In addition to the US usage of “laser spying” against the Russians, Nasa technology that has previously been used to detect faint radio signals from space, is now being used to eavesdrop on a room where the curtains are blocking the windows. Using a “horn antenna” this “microwave” technology can blast a wave of energy that is between 30GHZ and !00Ghz through a building wall. If people are speaking inside a room, any flimsy surface, such as clothing will be vibrating, and cause a modulation of the radio beam as it reflects from the surface. It is then amplified and analyzed.

Simpler systems using the planted bug can also use a laser beam to transmit conversations. Such a device was found in the offices of Trinidad & Tobagos’s director of public prosecutions this year.

So what beans were spilled? Not anything too incriminating…indeed the fact that Hague’s words actually drew the attention of the British press is a testament to how hush-hush these topics have been traditionally.

Bernard Jenkins, the Conservative chairman of the commons public administration select committee was questioning Hague on his foreign policy strategy. Seeing as the UK’s new government has done away with the foreign office’s strategy department, Jenkins wanted to know whether soldiers and spies stationed overseas are now being expected to cobble together their own strategy on the fly.

Hague responded as follows: “No. That is the absolute opposite of what I am saying. The strategy of the country comes from the prime minister, the national security council, the foreign secretary. They have to be the people who think together about this and use every possible source of advice about it, including the advice and the varied opinions of the people who work in their department. So, no, we are not leaving it to the spy in a particular location or the soldier in a particular location.”

Aha…so they do exist!

It has been said that Hague should have offered a ‘no comment’ on intelligence-related topics instead of responding directly to the query about spies, but then again, it’s a little bit ridiculous to continue the charade that British spies don’t exist. Apparently, it’s extremely easy to ‘spot the spy’ in any British embassy, mostly because they think so highly of themselves (à la James Bond). True or not, spies are no secret…most countries have their own network of operatives (though some more extensive than others) stationed around the world…

Time has come for the world to recognize that a nuclear-armed Iran could bring the economy to their knees by hiking the price of Middle East oil, and that what is needed is more than rhetoric and mild sanctions against Iran.

“Let’s tango with the Americans,” said Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to his aides.

“What style?” they asked. “Open-embrace tango, with space between the dancers, or close embrace, where you dance chest-to-chest?”

“Iranian-style,” said Ahmadinejad. “We lead, holding the Americans by the jugular, pulling them one step forward and pushing them two steps back.”

“What if they refuse to dance?” asked the aides.

“They won’t,” Ahmadinejad chuckled. “It’s been 31 years since our Islamic revolution, and the Americans still haven’t learned they’re dancing to our tune.”

An imaginary dialogue, of course, but a plausible one, considering how Iran toys with the world, thus far with impunity.

Is it a coincidence that suddenly last week, when the Iranians apparently realized that, this time, the superpowers and other UN Security Council members were serious about imposing sanctions, a Turkish-Iranian nuclear agreement was brokered, with the Brazilian president’s help? The terms of the deal are nearly identical to those that Iran first accepted, then rejected, last year. A tango.

The deal has Iran exchanging Iranian-enriched uranium, which when further enriched could be used in a nuclear bomb, for fuel rods. However, Iran agreed to exchange only half the quantity of enriched uranium it reportedly possesses. What’s to stop it, for example, from enriching the other half further for use in a bomb?

At the heart of this crisis is Tehran’s argument that it has a sovereign right to possess nuclear technology, combined with its refusal to play by the rules of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, which Iran signed in 1968, and which prohibits development of nuclear weapons. The issue isn’t Iran’s right to create electricity from nuclear power, rather the fact that an Iran with nuclear weapons would constitute a regional superpower. It would place Ahmadinejad’s hands on the oil spigots of the Gulf states, and perhaps those of Saudi Arabia as well.

When Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait, endangering the West’s oil supply, the U.S. and its allies attacked Iraq. But the world could not do the same with a nuclear-armed Iran.

Intelligence records show Iran started working toward nuclear weapons as early as 1990, long before Ahmadinejad became president. This came to light in 2002, with the public revelation of the existence of a nuclear facility at Natanz. International scrutiny followed. Iran’s then-president, reformist Mohammad Khatami, insisted that his country’s ambitions were solely for nuclear energy. He assured his countrymen that this would enhance Iran’s technological capabilities, thus elevating Tehran’s status in the region and worldwide, while bolstering national pride and demonstrating defiance to the bullying foreign powers.

