>the status of the Geneva Conventions—were a soldier operating under false identity to be captured by an enemy
This is not too problematic. Geneva convention and Hauge regulations are clear. They don't get the protection of Geneva conventions like troops normally are. They are spies or saboteurs.
In Russia KGB and now FSB have always been a military service. Captured KGB/FSB officers (in civilian clothing) are not treated as captured military.
Forgive 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?
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 -- except now we have deadlier conventional and biological/chemical weapons.
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.
Like Great Britain, I imagine? Sending your special forces to another country with the specific task of killing their head of state is an act of aggression... but then again, if you're a permanent member of the UNSC, it doesn't matter much.
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 lack of ethics or morals").
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
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).
I probably am. I'm not an expert in this. Sorry, if you know more about it than I do I defer to you. But what I understand is, say I had a SAP that was running psychological experimentation on everyday Americans without their knowledge or consent, it sounds as if you're saying that it's guaranteed the EB would know "in general terms" this was going on. I think that's false. I definitely think it's possible that there are blacker than black SAPs that escape any EB/LB oversight whatsoever. But, please, enlighten me differently if that's not true :) ;p xx
Shady stuff including psychological experiments definitely went on during the Cold War (with a lot of EB support for that general sort of thing if not explicit approval of every program) but one of the main results of the Church Commission and subsequent legislation like Title 50 updates, etc, was the implementation of severe limitations with regard to what intelligence agencies can do involving US civilians.
To the extent that there's anything "blacker than black" it's the decisions that intelligence officers and the contract employees who support them do on their own initiative - that, and things that are done under the aegis of foreign governments.
It's an ugly world out there and the US does ugly things in its citzens' name, and many of them are openly reported, e.g., killing children with hot shrapnel via drone strikes. Shady clandestine paramilitary operations do certainly happen, most of which never see the light of day. But even the SAPest of SAPs will run into big problems if it messes with US citizens in any capacity without very high-level authorization, which is more or less never given. The Awlaki sanction was a big, big decision for example. I'm pretty darn sure that psychological experiments on everyday Americans without their consent is not a thing that's happening.
Cool, this is an interested perspective, thanks for the read. It was really good to get all that information. After reading that I'm more inclined to believe you with regard to operations on US citizens, and those done by the domestic LE/intelligence/security agencies.
I suppose a few other counterpoints I have are how I heard numerous times that Trump wasn't briefed into certain things because people in intelligence thought he might loud mouth about it. And secondly, I think the scope for discretion, noted by your, "it's the decisions that intelligence officers and the contract employees who support them do on their own initiative - that, and things that are done under the aegis of foreign governments." is actually pretty large. Especially when you consider that large multinational corporations might be contracted. I suppose I'm talking more about defense/security related tech programs, and less about actual intelligence operations, tho I threw in that obvious example to make a point. I'm prepared to accept that's how it used to be but no longer is with regard to the latter at least.
But on the technology/science side, I'm less convinced black SAPs have full-spectrum EB oversight. Does the EB really already know everything that goes on at Los Alamos? Nevada Test Site? Or various defense corporation facilities worldwide contracted and funded at least in part by the US government? I definitely think there are some people who have a large picture, but I don't believe it to be EB, unfortunately, as I said at first, for "democracy" :( ;p xx
How many layers within layers might those companies and programs have, where they are receiving funding and technology and not filtering the general picture back up to EB? I think there's a definite possibility of that, for sure! :p ;) xx
I'm going to go read a bit more about Awlaki, Church, Title 50. Thank you again!! :P ;) xx
With regard to Trump, there was a lot of media reporting around him being sloppy with classified material, etc -- and it's entirely possible that career intelligence professionals, aka the "deep state", took this into account when putting together briefings for him. But aside from that particular presidency, generally speaking, the commander in chief is almost never briefed on details of sources and methods for the most sensitive SAPs, simply because of the general principle of "need to know", i.e., if you want to keep something secret you should tell as few people about it as possible. With that said, the highest levels of the EB are certainly briefed on the key insights delivered by said SAPs.
As far as Los Alamos, aliens, etc -- super interesting topic. The recent UFO footage released by the Navy sure does make you wonder. Who knows....
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 about, however.
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 because the hospital emblem is specially protected because those ships are never supposed to be attacked.
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 trigger pullers to support personnel within the SOF world.
