On This Day — The Crash of PAK-1 (August 17 1988) [A Case of Exploding Mangoes]

Posted on August 17, 2023 by L

“Of all the violent political deaths in the twentieth century, none with such great interest to the U.S. has been more clouded than the mysterious air crash that killed president (and Army Chief General) Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq of Pakistan in (August) 1988, a tragedy that also claimed the life of the serving American ambassador and most of Zia’s top commanders”.

Barbara Crossette
New York Times
South Asia bureau chief
(from 1988 to 1991)

August 17 2023 — On 17 August 1988, General Zia-ul-Haq, the President of Pakistan and Chief of Army Staff (COAS), died in a mysterious C-130 Hercules plane crash. The case — it seems — was never solved. Really? Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

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Havana Syndrome — The Missing Piece of the Puzzle

Posted on August 16, 2023 by L

“Many mathematicians believe that if they understand Maxwell equations mathematically inside out, they will understand the physics inside out. Only it doesn’t work that way. Mathematicians who study physics with that point of view — and there have been many of them — usually make little contribution to physics and, in fact, little to mathematics. They fail because the actual physical situations in the real world are so complicated that it is necessary to have a much broader understanding of the equations.”

Richard Feynman
(Nobel Prize 1965)

“I understand what an equation means if I have a way of figuring out the characteristics of its solution without actually solving it.” — P. A. M. Dirac

August 16 2023 — On October 3 2017, I coined the expression “Havana Syndrome” which is now universally used, both by mainstream media and the research community. Five years later, I came to the conclusion that these alleged attacks in Cuba never occurred. Yet, there is no doubt that such attacks did really occur before the events reported in Havana. As I have explained long ago, such microwave espionage attacks are conducted routinely. Nevertheless, there is a mystery that could not be explained. Why would the attackers raise the power to a level where it activates the Frey effect, thus warning the targeted individual? The experts hired by the CIA failed to answer that question. Here is the most likely explanation. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

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Spy Glossary — On the Origin of “GLOMAR Response” (March 18 1975) [UPDATE — Documentary film : Neither Confirm Nor Deny]

Posted on August 12, 2023 by L

“We can neither confirm nor deny the existence of the information requested but, hypothetically, if such data were to exist, the subject matter would be classified, and could not be disclosed.”

CIA
March 18 1975

March 18 2022 — American spies don’t just talk American English. They have their own spy lingo. Did you ever wonder what a “GLOMAR” answer is? On March 18, 1975, one of CIA’s greatest intelligence coups, Project AZORIAN, was fully exposed through a nationally broadcast syndicated report. Jack Anderson’s syndicated television report revealed the truth about the Glomar Explorer and its connection to a secret intelligence operation. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

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On This Day — Reagan jokes about bombing Russia (August 11 1984) [MEDINT — Did Ronald Reagan Have Alzheimer’s Disease While in Office?]

Posted on August 11, 2023 by L

“My fellow Americans, I am pleased to tell you today that I’ve signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes.”

President Ronald Reagan
(August 11, 1984)

August 11 2023 — President Ronald Reagan made the comment during a sound check for his Saturday radio address. It has long been rumored that President Reagan suffered from Alzheimer’s Disease years before it was diagnosed in 1994. During the eight hours of testimony related to the trial of John Poindexter, his onetime national security adviser, Reagan said “I don’t recall” or “I can’t remember” 88 times. Reagan could not identify Gen. John Vessey, who served for more than three years as his chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

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International Cat Day (August 8 2023) — Remembering CIA Operation Acoustic Kitty

Posted on August 9, 2023 by L

“They slit the cat open, put batteries in him, wired him up. The tail was used as an antenna. They made a monstrosity. They tested him, and tested him. They found he would walk off the job when he got hungry, so they put another wire in to override that. Finally, they are ready. They took it out to a park bench and said: ‘Listen to those two guys. Don’t listen to anything else – not the birds, no cat or dog – just those two guys!’ (…) They put him out of the van, and a taxi comes and runs him over. There they were, sitting in the van with all those dials, and the cat was dead.”

