UK — Theresay May Creates “Fake News” Intelligence Unit

“[Russia] is seeking to weaponise information. Deploying its state-run media organisations to plant fake stories and photo-shopped images in an attempt to sow discord in the West and undermine our institutions. So I have a very simple message for Russia. We know what you are doing. And you will not succeed. Because you underestimate the resilience of our democracies, the enduring attraction of free and open societies, and the commitment of Western nations to the alliances that bind us.”

Theresa May — UK Prime Minister (November 2017)

Theresa May is setting up a new “fake news” unit to shut down the influx of anti-Western propaganda she believes is being spread by Russia. The anti-fake news unit will be tasked with “combating disinformation by state actors and others.” British Secretary of Defense, Gavin Williamson, will be providing further details about the National Security Communications Unit in a speech to the House of Commons “within the next few days”. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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IRAN — Professor Ahmadreza Djalali Death Sentence Suspended

“We hope the sentence will be quashed. My client’s file is currently under investigation by a deputy prosecutor and his assistant in charge of enforcing sentences.”

Zeinab Taheri —  Professor Ahmadreza Djalali’s lawyer

Professor Ahmadreza Djalali

January 24 2018 — The death sentence issued against university professor Ahmadreza Djalali in Iran has been suspended pending further investigations by the Iranian Supreme Court. A letter Djalali wrote recently from prison indicates without a doubt that at least one European Intelligence Agency wanted to recruit him to gather information regarding Iranian nuclear scientists. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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Remembering Argentina Prosecutor Alberto Nisman (December 5 1963 – January 18 2015)

“Over the next few weeks, every Argentine seemed to have an opinion about how Nisman had died; the case became the Latin-American equivalent of the J.F.K. assassination, grist for conspiracy theories involving spies and foreign governments and conniving politicians. Posters across Buenos Aires asked: Who killed Nisman?”

The New Yorker

“I am not going to speculate because I do not know who killed him but, yes, there are possibly ‘dark forces’ at work in this country.”

Horacio Verbitzky — Argentina journalist and human rights campaigner

“The challenge is very complex. If this had been investigated differently from the start, this would be a whole different thing.”

Federal prosecutor Eduardo Taiano

Argentina Prosecutor Alberto Nisman (December 5 1963 – January 18 2015)

Three years later,  the mysterious death of special prosecutor Albert Nisman is still an unresolved case.

The 52-year-old was found dead in his apartment on January 18 2015. On the next day, Nisman was scheduled to testify before Congress that Argentina’s President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner (along with members of her government) had attempted to cover-up a deal that protected the perpetrators of the 1994 bombing of AMIA, a Buenos Aires Jewish cultural center.

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Fake News & Journalism for Peace — Pope Francis : “The Truth Will Set You Free.”

“Fake news is a sign of intolerant and hypersensitive attitudes, and leads only to the spread of arrogance and hatred. That is the end result of untruth. (…) This false but believable news is ‘captious’, inasmuch as it grasps people’s attention by appealing to stereotypes and common social prejudices and exploiting instantaneous emotions like anxiety, contempt, anger and frustration.”

Pope Francis — January 24 2018

“The Pope is not saying that all journalists are snakes but he is certainly acknowledging that they can be.”

Vatican spokesman Greg Burke

Pope Francis leads his Wednesday general audience in Saint Peter’s square at the Vatican January 24, 2018. REUTERS/Tony Gentile

January 24 2018 — On the feast of Saint Francis de Sales — patron saint of journalism — Pope Francis demands truth. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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Should You Trust The New York Times and Its Official Sources?

“The evidence of a possible Libyan link, first reported publicly this week by the French newsmagazine L’Express, was confirmed and detailed by American officials involved in the investigation of the Pan Am bombing.”

MICHAEL WINES — The New York Times (October 9 1990)

Howard R Teicher proposes “to shame France into joining in some action… White House might have to go around the [French] civilian government and rely on military to military channels… as political channels have failed earlier this year.”

“Given the stated desire of some French general officers to cooperate with us against Gadhafi, we might actively encourage them to sell the proposal to their civilian leadership.”

Around this day – DDI Richard Kerr and Tom Twetten are sent to the White House to explain what the CIA could do “to apply psychological pressure on Gaddafi”.

Twetten said it would be no problem for the CIA “to plant false stories in publications abroad” to unnerve Gadaffi.

National Security Council  Letter — Operation VECTOR ( August 7 1986)

“Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. I will add that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors.”

Thomas Jefferson — Reply to John Norvell (1807)

Michael Wines is a national correspondent for The New York Times and writes about voting and other election-related issues. Since coming to The Times in 1988, he has covered the Justice Department, the American intelligence community, the White House, the 1992 presidential campaign, Congress, the environment and, for nearly 15 years, news and life in Russia and surrounding states, southern Africa and China. Before coming to The Times, he was a reporter in the Washington bureau of The Los Angeles Times. [NYT]

On October 9 1990, Michael Wines penned a very important story. According to American Government investigators involved in the Pan Am 103 inquiry (Lockerbie), Libyan intelligence agents were the culprits who had assembled and planted the bomb that destroyed the plane.

In a recent post — LOCKERBIE — Dirty Tricks & Tribulations in Senegal — I provided all the documents related to the February 1988 arrests of two Libyan citizens in Dakar: Police records, interviews, precognitions, CIA cables, decisions of justice, etc… These original documents allow us to check unambiguously the veracity of the information reported by Michael Wines in his crucial piece.

