Replies to post #265047 on Tornado Alley (PROG)

[StephanieVanbryce]

o.k.. I'll post it .. I've never liked the 'observer' since his son in law took it over .. It used to
be an excellent little rag ... now, I don't know. .it hasn't been long enough ...

The Spy Revolt Against Trump Begins

Intelligence Community pushes back against a White House
it considers leaky, untruthful and penetrated by the Kremlin

By John R. Schindler • 02/12/17 10:00am

In a recent column, [ http://observer.com/2017/01/donald-trump-intelligence-community-kremlin-spy-alliance/ ] I explained how the still-forming Trump administration is already doing serious harm to America’s longstanding global intelligence partnerships. In particular, fears that the White House is too friendly to Moscow are causing close allies to curtail some of their espionage relationships with Washington—a development with grave implications for international security, particularly in the all-important realm of counterterrorism.

Now those concerns are causing problems much closer to home—in fact, inside the Beltway itself. Our Intelligence Community is so worried by the unprecedented problems of the Trump administration—not only do senior officials possess troubling ties to the Kremlin, there are nagging questions about basic competence regarding Team Trump—that it is beginning to withhold intelligence from a White House which our spies do not trust.

That the IC has ample grounds for concern is demonstrated by almost daily revelations of major problems inside the White House, a mere three weeks after the inauguration. The president has repeatedly gone out of his way [ http://observer.com/2016/12/trump-declares-war-on-the-intelligence-community/ ] to antagonize our spies, mocking them and demeaning their work, and Trump’s personal national security guru can’t seem to keep his story straight on vital issues.

That’s Mike Flynn, the retired Army three-star general who now heads the National Security Council. Widely disliked in Washington for his brash personality and preference for conspiracy-theorizing over intelligence facts, Flynn was fired as head of the Defense Intelligence Agency for managerial incompetence and poor judgment [ http://observer.com/2016/07/military-guys-make-bad-running-mates/ ] —flaws he has brought to the far more powerful and political NSC.

Flynn’s problems with the truth have been laid bare by the growing scandal about his dealings with Moscow. Strange ties to the Kremlin, [ http://observer.com/2016/08/yes-american-spies-really-think-trump-is-putins-guy/ ] including Vladimir Putin himself, have dogged Flynn since he left DIA, and concerns about his judgment have risen considerably since it was revealed that after the November 8 election, Flynn repeatedly called the Russian embassy in Washington to discuss the transition. The White House has denied that anything substantive came up in conversations between Flynn and Sergei Kislyak, the Russian ambassador.

That was a lie, as confirmed by an extensively sourced bombshell report in The Washington Post, [ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/national-security-adviser-flynn-discussed-sanctions-with-russian-ambassador-despite-denials-officials-say/2017/02/09/f85b29d6-ee11-11e6-b4ff-ac2cf509efe5_story.html?utm_term=.b74549d0b297 ] which makes clear that Flynn grossly misrepresented his numerous conversations with Kislyak—which turn out to have happened before the election too, part of a regular dialogue with the Russian embassy. To call such an arrangement highly unusual in American politics would be very charitable.

In particular, Flynn and Kislyak discussed the possible lifting of the sanctions President Obama placed on Russia and its intelligence services late last year in retaliation for the Kremlin’s meddling in our 2016 election. In public, Flynn repeatedly denied that any talk of sanctions occurred during his conversations with Russia’s ambassador. Worse, he apparently lied in private too, including to Vice President Mike Pence, who when this scandal broke last month publicly denied that Flynn conducted any sanctions talk with Kislyak. Pence and his staff are reported to be very upset with the national security adviser, who played the vice president for a fool.

It’s debatable whether Flynn broke any laws by conducting unofficial diplomacy with Moscow, then lying about it, and he has now adopted the customary Beltway dodge about the affair, ditching his previous denials in favor of professing he has “no recollection of discussing sanctions,” adding that he “couldn’t be certain that the topic never came up.” That’s not good enough anymore, since the IC knows exactly what Flynn and Kislyak discussed.

