Thanks to a FOIA request, new evidence has emerged from the FBI’s own internal communications that appear to support many of the claims made by Sibel Edmonds regarding (largely though not exclusively) GOP collusion in the spying activities of the Turkish government.

This is no small matter, as it involves blackmail and bribery of high-level officials like former Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, PNAC signatory Richard Perle, Congressman Roy Blunt, Congresswoman Jean Schmidt, Turkish Ambassador Marc Grossman, Congressman Stephen Solarz, Asst. Sec. Def. Douglas Feith, Congressman Dan Burton and others to “look the other way” from those engaged in spying activities with a foreign government against the United States.

Per the report from the Boiling Frogs website:

Recently released FBI documents prove the existence of highly sensitive National Security and criminal investigations of “Turkish Activities” in Chicago prior to September 11, 2001. These documents add further support to many of the allegations that former FBI translator Sibel Edmonds has claimed, in public and in Congress, since 2002. The documents were released under a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request into an organization called the Turkish American Cultural Alliance (TACA), an organization repeatedly named by Ms. Edmonds as being complicit in the crimes that she became aware of when she was a translator at the FBI.

The documents released under FOIA are almost completely redacted, but they do support many of Edmonds’ claims, including:

• There were a number of very serious FBI investigations into “Turkish activity in Chicago” involving a number of targets, including TACA.
• These investigations were related to “National Security” among other things.
• These investigations were regarded as so sensitive that no files were to be uploaded to FBI’s computer system.
• Congressional corruption was involved.
• The FBI repeatedly conducted actual “physical surveillance” against Turkish and American targets.
  Some of these investigations were shut down in 2001.

What makes it more suspicious is the near universal silence on the part of the corporate media about this whole affair. They spent more energy investigating the deaths of Lacey Peterson or Michael Jackson than they have on this.

It should also be noted that this incident is also tied up with the events surrounding the Valerie Plame/Brewster Jennings outing.

vruz:(via ericmortensen)

• Sources have said the FBI was in the second day of raids around the southeastern Michigan city of Adrian that are connected to a militia group, known as the Hutaree, an Adrian-based group whose members describe themselves as Christian soldiers preparing for the arrival and battle with the anti-Christ.
• Lackomar said he heard from other militia members that the FBI targeted the Hutaree after its members made threats of violence against Islamic organizations.
  
  

• Bomb makers who have been active in Afghanistan may already have the ability to produce a “dirty bomb” using knowledge acquired over the internet.
• It is feared that terrorists could transport an improvised nuclear device up the Thames and detonate it in the heart of London. Bristol, Liverpool Newcastle, Glasgow and Belfast are also thought to be vulnerable.
• Lord West, the Security Minister, also raised the possibility of terrorists using small craft to enter ports and launch an attack similar to that in Mumbai in 2008, when more than 150 people were killed.
• The Government is so concerned about the threat that it is setting up a command centre to track suspicious boats.
• The terrorism threat level was raised from “substantial” to “severe” in January after the failed attempt to blow up an aircraft over Detroit on Christmas Day.
• Three separate reviews of the country’s ability to prevent a major terrorist attack were published simultaneously yesterday, before an international meeting on nuclear security in Washington next month.
• Downing Street released an update to the National Security Strategy in which it stated that “the UK does face nuclear threats now” and added that there was “the possibility that nuclear weapons or nuclear material [could] fall into the hands of rogue states or terrorist groups”.
• The International Atomic Energy Authority recorded 1,562 incidents where nuclear material was lost or stolen between 1993 and 2008, mostly in the former Soviet Union, and 65 per cent of the losses were never recovered.

Those lost nukes in an attack would be a perfect no-paper-trail-instrument for intelligence agencies working in collusion with other power brokers who want to expand their ubiquitous presence and control. Never mind the non-existent al-qaeda bogey man, if this goes down it wasn’t because of some farmers growing poppies. Plus, John Robb is right, if regional reactionaries want to hurt the US/UK hegemony, the things to blow up are in their own backyard (oil pipelines, electrical and water infrastructure). 

criminalwisdom:

“Operation Northwoods was a plan circulated in the U.S. government in 1962 to stage false flag terrorist attacks inside the U.S. and abroad to provoke “military intervention in Cuba”. The plan called for Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) or other operatives to commit genuine acts of terrorism in U.S. cities and elsewhere. These acts of terrorism were to be blamed on Cuba in order to create public support for a war against that nation, which had recently become communist under Fidel Castro. One part of the Operation Northwoods plan was to “develop a Communist Cuban terror campaign in the Miami area, in other Florida cities and even in Washington.”