When Ahmadinejad first assumed office, he wasted no time in declaring that nuclear research would proceed regardless of what the Europeans and the Americans did or said. He told parliament on August 6, 2005: “I don’t know why some countries cannot understand that the Iranian people will not succumb to force.” Ahmadinejad’s subsequent rhetoric shows that he, like his predecessor Khatami, continues to see the president as the one who will protect Iran from condescending foreigners trying to stop it from becoming nuclear.

Iran has the know-how, technology and materials to build a nuclear bomb. What it needs now is time: to enrich enough weapons-grade uranium to build at least one such bomb. Then, Iran believes, it – and not the UN, the U.S., or the rest of the world – will be able to dictate the terms of any agreement it is a party to. To gain that time, Tehran is dancing the tango.

Whenever the world’s patience seems to be at an end, the Iranians hint that they are amenable to a compromise. When negotiations behind closed doors commence, and weeks are wasted on futile talk, public attention is deflected and Iran’s willingness to settle evaporates. One step forward, two steps back. Tango, Iranian-style.

The proposed UN resolution for sanctions is important because it came immediately after the announcement of the Iranian-Turkish deal, indicating that the powers weren’t taken in by it. But even a UN-drawn line in the sand will not deter Iran. Cuba has been subjected to more severe sanctions since 1961, and yet maintained its defiance. Iran is unlikely to react differently.

The time has come for the countries of the world to recognize that a nuclear-armed Iran could bring their economies to their knees by hiking the price of Middle East oil astronomically, and that what is needed is more than rhetoric and mild sanctions against Iran. Now is the time to move, not just talk. As Eli Wallach said in the epic spaghetti Western “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”: “When you have to shoot, shoot! Don’t talk.” If bold action is to be taken, it must be taken before Ahmadinejad appears on TV announcing that Iran has tested its first nuclear bomb in the Iranian desert. By then, the tango dance party will be over.

This op-ed was originally published in Ha’artez/International Herald Tribune on 05/28/2010

Although Israel has not claimed any responsibility for killing Palestinian militant Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai this February, Britain believes the Mossad to have been behind the operation. Al-Mabhouh was, after all, instrumental to the smuggling of Iranian weapons to Gaza to support Palestinian Islamists.

What does the UK want from Israel? A commitment not to misuse British passports in future operations. Apparently it has been the Mossad’s refusal to submit to this condition that forced the UK to deny the spy agency an official presence in London.

No news on the identity of the specific agent denied return, but apparently he was not involved in the theft of the passports, and was actually the official liaison between MI6 and the Mossad.

At the end of the day, the UK and Israel are on the same page when it comes to fighting terrorism and putting a stop to Iran’s nuclear armament plans. Israel does not seem too concerned about Britain’s blocked border, seeing as it has not retaliated with a quid-pro-quo move. That said, Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot reports that Israeli officials are looking to repair their relationship with the UK as quickly as possible.

The UK Foreign Office has said, “…we look to Israel to rebuild the trust we believe is required for the full and open relationship we would like. We have asked for specific assurances from Israel, which would clearly be a positive step towards rebuilding that trust. Any Israeli request for the diplomat to be replaced would be considered against the context of these UK requests.”

Apparently British passports were not the only ones misused in the February assassination plot. Irish, Australian, French and German passports – some forged, some stolen – were also employed, along with masterful disguises.

But now, the world has yet another – seemingly more concrete – reason to distrust Iran. Published in The Times of London on Monday was a memo apparently leaked from the heart of Iran’s nuclear program, describing the country’s four-year plan to test a neutron initiator, otherwise known as a bomb trigger.

Rest assured, there is no civilian use for a neutron initiator, but of course the Iranians have dismissed the memo as an attempt to frame Iran. In fact, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast referred to the incident as a “scenario” dreamt up by the West.

The documents, whose authenticity and significance the U.S. plans to investigate, apparently includes a note on undercover testing: not only to see if the bomb trigger works but to ensure that whatever traces of uranium are left from the testing are not large enough to be detectable by the examining world.