In pretty much every capital worldwide, embassies that provide sanctuary to hostile intelligence services are subject to counterintelligence surveillance, including monitoring phone calls. Our spy services conduct signals intelligence—SIGINT for short—against the Russian embassy in Washington, just as the Russians do against our embassy in Moscow. Ambassadors’ calls are always monitored: that’s how the SpyWar works, everywhere.

Ambassador Kislyak surely knew his conversations with Flynn were being intercepted, and it’s incomprehensible that a career military intelligence officer who once headed a major intelligence agency didn’t realize the same. Whether Flynn is monumentally stupid or monumentally arrogant is the big question that hangs over this increasingly strange affair.

Prominent Democrats in Congress are already calling for Flynn to be relieved over this scandal, which at best shows him to be dishonest about important issues. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, has bluntly asked for the national security adviser’s ouster. Republicans on the Hill who would prefer that the White House stop lying to the public about its Kremlin links ought to get behind Schiff’s initiative before the scandal gets worse.

In truth, it may already be too late. A new report by CNN indicates that important parts of the infamous spy dossier that professed to shed light on President Trump’s shady Moscow ties have been corroborated by communications intercepts. In other words, SIGINT strikes again, providing key evidence that backs up some of the claims made in that 35-page report compiled by Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence official with extensive Russia experience.

As I’ve previously explained, that salacious dossier is raw intelligence, an explosive amalgam of fact and fantasy, including some disinformation planted by the Kremlin to obscure this already murky case. Now SIGINT confirms that some of the non-salacious parts of what Steele reported, in particular how senior Russian officials conspired to assist Trump in last year’s election, are substantially based in fact. This is bad news for the White House, which has already lashed out in angry panic, with Press Secretary Sean Spicer stating, “We continue to be disgusted by CNN’s fake news reporting.”

That is hardly a denial, of course, and I can confirm from my friends still serving in the IC that the SIGINT, which corroborates some of the Steele dossier, is damning for the administration. Our spies have had enough of these shady Russian connections—and they are starting to push back.

There are pervasive concerns that the president simply isn’t paying attention to intelligence.

How things are heating up between the White House and the spooks is evidenced by a new report [ http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/mike-flynn-nsa-aide-trump-234923 ] that the CIA has denied a security clearance to one of Flynn’s acolytes. Rob Townley, a former Marine intelligence officer selected to head up the NSC’s Africa desk, was denied a clearance to see Sensitive Compartmented Information (which is required to have access to SIGINT in particular). Why Townley’s SCI was turned down isn’t clear—it could be over personal problems or foreign ties—but the CIA’s stand has been privately denounced by the White House, which views this as a vendetta against Flynn. That the Townley SCI denial was reportedly endorsed by Mike Pompeo, the new CIA director selected by Trump himself, only adds to the pain.

There is more consequential IC pushback happening, too. Our spies have never liked Trump’s lackadaisical attitude toward the President’s Daily Brief, the most sensitive of all IC documents, which the new commander-in-chief has received haphazardly. The president has frequently blown off the PDB altogether, tasking Flynn with condensing it into a one-page summary with no more than nine bullet-points. Some in the IC are relieved by this, but there are pervasive concerns that the president simply isn’t paying attention to intelligence.

In light of this, and out of worries about the White House’s ability to keep secrets, some of our spy agencies have begun withholding intelligence from the Oval Office. Why risk your most sensitive information if the president may ignore it anyway? A senior National Security Agency official explained that NSA was systematically holding back some of the “good stuff” from the White House, in an unprecedented move. For decades, NSA has prepared special reports for the president’s eyes only, containing enormously sensitive intelligence. In the last three weeks, however, NSA has ceased doing this, fearing Trump and his staff cannot keep their best SIGINT secrets.

Since NSA provides something like 80 percent [ http://observer.com/2016/09/were-losing-the-war-against-terrorism/ ] of the actionable intelligence in our government, what’s being kept from the White House may be very significant indeed. However, such concerns are widely shared across the IC, and NSA doesn’t appear to be the only agency withholding intelligence from the administration out of security fears.