And ever since Florida has become the USA hub for some very dirty deals and false flag operators. See The Deep History of the Venice Municipal Airport and The Ultimate Hedge if you think you have the stomach for it.

• Senior Bush administration officials sternly cautioned the 9/11 Commission against probing too deeply into the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, according to a document recently obtained by the ACLU.
• The notification came in a letter dated January 6, 2004, addressed by Attorney General John Ashcroft, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and CIA Director George J. Tenet. The ACLU described it as a fax sent by David Addington, then-counsel to former vice president Dick Cheney.
• In the message, the officials denied the bipartisan commission’s request to question terrorist detainees, informing its two senior-most members that doing so would “cross” a “line” and obstruct the administration’s ability to protect the nation.
• “In response to the Commission’s expansive requests for access to secrets, the executive branch has provided such access in full cooperation,” the letter read. “There is, however, a line that the Commission should not cross — the line separating the Commission’s proper inquiry into the September 11, 2001 attacks from interference with the Government’s ability to safeguard the national security, including protection of Americans from future terrorist attacks.”
• FireDogLake’s Marcy Wheeler speculates that this was an attempt by the Bush administration to ensure that its torture of certain detainees, which has since been widely documented, remained secret.
• “[W]hoever made these annotations appears to have been most worried that Commission staff members could make independent judgments about the detainees and the interrogations,” Wheeler wrote on her blog. The official “didn’t want anyone to independently evaluate the interrogations conducted in the torture program.”

Netwar is a term developed by RAND researchers John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt to describe an emergent form of low intensity conflict, crime, and activism waged by social networked actors. Typical netwar actors might include transnational terrorists, criminal organizations, activist groups, and social movements that employ decentralized, flexible network structures.

****

The high flexibility and reconfigurability inherent in the network structure creates a challenge in maintaining its effectiveness. Arquilla and Ronfeldt identify four areas that affect the strength of a network:

• Organization – what type of network is employed, and to what extent are the actors networked?
• Doctrine – what motivates the use of the network form, what keeps it from falling apart, and how does the organization operate without central leadership?
• Technology – what communication technology is being used, and how?
• Social ties – how much interpersonal trust exists within the network?

With this rubric, the strength of a netwar actor corresponds to how highly networked it is, whether its doctrine sustains the network and guides its members, how effectively technology is used to maintain the network, and how much interpersonal trust there is between nodes in the network.

Networks with many leaders, or no leader, may maintain coordination through a combination of powerful doctrine, ideology, shared beliefs, and/or common interests. This allows all the members of the network to maintain a common objective despite great personal or group autonomy. In other words, this provides an “ideational, strategic, and operational centrality that allows for tactical decentralization.”

***

The following are several examples used to support the argument that there is in fact an emergent netwar.

• Terrorism

Terrorist groups, in the Middle East especially, seem to be adopting flexible, decentralized network structures as part of a shift away from “formally organized, state-sponsored groups to privately financed, loose networks of individuals and subgroups that may have strategic guidance but that, nonetheless, enjoy tactical independence”.

Past terrorist groups did incorporate autonomous cells, but they were largely coordinated in a non-networked manner. Newer terrorist movements, such as al-Qaeda employ less hierarchical, loosely interlinked organizational models. Rather than the rigid bureaucratic structures and nationalist agendas of old terror groups, these new operatives are networked, relying on decentralized decision making with flexible ties between other individuals and radical groups sharing common values.

• Zapatistas

The Zapatista movement began as a seemingly traditional, hierarchical insurgency, but was transformed into an information-age conflict. It has benefited from a diverse network of actors, made up of indigenous communities, non-indigenous middle-class guerilla leaders, and a range of local and transnational NGOs sympathetic to the Zapatista cause. Numerous transnational NGOs networked with local Mexican NGOs that were involved with the marginalized indigenous community and the Zapatista guerillas.

