One Year Ago — CIA Molly Hale Goes Digital (February 4 2019) [UPDATE : 11th Female Star Identity Revealed]

“To this day, Barbara [Robbins] is the youngest officer memorialized on our Wall. She was the first American woman to die in Vietnam and the first woman in our Agency’s history to make the ultimate sacrifice.  Nine women since then have fallen in service to our mission. Today we remember them all, with great love and great admiration.”

CIA Director Leon Panetta — Memorial Ceremony (2011)

“Dear Molly, Could you tell us how many stars on the Memorial Wall are known to represent women? Regards, Intel Today”

Intel Today — Question to Molly Hale (February 4 2019)

“In our HQs lobby, a wall w/black stars carved into white marble stands as a humble memorial to our fallen officers. There are currently 129 stars; 91 are unclassified. Out of those, 11 represent women”

Molly Hale — March 22 2019

On February 4 2019, CIA Molly Hale went digital. I could not resist firing the very first question on Twitter! How many CIA women are honoured by a star on the CIA wall? A few weeks later, we got the answer to that question… And much more! Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY Continue reading

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On This Day — Madeleine Albright Discovers Her Jewish Roots (February 4 1997) [Lockerbie]

“I do believe this to be a personal issue, but since it is an object of discussion, I would just as soon have you know what I know. I started to think about it and to put pieces together. There was more and more information, and it began to make more sense to me.”

Madeleine Albright  — U.S. Secretary of State (February 4 1997)

Many journalists have credited Madeleine Albright for her “Read My Pins” diplomacy.

On February 4 1997,  U. S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright said she had received information that two grandparents may have been Jewish and may have perished in the Auschwitz concentration camp. Seriously? Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY Continue reading

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On This Day — The Cavalese Cable Car Disaster (February 3 1998) [2020]

“Many believe one of the reasons the Italian judges went after the CIA RDI [Rendition, Detention, Interrogation]  and [former CIA Officer] Sabrina De Sousa in the Abu Omar case was the USMC and USG accountability failures and arrogance.”

Mark Fallon — International Security Consultant & Author (February 4 2018)

“Get rid of the videotape. If it were mine, I would get rid of it.”

US Captain Chandler Seagraves — Electronic-warfare officers

The “Strage del Cermis” (Italian for “Massacre of Cermis”), named for the mountain ridge where the bodies were recovered, claimed the lives of eight Germans, five Belgians, three Italians, two Poles, one Dutch citizen, and one Austrian.

On February 3 1998, a U.S. Marine Corps jet on a low-level training flight sliced through steel wires supporting a cable car near the ski resort of Cavalese in the Italian Alps, sending a gondola plunging to the ground. All 20 people inside the gondola were killed. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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Intel Today Top DOSSIERS — New Feature Coming Soon!

Dossier — Definition : Collection of papers containing information on a particular event, or on a person such as a criminal or a spy. [Collins English Dictionary]

Origin — Late 19th century. From French: a file with a label on the back from dos back. [Latin dorsum]

Example — “The Steele dossier, also known as the Trump–Russia dossier, is a private intelligence report …”

February 2 2020 — There is no doubt that blogging is a wonderful and powerful technique to report on current investigations. But this modern tool has also some drawbacks.  Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY Continue reading

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2020 Olof Palme Prize Ceremony — John Le Carré : “And how would I like to be remembered?” (30 January 2020)

“The 2019 Olof Palme Prize goes to David John Moore Cornwell, also known by the pen name John le Carré, for his engaging and humanistic opinion making in literary form regarding the freedom of the individual and the fundamental issues of mankind.”

Olof Palmes Minnesfond

“Reading and thinking about Palme makes you wonder who you are. And who you might have been, but weren’t. And where your moral courage went when it was needed. You ask yourself what power drove him – golden boy, aristocratic family, brilliant scion of the best schools and the best cavalry regiment – to embrace from the outset of his career the cause of the exploited, the deprived, the undervalued and the unheard?”

 David Cornwell — Olof Palme Award acceptance speech (January 30 2020)

David John Moore Cornwell — also known by the pen name John le Carré — won the 2019 Olof Palme Prize. Here is the text of his acceptance speech. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY Continue reading

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On This Day — Nixon Dismisses CIA Director Richard Helms (February 2 1973) [2020]

“The timing caught me by surprise. I had barely enough time to get my things out of the office and to assemble as many colleagues of all ranks as possible for a farewell. …  A few days later, I encountered Haldeman. ‘What happened to our understanding that my exit would be postponed for a few weeks?’ I asked. ‘Oh, I guess we forgot,’ he said with the faint trace of a smile. And so it was over.”

Former CIA Director Richard Helms 

February 2 2020 — Richard McGarrah Helms (March 30, 1913 – October 23, 2002) served as the United States Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) from June 30 1966 to February 2 1973. Helms began intelligence work with the Office of Strategic Services during World War II. Following the 1947 creation of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) he rose in its ranks during the Truman, Eisenhower, and Kennedy administrations. Helms then served as DCI under Presidents Johnson and Nixon. Follow us on Twitter: Intel_Today Continue reading

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On This day — Ayatollah Khomeini Returns to Iran (February 1 1979) [2020]

“You will see we are not in any particular animosity with the Americans. [The Islamic Republic of Iran] will be a humanitarian one, which will benefit the cause of peace and tranquillity for all mankind. (…) It is advisable that you recommend to the army not to follow [Shah’s prime minister Shapour] Bakhtiar.”