What’s going on was explained lucidly by a senior Pentagon intelligence official, who stated that “since January 20, we’ve assumed that the Kremlin has ears inside the SITROOM,” meaning the White House Situation Room, the 5,500 square-foot conference room in the West Wing where the president and his top staffers get intelligence briefings. “There’s not much the Russians don’t know at this point,” the official added in wry frustration.

None of this has happened in Washington before. A White House with unsettling links to Moscow wasn’t something anybody in the Pentagon or the Intelligence Community even considered a possibility until a few months ago. Until Team Trump clarifies its strange relationship with the Kremlin, and starts working on its professional honesty, the IC will approach the administration with caution and concern.

I previously warned [ http://observer.com/2016/12/trump-declares-war-on-the-intelligence-community/ ] the Trump administration not to go to war with the nation’s spies, and here’s why. This is a risky situation, particularly since President Trump is prone to creating crises foreign and domestic with his incautious tweets. In the event of a serious international crisis of the sort which eventually befalls almost every administration, the White House will need the best intelligence possible to prevent war, possibly even nuclear war. It may not get the information it needs in that hour of crisis, and for that it has nobody to blame but itself.


John Schindler is a security expert and former National Security Agency analyst and counterintelligence officer. A specialist in espionage and terrorism, he’s also been a Navy officer and a War College professor. He’s published four books and is on Twitter at @20committee.

http://observer.com/2017/02/donald-trump-administration-mike-flynn-russian-embassy/

I don't have much respect for outlets owned by the son - in - law .. then only references that same publication .. but, it does match with some facts .. so .....................

[fuagf]

White House Plans to Have Trump Ally Review Intelligence Agencies

"Spy Agencies Are Now Reportedly Withholding Intelligence From the White House"

By JAMES RISEN and MATTHEW ROSENBERGFEB. 15, 2017


Stephen A. Feinberg, right, a founder of Cerberus Capital Management, at the Capitol in December 2008.
He is said to be in talks for a White House role examining the country’s intelligence agencies.
Credit Brendan Smialowski for The New York Times

WASHINGTON — President Trump plans to assign a New York billionaire to lead a broad review of American intelligence agencies, according to administration officials, an effort that members of the intelligence community fear could curtail their independence and reduce the flow of information that contradicts the president’s worldview.

The possible role for Stephen A. Feinberg .. http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/f/stephen_a_feinberg/index.html?inline=nyt-per , a co-founder of Cerberus Capital Management, has met fierce resistance among intelligence officials already on edge because of the criticism the intelligence community has received from Mr. Trump during the campaign and since he became president. On Wednesday, Mr. Trump blamed leaks from the intelligence community for the departure of Michael T. Flynn, his national security adviser, whose resignation he requested.

There has been no announcement of Mr. Feinberg’s job, which would be based in the White House, but he recently told his company’s shareholders that he is in discussions .. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/02/business/dealbook/trump-stephen-feinberg-private-equity-cerberus.html .. to join the Trump administration. He is a member of Mr. Trump’s economic advisory council .. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/02/us/politics/donald-trump-transition.html .

Mr. Feinberg, who has close ties to Stephen K. Bannon, Mr. Trump’s chief strategist, and Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, declined to comment on his possible position. The White House, which is still working out the details of the intelligence review, also would not comment.


Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s chief strategist, and Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, in the
Oval Office this month. Mr. Feinberg has close ties to both men. Credit Al Drago/The New York Times

Bringing Mr. Feinberg into the administration to conduct the review is seen as a way of injecting a Trump loyalist into a world the White House views with suspicion. But top intelligence officials fear that Mr. Feinberg is being groomed for a high position in one of the intelligence agencies.

Mr. Bannon and Mr. Kushner, according to current and former intelligence officials and Republican lawmakers, had at one point considered Mr. Feinberg for either director of national intelligence or chief of the Central Intelligence Agency’s clandestine service, a role that is normally reserved for career intelligence officers, not friends of the president. Mr. Feinberg’s only experience with national security matters is his firm’s stakes in a private security company and two gun makers.