Although U.S. State Department spokesman Philip Crowley refused to discuss matters of intelligence, he did say, “Iran has yet to really come to… the international community and address our concerns in a meaningful way.”

According to the report in The Times, intelligence agencies dated the memo to early 2007, but the US-based Institute for International Science and Security (ISIS), that was consulted before the piece ran, has cautioned against jumping to conclusions. ISIS believes further document assessment is necessary before the memo can be accurately authenticated, dated and fit into the context of Iran’s nuclear development history.

The timing of the article, though, supports Hillary Clinton’s bid for additional UN sanctions against Iran, and highlights how close Iran is to losing its chance at a diplomatic approach to nuclear and other issues: 2009’s very close to being over…

Might sound hard to believe, but Mussolini served an important purpose, one for which he was paid pretty well too. For 100 British pounds/week – the equivalent of about 5-6000 GBP today – Mussolini used his newspaper to generate support for the war amongst the factory workers of Milan, just when morale was slipping and war protesters were starting to stir dissent.

Britain could not afford to lose Italy as an ally, nor to do without the weapons output of Milan’s factories should striking begin, so Mussolini was hired, as part of a security campaign, to spread pro-war propaganda amongst his readers.

The campaign involved sending 100 British intelligence officials to Italy with the mission of “stiffen[ing] the backbone” of Italian industrial working class. Samuel Hoare was then the man in charge of MI5’s agents in Rome, and his memoirs reveal that Mussolini was indeed acting as a British agent at the time.

Mussolini’s socialist newspaper was just the right vehicle through which to speak to the industrial factory workers.

Although Martland cannot prove how Mussolini spent his generous paycheck (which was peanuts compared to what Britain was spending on the war every day), he believes Mussolini’s penchant for womanizing was significantly enabled by his undercover work for the British.

Martin Bormann, Adolf Hitler’s private secretary, is known to have died along a railway track on May 1, 1945, potentially after ingesting a cyanide pill. Either way, the fact that he died in the waning days of WWII did not deter Britain’s domestic intelligence agency from keeping his file open, tracking and recording sightings of the dead man for years after.

In one such instance, a London correspondent for the Chicago Tribune said he had been approached in 1951 by Bormann, who had asked him to pass along clandestine papers to Washington. It turned out – not surprisingly – that the man claiming to be Bormann was not him at all, but a mentally unstable individual from North London by the name of Harry Ardour.

One memo in the file refers to current (that is, post-mortem) sightings of Bormann in Switzerland, Bolivia, Italy, Tibet, Norway and Brazil. Quite the world traveler!

British spies continued to follow their Bormann leads, despite the protests of their superiors. The manhunt became something of an obsession, and London could not dissuade her agents against keeping up the search…until 1998, when forensic evidence – a skull believed to be Bormann’s was positively identified – closed the case once and for all.

That said, the British government and intelligence officials are adamant that British agents have not been involved in the sort of interrogation that violates suspects’ human rights. MI6 Director John Scarlett told BBC Radio: “Our officers are as committed to the values and the human rights values of liberal democracy as anybody else.”

It’s that ‘anybody else’ that has some human rights organizations fretting. Several groups, including the Joint Committee on Human Rights, have been urging the British government to allow for an independent investigation into the allegations. Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s office and Chairman of Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee Kim Howells have said that there is no need for an inquiry at this time.

Howells, whose committee monitors Britain’s intelligence agencies, said, “We’ve found no evidence that there has been collusion between the intelligence services, any government department and governments that torture individuals.”  He also said that “no government on Earth” could say beyond a shadow of a doubt that suspects held abroad had not had their human rights infringed upon. This, of course, is the sort of comment that leads to calls for independent inquiries.

Even if British agents did not torture anyone, anti-terror information garnered through torture carried out by other governments and used by Britain in its anti-terror campaign, could be regarded as complicity in torture. There are also those who allege that British agents provided questions to interrogators of other governments who used torture, and that this is also a form of complicity.

So far though, the British government is standing by its agents – no indie inquiry in sight.

images courtesy of wordpress blogs

When Blunt died in 1983, his memoir was donated anonymously to the British Library with the caveat that it would not be made public for 25 years. The Library honored the condition, but it seems that all the waiting may have been for naught – Blunt’s manuscript is not nearly so juicy as one would have hoped.

