FAS | Intelligence | News | 1999 ||||

November 1999 Intelligence News

• Knowing Thy Enemy: Bringing Tactical Intelligence to the Fleet by LT David Newcomb - surface warfare magazine Connecting the Surface Navy and the intelligence community.
• RUSSIA / U-S ESPIONAGE Voice of America 30 November 1999 -- Russia has accused a U-S diplomat of trying to steal military secrets, adding a further complication to the already troubled relationship between Moscow and Washington.
• CLINTON - RUSSIA Voice of America 30 November 1999 -- President Clinton says he does not believe U-S policy toward Moscow should be affected by new allegations of espionage in the United States and Russia.
• RUSSIA / U-S / ESPIONAGE Voice of America 30 November 1999 -- Russian security services have briefly detained a junior U-S diplomat in Moscow who they say was trying to obtain Russian government secrets.
• ACCUSED NAVY SPY Voice of America 30 November 1999 -- A U-S Navy sailor is in custody, accused of passing secrets to Russia. The alleged agent is an expert in what American spy submarines were learning about Russian military activities.
• DoD News Briefing Tuesday, November 30, 1999 -- This is a first class petty officer, is an E-6, for those of you not familiar with the Navy rank structure, named Daniel M. King. He was charged on November 5th with wrongful disclosure of classified information to a non-authorized person -- that's Article 92 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice; and espionage, which is Article 106(a) of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. He is being held in pre-trial confinement at the brig in Quantico, Virginia, the Marine Corps Base there. He was apprehended on the 28th of October, and again, charged on the 5th of November.
• Cloak Over The CIA Budget Washington Post November 29, 1999 -- The government had released the intelligence budgets for two previous years. Yet by this year, when Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists requested it, the figure once again had become sensitive. The CIA vigorously contested Mr. Aftergood's Freedom of Information Act suit to force its release. That the agency now has won does not make its position any more defensible.
• The murky side of trade meetings By LES BLUMENTHAL & MICHAEL DOYLE, Nando November 25, 1999 -- "We operate on the assumption they are listening to us and we are listing to them," said one former trade official. John Pike, an intelligence specialist with the Federation of American Scientists, said that anyone not sharing that assumption "is in for a rude awakening." He expressed little doubt that the Seattle WTO meeting would be a hotbed of surveillance. "Of course, I would hope so," Pike said of the likelihood of U.S. spying in Seattle. "And they (other nations) are trying to do the same thing to us. We haven't signed a non-aggression pact and except for our closest allies, it's a war against all."
• Chinese Army Pushes Cyberwar BY JAMES RIDGEWAY Village Voice November 24 - 30, 1999 -- "I am skeptical [that these kinds of] 'offensive information operations' can be anything more than seriously annoying," said John Pike, a defense analyst at the Federation of American Scientists. "That said," Pike continued, "the U.S. is more dependent on network systems than any other country in the world. . . . If you want to be a nuisance to the U.S. without provoking us to nuke you, this is one way to do it."
• Intelligence Budget Can Be Secret, Judge Rules By Vernon Loeb, Washington Post November 23, 1999 -- U.S. District Court Judge Thomas F. Hogan dismissed a lawsuit filed by the Federation of American Scientists (FAS) under the Freedom of Information Act, saying the director of central intelligence has broad power "to protect the secrecy and integrity of the intelligence process."
• Court rejects CIA budget disclosure suit WASHINGTON, November 22, 1999 (UPI) A federal judge upheld Monday the CIA's long standing policy of keeping the annual intelligence budget a secret, according to the Federation of American Scientists, a Washington-based advocacy group.
• EGYPT AIR INVESTIGATION Voice of America 19 November 1999 -- The Chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board is sharply criticizing the American and the Egyptian media for speculating about the cause of the crash of Egypt Air flight 990.
• Text: Air Safety Board Chief Criticizes US and Egyptian Media Coverage 19 November 1999 -- "Over the last few days, we have witnessed a virtual cyclone of speculation about the course of this investigation," said James E. Hall, Chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), about the crash of EgyptAir 990.
• U.S. Department of State Daily Press Briefing NOVEMBER 18, 1999 -- EGYPT -- US has been working cooperatively with government at all levels on airliner crash investigation. US concerned by outlandish conspiracy theories being posited in the media, both here and in Egypt. Unfounded, unnecessary speculations about the investigation's conclusion do no good, and can cause harm to families of victims. A very senior Egyptian security official is expected to meet with Acting Secretary Pickering today. Today an effort to construct a transcript of the cockpit voice recorder has begun.
• EGYPT AIR 990 Voice of America 18 November 1999 -- The Egyptian government says efforts to begin a criminal investigation into the crash of Egypt Air flight 990 is a rush to judgement, adding that more needs to be known about the circumstances of the crash.
• EGYPTAIR / MEDIA SPECULATION Voice of America 18 November 1999 -- The U-S State Department is appealing for an end to premature speculation about the crash of Egypt Air flight 990.
• Global Pro-Transparency Group Issues Survey on World Corruption By Eric Green Washington File 18 November 1999 -- Transparency International, the Berlin-based organization devoted to curbing world corruption, has released its fifth annual "Corruption Perceptions Index" (CPI) survey of corruption levels in 99 countries, based on the perceptions of business people, risk analysts and the general public.
• EGYPT AIR / REACT Voice of America 17 November 1999 -- Egyptians are reacting with disbelief to indications that officials investigating the crash of Egypt Air flight 9-9-0 believe it may have been caused deliberately by one of the crew members.