Following setbacks in battle, the guerillas switched tactics and began to exploit the network form, taking advantage of the NGOs connections to mobilize global awareness and support for their reform movement, while putting pressure on the Mexican government. These diverse groups of activists and issue organizations were united by common values and shared goals. The internet, which was in its infancy at the time, also became a key space for networking various groups from around the globe with the Zapatista movement.

• Transnational Criminal Organizations

Transnational Criminal Organizations (TCOs) are empowered by the network form in the sense that it heightens their mobility, adaptability, and their ability to operate transnationally. These transnational networks pose a problem for states operating in a conventional, inwardly focused manner. For instance, cartels in Colombia draw power from their extended transnational network resources, making it difficult for the Colombian government to fight the cartels within the confines of its national boundaries. Thus, networking allows TCOs to easily operate across jurisdictions, evading national law enforcement agencies. Networks also make it more difficult to dismantle a criminal operation, given that there is less emphasis on rigid, central leadership.

• WASHINGTON: The “war on terrorism” just got a little more complicated with the indictment of an average white American female dubbed “Jihad Jane” on charges of plotting with Islamic radicals, bringing even the so-called soccer moms under the radar.
• Colleen LaRose, 46, a Pennsylvania native, has been charged with trying to recruit Islamic fighters and plotting to assassinate a Swedish cartoonist who made fun of Prophet Muhammad, according to a federal indictment unsealed on Tuesday.
• What is striking about the case is that Colleen LaRose, who called herself Fatima La Rose, is a regular workaday housewife. Blonde and green-eyed, she would have easily slipped under scrutiny that typically focuses on non-whites.
• In 2008, LaRose allegedly posted a video on YouTube calling herself JihadJane and stating she was “desperate to do something somehow to help” ease the suffering of Muslims, a move that attracted the attention of law-enforcement authorities.
• According to the indictment, in email exchanges with five unindicted and unnamed co-conspirators in South Asia, Eastern and Western Europe, LaRose allegedly agreed to recruit people for jihad, to raise money for fighters. She also agreed to one jihadist’s request to marry him to enable him to get inside Europe.
• This is the first time a white American female has signed up for jihad. According to the indictment, in March 2009, shortly before she made the You Tube video, LaRose allegedly received a directive from her jihadist contacts to “go to Sweden… find location of (resident of Sweden)… and kill him… this is what i say to u”. The target was identified as Lars Vilks, a cartoonist who had drawn Prophet Muhammad with the body of a dog.
• LaRose was instructed to kill Vilks in a way that would frighten “the whole Kufar (non-believer) world.” She was arrested in October 2009 but the case was kept under seal as authorities pursued leads to track down her jihadist contacts.
• The indictment was unsealed on Tuesday after the arrest of seven Muslims in Ireland, in a case that was said to connect “Jihad Jane” to the plot to kill Vilks.

(Pshh, more fear-mongering. SUSPECT EVERYONE! TERRORIST SOCCER MOMS!!)