His public unmasking came in 1979, 15 years after the once Cambridge professor and well regarded art historian confessed to operating in a four-person Russian ring along with another notorious Cold War traitor, Kim Philby. Blunt was granted immunity in exchange for information, but after his secret double life was made known to the British public, he thought about killing himself.

His memoirs offer a brief account of his life, from birth through to the moment his spy life was publicly revealed. People have been disappointed that Blunt more or less skips over his busy spy years in the 40s and 50s, but he does explain how he was recruited and finally discovered for the Russian spy he was.

It was his friend and agent Guy Burgess who first got him involved in the spying life. Both men were gay, and they met when Blunt was teaching at Cambridge in the 30s. Burgess introduced Blunt to left-wing politics, and when Blunt was all set to join the Communist party, Burgess suggested he would be of better use doing undercover work for the KGB.

Blunt also worked on recruiting (indeed in the end it was one of the agents he had helped to recruit that out-ed him), and was then dormant until WWII. During the war, he worked for MI5 as a military intelligence agent, which of course gave him access to all sorts of classified information, which, one can assume, he dutifully passed on to the Soviets.

After the war he went back to being the royal surveyor of art. He was knighted in 1956 and exposed in 1963. He says in his memoirs that getting involved with espionage was “the biggest mistake of [his] life.”

pics courtesy of opsroom.org and newstatesman.com

The Mail on Sunday newspaper came across Sawers’s wife’s Facebook page – public for all to see – and, of course, couldn’t resist publishing domestic snapshots of John wearing a Santa hat, posing with his kids and playing frisbee at the beach. Fun family times.

The page has since been removed (naturally) and while some are calling the snafu a security breach, others – like Foreign Secretary David Milibrand – think it’s all been blown out of proportion: “It’s not a state secret that he wears Speedo swimming trunks. For goodness’ sake, let’s grow up.”

From a security standpoint, the real issue regards the details the page gave away about the Sawerses’ three children – not to mention the location of their home in London. It’s surprising in a world where people are warned not to put any identity-related details up on Facebook, not even birth years, that the wife of a former spy didn’t know better.

For years MI6 was an extremely private organization – the British government wouldn’t even acknowledge its existence…and its spy chief was known only by the letter ‘C.’ There must be some veteran employees grimacing at the thought of having such a publicly-known figure taking the reins this winter…

pics courtesy of telegraph.co.uk and bbc.co.uk

Deloitte’s new counter-espionage force will be headed up by Steve Cummings, a former director of the Centre for the Protection of the National Infrastructure (CPNI). His team will be composed of consultants (of course) with experience in both government and business intelligence.

After what one might argue to be a more far-reaching intelligence role, Cummings isn’t taking the Deloitte gig lightly:

“In a globalized world where the threat from terrorism seems more pressing, it is easy for companies to make the mistake of thinking that espionage carried out by competitors or states is a thing of the past.

“Yet many businesses face a greater threat of attacks against valued information which can have a direct effect on their commercial success and longer term business strategies, or against intellectual property which has a high commercial value.”

Cummings believes that for companies to really fight corporate espionage successfully, they must train their staff appropriately on matters of security and combine this education with “effective technical and non-technical controls.”

pic courtesy of zdnet.com

The current MI6 spy chief, John Scarlett, hasn’t been the most savvy at turning the fickle tide of publicity in his favor. Of course, MI6’s involvement in drafting the briefing that supported the existence of weapons of mass destruction in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq didn’t help Scarlett’s popularity case.

Sawers, 52, has a rather impressive resume. In addition to his present ambassadorship to the UN, he was a key foreign policy adviser to former Prime Minister Tony Blair from 1999 to 2001. During this time, he played a significant role in managing the Kosovo crisis and the Northern Ireland peace process. Sawers has also been an ambassador to Egypt and South Africa and has completed diplomatic assignments in Baghdad and Washington, D.C.

This winter, he will be taking over the helm of an espionage organization whose focus has shifted dramatically, from combating the spread of Soviet-style communism to keeping an ever-watchful eye on Al Qaeda and other terrorist groups.

