Trump Pulls Troops Out of Syria and Afghanistan

Mattis, a superb combat warrior, disagrees with a  superb strategist
They're both right! 

We may take a bit of flack from pseudo-hawks and NeoCons, but we support Trump's decision 100%.

Old Military and Intelligence guys have wondered at the rationale of keeping our troops in the Middle East.
Saddam is dead,
Osama bin Laden is still dead.

We have no stake in the Middle East other than to assist governments to stabilize, which does not include the massive presence of Central Command Forces. Nor does it require keeping massive US Military forces in Europe under the European Command -- a relic of the Cold War. Let the Europeans fund and populate NATO; we're tired of taking their lip and funding their exquisite tastes.

As necessary, we have the capability of transporting a fully equipped combat division, with combat support aircraft from the US to a crisis site within hours via our Transportation Command's  C-5 and
C-17 cargo planes.  We can deploy supersonic bombers and fighters from the US to arrive over the Middle East with minimal flight time with maximized combat effectiveness.

We should learn from history [an odd idea, now, isn't it?]

We've been involved in these faux wars for decades, the purpose of which always remains vague - other than to support the Military-Industrial Complex -- as detailed by General/POTUS Eisenhower.

As the Soviet Empire was crumbling, we sat with Bill Clark, then the Assistant Secretary of the Army [General Mark Clark's son] as he bemoaned the future/demise of the Military without a defined enemy.

Specifically, without a definable enemy, we would have no reason to maintain a large, standing Military; and if a new global crisis arose, how could we mobilize in time to meet that crisis?

We've spent a few years in combat in a variety of countries, supposedly to "defend our country", only to learn the enemies we fought were once our friends, and our current friends were once our enemies.

Worse, we learned our "leaders" [e.g., Kissinger, Bush-1, W, Robert Gates, Obama, Billary] were the actual enemy we've come to know as the Deep State, all leading us into senseless wars.

After we [personally] were able to defeat the insurgency in Northeast Thailand, we gloated until we learned the insurgency had been sponsored by the Chinese who coopted the anti-government movement protesting the government's confiscation of farmlands in order to build a hydro-electric dam, funded by our very own Agency for International Development [USAID].  The dam construction devastated famers by claiming their fertile land and relegating this once prosperous group to generations of poverty and government subsidies.

But, the "greater good" prevailed as the region received electricity -- although few could use it.

That revelation in 1974, got us to thinking about our major Military commitments.

China and Vietnam [Ho Chi Minh] were some of our greatest supporters in WW2, establishing OSS spy networks (which we inherited during the Vietnam War) and recovering our downed pilots; but now, that enemy, Japan - the invading force, is our close ally in the Pacific, and China is now our enemy.

Ho Chi Minh worked in England and in France, and on the docks in Baltimore, so he was fluent in English as well as the US culture.

He led the movement for independence from France and formed the Indochinese Communist Party, and following WW2, sought Eisenhower's support for Vietnam's independence - which Ike declined.

LBJ initiated the war with North Vietnam by sending our warships into their territorial waters, drawing fire, thus convincing Congressional hawks to declare war.

As it turns out, the Tonkin Gulf Resolution was drafted a full six months before the attacks on US vessels occurred.

While we valiantly fought that war until 1975, Henry Kissinger, without the knowledge of Nixon, was selling us out to the Chinese in 1972, in exchange for a trade agreement.

But, throughout that war, we were often reminded of the heroin trade, via the Golden Triangle, through US Military transport, to the US.  Some folks are convinced that trade was sponsored or conducted by the CIA.

Iraq, for decades before we invaded to depose Saddam, was our closest Middle East Arab Ally [see our colleague, #Rick Francona's book "Ally to Adversary"], as well as our principal oil supplier.

Dick Cheney's Defense Contractors made a fortune exploiting the war -- and our soldiers, and we then had a generation of soldiers succumb to the Gulf War Syndrome [attributed to the oil vapor from burning wells, or, depleted uranium munitions, but in fact, derived from the Anthrax vaccine immunizations in 1990 by order of the Department of Defense on all Army troops who "might" be deployed to Iraq -- Bush's friends in the Pharmaceutical Industry profited mightily from that requirement -- even though it had not been through more than one (incomplete) trial.

Theoretically, the US would use oil sales from Iraq to pay for that war, but, in the end, the oil fields went under the control of other countries, and the US got not a cent!  On the other hand, US Defense contractors made fortunes.

Estimates by Reuters put the estimated total cost of the Iraq War at more than $5.6 Trillion.  
The war killed an estimated 150,000 Iraqi civilians, with unconfirmed estimates ranging up to 600,000, including security forces, insurgents, journalists, and humanitarian workers!  Bush demonstrated US power by publicly executing Saddam by hanging him, by the neck, until dead.
[Rumor has it that W faced that same sentence in Gitmo in December, 2018]

The social impact in Iraq included the reinvigoration of Islamic militants, reversal of women's rights, and a weakened an already precarious healthcare system.  The multi-billion reconstruction effort was regarded a failure as most of the monies spent on security was lost to waste or fraud.

