Geosystems Situational Awareness Mast (aka Zippermast) from Travis on Vimeo.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Film: The Cult of the Suicide Bomber 1 and 2, by Robert Baer
I Just finished watching part 2 and ordered it through Netflix. These two documentaries are awesome, and Mr. Baer did a great job in peeling back the layers of this horrific tactic. If you want to see into the mind of these folks, and get a feel for the why and how, then check this out. –Matt
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The Cult of the Suicide Bomber 1
The Cult of the Suicide Bomber 2 (2008)
Editorial Reviews
About the Actor
Robert Baer spent twenty years running agents from inside the CIA s Directorate of Operations, operating against Hizballah, Al-Qaeda, and other terrorist organizations, and was considered perhaps the best on-the-ground field officer in the Middle East (Seymour M. Hersh, The New Yorker). His memoir See No Evil was a New York Times bestseller and inspired the movie Syriana, starring George Clooney.
When Baer left the agency in 1997 he received the Career Intelligence Medal, with a citation that says, He repeatedly put himself in personal danger, working the hardest targets, in service to his country.
–Robert Baer [was] one of the most talented Middle East case officers of the past twenty years. (Reuel Marc Gerecht, The Atlantic Monthly)
Product Description
On 18 April 1983 a truck drove into the entrance of the US embassy in downtown Beirut killing 63 people, including six CIA officers. Never before had the CIA lost so many officers in a single attack. In the weeks and months after the bombing top investigators from the CIA and FBI failed to solve the mystery of who was responsible. For Robert Baer, the CIA s top operative in the Middle East, it became a lifelong obsession.
His investigation and the answers he found became the Emmy Award-nominated motion picture, The Cult of the Suicide Bomber. In the first film Bob uncovered the history and evolution of suicide bombing as a weapon of radical Islam. Now in this vital new film he discovers how the phenomenon has spread to the West and changed the role of women in the Middle East, and crucially tells us how this threat can be defeated.
With shocking footage of actual suicide bombings and interviews with failed suicide bombers, The Cult of the Suicide Bomber is the most definitive documentary on suicide bombers ever produced.
Baer himself says: I almost look at the Cult of the Suicide Bomber films as a CIA briefing. In the CIA, we were taught to go to policy makers and tell them what we believe is the absolute truth. For me, the Cult films are the absolute truth.
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Crime: The ‘Real’ Lord of War, Viktor Bout
This guy is pretty interesting, and has definitely done some amazing things in the field of weapons delivery. But like most who walk the line between legal and illegal weapons delivery, you always face the potential of getting caught one day. Viktor made things happen out there, but at what price to self and others? But on the other hand, everyone has done business with the guy, because he could get things done in really crappy places. The movie Lord of War staring Nicolas Cage was about his exploits, and there are plenty of stories, books, and articles about him. And after he got caught in Thailand, the Economist wrote this recent article. –Matt
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International man of mystery
Flying anything to anybody
Dec 18th 2008
From The Economist print edition
The rise and fall of Viktor Bout, arms-dealer extraordinaire, shows a darker side of globalisation
VIKTOR BOUT knew, long before his plane lifted off from Moscow, that they meant to snatch him. For years he had hunkered down in the Russian capital, making only rare forays abroad. Western spies, the United Nations and do-gooder activists were after him. They said that he had smashed arms embargoes and struck deals with a remarkable axis of ne’er-do-wells: supplying weapons and air-transport to the Taliban, abetting despots and revolutionaries in Africa and South America, aiding Hizbullah in Lebanon and Islamists in Somalia. He also found time to supply American forces in Iraq, perhaps al-Qaeda too, and maybe even Chechen rebels.
He denied all wrongdoing and, no doubt, thought his accusers irritating and hypocritical. But until the fuss died away he knew that he was safe only in Russia, from where extradition was impossible.
Yet Mr Bout, a puzzling, amoral and intelligent man, made a poor choice in March, leaving behind his wife and daughter and flying to Bangkok. As a consequence he may end up in New York as the star of a trial that would provoke echoes of cold-war spy games, further chilling relations between the West and Russia.
A shy and plump man, for years his only public image was a grainy, Soviet-era passport photo. That shows a dumpy, youngish face, with drooping eyes peering above a thick, triangular, moustache—the sort one might buy in a joke shop. He was probably born in what is now Tajikistan but, as with the picture, details of his life are fuzzy. American prosecutors say that he uses at least half a dozen passports and more aliases, including “Butt”, “Budd”, “Boris”, “Bulakin” and “Aminov”. A gifted linguist, he slips easily between as many languages as he has names.
