muster in the current review of Agency personnel to determine which positions are performing "inherently government functions" that by law have to be conducted by government employees.  It's very simple.  Running a prison--keeping up the facilities, providing the local nationals who act as the jailors and do the physical labor, and supervising this would all come under generic "facilities management" which will easily slide by as a "nonessential government function --work suited for green badgers.  Given that most branches of the government contract out facilities management, it will be a much easier case to make than for the known Abraxas contracts in the NOC program. 

Whether a prison is outsourced to a private corporation or is run by government employees makes no difference to the War on Terror--as long as we're all abiding by the Constitution that many of us are sworn to uphold.  Outsourcing facilities management of the black sites might even be a good idea, but it does call interesting questions about the role of industrial contractors in the War on Terror.

 

----

Note to the Agency Spy Who Monitors Me:  You might want to give this one directly to your branch chief boss rather than funnel and filter up through corporate's own branch project manager.  A discreet drop copy to the corporate head office along with a copy of OUTSOURCED probably wouldn't be a bad idea either.  There are some other passages they'll definitely want to take a serious look at.

And keep in mind no soldiers or spies were harmed in the making of this book.  Any release of classified national security information is purely the product of vigorous analysis and a vivid imagination.

------

 

"Perhaps it is the political thriller we deserve. By traveling the more complicated route, Hillhouse manages a neat trick: to balance nonfiction-style education with a gripping story that opens with great betrayal and only worsens after that. Here, perhaps, we have definitive proof that McGrath was wrong: Espionage writers are ready to write fiction that tells the darkest possible truths."

--The Los Angeles Times

 

The Truthiness about Blackwater

We live in a time of polemics, of polarized politics and of truthiness. Named “Word of the Year” by Merriam-Webster in 2006, for anyone who hasn’t heard of it, truthiness is a concept devised by comedian Stephen Colbert to characterize something claimed as truth, based on gut feelings and not facts, distorting facts for emotional appeal and political gain. Truthiness.

BLACKWATER by Jeremy Scahill is the truthiness about Blackwater USA. BLACKWATER (the book) is to Blackwater USA (the company) what the aluminum tubes were to WMDs in Iraq. Whereas underlying facts may be correct, the conclusions based on pre-conceived political agendas are wildly off.

Because I believe the underlying research was solid and the topic of Jeremy Scahill’s book BLACKWATER needed to be discussed, I’ve waited until it had good traction on The New York Times bestseller list to write candidly about it and its truthiness.

Now truthiness by its very nature is difficult to debate and dispel, as Stephen Colbert demonstrates so brilliantly night after night. That’s why it’s so damn useful as a political tool. I’ve rolled my eyes every time I’ve heard Mr. Scahill call Blackwater Bush’s Praetorian Guard. The analogy is so far from historical fact, it barely passes as truthiness and it pains the historian in me. So rather than give it the gravitas of a more serious analysis, I decided it was better to respond to this truthiness with more truthiness:

Top Ten Ways Blackwater Shooters aren’t the Praetorian Guards

10. The bulging muscles of the Praetorian Guards weren’t from steroids. 

9. Praetorian Guards watched real gladiators; BW shooters watch 300—over and over.

8. Praetorian Guards really were tier-one.

7. Praetorian Guards wore togas only in Rome; BW shooters wear Speedos only at the Liberty Pool.

6. Praetorian Guards didn’t have their own ProShop.

5. Praetorian Guards never Googled, “What Color is the Boat House at Hereford?”

4. Praetorian Guards were loyal to death; BW shooters always want to know how much Triple Canopy is paying.

3. Praetorian Guards were immortalized in marble statutes; BW shooters get bear paw tattoos.

2. Praetorian Guards assassinated emperors; BW shooters never really get to do the cool offensive stuff.

1. Praetorian Guards knew what the Praetorian Guards were.

I’ll spare you a top ten list about the inferences that Blackwater is a crusading army of God. Suffice it to say they’re not choirboys.

***

I’m in an unusual position. I am the only blogger who focuses upon the nexus of the current transformation in national security, the outsourcing of the War on Terror.  I am also a novelist, a thriller author, who, in less than two months, has the first novel coming out about this outsourcing revolution.

Although I’m writing fiction, I do so with a strong commitment to the truth, to reality of the War on Terror industry and to a fair portrayal of its players.  These men and some women put their lives on the line with the belief that they are keeping the rest of us safe and free.  At the same time they’re also working for personal and corporate profit.  Patriotism and profit.  It makes a lot of us uncomfortable and it's hard to understand how they can coexist without corrupting one another.  Such contradictions are what makes fiction interesting and this industry so hard to understand.

And I've tried.  I’ve done my damnedest to get to know the private military and intelligence industries and the people working in it so I could understand it on its terms and write real characters, not caricatures bases on preconceived ideas.  I’ve slipped into the shadows and at times I’ve been afraid. It’s a rough crowd.