Keep in mind that the basis of George W Bush's invasion of Iraq was based on his announcement that Saddam Hussein held "Weapons of Mass Destruction" [WMD] a claim discounted by Rick Francona who was/is an expert on the region and acted as General Schwartzkopf's personal Arabic interpreter and Intelligence Advisor.

Schwartzkopf, opposed by Dick Cheney later became critical of the rationale behind the war once he learned the "WMD" claim was fraudulent and handed in his retirement papers rather than remain on Active Duty.  No evidence was ever substantiated of WMDs in Iraq.

Our legacy in Iraq was, perhaps, to create the subsequent regional terrorist factions which represent our current global threat.

The Afghans were our closest allies in their battles against the Soviets, as we helped create and aided the Mujahiden; but, there were even allegations that the CIA created Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, via Operation Cyclone, -- and then, once the Soviets were defeated, we abandoned our Afghan colleagues, allowing religious zealots to control the Taliban who were then dubbed terrorists; they're now our enemy because bin Laden was reportedly hiding out in Afghanistan.

In spite of the Special Operations assault on bin Laden's Pakistan hideout and his assassination, he has been repeatedly reported in sightings vacationing in the Caribbean with his family.

The faux assassination of bin Laden was conducted by Admiral McRaven's Special Operations units under the guise of Operation Neptune Spear as a public relations event for then-POTUS Obama.  McRaven reportedly was one of the flag rank officers who signed on to Obama's requirement that they agreed to fire on US Civilians if so ordered.

Contrary to all Intelligence protocols, bin Laden was killed and his [supposedly his] mutilated body was dumped in the ocean, sparking Muslim outrage throughout the world, and leaving professional Intelligence officers bewildered that he was not taken captive [he was unarmed] and interrogated to obtain his knowledge of regional and global terrorist groups.

Notably, SEAL Team Six, the lead on the bin Laden assault, later suffered 38 casualties, to include 15 participants of the bin Laden raid when their Chinook helicopter was shot down on August 6, 2011IN [Extortion 17] -- not long after members of the Team lampooned Obama as in Clint Eastwood's Empty Chair soliloquy.

Loading 38 SEALs aboard a chopper in a combat zone strains credulity, but, apparently, the orders came down from McRaven -- an officer we all respected until too many of these incidents surfaced, and he has recently become a highly vocal critic of President Trump.

The chopper was allegedly shot down by a Surface to Air [SAM/MANPAD]


But, why are we in Afghanistan now?

Most experts remain bewildered, other than the US now tacitly protects the poppy/heroin trade.

And, we learned that ISIS, our Enemy-du-Jour, has been led and funded by senior officers of our closest Mid-East Allies, apparently so we would have an officially recognized enemy.

Later, we learned that Benghazi was all about covering up Hillary's arms deals with ISIS and al Qaeda by overthrowing Qadafi and transferring the contents of Libyan armories to al Qaeda -- who just might be tempted use those weapons against US forces.


Of late, we received from an anonymous donor, the complete [unclassified] war-plan designed by [former General] Wesley Clark [Clinton's protege and commander of the Military raid on Waco] in which Clark planned a war between Ukraine and Russia, into which US forces would be inserted and engaged.
[It was difficult to determine who would have been the enemy in that war, but US engagement would guarantee profits for our Defense Contractors.]

In Central America, a grouping of 'banana republics" and a hotbed of corruption, the US built up the Southern Command [SouthCom] headquarters from a Military retirement vacationland to a highly energized and blossoming combat command, focused on defeating the communist threat to Nicaragua, which Jimmy Carter had turned over to the Sandinistas by pulling support from the "evil despot", Somoza - [a West Point graduate] and allowing communist Daniel Ortega to come to power and who then ushered in the Cubans and Soviets -- who presented The Threat.

We were assigned as the Special Intelligence Advisor to SouthCom, a thinly staffed regional headquarters which could respond to any regional crisis, and watched it mushroom into a bloated, top heavy bureaucracy which justified its existence by toppling our host and ally, Noriega with a massive invasion, built a huge Military force in Honduras and El Salvador, created a war zone in El Salvador, and essentially destabilized an entire sub-continent by becoming the common enemy of all, and a seeming ally of the Drug Cartels, thanks to Bush-1, Clinton, Bush-2, and Obama.

The US militarized El Salvador, Honduras, and Costa Rica, and headquartered Army and Air Force bases in each country, and supported Panama's Noriega as a "benevolent despot", who profited by accepting payments from the KGB, the CIA, Army Intelligence, -- and the Chinese.