Additionally, most of these SOF organizations have other (more conventional) mission sets they would be supporting at the same time. It can also be assumed that less than half of an organization's personnel are deployed at any given time, while the remaining personnel remain stateside retraining and preparing for their rotation--leaving a relatively small percentage of the alleged 30k SOF personnel actively participating in clandestine operations.
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.
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.
It's fun (and good for a career) to set up 'cybercommands' and looking-through-keyhole departments with a large logistical tail. Secrety organizations are easier to fund and harder to shutdown.
I'd say that you are simply seeing the natural result of a top-heavy military with less to do than meets the eye. Feature creep is a thing, especially in a growth industry.
Ideally, the various factions that run an increasingly imperial government each have their own intelligence services or even multiple ones that are controlled via competition.
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
This 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.
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[ 3.8 ms ] story [ 104 ms ] threadThis is not too problematic. Geneva convention and Hauge regulations are clear. They don't get the protection of Geneva conventions like troops normally are. They are spies or saboteurs.
In Russia KGB and now FSB have always been a military service. Captured KGB/FSB officers (in civilian clothing) are not treated as captured military.
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 -- except now we have deadlier conventional and biological/chemical weapons.
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 lack of ethics or morals").
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
To the extent that there's anything "blacker than black" it's the decisions that intelligence officers and the contract employees who support them do on their own initiative - that, and things that are done under the aegis of foreign governments.
It's an ugly world out there and the US does ugly things in its citzens' name, and many of them are openly reported, e.g., killing children with hot shrapnel via drone strikes. Shady clandestine paramilitary operations do certainly happen, most of which never see the light of day. But even the SAPest of SAPs will run into big problems if it messes with US citizens in any capacity without very high-level authorization, which is more or less never given. The Awlaki sanction was a big, big decision for example. I'm pretty darn sure that psychological experiments on everyday Americans without their consent is not a thing that's happening.
I suppose a few other counterpoints I have are how I heard numerous times that Trump wasn't briefed into certain things because people in intelligence thought he might loud mouth about it. And secondly, I think the scope for discretion, noted by your, "it's the decisions that intelligence officers and the contract employees who support them do on their own initiative - that, and things that are done under the aegis of foreign governments." is actually pretty large. Especially when you consider that large multinational corporations might be contracted. I suppose I'm talking more about defense/security related tech programs, and less about actual intelligence operations, tho I threw in that obvious example to make a point. I'm prepared to accept that's how it used to be but no longer is with regard to the latter at least.
But on the technology/science side, I'm less convinced black SAPs have full-spectrum EB oversight. Does the EB really already know everything that goes on at Los Alamos? Nevada Test Site? Or various defense corporation facilities worldwide contracted and funded at least in part by the US government? I definitely think there are some people who have a large picture, but I don't believe it to be EB, unfortunately, as I said at first, for "democracy" :( ;p xx
How many layers within layers might those companies and programs have, where they are receiving funding and technology and not filtering the general picture back up to EB? I think there's a definite possibility of that, for sure! :p ;) xx
I'm going to go read a bit more about Awlaki, Church, Title 50. Thank you again!! :P ;) xx
As far as Los Alamos, aliens, etc -- super interesting topic. The recent UFO footage released by the Navy sure does make you wonder. Who knows....
How is this playing fast and loose with the Geneva Conventions?
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 about, however.
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 because the hospital emblem is specially protected because those ships are never supposed to be attacked.
This database has many countries’ interpretation of the differences: https://ihl-databases.icrc.org/customary-ihl/eng/docs/v2_rul...
To name a few other BS outlets that once had a good reputation:
Forbes Cnn Inc. venturebeat Mashable The list goes on...
Though I can't recall what the exact changes are, this post doesn't show up at least.
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 trigger pullers to support personnel within the SOF world.
Additionally, most of these SOF organizations have other (more conventional) mission sets they would be supporting at the same time. It can also be assumed that less than half of an organization's personnel are deployed at any given time, while the remaining personnel remain stateside retraining and preparing for their rotation--leaving a relatively small percentage of the alleged 30k SOF personnel actively participating in clandestine operations.
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.
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.
or any of the other capitalized 3 letter agencies
It's fun (and good for a career) to set up 'cybercommands' and looking-through-keyhole departments with a large logistical tail. Secrety organizations are easier to fund and harder to shutdown.
I'd say that you are simply seeing the natural result of a top-heavy military with less to do than meets the eye. Feature creep is a thing, especially in a growth industry.
Ideally, the various factions that run an increasingly imperial government each have their own intelligence services or even multiple ones that are controlled via competition.