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Publications: Efficacy of Private Military Contractors in Peace Operations, by Nicholas Pascucci
This is a nice little publication that gives a quick run down of positive (and some negative) uses of PMC’s over the years. One of the conclusions made, that I really like, is the concept of applying quality control and clear objectives for these companies. The author makes the point that if used correctly, PMC’s are certainly capable of producing excellent results (Executive Outcomes in Sierra Leone for example). If there is no clear oversight or clear objective for these companies, then that is when problems arise (like in Iraq or Afghanistan).
To me, this conversation needs to continue to happen in this industry, of where we are and where we have come from, so we know best how to carry on into the future. All of the companies and the clients that use us must become the ultimate learning organizations and continue to find a better way. There is too much at stake in this war to not care about doing it right. It is also the goal of Feral Jundi to present to the reading public that we in this industry do care, and with a lot of hard work and persistence, we can find a better way.
The most important aspect of this conversation are the ideas that each side of the debate uses to support their views. For to long, academia and media has hijacked these ideas with assumptions and half-truths, and the only way to stop that is to challenge those assumptions with solid facts to the contrary. To be silent and not challenge this ideas only allows these assumptions to become some kind of truth.
And this site is not some propaganda machine (privately owned and operated by me, and not some company blog), that supports some ‘military industrial complex conspiracy’. This site is about setting the record straight, and having a serious discussion about the use of this tool called the ‘private security contractor’ in today’s war. I have been critical of this industry and of the client here before on FJ, only with the goal of presenting ideas for fixing the problems and providing a better service for the client–not promoting the shutting down of the whole thing down.
Identify the problems, identify the industry we want, and find the correct models and systems out there for contracting and oversight that will only help us to achieve that goal. I think we are doing great at identifying the problems, but we still have a ways to go on figuring out what is ‘the industry we want’. And I say ‘we’ meaning the state. It’s not about what I want, or what the government wants, but what the state collectively wants and what they are comfortable with. It does matter what the professor or the soccer mom or whomever thinks about this industry, and the more we can work to explain and justify what we are and what we can do for the people and the government in today’s war, the better it is for all. –Matt
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Efficacy of Private Military Contractors in Peace Operations
By: Nicholas Pascucci
Date: December 5, 2008
Summary: The Private Military Contracting field has experienced massive growth since the September 11th attacks. This essay explores how the contractors have been used in the past and how they can be used in peace- and nation-building operations in the future.
Introduction
In the years since the September 11, 2001 attacks, the Private Military and Security industries have grown remarkably, garnering contracts in hotspots and warzones around the world in support of the interests of both nation states and private companies. Private Military Companies can be found in over 50 countries, operating in an industry that makes over one hundred billion dollars annually.1 Their increased use has sparked much controversy, and revelations regarding both the successes and failures of the industry raise questions about its role in moderating conflict worldwide. In an industry whose primary focus is providing military-related services in failed states and conflict areas, understanding the effects of their activities and presence in those areas is essential to being able to utilize them effectively in creating peace.
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Tuesday, December 30, 2008
Somalia: Fresh Turmoil, Uncertainty As President Resigns
“The extremist al Shabaab Islamist group is best placed to take control of Mogadishu, but this is not a foregone conclusion,” said David Shinn, a U.S. expert on the Horn of Africa at George Washington University.
While al Shabaab have spearheaded attacks this year to become the face of the insurgency, they lack popular support, and do not have enough fighters to rule on their own without alliances with Islamist movements, analysts say.
Al Shabaab’s hardline ways — such as strict imposition of sharia law, banning drinking or films, and the beheading of several suspected government collaborators — sit uncomfortably with many among Somalia’s traditionally moderate Muslims.
Both of these articles point to the same reality. Islamists will be ruling Somalia. The question is what kind of Islamists will be ruling Somalia and will they work with the west and put a check on the things we worry about? Namely harboring terrorists and allowing piracy. Al Shabaab is way to extremist for Somalis, and once they have taken control and there is no one else to fight, how will the Somalis view their form of Sharia Law?
Strategically, I think that is the idea. Let them take the city, and then diplomatically we support the moderate factions who would be better to negotiate with in the future and better for the people of Somalia. The support should not be overt though, because anything the west touches, will disgust the local populations.
And get the Ethiopians out of there, because those forces are infuriating the local populations and driving support to Al Shabaab. When the dust settles, we must find a competitor to Al Shabaab who is willing to work with the west and the rest of the world, and who also can win the support of the people. Good luck with that one though, and that is the challenge. A good first step towards that goal though is to reshuffle the deck, and watch what happens when Ethiopia leaves, the President resigns and more than likely Al Shabaab takes over.
–Matt
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Somalia: Fresh turmoil, uncertainty as president resigns
Date: 29 Dec 2008
NAIROBI, 29 December 2008 (IRIN) – Fresh turmoil and uncertainty loom for the people of Somalia – already ravaged by displacement, conflict, drought and hyper-inflation – after the country’s interim president resigned on 29 December.
Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed resigned after disagreements with parliament and his prime minister, as well as pressure from the international community.
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