[We managed HUMINT programs in CentAm following a by-name request by the CIA DDO-LA [D Clarridge] and the former DCI [V Walters] to restructure both the CIA and the Military Intelligence HUMINT operations in Latin America]

Noriega was also a drug runner and arms dealer; but, then we created an intelligence program that revealed that Noriega was not just a tin-horn dictator, but masterminded a global network of hundreds of front companies through which he moved drugs, arms, and laundered money -- a sophisticated network CIA/Deep State coveted, so Noriega was declared evil, and the US invaded Panama, and the CIA took control of all the Noriega Front Companies to carry on their global, Black enterprises.

But, all that is hidden in the background, and Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria are sort of enemy strongholds, but, we're not sure who are the good guys, or the bad guys.

So, now, who will the US have to identify and combat "The "Threat"?
Afghanistan for another 10 or 15 years? or Syria, for another 10 years!

We have the highly skilled and specialized Special Forces [the Special Operations Commmand (SOCOM) designed for insertion into hostile zones to address "Terrorists".

We have a Cyber Command which theoretically can combat hacking by all our Cyber enemies, and even the Russians, if we can admit that the US targets the successor to the USSR
[the Cyber Command apparently includes Spookdblog as an enemy since they have bombarded our residences with impulse waves, hacked our cell-phones and texted Clapper's threats to us, along with excerpts of our highly classified Officer Evaluation Reports (OER)-- just to let us know they could do it.]

Notably, there are several other Unified Commands [AfriCom, SouthCom, Strategic Command, etc.,] which serve no purpose other than to create command slots for unnecessary generals and bureaucrats, and to fund NATO.

But, let's not forget the Defense contractors who provide that expensive support for our Military forces deployed in those regions. The massive expansion of our Military and Intelligence organizations under Bush and Obama have created a huge financial burden, and a bloated Military hierarchy unseen in the history of the US -- even at the peak of World War 2.

These Commands waste manpower and equipment, and create the scenarios for regional wars - usually backing the wrong elements; they augment their forces by deploying National Guard units from the US at great expense. It's time to rethink our Military from top to bottom.

Do we need to remain in Afghanistan or Syria?

Lots of senior Military officers will state adamantly that the US must live up to its commitments in both areas of operation [AO].  But, precisely what commitment is there?

1) Afghanistan: 
After 17 years, our accomplishments consist of:
   a) Trillions of dollars spent,
   b) Deployment of countless National Guard units in six month deployments barely long enough
        to familiarize them with the environment before coming under attack,
    c) Countless suicides during, and after deployments, abominable leadership, massive
        post-deployment illnesses,
    d) Assassination of US personnel by Afghan allies, and
    e) Absolutely no positive results other than protecting Poppy fields for local drug lords,
    f) Bad guys control most of the country and the Afghan Government [our Ally] controls
        a few acres
    g) Most Afghans regard us as their enemy

2) Syria:
We've only been engaged in Syria for seven years, since 2011, and here's a list of accomplishments:
   a) Roughly 500,00 people are dead
   b) Dozens of countries are involved
   c)  Many [exact number unknown] terrorist groups are involved -- on both sides
   d)  Syrian President Assad is backed by Iran and Russia [our current "enemies"] and Pakistan
   c)  Opposition to Assad includes
        (1) hundreds of "militias" from an estimated 85 countries,
        (2) Syrian Democratic Forces [Kurdish-led coalition of Arab and Kurdish Militias],
              (a) led by the Kurdish Worker's Party (PKK)
              (b) regarded by the US and the UK as a Terrorist group although the US provides
                   them air support against ISIS]
              (c) BUT, Turkey fights the Kurds fearing they will use a victory to declare an independent
                    state along the border
        (3) Miscellaneous Arabs, Sunnis, Christians, Druze, and Kurds],
        (4) Islamic extremists -- some of which have been declared terrorists,
              including the Syrian version of al Qaeda [armed by Hillary from Libyan
              military warehouses]
        (5) ISIS- supposedly local Islamic extremists, although manpower derives from a variety
              of countries including Canada, the US, Australia, Israel, the UK, Iraq, etc.
        (6) Official backing by outside nations includes the US, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, Turkey
       

Mr Trump has stated he will pull out of Syria, but, given the complexities listed above, he faces a great deal of opposition from Allies, the Democrats, the Pentagon, the GOP, and all those who anticipate profiting from the continuation of this conflict.

Essentially, Trump is removing his "Boots-On-The-Ground" units and still maintaining a protective shield by creating a "No-Fly-Zone" in the Northeast of Syria which is rich in Agriculture, Water, and Energy resources - the target of all the Bad Guys.

The US can remove its primary units deployed by Obama, but tactically, can still respond, as needed from other Middle East areas, or,  from the US with Special Operations units and A-10 Warthogs, the close-air support aircraft Obama was intent on eliminating.

Assuming the reports of satellite enabled weaponry [Star Wars], bad guys [if accurately identified] could be targeted and blasted into oblivion in seconds using the Directed Energy Weapons developed back in the 1970s, or lasers developed during the 1960s, now significantly enhanced, with targeting via sophisticated technology developed since then.

In the ancient words of Walt Kelly's POGO,

"We have met the enemy, and he is US!"

