INTELLIGENCE ISSN 1245-2122 N. 62 New Series, 16 June 1997 Publishing since 1980 Editor Olivier Schmidt (email intelligence-adi@wanadoo.fr; web http://www.blythe.org/Intelligence) TABLE OF CONTENTS, N. 62, 16 June 1997 FRONTPAGE U.S.A. - WHERE "PROACTIVE" INFILTRATION BECOMES MANIPULATION p.1 TECHNOLOGY AND TECHNIQUES HARDENING CIVILIAN AIRCRAFT AGAINST BOMBS p.2 BRITS PUT DOWN HIGH-TECH U.S.-FRENCH LASER RESEARCH p.3 BRITISH NCIS GETS ITS TECHNOLOGY ALL WRONG p.4 EAVESDROPPING - OUTLAWING ALL BUT FEDERAL TECHNOLOGY. p.5 CRIME MAP - Allocating Scares Resources Where They Count. p.6 HAIR ANALYSIS - Another Justice Department Report. p.7 MOVIES - New Anti-Crime Tactic. p.8 PROMIS - Infowar Before Its Time. p.9 INTELLIGENCE - A French Soucebook. p.10 PEOPLE U.S.A. - HAROLD J. NICHOLSON p.11 CANADA/RUSSIA - "BRINK"/"GIDEON" p.12 GREAT BRITAIN - JONATHAN AITKEN p.13 NORTHERN IRELAND - ROBERT "BASHER" BATES p.14 U.S.A. - Lewis C. Merletti. p.15 U.S.A. - Mark Kroeker. p.16 SPAIN - Juan Alberto Perote. p.17 CZECH REPUBLIC - Bohumil Sole. p.18 ALBANIA - Arben Karkini. p.19 CHINA/U.S.A. - Hammond Ku. p.20 AGENDA COMING EVENTS THROUGH 31 AUGUST 1997 p.21 INTELLIGENCE AROUND THE WORLD U.S.A. - HERCULEAN LABORS OF FBI DIRECTOR FREEH p.22 PUBLIC HELPS FBI PROGRESS ON ATLANTA BOMBINGS p.23 FAS Publishes Intelligence Budget. p.24 Firms Agree on Public Privacy. p.25 "Managing the Media". p.26 GREAT BRITAIN - NEW PREMISES FOR GCHQ p.27 SO YOU WANNA BE A SPY? p.28 SEARCH FOR AN ETHICAL FOREIGN POLICY p.29 Officials Not Businessmen & Vice Versa. p.30 NORTHERN IRELAND - FUTURE DAYS OF RAGE p.31 FRANCE - SECRET WHEELING AND DEALING IN AEROSPACE p.32 GERMANY - BFV BUSY CHASING DOUBTFUL "SUBVERSIVES" p.33 NORWAY - OPEN FILES FORCED ON POT AND PRIME MINISTER p.34 RUSSIA - PHONE THE FSB AND GO STRAIGHT TO JAIL p.35 CUBA - TOURISTS GREETED WITH BOMBS & SPY PLANES p.36 SUDAN - Details on Terrorism. p.37 MACAO - Portuguese "Gang Busters" Arrive. p.38 --------------------------------------------- FRONTPAGE Intelligence, N. 62, 16 June 1997, p. 1 U.S.A. WHERE "PROACTIVE" INFILTRATION BECOMES MANIPULATION Following the Oklahoma City bombing, the FBI quickly responded by changing its guidelines concerning the surveillance and infiltration of targeted "fringe" groups. FBI Director Louis Freeh told a congressional committee that the FBI was now acting "broadly and proactively, as opposed to defensively, which has been the case for many, many years." Strangely enough, the guidelines were the consequence of FBI "proactive" covert operations not against right-wing groups, but against the 1960's anti-Vietnam War movement and associated left-wing groups. The revelations in the 1970s that the FBI was conducting offensive covert operations against the antiwar movement and against black groups, such as COINTELPRO against the Black Panther Party, led to Justice Department setting up these "investigative guidelines" concerning when "investigations" could be opened, against whom, and how long the operation could last. The guidelines have been updated since the 1970s but still forbid the FBI and other federal law enforcement agencies to investigate a group based solely on its political views and require a reasonable indication that a federal crime either has been or will be committed. Several militant groups claim that the FBI has never really respected these guidelines. Indeed, the case of the Committee in Sympathy with the People of El Salvador (CISPES) tends to confirm that the Bureau has stubbornly refused to respect both the spirit and the letter of its own guidelines. In a recent Chicago court case, the FBI accused a federal judge of too strict enforcement of the guidelines. The CISPES already won a court case against the FBI in 1994 for illegal spying, but the Bureau won a stay of enforcement while appealing the 1994 ruling and, apparently, continues to spy on the CISPES (INT, n. 59 22). Now, according to protests from both right and left-wing groups, the FBI's renewed "proactive" infiltration strategy is making political dissent a federal crime. Ronald Noble, former Treasury undersecretary for enforcement, recently stated that federal investigators, who once waited for evidence suggesting a specific crime, are now quicker to react when members of a political group engage in general talk about committing violent acts. But "reacting quickly" now includes taking leading roles within such groups and "suggesting" violent crimes to "test" the group's reaction. Randy Trochman, co-founder of the Militia of Montana stated that "it's common knowledge that one out of every five individuals who claims to be a patriot is actually a government informant." During the Cold War, specialists estimated that two out of every three members of the American Communist Party were FBI informants or agents, including many of the Party's leading figures. So when a group leader "suggests" doing something, most members take it as an "order". Jurors throughout the United States are returning verdicts clearly reflecting this distrust of FBI "proactive