I’ve also studied the larger political issues and have combined these with my best understanding of the private military and intelligence industries in order to present the subtleties, mixed morals and contradictions that characterize the age we live in.  There is no more important issue to our society than the War on Terror, how we're fighting it and who we are becoming because of it.

It’s ironic that something that was pivotal in my decision to venture into this territory was an essay in The New York Times Book Review that chided thriller authors for their failure in helping the public make sense of the post- 9/11 landscape, particularly in regard to intelligence. It concluded with the damning words, ‘To understand what’s going on in the world…we readers need to turn to non-fiction.”

Sadly, that nonfiction is now betraying us.

My forthcoming novel is the truthiness about the War on Terror and about a company not unlike Blackwater USA. My fictional private military company, Black Management, is not evil. At the same time, it’s hard to call it good. OUTSOURCED is fact warped into fiction so far it again resembles fact, maybe more fact than in today’s nonfiction.

Truthiness.

Like Mr. Scahill, I, too, have a book to pimp. And this is where things become even more twisted.  Although his is nonfiction and mine is fiction, they’re both on the same subject, more or less. Mr. Scahill is a journalist and I’m a novelist, but we’re both part of the publishing industry. I’ve had strong pressure to market my book similar to his--with truthiness and hyperbole. Fear mongering sells. So does sensationalism.

(Regular readers of The Spy Who Billed Me will already know which route I chose because of how I run this blog. I call things as I see them with humor and irony but also with a commitment to fairness and truth--all the while doing my best to avoid truthiness, today’s Top Ten excepted.  I'm sure I fail at times, but I try.  And for those of you who just popped by, please don't mistake me for an industry pundit and start blasting.  Read the blog.) 

Whether an author is selling fiction or nonfiction about this subject, it’s too important for us as a nation to understand the War on Terror industry to portray it or one of its main players as a one-dimensional character out of a cheap pulp thriller. The real world is more textured than that, most of it in shades of gray and perhaps in this case, shades of black.

There’s an unprecedented amount of force as well as military and intelligence expertise concentrated in private corporations such as Blackwater USA. That alone is reason that we as a society need to understand the industry and keep a close eye on it. It’s an industry that is not going to go away, so we also have to figure out how to live with it. And to do that, we have to put the histrionics aside. Mr. Scahill’s book really isn’t a bad place to start to learn about it, as long as you understand the truthiness in it and filter it out.  Remember, juxtaposing facts does not make them related.  Read his book critically and you'll be rewarded.

My personal concern is more with the private intelligence industry than the private military one. The manipulation of intelligence regarding Iraq’s alleged WMDs had to be very artfully done to  short-circuit a formidable bureaucracy designed to prevent just such warping of intelligence.   We all know now that's possible, truthiness in 16 words or less.   

Today, unlike during the run-up to the Iraq War, the key pieces of that intelligence apparatus are now in private hands. Substituting truthiness for intelligence to misdirect US foreign policy for corporate gain has never been easier.  It's an industry of the shadows, with a deep culture of secrecy, one that's necessary for national security.  It also makes it impossible for the public to monitor.  If there were ever an industry for close Congressional oversight, this is it.

 

It is a very unusual time that we live in, when patriotism and profit; comedy and news, fiction and nonfiction converge. To truthiness and the darker truths it tells about all of us. May we learn to live with those very uncomfortable truths—or are they fiction?

The Spy Who Briefed Me

Protect the Secret Squirrels.  Black Hawk Down author Mark Bowden writes why SecDef Gates should consider keeping the Pentagon's spy unit.  He makes the unpopular conclusion, "Some of the things Rumsfeld did were right."

Taliban attacks Blackwater convoy.  A suicide car bomber in Kabul attacked a Blackwater diplomatic security detachment, injuring five BW employees, one seriously.  No principals were injured.

Bad Rep for Shoddy Work?  Improve or Hire a PR firm.  DynCorp is still fretting over its bad press from the January Special Inspector General Report for Iraqi Reconstruction alleged DynCorp had improperly spent funds on 20 VIP trailers and an Olympic-size pool as well as over $36 million for body armor, armored vehicles and weapons it couldn't account.  It's response:  hire Qorvis, PR firm to the Saudi government.  DynCorp, is a major private military corporation with a reputation for excellent upper management and big problems everywhere below.  They dwarf Blackwater and serve as a reminder, that despite their flaws, BW is generally well run.

Grazie, Italia.  The Nation did a nice rehash of the prosecution of CIA officers for rendering a Muslim cleric accused of recruiting jihadists to fight in Iraq.  Keep this in mind when reading about Italy's recent release of Taliban prisoners in a trade for an Italian hostage. 

PsyOps Coup or Misguided Investigators?  The Irish press is reporting that six flights that were suspected of carrying CIA prisoners were inspected, but instead of hooded, shackled detainees, they found racehorses and golfers.  I'm guessing it's a case of over-zealous investigators.   Do they really think there's such a high volume going on anymore, particularly routing through the North Atlantic?  I'm sure the surge capacity is there in the system, but I seriously doubt that it's being used.