Trump has an uphill battle to fix this.

Trump Disses Intelligence Community

The US Intelligence Community

For related story, click here [The Hill, Julian Hattem]

The Hill, a formerly reputable and objective journal of activities on Capitol Hill and the White House, published a piece by Julian Hattem, a very young reporter whose political zeal has seemingly tainted his reporting ability; his previous experience came as an intern on the Huffington Post and a stringer for the Japanese newspaper Ymiuri Shimbun -- notable for continuously denying the Comfort Women controversy [Journalism has plummeted in reliability in recent years as the old professionals were laid off when News Outlets ditched journalists with experience and ethics, and replaced them with children posing as adults, whose reporting would be better placed on Saturday Night Live].

This young reporter's headline appeared on Facebook as follows:

"Trump says he doesn't trust US intelligence just before classified briefing"
followed by this quote
" 'I won't use them because they've made such bad decisions' Trump claimed."

Naturally, this partial quote set the internet ablaze as lots of DNC  and GOP trolls and self-appointed national security experts jumped on this quote as evidence that Trump has no business being President if he's not going to listen to the Intelligence Community.

All the Intel that's fit to print

[Oddly, none of these critics have raised more than an eyebrow over the fact that Obama rarely takes the morning Intelligence Brief, and generally completely ignores the daily President's Briefing Book.]

But, then again, we have Hillary, who did take the morning brief from State INR [Bureau of Intelligence and Research], and then copied Top Secret Codeword material onto her emails and cell phone texts, revealing extremely sensitive intelligence information pertaining to "Sources and Methods", and in at least one documented case, outed the identity of an Iranian nuclear scientist who had been recruited to spy on Iran's nuclear capabilities.  The Iranians arrested and executed him.

Now, our stalwart young reporter would likely have been counseled had Ben Bradlee been his editor, but, Ben is no longer with us, sadly, and much of journalism's professionalism died with him.  And, we can't be sure if the headline and lead was actually Hattem's, or was created by a politically biased editor at The Hill.

So, let's examine young Hattem's story, as it unwinds beyond the headline --

"...Trump said he does not trust information coming out of US intelligence agencies and indicated he would cease relying on the bulk of the intelligence community's massive workforce."
[we added italics, underlining, and color to emphasize the nuance of Trump's statement]

Trump's more complete statement:
"Very easy to use them, but I won't use them because they've made such bad decisions"
referring to intelligence failures leading to the invasion of Iraq in 2003 based on the Intelligence Briefing Bush received which declared Saddam had Weapons of Mass Destruction!  

Notably, those WMDs never materialized, and Bush came under constant criticism from all sides, to include our allies.  Financially, the Iraq War(s) will have an estimated tab of nearly $4 Trillion, plus an expected $490 billion in benefits owed to the war veterans, a death toll of up to 189,000 security forces, insurgents, contractors, and humanitarian workers, and of course, close to 5,000 US Military casualties.

Iraq, without a strong leader to rule the myriad religious sects, many led by fanatical extremists, and now overrun with terrorist factions, is in shambles and will likely not return to its relatively quiet status of its days under the thumb of Saddam.  Currently, Iraq, once the 12th largest oil producer and exporter, can barely meet its own needs for fuel and will require close to $100 billion to rebuild its dilapidated production infrastructure.

"If we had never touched it, it would have been a lot better."

That's pretty much the conclusion that most observers have reached given the horrendous results.

Our Intelligence Community, then headed by the intellectually challenged,  professionally inexperienced, political hack  George Tenet came up with a National Intelligence Estimate [NIE] that claimed we could save the region from a possible nuclear war if we invaded and killed Saddam.

Well, we invaded, blasted the daylights out of Iraq several times, defeated their military quite readily, executed Saddam without much of a legal process, left the country leaderless [our hand-picked successor was shot and killed as he triumphantly exited the US plane in Iraq], and, emplaced a massive US Military occupation force since drawn down, but rebuilding as we speak to deal with ISIS/ISIL, an outgrowth of al Qaeda now linked, via Wikileads, to support from Hillary Clinton and President Obama.

What did we accomplish?

We disrupted Iraq, opening it to strife amongst all its tribes and religious sects who have all been competing for power; and, we have created tens of thousands of new enemies there who were previously our friends, but are now our bitter enemies.  We've converted our allies there to what we call "terrorists", i.e., those who hate us and wish to do us harm.  [For an in-depth read on this conversion, we recommend serious students read Rick Francona's book Ally to Adversary.]

But wait!  There's more!

Our Intelligence Community, still led by George Tenet, failed to recognize the threat to the US which came in the form of the attack on the World Trade Center [WTC] on 9/11/2001.

Oddly, the FBI was provided a Philippine Police report which provided accurate details of the plan to attack the WTC -- which was completely ignored at the FBI and the DCI.