Victor Marchetti
Special assistant to the CIA Deputy Director

August 8 2023 — Next to the wolf, the cat is one of humanity’s oldest pets. On International Cat Day, the world celebrates the most popular pet on the planet. Ernst Stavro Blofeld’s blue-eyed Persian is probably the most famous kitty in spy history. Less known is the true story of the CIA US$ 20 million cyborg acoustic kitty. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_TODAY

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Homage to Claude Shannon — The Bit Player [Update : The Cost of Ignorance]

Posted on August 8, 2023 by L

“In fact, the science of thermodynamics began with an analysis, by the great engineer Sadi Carnot, of the problem of how to build the best and most efficient engine, and this constitutes one of the few famous cases in which engineering has contributed to fundamental physical theory. Another example that comes to mind is the more recent analysis of information theory by Claude Shannon. These two analyses, incidentally, turn out to be closely related. “

Richard Feynman — Nobel Prize (1965)

“During an early foray into telegraphy, I realized that a little communication error could turn ‘Do you like me?’ into ‘Do you hear me?’ Which she was answering was very important to me.” — Claude Shannon

July 28 2019 — The documentary tells the story of Claude Shannon, the scientist who foresaw the information age and artificial intelligence. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

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Remembering CIA Molly C. H. Hardy (Dec. 15 1946 – Aug. 7 1998)

Posted on August 7, 2023 by L

“For a small cadre of CIA veterans, the death of Osama bin Laden was more than just a national moment of relief and closure. It was also a measure of payback, a settling of a score for a pair of deaths, the details of which have remained a secret for 13 years. Tom Shah and Molly Huckaby Hardy were among the 44 U.S. Embassy employees killed when a truck bomb exploded outside the embassy compound in Kenya in 1998.”

AP (5/29/2011)

The Memorial Wall is a memorial at the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters in Langley, Virginia. It honors CIA employees who died in the line of service. There are 140 stars carved into the white Alabama marble wall. 

August 7 2023 — The Memorial Wall is a memorial at the Central Intelligence Agency headquarters in Langley, Virginia. The wall honors CIA employees who died in the line of service. Today, there are 140 stars carved into the white Alabama marble wall. Eleven are known represent women. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today

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On This Day — Remembering Hiroshima (August 6 1945)

Posted on August 6, 2023 by L

 “I voiced to him [U.S. Secretary of War Stimson] my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a nuclear weapon.”

General Dwight Eisenhower

August 6 2023 — Seven  decades after the US dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the real reasons behind the decision still divide historians. Recently declassified documents from the time suggest the nuclear strikes may have been performed not out of military necessity but to intimidate the USSR.  Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

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Conspiracy Theories — A Night in August (August 5 1962) [Marilyn Monroe & Nelson Mandela]

Posted on August 5, 2023 by L

“There is no passion to be found playing small – in settling for a life that is less than the one you are capable of living.”

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela
(July 18, 1918 – Dec. 5, 2013)

August 5 2023 — Marilyn Monroe died of a barbiturate overdose late in the evening of Saturday, August 4, 1962, at her 12305 Fifth Helena Drive home in Los Angeles, California. Her body was discovered before dawn on Sunday, August 5. On the same day, Nelson Mandela was arrested in Durban, South Africa. Almost everyone has heard the conspiracy theory about Monroe being murdered by the CIA. Sadly, almost no one knows that the arrest of Nelson Mandela was made possible by a tip-off from the CIA. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

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Three Years Ago –The August 4 2020 Beirut Explosion : Debunking the FBI Conspiracy Theory [UPDATE : FBI Junk-Science Report disappears mysteriously from Wikipedia]

Posted on August 4, 2023 by L

“The amount of ammonium nitrate that blew up at Beirut port last year was one fifth of the shipment unloaded there in 2013, the FBI concluded after the blast, adding to suspicions that much of the cargo had gone missing.”

Reuters
(July 30 2021)

August 10 2021 — FBI forensic scientists have estimated that around 552 tonnes of ammonium nitrate exploded on August 4 2020 in the Port of Beirut, much less than the 2,754 tonnes that arrived on a Russian-leased cargo ship in 2013. Reuters, The Guardian, and other MSM are reporting this nonsensical junk-science report without even consulting scientific experts. Let me be very clear. This is total nonsense. Follow us on Twitter: @Intel_Today

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