K-Street finds new friends.  Many saw the November elections as a big blow to the lawyers, PR specialist and lobbyists that are the K-Street spin machine--the one that helped bring us multiple congressional scandals.  No so, thanks to the private military industry.  They've found a new role in the democratic-controlled Congress.  Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, Crowell & Moring, Patton Boggs, Qorvis Communications, and Vinson & Elkins have hired by such firms as DynCorp and KBR (former Halliburton subsidiary) to assist them through Congressional corruption inquiries.

Blackwater the Book.  I doubt the Blackwater Pro Shop is selling the new book BLACKWATER by investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill (Note to BW execs:   Thanks for bringing back the BW Teddy Bears!)   I have a different take on BW than Scahill and myself in the bizarre position on a DC NPR station defending its leadership yesterday (long story), but BLACKWATER is definitely worth a read because of the meticulous research.  So is Scahill's new article in the Nation, "Bush's Shadow Army."

Federal Prosecutor Lam firing linked to CIA Probe?  The San Diego Union-Tribune thinks so, but I suspect it was not done to protect the Agency.  As the Plame scandal has very publicly demonstrated, Rove and his friend Cheney are no friends of the CIA and are unlikely to have made the move to protect Dusty Foggo, former 3rd in command at the CIA or the Agency.  In their eye's, any help they gave to the spooks was more likely seen as an unfortunately side effect of the payback for prosecuting Republican Congressman Duke Cunningham or to help protect the intelligence contractor Wilkes.

The Whore Who Billed Me.  Okay, I admit there's no segue between the topic of this blog and this item, but I found it interesting.   David Kaplan of US News reports on his Bad Guy's blog that the Department of Justice has just issued a new guide to prostitution which includes such helpful info as the going rates for various sexual acts (ranging from $20 to $100.) Having just checked on prices here at Big Island resorts after being surprised at the prices that defense contractor Wilkes (as in Dusty Foggo and Cunningham scandals) allegedly had paid at the Hapuna Prince Resort for their call girls, these rates seem well below market.  (According to the Wilkes indictment, in one instance $600 was paid to their "driver" for prostitute A and B.  Later that evening, Prostitute A was given a $500 tip.)  It could be that the Mainland is a lot cheaper than here in Hawaii and it's another case of what we here call the price of paradise.

LAT Breaks Yet Another Big Story in the War on Terror

The public relies upon the media to shed light upon the shadowy inner-workings of the War on Terror, playing its watchdog role in a vibrant democracy.  The Washington Post and The New York Times have taken the lead in breaking major stories, prompting public debate on the use of torture, secret prisons, the role of the Geneva Convention, etc.  Always playing catch-up, the LA Times yesterday brought us an exclusive investigation into CIA rendition flight of Kahled Masri, a German citizen of Lebanese descent.  We already know from previous reports that the rendition teams have stayed at the Gran Melia Victoria hotel, a luxury hotel in Majorca, that they have made phone calls on personal cell phones, that they ordered bottles of red wine to celebrate the successful rendition and that they gave the hotel their personal frequent flier numbers, even though they were traveling under non-official cover.  We also knew that the company running the flight was Aero Contractors LTD., which flies or rather flew out of that unusual rural hub of CIA activity Johnston County, North Carolina.

Relying upon documents filed by German prosecutors as well as an on-site investigation in North Carolina, the home-base of the flight crew and aircraft used in the 2003 kidnapping of Kahled Masri, The LA Times has discovered these new insightful details:

 

• The flight crew spent an extra night in the hotel because of a forecast of snowstorms along their intended route;
• The chief pilot stayed in room 552;
• The chief pilot called home at 2:28 in the afternoon, although we don't know if this is the time in Majorca or North Carolina;
• In addition to the 3 bottles of celebratory Spanish wine they ordered, they splurged with 17 shrimp cocktails;
• The chief pilot drives a Toyota Previa minivan;
• The third pilot drives a Ford Explorer and has a 17-foot aluminum fishing boat;
• The chief pilot "keeps a collection of model trains in a glass display case near a large bubbling aquarium in his living room;"
• The third pilot "keeps plastic models of his favorite planes mounted by the fireplace in his living room in a house that backs onto a private golf course;"

And here comes the real eye-opener:

• The copilot who is 35 lives with his father and two dogs.

I could be wrong, but I'm sensing a Pulitzer here.

One thing the story doesn't tell us is whether Aero Contractors Ltd, was a shell of a private contractor or whether it was a devised facility of the CIA.  Since other reports have told us that the company dates back to 1979, well before the recent explosion of CIA outsourcing, it be an increasingly rare example of the CIA still doing things in-house.  The LAT also didn't seem to check with the FAA database which would also have told them that there are no longer aircraft registered to this company.  The shell game continues...

 

----------------

To regular readers, thanks for your patience while I've been both on the road and feeling like roadkill thanks to a plethora of projects coming due at once.  Normal, more serious posting is resuming this week.