It was Tenet's job to coordinate the efforts of all the US Intelligence agencies as well as to work with the foreign intelligence agencies of our friends and allies.  A post-mortem of our intelligence failures leading to 9/11 indicated pure stove-piping of intelligence reports, disruptive competition, and, ultimately, failure to share information of intelligence value.  Astoundingly, Bush did not fire Tenet, but kept him on to create the WMD fiasco leading us into the perpetual Iraq War, and even more devastating, the war in Afghanistan -- home to al Qaeda, which Osama bin Laden reportedly led.

Beginning in 2001, a Military response was created to find Osama bin Laden, reportedly the mastermind of the 9/11 attack -- although that notion was questioned early on, and remains in question.  But, we dispatched Special Forces troops who were quite adept at finding anyone, anywhere [recall they tracked down Che Guevera in South America], particularly since they had worked closely with the Taliban and could have tracked down Osama, had the Intelligence Community been functional; but it wasn't, and the US declared war on Afghanistan as our new official enemy; so we bombed them, and attacked them because our Tenet's Intelligence Community declared them the enemy.

And, by Gawd, they became our enemy, and created terrorist cells, and fought back against the US onslaught which grew into a massive war, with a new regional headquarters known as CENTCOM, which created Military and Intelligence reports of limited to no value in conducting the war.

As time went on, and ISIS grew from a cell of al Qaeda-Iraq, and it has now come to light that "US Military leaders altered intelligence reports 'to paint a rosier picture' of the US-led fight against ISIS than Intelligence analysts believed was warranted."

According to Brigadier General Tata, he was directed by
"an individual from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence who conducts the President's Daily Brief, to stop producing 'products of record' that did not fit the Administration's narrative of a defeated al Qaeda and a non-threatening enemy in ISIS."

SecDef MacNamara Briefs Bogus Intel

 Well, having been an Intelligence analyst for a number of years, we can assure you that such directives are not unusual.  We recall seeing Intelligence estimates briefed at the Five O'Clock Follies as press briefings in Vietnam restructured to validate General Westmoreland's bogus body counts and "victories" which never occurred, and his assurances that we had "... won the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese people" -- which was absolute drivel since the South Vietnamese distrusted and hated us almost as much as the North Vietnamese. Interestingly, most of the Viet Cong were South Vietnamese soldiers whom we had equipped.

At the Pentagon, in the Carter Administration, our colleague who managed the Korea desk, was pressed to portray North Korea as a burgeoning threat capable of overrunning South Korea; this followed Major General Singlaub's personal views of the North Korean threat.  Carter was advised that Singlaub was an idiot, and fired him.

Notably, North Korea is repeatedly being touted as a major threat, and we have been pleased to describe in detail why it is not a threat in a blog post a while back.

US Forces Moved into Honduras

We were also pressed by the Deputy Chief of Staff for [Army] Intelligence [Lt General Odom] to tout the Central American insurgents as a major threat to the region, thus justifying the deployment of a brigade from the 82d Airborne Division to El Salvador, plus a massive build up of US forces in Honduras to engage Nicaragua.

[In reality, we assessed Nicaragua as the most dangerous threat, particularly as it spawned the Liberation Theology [Maryknoll Missionary] Communist movement to engage the region.

Interestingly, we found that the sister [a Maryknoll nun and political advisor to Daniel Ortega] of Speaker of the House Tip O'Neil received a phone call on Ortega's office phone disclosing a Top Secret briefing we had just delivered to him.
[We subsequently met with O'Neil and recommended he end his political career rather than facing charges of Treason, and he complied.]

82d Airborne Division

To inflict reason on the engagement of US troops in El Salvador, we dismissed the concept of deploying an airborne brigade of blond haired, blue eyed gringos who would become targets of all four guerrilla organizations, but also any of the roving gangs terrorizing San Salvador.

In its place, we recommended an advisory unit of 55 trainers in each military specialty; Congress agreed, and authorized that deployment, limiting it permanently to 55 US advisors.

Even with these precautions, one of the advisors was assassinated within months of the arrival of the 55 advisors.


While we were the Editor of the Black Book [content was Top Secret Codeword] at the Pentagon  - which was distributed to the Intelligence Community [IC] executives and to the White House, we gained positive recognition as the most accurate publisher of unbiased Intelligence in the Community; and it was not unusual for disgruntled analysts from other agencies in the IC  to visit us carrying intelligence reports and analysis which their superiors had suppressed for political reasons.  Once we checked out the validity of the reports, we then added them to our Black Book, bringing these issues to attention of the entire Community -- and the National Security Council, forcing the issue back to the disgruntled analyst, now in elevated status, for detailed clarification.

Forgotten POWs

[At that time, the Defense Intelligence Agency was led by an array of Leftists left over from the Carter Administration whose acolytes remained in the shadows, but later rose to senior executive positions; it was DIA which suppressed intelligence on the post-war existence and location of US prisoners of war for political reasons, leading the North Vietnamese to execute hundreds of US POWs as they no longer served the purpose of bargaining chips.]