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini — Letter to US President Jimmy Carter (January 29 1979)

February 1 2020 — On January 17 1979, the Shah left the country, never to return. Two weeks later, on Thursday February 1st 1979, Khomeini returned in triumph to Iran, welcomed by a joyous crowd estimated to be of up to five million people. The communications between Khomeini and the president Jimmy Carter’s administration during the last two weeks of January 1979 remain largely classified and — not surprisingly — highly controversial. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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Lockerbie & the Glorious “Conspiracy Theorists” [103 Quotes from a Few Good Men]

“On a huge hill,
Cragged and steep, Truth stands, and hee that will
Reach her, about must, and about must goe;
And what the hills suddenness resists, winne so;
Yet strive so, that before age, deaths twilight,
Thy Soule rest, for none can worke in that night.”

John Donne — English poet and cleric in the Church of England

“The Myth surrounding Libya and Megrahi now quietly slides into history. Political Expedience rules over Truth.”

Richard C. Fuisz M.D. — Email to Intel Today (December 21 2018)

Mandela visiting Megrahi — aka the ‘Lockerbie bomber’ — in prison. Many thanks to my friend John Ashston who took the picture. “The same country should not be complainer, prosecutor and judge in this particular matter.” — Nelson Mandela

January 31 2019 — Ten years ago, a few good men began to blog about one of the most disgraceful miscarriages of justice: The Lockerbie Case. Here are some of the quotes I have collected over the years. Death has not got all of us quite yet! The search for the truth will go on. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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On This Day — The Lockerbie Trial Verdict (January 31 2001) [2020]

“The case was largely based on this inside guy [Libyan defector Abdul Majid Giaka]. It wasn’t until the trial that I learned this guy was a nut-job and that the CIA had absolutely no confidence in him and that they knew he was a liar. The CIA and the FBI kept the State Department in the dark. It worked for them for us to be fully committed to the theory that Libya was responsible.”

Michael Scharf —  Director of the Frederick K. Cox International Law Center at Case Western Reserve University School of Law

“I regard the Lockerbie verdict against Megrahi as a ‘Grand Monument to Human Stupidity’.  Indeed, the written opinion of the Lockerbie judges is a remarkable document that claims an ‘honoured place in the history of British miscarriages of justice.’ If the [SCCRC] Commission accepts the application for a full review, the infamous Zeist verdict doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of surviving.”

INTEL TODAY — July 5 2017

“The Myth surrounding Libya and Megrahi now quietly slides into history. Political Expedience rules over Truth.”

Richard C. Fuisz M.D. — Email to Intel Today (December 21 2018)

“The truth is replaced by silence, and silence is a lie. But the Russian people have a beautiful proverb: ‘A lie is like a bow. You hide the ends in water but the middle protrudes. You hide the middle, and the ends stick out.’ The disparity between historical reality and the description of history in books and newspapers can lead our youth only to lack of belief, to cynicism, whereas we need belief, but real belief can be based only on the truth.”

Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko — Open Letter (New York Times – February 17 1974)

On January 31, 2001, the Scottish Court in the Netherlands rendered its verdict in the Pan Am 103 bombing trial. The court found one of the two Libyan defendants, Al Amin Fhima, not guilty and he was immediately returned to Libya where he received a hero’s welcome.

It found the other defendant, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, guilty of murder and sentenced him to a minimum of 20 years imprisonment in Barlinnie prison in Scotland. The verdict did not, however, implicate those higher up in the Libyan government, nor did it rule out the possible involvement of Iran in the bombing.

Moreover, although the decision to convict Al-Megrahi was unanimous, the judgment indicates that it had been a close call, with the three judges acknowledging that the prosecution’s case had “uncertainties and qualifications” and that key witnesses had repeatedly lied.

Indeed, portions of the judgment read as though the text had been drafted for a “not proven” verdict, which is used under Scottish law when the court is convinced of guilt but the evidence does not rise to the level of “beyond reasonable doubt.”

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John Le Carré Wins 2019 Olof Palme Prize

“The 2019 Olof Palme Prize goes to David John Moore Cornwell, also known by the pen name John le Carré, for his engaging and humanistic opinion making in literary form regarding the freedom of the individual and the fundamental issues of mankind.”

Olof Palmes minnesfond

​“One must think like a hero to behave like a merely decent human being.”

May Sarton — (Quoted by David Cornwell in his Olof Palme Award acceptance speech on January 30 2020)

David John Moore Cornwell, better known by his pen name John le Carré

January 30 2020 — The 2019 Olof Palme Prize goes to David John Moore Cornwell, also known by the pen name John le Carré. Today (January 30, 2020), a Prize Ceremony will be held at the Stockholm Concert Hall. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY Continue reading

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