Critical Perspective on Developments in National Security, Intelligence, and Technology
A recent visitor to Blogs of War (and the path the visitor followed to get here) serves as yet another reminder of the threat from within:
Search Engine google.co.uk
Search Words how can i train myself for jihad?
IP Address 62.3.65.# (Zen Internet)
Continent : Europe
Country : United Kingdom
State/Region : Rochdale
An intelligence win in the UK reveals a disturbing plot:
The eight people arrested by terror police in Birmingham were allegedly planning an Iraq-style kidnapping and beheading in the UK.
Sky’s Crime Correspondent Martin Brunt says they intended to post a video of the hostage being tortured and killed on the internet.
Their target was a British Muslim soldier in his twenties who is now under police protection.
Sky News has live video.
Herschel Smith takes a depressing look at our military preparedness ahead of the surge:
A number of problems have plagued OIF: the naive trust in the healing powers of democracy, the unreadiness of the new Iraqi armed forces to take over security of Iraq without the necessary training and equipment, COIN doctrine that took its cue from forty year old counterinsurgency strategy flowing from Vietnam rather than looking to the holy war that the jihadists are fighting, and other problems too numerous to mention. This naivety created the milieu for the deployment of a force that was too small to bring security to a country the size of Iraq, and equipped for a conflict that would not last as long as this one has.
The problems run from the preparations for OIF to the present, where senior officers find it implausible that the available equipment will match the needs of U.S. troops in the coming months. It is one thing to support a surge of troops, and quite another to have the national discipline to prepare for it ten years ago.
Discipline and seriousness are exactly what we need from out political class at this moment. However, we seem to be moving in the opposite direction.
Details are sketchy. There are no additional reports detailing how he died or why the death is considered mysterious:
One of Iran’s top nuclear scientists, Ardeshir Hassanpour, a professor at the university of Shiraz, has died under mysterious circumstances. Hassanpour’s death was announced by Iranian state television, a week late, on Thursday. No reason was given for his death. The scientist was proclaimed the best scientist in the military field in the Islamic Republic in 2003. Hassanpour directed the centre for nuclear electromagnetic studies he had founded in 2005.
He had also co-founded the center for atomic research in Isfahan, the most important in the country, Iranian state television reported.
Last year, Ardeshir Hassanpour was awarded Iran’s most prestigious scientific award, the Kharazmi prize.
H/T: Regime Change Iran
Iran can’t manufacture most of the parts it needs to keep it’s aging F-14 fleet flying. Grounding them now, by withholding key replacement parts, will spare us the hassle of having to shoot them out of the sky later:
The Pentagon said Tuesday it had halted sales of spare parts from its recently retired F-14 fighter jet fleet, even as lawmakers pledged tougher oversight of the military’s surplus sales.
Sales of F-14 parts were suspended Friday pending a comprehensive review, Defense Logistics Agency spokesman Jack Hooper said.
“It was the prudent thing to do,” he said.
The review will examine Pentagon policy for handling the spare parts and determine what should be done with them “in light of the current situation with Iran,” Hooper said.
Iran, at odds with the United States and other countries over its suspected nuclear weapons program, among other issues, is still flying the F-14 Tomcat.
Ali-Reza Anghaie and Scot Terban
Information Security, Hackers, China, and Cyber Hype
Jon Iadonisi and Tim Newberry
Phillip Smyth
Dr. Rebecca Johnson