Later, our analyst colleagues were pressed to suppress intelligence information on Osama bin Laden, lest he be removed as s potential threat under President Clinton -- which resulted in multiple missed opportunities to capture him.  But, under George W Bush,  the NeoCons led his National Security Council to persuade him to invade Iraq, over the protests of the Intelligence Community.

And, of course, in the Obama Administration, the IC has pretty much been left alone to do its own thing, with Obama pretty much ignoring everything they have to say.  That of course, has not prevented NSA and the DNI from expanding their operations to target US citizens as potential terrorists, as pointed out by Fast Eddie Snowden, but, we've already discussed those issues.

Bottom Line:

Trump has been advised of, and recognizes that the assessments of the US Intelligence Community are generally inaccurate and corrupted by politically motivated executives.  That's not to say that the analysts are not excellent, but that, instead, the superb analytical products of the dedicated professionals at the base of the Intelligence Community are corrupted by senior staff to match the political statement of the day.

So, for him to advise that he will not accept most of what they produce and brief him on is to say that he recognizes that the IC leadership has consistently abused its status, and that its products are all too often suspect as politically motivated.

Trump was correct in his assessment of Intelligence Community estimates:

I won't use them because they've made such bad decisions!
[As a businessman, Trump has had to rely on trusted advisors; we don't think he can trust the IC]

[Disclaimer: The author is no longer involved in, or engaged with the Intelligence Community.  
He served, in succession, as desk officer/analyst at the Pentagon  East Europe, Middle East North Africa, and then Latin America, subsequently becoming the editor of the Black Book, after which he was assigned to the State Department Bureau of Intelligence & Research [INR] assessing threats in developing countries and providing special assessments for two Secretaries of State and as special advisor to Ambassador at Large, Vernon Walters.  He was Special Intelligence Advisor to the CINC Southern Command, and authored the 25-year HUMINT regional strategy.  His Master's degree is in International Economics having completed studies at Oxford and Georgetown Universities and the National Intelligence University.  His operational activities were in developing countries around the world, and he played a key role in the creation of the Defense Clandestine Service as operations officer from 1984-1990.  His Military service included  command of three intelligence units he formed.  His professional citations include The Director of Central Intelligence Exceptional Intelligence Analyst Award, a variety of military awards from the Army and DOD, and special recognition for excellence from the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.]

Gresham - In Memory of an Intellectual Giant [8 August 1957 - 2 July 2016]

John D Gresham Expert on Spec Ops and Intel Ops

This is another of our Guest Posts, 

i.e., 

reprints of articles which are important enough to 

rebroadcast to our unique audience in six continents.  

The obituary below is particularly significant since John Gresham authored a series of books which were exceptionally accurate, and in some cases, included material from Top Secret/Codeword reports which we assume had been released/declassified for his use by key Pentagon/Intelligence/White House officials.  

Since we spent a bit of time with John Gresham in his final years, during which a "mysterious illness" systematically destroyed his health, and finally, his ability to resist infection and his pulmonary functions -- a condition which destroyed his research and writing ability, we wanted to include some ancillary information in this tribute to him by Chuck Oldham.

Tom Clancy

His association and research support for the Maryland insurance salesman - Tom Clancy - comes to mind as we recall Tom Clancy's first and most famous novel The Hunt For Red October [1984], which recounted in exceptional detail the defection of a Soviet Navy captain commanding a submarine with the most advanced propulsion system of any Navy.  

We found this detail entrancing since we had been on the Pentagon's Current Intelligence [Soviet] Desk as this true story unfolded only a few years earlier, and we briefed a very small, select group of flag rank officers and Pentagon executives each day of the event.  The total number of personnel cleared for those briefs was perhaps 40, and neither Clancy nor Gresham were among them.  

But, as we had first hand experience, both analytical and operational in other noteworthy intelligence operations, we were once again surprised to see them recounted, in some noteworthy detail, by Clancy via Gresham's "research"; among those "novels" were Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger, which were completely accurate with the exception of the juxtaposition of key characters.

Heart Stoppage Victim

Notably, both John Gresham and Tom Clancy died of "undisclosed illnesses", common among highly visible authors who have discovered, or have been made privy to most sensitive secrets.  

Clancy died of the Breitbart syndrome known as "heart stoppage", which also took the life of William Colby, former Director of Central Intelligence - who, coincidentally, lived not far from Tom Clancy on Maryland's Eastern Shore.

Reagan & Walters - Strategists

President Reagan was perhaps Clancy's most visible and enthusiastic fan, and we suspect coordinated with former DCI Vernon Walters [for whom we worked (1981-83)] to ensure Clancy and Gresham were provided all the sensitive information necessary for full disclosure of these scenarios.  

Walters and Reagan were masters at the use of such information to expand the focus of intelligent observers and actionable people on actual events which posed a threat to national security.  [Walters, by the way, was the real Deep Throat in Watergate]



In reality, both John Gresham and Tom Clancy fall into the national hero category, so, this blog post today pays tribute to two fallen warriors, whose 
"pen was mightier than the sword." 