investigations" which look strangely like manipulation or provocation. In the case of the Washington State Militia, jurors acquitted one defendant on a charge of possessing illegal firearms when he declared he had converted semiautomatic rifles into illegal automatic weapons only at the "suggestion" of an undercover FBI agent. Three members of the 112th Georgia Militia were indicted in May 1996 for making pipe bombs and planning to assassinate federal officials, but authorities later conceded there were no assassination plans, and the accused claimed entrapment by a "master chef" bomb- maker informant. In November 1996, the three were convicted for the pipe bombs but all other charges were eased. In West Virginia, seven Mountaineer Militia members were arrested in October 1996 under the 1994 anti-terrorism law, but a federal magistrate has expressed reservations about the way prosecutors are using the previously untested law. The best publicized and most recent case opened recently in Phoenix, Arizona, and concerns the Viper Team militia. After the July 1996 seizure of truckloads of guns and bomb-making ingredients, a triumphal FBI press conference, and a message from President Bill Clinton thanking federal agents for averting "a terrible terrorist attack," the accused were cited on lesser conspiracy, weapons and explosives charges. The "Feds" confessed that the group neither posed an imminent threat nor had a specific plot, and a federal judge released half the Vipers on bail after their arrest. In March, ten Viper Team members sought leniency with guilty pleas, but Charles Knight and Christopher Floyd are fighting back, claiming that undercover Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) agent, John Schultz, known to the group as Scott "Doc" Wells, was more than a passive observer and repeatedly steered members into discussions that could be used to bolster conspiracy charges against them. In one recorded conversation with Viper Team members, Schultz stated: "You're talking [about stealing] food, gasoline, you're talking a crime, yes? Why not a bank? Why draw a line?" According to Schultz's boss, Steve Ott, Schultz "suggested" the bank-robbery idea only "to ascertain what their mind-set was." Even though right-wing militias have grabbed the headlines recently, left-wing groups have been subject to the same federal tactics. Ecology activist, Judi Bari, survived a 24 May 1990 car bombing in Oakland, California, which almost killed her and injured her coworker, Darryl Cherney. Bari's lawsuit against the FBI, accusing it of attempting to frame her as a terrorist in order to discredit her and the Earth First! environmental activist movement, is still in the courts and recently made headway against FBI stonewalling (INT, n. 49 10). Richard Held, the FBI Special Agent In Charge of the San Francisco office at the time of the bombing, resigned shortly after Bari forced the disclosure of police photographs of Bari's bombed car clearly showing that the bomb had been hidden directly under the driver's seat, rather than on the back seat floorboard, as police and the FBI had claimed to the press (INT, n. 56 13). Held headed FBI operations to disrupt the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement under the FBI's COINTELPRO program in the 1960s and 1970s. Two years ago we wrote that, "Shades of COINTELPRO seem to be closing in on FBI Special Agent Frank Doyle, a 20-year veteran of the FBI Terrorist Squad as bomb expert" (INT, n. 27 12). Indeed, he remains the main culprit in Bari's lawsuit against the FBI. FBI agents repeatedly said they have never heard of Darryl or Bari before the bombing, and they were not investigating Earth First! But an FBI field report, written minutes after the bomb exploded, states that Darryl and Bari were already known to the FBI and were "the subjects of an FBI investigation in the terrorist department." This charge, along with references to Earth First!, is also repeated in two other reports written just after the bombing, and originally withheld (INT, n. 49 10). Moreover, "discovery" procedure at the trial also resulted in a court order forcing the FBI to turn over their long-withheld San Francisco field office file on the Arizona Earth First! FBI sting operation. This 1988-1990 operation involved FBI "agents provocateurs", Undercover Agent Michael Fain and paid FBI informant Ron Frazier, who won the trust of a small group of activists over a period of two years, then convinced them to cut down a power line. The FBI agents bought the tools, taught the activists how to use them, chose the site, drove the activists there and, of course, busted them in the act. In a fitting epithet of federal "proactive investigation" tactics, California Superior Court Judge Everett Dickey ordered a retrial and released former Black Panther Elmer "Geronimo" Pratt on bail on 10 June after serving 27 years behind bars for a slaying he has always maintained he did not commit. In 1993, Amnesty International wrote to the Los Angeles District Attorney and the Parole Board