• Fact Sheet: U.S. Corruption Initiative (U.S. Mission to OSCE fact sheet)17 November 1999 -- Last week theEuropean Bank for Reconstruction and Development issued a report singling out corruption as one of the most important obstacles to economic progress in countries in transition.
• EGYPT AIR INVESTIGATION UPDATE Voice of America 16 November 1999 -- Differences have emerged between the United States and Egypt over the course of the investigation into the crash of Egypt Air flight 990.
• EGYPT AIR INVESTIGATION Voice of America 16 November 1999 -- The investigation into the crash of EgyptAir Flight-990 is expected to be turned over to the F-B-I. Federal air safety investigators say they found suspicious comments on the plane's cockpit voice recorder.
• ROMANIA / INTELLIGENCE CENTER Voice of America 16 November 1999 -- The gigantic marble palace of former dictator Nicolae Ceausescu will house the American-backed "Regional Center for Combating Trans-Border Crime."
• EGYPTAIR INVESTIGATION UPDATE Voice of America 15 November 1999 -- Theories about the cockpit crew possibly struggling with an intruder or perhaps some act of sabotage on board do not appear to be supported by the evidence seen so far.
• EGYPTAIR CRASH/PILOTS Voice of America 13 November 1999 -- Some U-S media speculated that one of the pilots may have crashed the plane as a way to commit suicide, or had been forced to do so by someone in the cockpit.
• EGYPTAIR-POSSIBLE CAUSES Voice of America 12 November 1999 -- Nearly two weeks after the crash, nothing investigators have found explains why flight 990 lost altitude at 33-thousand feet.
• CUNNINGHAM NAMED DIRECTOR OF DEFENSE SECURITY SERVICE November 12, 1999 -- Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen has appointed retired Lt. Gen. Charles J. Cunningham Jr. as the director of the Defense Security Service, effective Nov. 8, 1999. He has been the acting director of DSS since June 7, 1999.
• EgyptAir Flight 990 - Questions persist over 33 military officers on flight The Providence Journal-Bulletin November 10, 1999 -- A Defense Analyst with the Federation for American Scientists discounted the possibility that the Egyptian officers were targets of terrorists. "It would be difficult for anyone to ascertain what flight these officers would be on," said the analyst, John Pike. And if any particular officer was a target, terrorists could have an easier time trying to assassinate him in Egypt.
• LETTER FROM THE PRESIDENT November 10, 1999 -- I have determined that the following are major illicit drug producing or drug transit "countries" (including certain entities that are not sovereign states).
• U-S - DRUG LIST Voice of America 10 November 1999 -- The Clinton Administration has taken two countries off its annual list of places that are considered major drug producers or drug transit points.
• Text: U.S./Mexico Drug Control Group Issues Communique 10 November 1999 -- U.S. and Mexican drug control officials agree that their bilateral cooperation is meeting with success in key areas such as fugitive arrests, money laundering investigations, and firearms tracking.
• BERLIN WALL ANNIVERSARY-STASI INFORMERS Voice of America 08 November 1999 -- There were 90- thousand Stasi policemen and --- according to students of the era --a half million civilian collaborators.
• U-S / EMBASSIES INSECURE Voice of America 05 November 1999 -- The Panel agreed with earlier recommendations that more than one-billion dollars a year be spent on embassy security each year for the next ten years. But in its report the Panel cautioned against turning embassies into fortresses.
• Report on "America's Overseas Presence in the 21st Century," by the Overseas Presence Advisory Panel 05 November 1999 (1,538 kb PDF file) and Secretary Albright et al remarks and briefing
• Text: McCaffrey Reviews Western Hemisphere Drug Policy Summit 05 November 1999 -- The historic gathering of the Western Hemisphere's top drug policy officials has yielded "consensus on a number of important principles," says General Barry McCaffrey, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP).
• Lockerbie Trial Briefing Unit Discusses Trial of Libyan Suspects By Rick Marshall Washington File 05 November 1999 -- A team of law professors from the University of Glasgow in Scotland have established the Lockerbie Trial Briefing Unit to provide expert information on the upcoming trial of two Libyans who are suspected of bombing Pan Am Flight 103 in December 1988.
• U.S. Corporations Warned of Cyber-Terrorism by Charlene Porter Washington File 04 November 1999 -- Officials from the National Security Agency (NSA) and the U.S. Department of State (DOS) briefed hundreds of representatives from multi-national corporations and non-profit organizations about the growing risks of terrorists who are not trying to shed blood, but rather to wreak havoc with electronic records.
• Judge Considers Intelligence-Budget Secrecy Omaha World-Herald November 2, 1999 -- The Justice Department told a federal court on Monday that forcing the Clinton administration to reveal total spending for intelligence could compromise national security, even though the figures were released for 1997 and 1998. The Federation of American Scientists is trying to force the government to reveal the figure under a Freedom of Information Act request. The Justice Department is seeking a pre-emptive court ruling blocking such a release.
• DoD News Briefing November 02, 1999 -- The Bright Star was last month. I haven't asked the question if there were any fundamentalist protest.
• EGYPT AIR CRASH Voice of America 02 November 1999 -- The FBI has interviewed more than 100 people around the country -- including two on the Massachusetts island of Nantucket who say they saw something unusual in the sky around the time of the crash.
• EGYPT AIR CRASH Voice of America 02 November 1999 -- Investigators continue looking for clues to what caused an Egyptian airliner to plunge into the Atlantic ocean after taking off Sunday from New York's Kennedy airport.
• EGYPT / CRASH REACT Voice of America 01 November 1999 -- Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak in an interview broadcast on Egyptian television, he said he did not believe the accident was due to any criminal act.