SUMMARY VERSION INTELLIGENCE ISSN 1245-2122 N. 107, New Series, 29 November 1999 Every Two to Three Weeks Next Issue on 13 December 1999 Publishing since 1980 Editor Olivier Schmidt (email intelligence-adi@wanadoo.fr; web http://www.blythe.org/Intelligence) TABLE OF CONTENTS, N. 107, 29 November 1999 FRONT PAGE USA/GREAT BRITAIN - THE "ISLAMIC BOMB" AFFAIR BACK IN COURT p.1 TECHNOLOGY AND TECHNIQUES "INTELLIGENCE" OVERVIEW OF MEDIA COVERAGE p.2 HOW ECHELON WORKS IN THE FRAMEWORK OF NSA ACTIVITY p.3 BRITS' US-STYLE E-COMMERCE BILL PUSHES BUSINESS OUT p.4 Y2K MADNESS HITS BRITAIN EARLY p.5 CODES, COMMUNICATION SECURITY & INTERNET p.6 TECH - Jumping Robots Spies & Mercenary Study. p.7 PEOPLE USA - THOMAS J. PICKARD p.8 - RUBEN GARCIA p.9 RUSSIA - BORIS KARPICHKOV p.10 - IGOR SUTYAGIN p.11 AGENDA COMING EVENTS THROUGH 18 JANUARY 2000 p.12 INTELLIGENCE AROUND THE WORLD USA - AWAITED FBI SHAKE-UP ARRIVES p.13 - WASHINGTON "WMD" UNIT & OTHER FBI NEWS p.14 - IRAN-CONTRA COMEBACK & OTHER CIA NEWS p.15 - New DIA Chief "Meets The Press". p.16 NORTH AMERICA - Open Source Intelligence. p.17 USA, CANADA. GREAT BRITAIN - CASHING IN ON THE MITROKHIN FILES p.18 - A NEW & "BETTER" PREVENTION OF TERRORISM ACT p.19 - NUCLEAR ARM ACCIDENTS & MOD COVER-UP p.20 IRELAND - CROSS-BORDER MONEY LAUNDERING COOPERATION p.21 FRANCE - DGSE RECRUITMENT, PSY OPS, INTEL FILES & NEWS p.22 NETHERLANDS - MAJOR DUTCH/ISRAELI CRIME SYNDICATE ROLLED UP p.23 WESTERN EUROPE - For And Against Drugs. p.24 - Open Source Intelligence. p.25 GREAT BRITAIN, GERMANY, DENMARK, SWITZERLAND, WESTERN EUROPE. EASTERN EUROPE - Open Source Intelligence. p.26 ROMANIA, BALKANS, RUSSIA, KAZAKSTAN. LATIN AMERICA - Open Source Intelligence. p.27 MEXICO, SURINAME, BRAZIL. AFRICA - Open Source Intelligence. p.28 SOUTH AFRICA, AFRICA. MIDDLE EAST - Open Source Intelligence. p.29 ISRAEL, MIDDLE EAST. ASIA - Open Source Intelligence. p.30 CHINA, NORTH KOREA, INDONESIA. --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 107, 29 November 1999, p. 1 USA/GREAT BRITAIN THE "ISLAMIC BOMB" AFFAIR BACK IN COURT British HM Customs is continuing to refuse to release almost 7,500 documents relating to a joint UK/US intelligence and customs investigation, code named Operation Quarry, dating from the late 1980s, which the authorities in London and Washington claimed prevented Saddam Hussein from developing a nuclear device. The case involved Ali Daghir, a businessman with dual UK/Iraqi nationality, and his French assistant, Jeanine Speckman, who managed a small British-based import/export company called Euromac. In 1988, before Iraqi forces invaded Kuwait and Saddam Hussein became the West's most wanted despot, the British Conservative government, under Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, granted trade credits to Baghdad worth œ750 million, while the British Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) published a booklet, "Hints for Exporters", listing Iraqi state enterprises which were in the market for British goods. ...(cut)... --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 107, 29 November 1999, p. 3 HOW ECHELON WORKS IN THE FRAMEWORK OF NSA ACTIVITY Most intelligence specialists are rather surprised by the recent media coverage and public interest in the NSA Echelon dictionary system. Detailed information has been publicly available since 1967 when David Kahn published "The Codebreakers - The Story of Secret Writing" (Macmillan) with 60 pages on the NSA. The major book on the subject remains James Bamford's, "Puzzle Palace - Inside the National Security Agency, America's Most Secret Intelligence Organization" (1982, Penguin). Besides these and other books, various articles have covered aspects of NSA use of key word for "tagging" and analyzing collected intelligence. As one specialists stated, "I covered this story more than a decade ago in the computer and electronics trade press and as a researcher for a feature done by Germany's [weekly] 'Stern' on NSA activities in Germany. I did not know the code name at the time." The code name, Echelon, became known in August 1996 when a New Zealand anti- nuclear activist, Nicky Hager, researching the New Zealand Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB), came up against the NSA and published his book, "Secret Power" (see "New Zealand - Echelon System Sigint Network Revealed", INT, n. 42 50). The rest is recent media and political developments. While the dictionary aspects of Echelon have captured public attention, they are rather secondary part of NSA's work. "Tagging" key words serves no purpose without powerful analysis to use it. Like information scientists, NSA has very likely been using combinatory analysis and cooccurrence mapping. The