On an array of issues — including the Iran nuclear deal, the utility of NATO, and how best to combat Islamist militancy — much of the information and analysis produced by American intelligence agencies contradicts the policy positions of the new administration. The divide is starkest when it comes to Russia and President Vladimir V. Putin, whom Mr. Trump has repeatedly praised while dismissing American intelligence assessments that Moscow sought to promote his own candidacy.

-
Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump

The real scandal here is that classified information is illegally
given out by "intelligence" like candy. Very un-American!
12:13 AM - 16 Feb 2017
-

Against this backdrop, Mr. Trump has appointed Mike Pompeo, a former Republican congressman from Kansas, to run the C.I.A., and former Senator Dan Coats, an Indiana Republican, to be the director of national intelligence (he is still awaiting confirmation). Both were the preferred choices of the Republican congressional leadership and Vice President Mike Pence and had no close or longstanding ties to Mr. Trump. In fact, they each endorsed Senator Marco Rubio of Florida for president during the 2016 Republican primaries.

But the potential White House role for Mr. Feinberg follows intense speculation among intelligence professionals that Mr. Feinberg is in line for a powerful position within the intelligence community.

Reports that Mr. Feinberg was under consideration to run the clandestine service rocked the intelligence community in recent weeks, raising the prospect of direct White House control over America’s spies at a time when Mr. Trump’s ties to Mr. Putin are under investigation by the F.B.I. .. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/14/us/politics/russia-intelligence-communications-trump.html .. and congressional committees.

The last time an outsider with no intelligence experience took the job was in the early days of the Reagan administration, when Max Hugel, a businessman who had worked on Mr. Reagan’s campaign, was named to run the spy service. His tenure at the C.I.A. was marked by turmoil and questions about the politicization of the agency. He was forced to resign after six months, amid accusations about his past business dealings. (He later won a libel case against the two brothers who made the accusations.)

Even the prospect that Mr. Feinberg may lead a review for the White House has raised concerns in the intelligence community.

Mr. Coats is especially angry at what he sees as a move by Mr. Bannon and Mr. Kushner to sideline him before he is even confirmed, according to current and former officials. He believes the review would impinge on a central part of his role as the director of national intelligence and fears that if Mr. Feinberg were working at the White House, he could quickly become a dominant voice on intelligence matters.

Michael V. Hayden, a retired general who ran the C.I.A. and the National Security Agency during President George W. Bush’s administration, said it was hard to wrap his head around “the idea of a D.N.I. nominee in the confirmation process while others consider retooling the position.”


Mike Pompeo, center, the C.I.A. director, being sworn in last month by Vice President Mike
Pence. Mr. Pompeo does not see an urgent need for a review of the intelligence community.
Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times

“I think I’d be concerned, too,” he said.

The challenge is less immediate for Mr. Pompeo. He does not see an urgent need for a review of the intelligence community, according to current and former American officials, but sees it as better than the appointment of Mr. Feinberg to a job with actual authority over daily intelligence operations.

Many intelligence officials question what purpose a White House intelligence review would serve other than to position Mr. Feinberg for a larger role in the future. Most significant changes to the intelligence community would require an act of Congress, a fact that would ultimately blunt whatever ideas or proposals Mr. Feinberg came up with. Even with a Republican majority in both houses, getting Congress to agree to major changes to intelligence agencies seems unlikely.

It is difficult to “object to someone putting fresh eyes on the organization of the intelligence community,” Mr. Hayden said. “But, even though the D.N.I. staff has become far too large, I don’t think any of us think a major restructuring of the community is in order.”

Tensions between the intelligence community and the White House have already played out on several fronts. Before Mr. Flynn was forced out, one of his top aides, Robin Townley, was denied a security clearance by the C.I.A. But distrust of the intelligence community has been building for years in conservative political circles, where the C.I.A. during the Obama administration was seen as heavily politicized.

Representative Steve King, Republican of Iowa, said in a recent interview that some officials in the intelligence community were trustworthy but “not all.”
Got a confidential news tip?

“People there need to be rooted out,” Mr. King said.

Another Republican lawmaker said that the predominant view at the White House is also that the politicians in the intelligence agencies need to be cleaned out.