• Today the trial of Splitting the Sky commenced. Splitting the Sky attempted a citizens’ arrest on credibly accused war criminal George W. Bush on March 17, 2009, and was arrested and jailed for doing so by police. Try as its representatives might to disguise their motivations with the kind PR spin doctoring we witnessed in the court today, the Calgary Police, the RCMP and its contractors were under the Harper government’s strict political orders to protect the Alberta home turf of the current minority government that came to power as the holder of the Bushite franchise in Canada. Some have termed this historic proceeding as “The Trial of Splitting the Sky versus George W. Bush.” From what I witnessed firsthand on day one, the government attempt to manage this highly volatile convergence of law and politics was an exciting affair.
• My perception was that until STS testified, Judge Delong was more inclined to the Crown’s side of the argument, namely that the police were “keeping the peace” in a law-abiding manner by arresting STS. Once STS had outlined his justifications for seeking the arrest of Bush, the judge perked up markedly. Charles Davison’s main contentions revolved around the characterization of STS’s understanding at the moment he attempted the citizen’s arrest. STS informed the court that three documents most influenced his decision to arrest Bush. The first was a statement disseminated prior to Bush’s lecture date by Lawyers Against the War. It was directed to a number of law enforcement officials right up to Prime Minister Stephen Harper. In a concise yet rich and detailed intervention, LAW detailed why George W. Bush was inadmissible to Canada under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and Canada’s Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act (see: http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=12668).
• The second document submitted to the court was a letter of solidarity written by former US Attorney-General Ramsay Clark. Over three decades Clark and STS have developed a deep and fruitful collaboration going back to the days when the latter was charged with killing a jail guard in the Attica prison debacle of 1971. The third document to be placed before the Court is entitled “Bush League Justice: Should George W. Bush be Arrested in Calgary, AB, and Tried for International Crimes.” It was authored by STS’s friend and colleague, Anthony J. Hall. I noticed that Judge DeLong, who had been particularly statue-like and expressionless prior to reading Hall’s essay, suddenly metamorphosed into an engaged human being apparently interested in this highly significant case in Canada’s history.
• Not long after the period when Judge Delong had listened to STS’s impassioned oratory and viewed Professor Hall’s essay, the court was adjourned. The judge concluded by stating he was willing to stay until Thursday (i.e. for the full four days allotted for the trial) plus an extra day if necessary. The Judge’s looking ahead to a week-long trial can be deemed a victory for STS and his supporters as a five day event should allow for more evidence to be brought to light in a legal proceeding which is certainly one of the most significant trials ever to take place in Calgary. Judge Delong has been presented with a chance to create a beacon of a hope in a world afflicted with the prospect of never ending military strife as set in motion by the Cheney-Bush regime’s fraudulent Global War on Terror.
• Tomorrow is the second day of the trial and STS’s lawyer may be calling Professor Anthony J. Hall to the stand to testify. Cynthia McKinney will arrive in Calgary on Tuesday evening. It is hoped the the court will give this indefatigable freedom fighter the green light to testify on Wednesday.

See Part II: Case Shut Down on Second Day.

pieto:

Raven Rock Mountain Complex (RRMC) is an underground continuity of government facility built by the U.S. government in the early 1950s. It is located about 14 km (8.7 miles) east of Waynesboro, Pennsylvania, and 10 km (6.2 miles) north-northeast of Camp David, Maryland. It is also called the Raven Rock Military Complex, or simply Site R. Other designations and nicknames include “The Rock”, NMCC-R (National Military Command Center Reservation), ANMCC (Alternate National Military Command Center), AJCC (Alternate Joint Communications Center), “Backup Pentagon”, or “Site RT”; the latter refers to the vast array of communication towers and equipment atop the mountain. Colloquially, the facility is known as an “underground Pentagon”

The RRMC was one of the “undisclosed locations” frequently used by Vice President Dick Cheney following the September 11 attacks.

via

from his page on Huff Post:

• Editor’s Note: The Huffington Post’s editorial policy, laid out in our blogger guidelines, prohibits the promotion and promulgation of conspiracy theories — including those about 9/11. As such, we have removed this post.

• Canada and U.S. authorities are talking about extending cross-border security measures that were implemented for the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver and were to end with the closing of the Winter Games.
• The RCMP and the U.S. Coast Guard have jointly patrolled the waters off Vancouver since the beginning of the month, boarding nearly 200 vessels and interviewing about 500 people in their efforts to maintain security, RCMP Sergeant Duncan Pound of the border integrity program said in an interview.
• Almost every small craft in the vicinity of the maritime border has been contacted to confirm the legitimacy of its voyage. Although some arrests on outstanding criminal warrants have been made and some vessels have been sent back to port for not being safe, none of the incidents involved a threat to Olympic security.
• The joint patrols will end with the Paralympics but spokesmen from the two agencies said yesterday legislation that would allow joint maritime policing on a permanent basis is on the agenda of both the U.S. and Canadian governments.

Like Joe Stack and Amy Bishop, J.Patrick Bedell’s story goes deep into the weird. After Coleman’s mention of Bedell’s reading habits and interests he goes on to make the very important note of the ridiculous politicizing and right wing co-option of the shootings:

• Wikipedia appears to have already taken down Bedell’s self-authored page; however Bedell’s web footprints are being gathered by some rightwing bloggers who are trying to tie Bedell’s actions to a bizarre brand, in their thoughts, of “liberal” mindset (e.g. here, here, and here).