former consists of watching the frequency of selected key words, or specific combinations key words, in international telecommunications traffic. Any significant change in frequency can indicate something is happening and target the "tagged" communications for more in-depth analysis. This is often referred to as the "top down" approach for managing vast amounts of information. The "bottom up" approach is to construct cooccurrence mappings of information where "units" -- be they reports, articles, emails, or even single paragraphs -- are "tagged" according to the key words they contain. The cooccurrences of key words are used as a measure of similarity between "units" which are mapped out so that more "similar" units are closer together on the mapping. ...(cut)... --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 107, 29 November 1999, p. 14 USA WASHINGTON "WMD" UNIT & OTHER FBI NEWS ...(cut)... On 7 November, the "New York Post" reported that US Congressman, Curt Weldon, of Pennsylvania, stated that the FBI was reluctant to ask Russia if there are suitcase-size nuclear weapons buried in the US. Weldon cited congressional testimony of KGB defector, Vasili Mitrokhin, and of Russian general turned fiery politician, Alexander Lebed, who claim the former Soviet Union produced 132 suitcase-sized, ten-kiloton nuclear weapons, but can now only account for 48. This came up two years ago ... when Lebed was campaigning to become a Siberian governor. In June 1997, he told the story to a visiting US congressional delegation and several times to the US media (he won his election too). The accusation was rejected by Russian and US specialists who pointed to Lebed's political rivalry with President Boris Yeltsin (see "Russia - Media Wave of Political 'Backpack' A-Bombs", INT, n. 68 40). Anonymous US White House officials and a well-documented edition of "TV Guide" at the time claimed "there is no information to support it" and "no credible evidence" that Russian warheads have been diverted. On 25 September 1997, senior Russian Defense Ministry official, Lieutenant General Igor Volynkin, stated that Russia never manufactured backpack nuclear bombs, although it would theoretically be possible but not cost-efficient in military terms. The device could only be trusted to operate correctly for a few months, after which it would have to be disassembled and replaced at exorbitant cost by highly-specialized teams ... not likely to operate unnoticed in Pennsylvania or up-state New York. Gen. Volynkin said that, since it was established 50 years ago, his department at the Defense Ministry has had "sole responsibility over nuclear stocks" and has never had backpack bombs. Congressman Weldon, like Governor Lebed, should do more homework and less campaigning. ...(cut)... --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 107, 29 November 1999, p. 22 FRANCE DGSE RECRUITMENT, PSY OPS, INTEL FILES & NEWS On 3 November, Agence France Press (AFP) announced the "DGSE Is Hiring and Equipping Itself", thanks to a four percent 2000 budget increase. The defense budget will provide FF 1,503 billion and the prime minister's office will provide FF 200 million (reserved, in particular, for "operational activities"). In 2000, 87 new employees will be hired, bringing the total number of DGSE civilians up to 2,884. In 1999, the DGSE reported having 2,800 civilian and 1,300 military, a figure some specialists say excludes certain "sensitive" categories of personnel such as "on-call" secret military units that take orders from the DGSE. The AFP report confirms that the DGSE has abandoned its plan to move its headquarters to the fort in Noisy-le-Sec, a Paris suburb (see "France - DGSE Moves In on Its Neighbor", INT, n. 57 30), but retains its current three locations: the Mortier and Tourelles barracks in Paris, and the Noisy fort. The report also confirmed previous information that the ageing DGSE spy ship, "Le Berry", will be replaced next year by the "Le Bougainville". ...(cut)... --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 107, 29 November 1999, p. 30 ASIA - Open Source Intelligence. CHINA. Specialists have noted the publication of "Bringing Internet Warfare into the Military System is of Equal Significance with Land, Sea, and Air Power", by Leng Bingling,, Wang Yulin and Zhao Wenxiang in the Chinese army newspaper, "Jiefangjun Bao", on 11 November. At the same time, Chinese armed forces recently carried out their first virtual war games involving the use of advanced information technologies. The article states that a fourth branch of the armed services devoted to information warfare should perhaps be developed in the near future. ...(cut)... ---------------------------------------------