Through Cerberus, his private equity company, Mr. Feinberg has strong ties to the government contracting industry. Cerberus owns DynCorp International, which has had a wide array of large contracts providing security to the State Department and other agencies. DynCorp is now locked in a major legal dispute over the fate of a $10 billion State Department contract that it previously held to provide air support for counternarcotics operations overseas.

John F. Kelly, the new Homeland Security secretary, was paid $166,000 a year as a DynCorp adviser until he was named to the new administration.

Cerberus also owns Remington Outdoor, a major firearms manufacturer.

In 2008, Mr. Feinberg also considered investing in Blackwater, the security firm founded by Erik Prince, a former member of the Navy SEALs, before it was ultimately acquired by other investors.

New York magazine reported last year that Mr. Feinberg went to Blackwater’s North Carolina compound in 2005 to take firearms training .. http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/11/a-billionaires-dreams-of-creating-a-guns-empire.html .

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/15/us/politics/trump-intelligence-agencies-stephen-feinberg.html?_r=0

---

Meet Stephen Feinberg, The Private Equity Billionaire In Talks To Join The Trump Administration

Noah Kirsch, Forbes Staff

I cover billionaires, entrepreneurs and, sometimes, good eats.

Feb 4, 2017 @ 09:00 AM

Trump’s cadre of cabinet members is already worth an estimated $4.5 billion.


Stephen Feinberg (second from left) convenes with his crew as lawmakers discuss the auto bailout bill at the US Capitol in 2008.
(Photo by Jahi Chikwendiu/The Washington Post/Getty Images)

Stephen Feinberg, a private equity magnate from New York City, may soon be the latest billionaire to join team Trump.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/noahkirsch/2017/02/04/stephen-feinberg-private-equity-billionaire-trump-administration/#5cc6b5d83403

See also:

Cerberus Capital, Owner Of Gun Manufacturer Freedom Group, Will Sell Off All Assets In Firearms
Posted: 12/18/2012 7:34 am EST | Updated: 12/18/2012 10:58 am EST
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=82588778

Trump's economic team: .. morsel ..
Steve Feinberg, another hedge-fund manager, who is also the CEO of Cerberus Capital Management. If Cerberus sounds familiar, it should. It’s another specialist in "distressed investing.” Cerberus most famously tried to grab Chrysler during the auto industry collapse, but the deal fell apart. But Cerberus did manage to buy up most of GM’s finance arm and pull in billions from TARP. It also bought guns, guns, and guns. Cerberus owns Bushmaster and Remington. Incidentally, it was a Bushmaster AR-15 that was used at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Who funds the NRA? Um.
http://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=124342499

[StephanieVanbryce]

The ODNI statement comes in response to a Wall Street Journal story reporting that intelligence officials have kept intelligence from Donald Trump. | Getty

Office of Director of National Intelligence: We don't withhold intel from Trump

By Louis Nelson
02/16/17 07:16 AM EST

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence denied on Wednesday reports that intelligence community officials have withheld intelligence from President Donald Trump.

The ODNI statement, released late Wednesday night, comes in response to a Wall Street Journal story reporting that intelligence officials have kept intelligence from Trump over concerns that that information might be leaked or otherwise compromised by a White House reportedly lacking in organization and besieged by internal conflict.

"Any suggestion that the U.S. Intelligence Community is withholding information and not providing the best possible intelligence to the President and his national security team is not true,” the ODNI statement said.

The Journal’s reporting, which cites anonymous sources and has not been independently confirmed by POLITICO, is further evidence of a rift between Trump and the intelligence community of which he is in charge. On Wednesday, Trump blamed the intelligence community for leaks that have proved damaging to his administration and compared its practices to those of Russia.

In the past, he has likened the intelligence community to Nazi Germany and stubbornly disputed conclusions reached unanimously by all 17 federal intelligence agencies.

Further muddying the relationship between Trump and the intelligence community are the alleged ties between close allies of the president and the Russian government, which have been reported by multiple media outlets but have been strenuously denied by Trump and those around him.


!
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/02/office-director-national-intelligence-trump-intel-wsj-235080