urging that Pratt be granted a retrial or be released in view of new evidence which "strengthened concerns about irregular conduct by the prosecuting authorities." All declined to review the case and the District Attorney argued against a new trial. Pratt's conviction was overturned on 29 May after new evidence showed that the chief witness against him was a police and FBI informant who lied under oath. --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 62, 16 June 1997, p. 4 BRITISH NCIS GETS ITS TECHNOLOGY ALL WRONG The role and future of the British National Criminal Intelligence Service (NCIS), and its unclear relationship and even domination by MI5, have left it in a state of flux and looking desperately for a "follow on" the Cold War. The IRA, organized crime and drugs were to fill the bill, but recently, highly publicized NCIS declarations, involving choices of anti- crime technology, show that the Service is still "lost in the woods". In February of this year, the OECD's Financial Action Task Force (FATF) published a report, "1996-1997 Report on Money Laundering Typologies", largely devoted to "e-money" (INT, n. 61 8), specifically examining British Mondex and three other e-money systems. The report concludes that there is nothing that "will make them especially attractive to money launderers." There is even an annex -- "Issues Concerning New Payment Technologies" -- with a section on "Effectiveness of Traditional Investigative Techniques and Analysis". Nonetheless, on 3 June in Lisbon, Gareth Maclachlan, of the NCIS' organized crime unit, gave an alarmist speech at a two- day conference called "Cyberlaundering and Fraud - Electronic Money Washes Whiter." According to Mr. Maclachlan, near- perfect counterfeit copies of millions of pounds' worth of electronic money could trigger an international financial collapse. According to Mr. Maclachlan, "smart card" electronic money, such as the British Mondex, could be replicated or tampered with. "What is only a little trickle at the moment will become a roaring torrent," he told Reuters, which dutifully reprinted the information without noting that either the OECD or the NCIS is wrong. Earlier, on 28 May, Albert Pacey, director general of NCIS, had set the tone when opening NCIS's third international organized crime conference in London on the exploitation of technology. He wasn't any less alarmist, but then the conference was organized by another law enforcement agency in need of a mission and better technology: the Office of International Criminal Justice, better know as Interpol, for which the NCIS is the British branch office. According to Mr. Pacey, a NCIS internal report on criminal misuse of information technology entitled "Project Trawler" supposedly found the surprising switch of drug traffickers into software piracy. But China and a few other Asian nations, which execute drug dealers, have the world's software piracy market "sewn up". The Project Trawler report claims that international criminal syndicates already use the Internet to conduct business. They also use faxes, telephones and the post. The report then drags out the terrorist scarecrow to complain about the technological and legal problems of getting access to Internet communications. But according to a 9 July "Electronic Telegraph" report, a legal loophole in the British Data Protection Act (DPA) allows the police to intercept and read private e-mail without obtaining a warrant, and the Defence Research Agency (DRA) is reportedly working for the police and intelligence agencies to develop methods to intercept e-mail as it is sent. One would suppose British "police and intelligence agencies" includes the NCIS. --------------------------------------------- Intelligence, N. 62, 16 June 1997, p. 10 INTELLIGENCE - A French Soucebook. We have often mentioned sourcebooks on intelligence published in English, which seems to the privileged language for such works. These include Paul W. Blackstock and Frank L. Schaf, Jr.'s "Intelligence, Espionage, Counter-espionage, and Covert Operations", Jeffrey T. Richelson's "Foreign Intelligence Organizations", and George C. Constantinides's "Intelligence and Espionage - An Analytical Bibliography". So it is both surprising and gratifying to have a French contribution to public knowledge about intelligence and that is what Jacques Baud's "Encyclopedie du Renseignement et des Services Secrets" (Charles Lavauzelle, 524 pp., isbn 2 07025 0406 x, FF 165) is. The publisher specializes in defense-related publications and that was the intended public for this work. However, the lack of such a book in French and the book's clear and concise presentation of world intelligence services and intelligence activity have made it a success with the general public. All information is from open sources, but the level of technical detail reveals the original intention of this book which looks like a public version of internal intelligence service manuals or "file cards" on other intelligence services. ---------------------------------------------