According to the BBC, MI6’s choice of future leader is an indicator of a changing intelligence landscape. Gone are the days of such extreme secrecy, during which even John Scarlett’s identity was kept under wraps – he was known to the British public only by the code-letter “C.” His successor is the opposite – very much a public figure who’s excelled in roles requiring international prowess; he is highly recognizable both at home and abroad.

images courtesy of daylife.com and maximsnews.com

In its most recent recruitment efforts, the agency has sought to attract school teachers by placing an ad in their trade newspaper – the Times Educational Supplement. The recruitment ad says that teachers’ people skills make them an ideal fit for a career as operational intelligence officers.

Literally: “Your experience of dealing with people means you can build trust and relationships with all sorts of individuals, which makes you the ideal candidate for developing a career securing the information we need to protect national security.”

Job responsibilities include developing relationships with people who can “provide information of relevance to national security,” writing reports and delivering briefings.

It’s a big jump from keeping a class of kindergartners in check to convincing terrorists to confide in you, but we’re sure MI5 has a solid training program in place for teachers who choose to make the switch from the classroom to intelligence gathering in the war on terror.

What can these folks expect to be paid? GBP 35,425 (about $58,000), which is about the same as a rather experienced high school teacher makes in the UK.

Of course, the government’s official PR take on MI5 targeting teachers, is that they’re not. They place ads in all sorts of trade publications and mainstream media to get a diverse group of candidates who may have the right skills and experience.

images courtesy of dorisday.net and directnews.co.uk

The Sunday Times reported this weekend that the MI6-trained female agent inadvertently left her handbag on a coach bus at the El Dorado airport in Bogota, Colombia. She was a drugs liaison officer working to further the efforts against drug trafficking, but her mistake has purportedly cost British taxpayers millions, put many lives at risk and undone much of the progress that was being made in the war on major drug traffickers.

It’s said that the USB stick contained a comprehensive list of undercover agents plus details of 5+ years of intelligence work. Once operation heads were notified of the security breach, they were forced to stop ops and relocate involved agents and informants, should the lost information have ended up in the hands of the opposition.

“What about encryption?” we’re sure you’re asking yourselves. Surely the device was locked in such a way as to prevent your average drug lord from accessing the data. Reports of the leak do not mention encryption – just that the loss of the item severely undermined the war against drug traffickers.

Originally kept on the quiet by the agent’s employer, the Serious Organized Crime Agency (SOCA), the error is just another in what is becoming a laundry list of similar security incidents. Indeed, people are starting to refer to ‘British Intelligence’ as an oxymoron, much to the embarrassment of Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, who is ultimately responsible for the UK’s anti-drugs operations and the security of criminal intelligence.

SOCA confirmed the report, but  the public is getting wind of it 3 years after the fact. Good news, of course, otherwise every drug lord in Colombia would be scrambling for stray USB sticks.

photo courtesy of www.vagabondish.com

The Advisor will be responsible for keeping one step ahead of the gadget landscape, making sure that the UK’s intelligence and counterterrorism efforts around the world are well equipped with the most up to date technologies and methods.

Candidates for the high-profile role are required to have world-class scientific expertise and credibility, excellent strategic skills, outstanding influencing and communication skills, and a successful track record in complex project management.

Surprisingly, the role is intended to be a part-time one, requiring only two or three days a week for a five-year term. It is expected that these parameters will appeal to those conducting academic scientific research that they would like to continue while simultaneously taking on the “unique and challenging” role at MI5.

Part of the challenge will be to have a tech vision that is futuristic. “It will involve a sort of future gazing to see where technology will be taking us in a year or so,” said Professor John Beddington, the British government’s chief scientific advisor.

The British media has had a ball comparing the role to that of Bond’s master gadget man. Although the focus will be on using science and technology to support agents in the field, gadgets and techniques will likely be related to internet and in-field surveillance (think taps, bugs, and cyber security instead of underwater vehicles).

Professor Beddington further clarified that the advisor would have “to frustrate terrorism to prevent espionage hurting the UK, protect our critical national infrastructure and to frustrate the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.”

One thing’s certain – this job won’t leave the person who fills it twiddling his thumbs!

The application deadline is April 24, 2009.

photo courtesy of www.mpg.de