As someone who has been working in this area as a don't show don't tell fashion, i have the feeling this would be unprecedented in the sheer amount of size this apply
Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
31–40 of 45 posts
Re: Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Define "involved" though. Military operations have extremely long logistics tails compared to civilian law enforcement, thus inflating the personnel on the books.
To add to this, the article mentions that half of the alleged 60k are SOF (~30k). This includes units like the 75th Ranger Regiment, most likely the largest SOF organization. According to a quick glance at their Wiki task org, 14 of the 27 COs exist in either a support, command, or training capacity. This roughly breaks down to 50% of the entire Regiment, and the 75th should (in theory) have the highest ratio of trig…
Very informed comment – wish I could upvote twice. Well done!
Re: Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
#33We know how to win the war. That is easy. The hard part is knowing which side to fight for.
Maybe neither would be good. All playgrounds don't need more bullies.
Re: Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
For me, it's not the fact it exists that is shocking. It's the fact that it exists outside of any oversight and apparently without any consideration of US or foreign law. I know the US has played fast and loose with the Geneva Conventions for a long time now. But the more the US flaunts internal laws and norms on war, the more likely aggressors are going to put them aside and we're back to the savagery of World War I…
Aggressors like what? The US has military superiority and distance to the other super powers, and it would not be in any of their interests to start a war - let alone one on moral grounds, which are flexible at best for all superpowers.
fun fact, ww1 was started at a time of high economic interdependence among world powers
Re: Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
#35This particular incarnation of Newsweek relaunched in 2014 with an “exclusive” falsely identifying an elderly engineer named Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto as Bitcoin inventor Satoshi Nakamoto. Keep that in mind as you judge the credibility of Newsweek’s “exclusive” reports.
Re: Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
#36Forgive me if I’m being obtuse, but I feel like this piece is written in such a sensationalistic fashion that I can’t understand what the real story is..? All the various branches of US intelligence and military have clandestine operations.. is that supposed to be shocking?
I agree. Over hyped click bait.
The "secret forces" they identify are special forces (of course, what would you expect?), civilian consultants (same) and those who "search for high-value targets and collect what is called "publicly accessible information"—or even engage in campaigns to influence and manipulate social media"( i.e., military staff surfing the public web as anonymously as possible).
Article admits that only the real spies use fake IDs and then only during a mission: "Most signature reduction soldiers travel under real names, exchanging operational identities only once on the ground where they operate,".
Also some of this sounds like disinformation, e.g., re ability to manipulate enemies databases to get through security. Sounds like noise to freak opponents out.
Re: Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
For me, it's not the fact it exists that is shocking. It's the fact that it exists outside of any oversight and apparently without any consideration of US or foreign law. I know the US has played fast and loose with the Geneva Conventions for a long time now. But the more the US flaunts internal laws and norms on war, the more likely aggressors are going to put them aside and we're back to the savagery of World War I…
These programs are directed by the Executive Branch with Legislative Branch oversight and potential Judicial Branch review. Not sure what any of these programs have to do with GC violations or laws/norms of war? Literally every major industrialized country has clandestine programs and this business predates the GCs by millennia ("the world's second-oldest profession, distinguished from the oldest one by its relative…
That's not really true. There's lots of SAPs that have no Leg oversight, and Exec doesn't know about them. DoE has lots of black budget programs that don't have the same scrutiny as DoD ones. And even in DoD there's so many SAPs, it's not possible that Exec and Leg have been briefed in to all of them, nor asked to be. So while theoretically, Exec and Leg should be able to look at any SAP, how are they going to know about them, if someone in the program uses their discretion to decide to not tell them it exists?
From the point of view of "democracy" this is definitely a bug. But from the point of view of SAPs and commercial interests involved in them, this is mostly a feature (except when things are so secret and locked down it's hard to bring in talent to work on them). Tho, in the case of this so-called "secret army" they don't seem to be suffering any talent shortage :p;) xx
Re: Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
#38Forgive me if I’m being obtuse, but I feel like this piece is written in such a sensationalistic fashion that I can’t understand what the real story is..? All the various branches of US intelligence and military have clandestine operations.. is that supposed to be shocking?
I agree. Over hyped click bait. The "secret forces" they identify are special forces (of course, what would you expect?), civilian consultants (same) and those who "search for high-value targets and collect what is called "publicly accessible information"—or even engage in campaigns to influence and manipulate social media"( i.e., military staff surfing the public web as anonymously as possible). Article admits that…
It might not be notable if you're familiar with the scale of it and the secrecy through your own experience, but that's not really the main audience of Newsweek. I think a majority of regular people this would be newsworthy and interesting. I agree some of it could be disinfo.
I wonder how representative the 60k estimate is of the true size of people whose main full-time work is mostly in SAPs / black budget programs, not just these seemingly "operationally focused" ones.
Re: Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not sure what OP meant, but from what I understand (which is very little) the Geneva Conventions forbid "perfidy", which includes "feigning civilian, non-combatant status". See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfidy . I don't know enough about the laws of war to understand how that relates non-combat roles (is it OK to dress as a civilian for surveillance? presumably?), which I think is most of what this article was a…
The next part of Article 37, also quoted in the article, contrasts (which is forbidden) perfidy with permissible ruses of war . It’s a very blurry line, but actual combat seems to be one major distinction. Disguising a battleship as an enemy or merchant vessel seems to be okay...as long as the disguise is dropped before engaging. However, marking it as a hospital ship seems right out regardless of the situation becau…
Thanks, super interesting.
Re: Exclusive: Inside the Military's Secret Undercover Army
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
These programs are directed by the Executive Branch with Legislative Branch oversight and potential Judicial Branch review. Not sure what any of these programs have to do with GC violations or laws/norms of war? Literally every major industrialized country has clandestine programs and this business predates the GCs by millennia ("the world's second-oldest profession, distinguished from the oldest one by its relative…
That's not really true. There's lots of SAPs that have no Leg oversight, and Exec doesn't know about them. DoE has lots of black budget programs that don't have the same scrutiny as DoD ones. And even in DoD there's so many SAPs, it's not possible that Exec and Leg have been briefed in to all of them, nor asked to be. So while theoretically, Exec and Leg should be able to look at any SAP, how are they going to know a…
Respectfully, you seem to be confusing the fact that there are government agencies which report to the EB and are overseen by the LB, and these agencies have highly sensitive SAPs about which very few people know specifics (true) with the notion that the EB has no idea in general about what goes on through these SAPs and there is no accountability within these agencies for methods used by these SAPs and/or the outcomes they achieve (untrue).