Remembering NSA Historian Matthew M. Aid (March 11 1958 – August 20 2018) [The Second Gulf of Tonkin incident (August 4, 1964)]

Posted on August 20, 2023 by L

“One of Mr. Aid’s most significant findings, which became publicly known in 2005, was an NSA cover up of erroneous records related to the 1964 Gulf of Tonkin incident, in which US officials alleged that North Vietnamese torpedo boats twice fired on US Navy ships. The incident led to US military engagement in Vietnam. A report written by an agency historian in 2001 noted that US intelligence officers falsified documents about a disputed attack, but that fact was suppressed.”

Washington Post
(August 29 2018)

August 20 2023 — Matthew Aid was an American military historian and author. He was working on signal intelligence and the history of the National Security Agency. His work has been published in numerous journals, newspapers, and magazines including Foreign Policy, Politico magazine, National Security Archive, and the Associated Press. In 2005, Matthew Aid discovered that the CIA and four other agencies had been withdrawing thousands of records from the National Archives with the help of insiders. He is greatly missed by those who still care about facts in this post-truth world. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

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70 Years Ago — CIA Operation TP/AJAX : The Iranian Coup d’État (August 19 1953) [UPDATE — Former Foreign Secretary : “The UK should finally acknowledge its leading role in the 1953 Iran Coup”]

Posted on August 19, 2023 by L

“Yes, my sin — my greater sin and even my greatest sin is that I nationalized Iran’s oil industry and discarded the system of political and economic exploitation by the world’s greatest empire. This at the cost to myself, my family; and at the risk of losing my life, my honor and my property. With God’s blessing and the will of the people, I fought this savage and dreadful system of international espionage and colonialism.”

Dr. Mohammad Mosaddegh
Defending himself against a treason charge
(December 19, 1953)

August 19 2023 — Mohammad Mosaddegh (16 June 1882 – 5 March 1967) was an author, administrator, lawyer, and parliamentarian, who was elected as the prime minister of Iran in 1951. His administration introduced a wide range of progressive social and political reforms, notably the nationalization of the Iranian oil industry, which had been under British control since 1913 through the Anglo-Persian Oil Company. His government was overthrown in a coup d’état orchestrated by the British MI6 and the American CIA. Follow us on Twitter: @INTEL_TODAY

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7 Years Ago — The FAREWELL DOSSIER [Happy 007 Anniversary!]

Posted on August 18, 2023 by L

“There have been only two kinds of CIA secret operations: the ones that are widely known to have failed—usually because of almost unbelievably crude errors—and the ones that are not yet widely known to have failed.”

Edward Luttwak

03 Jun 1982, Paris, France --- Original caption: Paris: President Francois Mitterrand greets President Ronald Reagan arriving at the Elysee Palace for lunch and meeting. President Reagan is France to attend the Economic Summit at Versailles. --- Image by © Bettmann/CORBIS
On July 19 1981 President Ronald Reagan met with French President Francois Mitterrand in Ottawa, Ontario at an economic summit. Mitterrand informed Reagan about the “Farewell Dossier”.

August 18 2016 — Not everyone will agree with Ed Luttwak’s analysis which is undoubtedly a tad unfair. There is no doubt that the Farewell Operation was an extraordinary successful operation. And yet everyone suspected everyone of lying about it. It just seemed too good to be true. Follow us on Twitter:@INTEL_TODAY 

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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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