The conclusion is as inescapable as it is horrifying. Nearly every single piece of information in this NYT article is factually mistaken. Moreover, the reasoning is deeply flawed.

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One year Ago — Bob Woodward: “Trump Dossier Is a Garbage Document. Intelligence Chiefs Should Apologize to Trump”

“To your request of my opinion of the manner in which a newspaper should be conducted so as to be most useful, I should answer, ‘by restraining it to true facts and sound principles only.’ Yet I fear such a paper would find few subscribers. It is a melancholy truth, that a suppression of the press could not more completely deprive the nation of its benefits, than is done by its abandoned prostitution to falsehood. Nothing can now be believed which is seen in a newspaper. Truth itself becomes suspicious by being put into that polluted vehicle. I will add that the man who never looks into a newspaper is better informed than he who reads them; inasmuch as he who knows nothing is nearer to truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors. He who reads nothing will still learn the great facts, and the details are all false.”

Thomas Jefferson — Reply by the U.S. President to John Norvell, 1807

woodward

January 24 2017 — On this weekend’s broadcast of “Fox New Sunday,” veteran journalist Bob Woodward said the unverified dossier about President-elect Donald Trump and Russia is a “garbage document”. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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Wormwood — Searching the Truth to the Bitter End

“The most efficient accident, in simple assassination, is a fall of 75 feet or more onto a hard surface.”

CIA assassination manual (1953)

“What Wormwood tries to do is tell a story about how we know what we know and how reliable is that knowledge.”

Errol Morris — Documentary Director

“You think that finding the answer to this is gonna restore the path of your own life. But how can it possibly do that if you’ve lost yourself along the way?”

Eric Olson (Wormwood)

 

Wormwood is a 2017 American six-part docudrama miniseries directed by Errol Morris and released on Netflix on December 15, 2017. The series follows a scientist who participates in a secret government biological warfare program.

In the final chapter (Episode 6), Seymour Hersh states that he believes the CIA murdered Colonel Frank Olson. Although, he has a source that backs up this story, Hersh refuses to speak out because the story would expose how his source acquired the necessary information. He claims he knows what Frank did that got him killed.  But he will not reveal it. At least, not now…

Next Tuesday, I will suggest the most likely reason behind the decision to execute Colonel Frank Olson. Stay tuned!

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Breaking News — Former CIA Jeffrey Sterling Released to a Halfway House [UPDATE]

“Sterling’s case drew nationwide attention because the Obama-era Department of Justice unsuccessfully tried to force the reporter, James Risen, to divulge the identity of his sources for ‘State of War’, a book in which he revealed the CIA had botched a covert operation against Iran’s nuclear program. Risen reported that instead of undermining the Iranians, the CIA had provided them with useful information on how to build a nuclear bomb.”

The Intercept — Peter Maass (January 19 2018)

We welcome the forthcoming release of Jeffrey Sterling into a halfway house, but hope that he can be reunited with his family soon. His conviction was a breach of First Amendment protections. Simply being in contact with a journalist does not amount to espionage and should not incur imprisonment.

Margaux Ewen — RSF North America Director  (Reporters Without Borders)

“Just like the CIA primary mission is to protect the Agency, the New York Time primary mission is to protect the Time. And so when this hit the fan — so to speak — Jeffrey was on his own.”

Former CIA John Kiriakou

On Christmas eve, I told you that former CIA Jeffrey Sterling could be released from jail early this year. I am happy to report that this prediction came true. Today — January 16 2018 — Jeffrey Sterling was released from prison to a halfway house, ahead of the original end date of his 3.5 year prison sentence on June 14, 2018.  Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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On This Day — Nixon Announces Vietnam Peace Agreement (January 23, 1973)

“We have found that our friend, the Republican nominee, our California friend, has been playing on the outskirts with our enemies and our friends both, he has been doing it through rather subterranean sources. Mrs Chennault is warning the South Vietnamese not to get pulled into this Johnson move.”

President Johnson — Phone call to Senator Richard Russell

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President Richard M. Nixon meeting with national security adviser Henry A. Kissinger in the Oval Office. (Richard M. Nixon Presidential Library, Photo collections, Master Print File with Staff Individuals)

On January 23 1973, President Richard Nixon announces that Henry Kissinger and North Vietnam’s chief negotiator, Le Duc Tho, signed an agreement to end U.S. military involvement in Vietnam. The official cease-fire, along with the release of all American prisoners of war, is to go into effect on January 28, though troops would remain in Vietnam until the fall of Saigon in 1975. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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One Year Ago — French Minister of Defence Acknowledges the Death of 6 DGSE Officers

“I remember a violent discussion regarding Libya with Vladimir Putin near the end of 2011. We had obtained — thanks to Russia’s vote — that the UN would impose a no-fly zone and that we would take no further actions. Then Gaddafi was killed. Putin accused us to have lied to him and show total disrespect for International Law. I cannot say that he was wrong.”

François Fillon

Former French Prime Minister (17 May 2007 – 16 May 2012) and  front-runner for the 2017 presidential election

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Jean-Yves Le Drian — French Minister of Defence

January 22 2017 — Jean-Yves Le Drian, the Minister of Defence and Veterans Affairs under President François Hollande since 2012, has officially acknowledged the death of six DGSE officers during the last year. According to France 24, these DGSE officers were acting as advisors for General Haftar. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today Continue reading

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