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

Click here for original story
[Chuck Oldham (Editor, DefenseMediaNetwork]

Our friend and colleague John D. Gresham died July 2, 2016, after fighting serious health issues for the past several years.

An author, researcher, game designer, commentator and historian, John was well known for his interviews, commentary, research, screenwriting, and production assistance for various documentary series produced for TLC and the History, Military, New York Times, Discovery, and National Geographic channels.

He was the primary researcher and partner to Tom Clancy on his best-selling series of non-fiction “guided tour” books about military units.

These included Submarine (1993), Armored Cav (1994), Fighter Wing (1995), Marine (1996), Airborne (1997), Carrier (1999), and Special Forces (2001), all published by Berkley Books.

He also was the award-winning co-designer of Supermarina I and Supermarina II (Clash of Arms Games, 1996 and 1997), naval wargames based upon Larry Bond’s award-winning Command at Sea game system.

His book DEFCON-2 (with Norman Polmar) was a single-volume history of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Beyond Hell and Back (2007, with Dwight Jon Zimmerman), describes seven key U.S. special operations missions.

His last book was Uncommon Valor, covering six Medal of Honor recipients and their deeds in Iraq and Afghanistan, also co-authored with Zimmerman.

He was the consulting editor of The Year in Special Operations for more than a decade, and was an integral part of its growth and success over the years.

John had big ambitions for the publication from the beginning and achieved most of them. He also wrote many stories for other Faircount publications, and was a regular contributor to the Defense Media Network website.

John was a proud and passionate man, and wore his heart on his sleeve with respect to his avocations, his politics, his heroes, and his country. He was an expert on most things military or security-related, but read widely and well, and could discuss a wide range of subjects with authority. He felt privileged to be able to work with and write about the military, and held strong opinions about what shape it should take, as well as about various weapons, strategies, communities, programs, and people.

Chuck, About That Deadline

Most of his friends have a “John story” that demonstrates his personality or character. As one of his editors, over the years I collected a lot of John stories of a different sort, since I cannot recall him having ever made a deadline.

 While this often caused enormous stress, I can look back on it now with a smile, because John’s excuses became increasingly creative as the years went by. Equipment failures became old hat, although the old “Didn’t you get my email? I sent that to you” remained a favorite.

Hard drives died, laptops expired, email was hacked. My personal favorites were the acts of God and Mother Nature.

At deadline time, John’s home became the focus of strange and inexplicable phenomena, an uncanny vortex attracting the extremes of weather and chance, where pop-up tornadoes, mini-blizzards, neighborhood flash floods, sudden, violent downpours, and localized windstorms showering tree limbs from the skies could knock out power and communications for days at a time.

I won’t miss tearing my hair out over missing stories when the next deadline comes, but I’ll miss our long conversations about military history, technology, and publishing, our debates over strategy and tactics, and our arguments over politics. John was an outsized personality – fiercely proud, brimming with enthusiasm, a big kid at heart – the world will be a little less colorful without him.

-------

Editorial Note: 
John Gresham's final years were filled with pain and agony as he was reduced from a dynamic, healthy guy with an athletic physique, frequently visiting and engaging with Special Operations units, to a faltering, wavering frail body barely able to stand without a cane. 

Frequent visits to doctors resulted in their failure to determine the cause of his ailments, the combination of which destroyed him, slowly, shutting down his bodily functions, one by one.  No one could figure out his condition, and so all gave up trying.

In retrospect, we presume he had been targeted by the CIA since his research revealed extraordinarily accurate details of actual events of the Intelligence Community, the source of which was likely Bill Colby and Vernon Walters [we worked for both of these men].  His apartment was pillaged after his death, apparently to determine what other secrets he'd gathered and might publish; then again, it was probably "terrorists" and not CIA flunkies.

Until the revelations of Wikileaks, we would not have believed the horror stories about the CIA and DNI since we had been an executive in the Intelligence Community prior to its corruption 
[actually, we later learned its corruption dated back to the 1960s, though were were blissfully patriotic and never imagined just how corrupt the IC leadership was (perhaps that was why Colby offered up the Family Jewels to the Church Committee] 

Given the Wikileaks revelations, plus the details surrounding Colby's murder, plus the murder of Breitbart, plus the health details of Gresham leading up to his death, we naturally assume CIA murdered him, most likely with their frozen dart gun inflicting multiple viruses into his system.

The Most Plausible Explanation For The 10 Riverine Sailors Captured By Iran

Riverine Crew as guests of the Iranian Navy

We are pleased to publish this analysis of the Iranian Navy's capture of 

US sailors by our irascible old friend and fellow Administration critic and 

malcontent, Tom Lipscomb.  Tom is most notable for his excellent reporting, 
but of late,  for being banned from FaceBook for his frequent irreverent 
and politically-incorrect commentary which was offensive to many on 
an equal opportunity level.

Click here for original story [American Thinker]

I have heard separately from two experts, both high ranking Marines, one on active duty and the other working in DC at a foundation, the following.
 When I pressed them on the Fars News Service statement from Iran that the 10 personnel captured on the two US vessels were all Marines, they countered:

No, they are part of a Rivierine Squadron based in San Diego. Further they are support crews for SEAL missions from the US Navy and highly trained. The Iranians probably mistook “Riverine” for “Marine” in doing the story.

So that explains several things. 

Why the captured sailors were so much more fit than the average sailor these days, and how a woman could be among them. While not Special Ops personnel directly engaged, they have to be extraordinarily fit and well-trained, as indeed these sailors appear to be.

It also raises the question as to whether they had been on a mission ferrying SEALS somewhere. 
One must understand that small craft “belly bumping” has been going on all over the Gulf for decades. 

There are Standard Operating Procedures [SOP] for numerous levels of possible engagement, including being swarmed and overcome. 

They don’t have to include vainglorious responses like getting all your people killed resisting being taken prisoner by other ships with more firepower.



The young Lieutenant commanding the mission, covered in this Chicago Tribune story appeared totally composed in making that statement of  “confession,”  probably because that was exactly the statement he was supposed to make, according to one of those SOPs at Fifth Fleet that had been set up for the alternative scenarios.
 

So any notion that malfeasance by the officers and crews of these two vessels is most unlikely. 



Also unlikely is any notion that with the multiple communications channels of Special Ops vessels and multiple navigation aids anyone on board them got lost, was without communications, or drifted while doing repairs anywhere near the Fars Islands. 

Washington Post

Look at a map. 

The course from Bahrain to Kuwait is not only direct, it is almost directly N-S and given the shallow draft capability of these vessels, both boats could have proceeded with the Arabian coast in sight the entire time.



So how did they get more than 70 miles and 90 degrees off their course, (some “short cut”) which at their speeds of more than 40 mph would have taken over an hour one way, and fall into the 12 mile limit of the Farsi Islands claimed by Iran?



In short, they didn’t.



Fifth Fleet knew exactly where they were at all times, just as it knows exactly where all the other NATO vessels, which practically pave the Persian Gulf these days are. And they had the option to back them up with air and sea power if they were allowed to.



If the American people were not suffering from an incompetent and incurious press and media, some of these discrepancies would have come to light and been subject to public debate. 

One would think the questions remaining over what are now the clear lies about Benghazi would excite some editorial interest.



The explanations pouring out of Obama’s lying Administration spokespersons from the Secretary of Defense to the Secretary of State simply do not stand the light of day. 

In fact they insult the intelligence of any knowledgeable citizen with military experience.

But one thing is clear. Secretary of State Kerry was a much better liar about his small boat riverine actions in Vietnam than he is in explaining what was going on with our riverine sailors in the Persian Gulf.

SpookdBlog Editorial Note:

Donning our Tin Foil Conspiracy Cap, which has been consistently accurate on all things Benghazi, we'll speculate that this highly publicized capture of US sailors by the Iranian Navy, without a visible reaction from nearby US Naval vessels from the Sixth Fleet, was staged, much the same as the attack on the Benghazi Consulate was staged to capture the US Ambassador and trade him for the Blind Sheik.

Wc make this allegation based on the series of covert attempts by this Administration to resurrect positive relations with Iran.  Keep in mind Obama's persistent efforts to befriend Iran, which included the now infamous "nuclear deal", the secret meetings in Muscat in 2013 -- which followed 19 months of negotiations among the six major world powers and Iran, leading to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action signed on 14 July 2015.  

We also have noted the large number of Iranians [and Muslim Brotherhood members] in this Administration, to include Huma Abedin [Hillary's closest advisor] linked to the Muslim Brotherhood/Sisterhood [interestingly, all references to her linkage to Iran and to the Muslim  Brotherhood appear to have been purged from the Internet]; and, of course, Valerie Bowman Jarrett [Obama's puppeteer], born in Shiraz, Iran.   We somehow think these folks might have influenced Oval Office decisions to embrace Iran.

And, last but not least, we recall Hillary's role, in which she visited Egypt with Huma, and set off riots and protests against her linkage, via Huma, with the Muslim Brotherhood.  However, the most interesting link in this puzzle is Hillary's "covert" flight to western Iran in late 2012, reportedly to meet with President Ahmadinijad in Ahvaz and Ayatollah ali Khamenei to discuss Iran's nuclear program.  As in all poorly planned operations, Hillary's plane crashed, killing her SEAL escort [listed as a suicide in Afghanistan].  While she recovered in a MidEast hospital, her cover story was that she had the flu, fell, and had a concussion.  She was later spirited into a US hospital and with great fanfare, released with her "double" making PhotoOp appearances for show.

Bottom line:  We believe the capture of the US sailors was a staged event to enable the Administration to lift the sanctions on Iran and return the $1.4 Billion in seized Iranian assets.  We'll report more as this tale unfolds.

See also: Calling BS on the official story of the Iranian capture of two US riverine boats