Category Archives: Department of Homeland Security

1000 Foreign Nationals, 21 Arrested and a Fake School

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Lots of questions to be asked here but let’s start with: What was the tip that started this investigation? The next question is: Who investigated the school to give it a license or accreditation or did it have one? The last question: What happened to the 1000 foreign nationals?
Oh wait, here is an update…this was an FBI sting operation. The Feds actually created the school for the sting operation. My bad, I should have known.
Department of Justice
Office of Public Affairs
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, April 5, 2016

21 Defendants Charged with Fraudulently Enabling Hundreds of Foreign Nationals to Remain in the United States Through Fake ‘Pay to Stay’ New Jersey College

“College” Created as Part of Homeland Security Investigations Sting Operation

Twenty-one brokers, recruiters and employers from across the United States who allegedly conspired with more than 1,000 foreign nationals to fraudulently maintain student visas and obtain foreign worker visas through a “pay to stay” New Jersey college were arrested this morning by federal agents, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman for the District of New Jersey announced.

The defendants (see chart below) were arrested in New Jersey and Washington by special agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and charged in 14 complaints with conspiracy to commit visa fraud, conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit and other offenses.  All the defendants, with the exception of Yanjun Lin aka Aimee Lin, 25, of Flushing, New York, will appear today before U.S. Magistrate Judge Steven C. Mannion of the District of New Jersey in Newark, New Jersey, federal court.  Lin will appear before U.S. Magistrate Judge Karen L. Strombom in the Western District of Washington federal court.

“‘Pay to Stay’ schemes not only damage our perception of legitimate student and foreign worker visa programs, they also pose a very real threat to national security,” U.S. Attorney Fishman said.  “Today’s arrests, which were made possible by the great undercover work of our law enforcement partners, stopped 21 brokers, recruiters and employers across multiple states who recklessly exploited our immigration system for financial gain.”

“While the United States fully supports international education, we will vigorously investigate those who seek to exploit the U.S. immigration system,” said Director Sarah R. Saldaña for ICE.  “As a result of this operation, HSI special agents have successfully identified and closed a gap in the student visa system and have arrested 21 individuals alleged to be amongst the system’s most egregious violators.”

“Individuals engaged in schemes that would undermine the remarkable educational opportunities afforded to international students represent an affront to those who play by the rules,” said Special Agent in Charge Terence S. Opiola for ICE Homeland Security Investigations.  “These unscrupulous individuals undermine the integrity of the immigration system.  Our special agents are committed to addressing, identifying fraud in order to better protect the system as a whole.”

According to the complaints unsealed today and statements made in court:

The defendants, many of whom operated recruiting companies for purported international students, were arrested for their involvement in an alleged scheme to enroll foreign nationals as students in the University of Northern New Jersey, a purported for-profit college located in Cranford, New Jersey (UNNJ).  Unbeknownst to the defendants and the foreign nationals they conspired with, however, the UNNJ was created in September 2013 by HSI federal agents.

Through the UNNJ, undercover HSI agents investigated criminal activities associated with the Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP), including, but not limited to, student visa fraud and the harboring of aliens for profit.  The UNNJ was not staffed with instructors or educators, had no curriculum and conducted no actual classes or education activities.  The UNNJ operated solely as a storefront location with small offices staffed by federal agents posing as school administrators.

UNNJ represented itself as a school that, among other things, was authorized to issue a document known as a “Certificate of Eligibility for Nonimmigrant (F-1) Student Status – for Academic and Language Students,” commonly referred to as a Form I-20.  This document, which certifies that a foreign national has been accepted to a school and would be a full-time student, typically enables legitimate foreign students to obtain an F-1 student visa.  The F-1 student visa allows a foreign student to enter and/or remain in the United States while the student makes normal progress toward the completion of a full course of study in an SEVP accredited institution.

During the investigation, HSI special agents identified hundreds of foreign nationals, primarily from China and India, who previously entered the U.S. on F-1 non-immigrant student visas to attend other SEVP- accredited schools.  Through various recruiting companies and business entities located in New Jersey, California, Illinois, New York and Virginia, the defendants then enabled approximately 1,076 of these foreign individuals – all of whom were willing participants in the scheme – to fraudulently maintain their nonimmigrant status in the U.S. on the false pretense that they continued to participate in full courses of study at the UNNJ.

Acting as recruiters, the defendants solicited the involvement of UNNJ administrators to participate in the scheme.  During the course of their dealings with undercover agents, the defendants fully acknowledged that none of their foreign national clients would attend any actual courses, earn actual credits, or make academic progress toward an actual degree in a particular field of study.  Rather, the defendants facilitated the enrollment of their foreign national clients in UNNJ to fraudulently maintain student visa status, in exchange for kickbacks, or “commissions.”  The defendants also facilitated the creation of hundreds of false student records, including transcripts, attendance records and diplomas, which were purchased by their foreign national conspirators for the purpose of deceiving immigration authorities.

In other instances, the defendants used UNNJ to fraudulently obtain work authorization and work visas for hundreds of their clients.  By obtaining this authorization, a number of defendants were able to outsource their foreign national clients as full-time employees with numerous U.S.-based corporations, also in exchange for commission fees.  Other defendants devised phony IT projects that were purportedly to occur at the school.  These defendants then created and caused to be created false contracts, employment verification letters, transcripts and other documents.  The defendants then paid the undercover agents thousands of dollars to put the school’s letterhead on the sham documents, to sign the documents as school administrators and to otherwise go along with the scheme.

All of these bogus documents created the illusion that prospective foreign workers would be working at the school in some IT capacity or project.  The defendants then used these fictitious documents fraudulently to obtain labor certifications issued by the U.S. Secretary of Labor and then ultimately to petition the U.S. government to obtain H1-B visas for non-immigrants.  These fictitious documents were then submitted to the U.S. Customs and Immigration Services (USCIS).  In the vast majority of circumstances, the foreign worker visas were not issued because USCIS was advised of the ongoing undercover operation.

In addition, starting today, HSI Newark is coordinating with the ICE Counterterrorism and Criminal Exploitation Unit (CTCEU) and the SEVP to terminate the nonimmigrant student status for the foreign nationals associated with UNNJ, and if applicable, administratively arrest and place them into removal proceedings.

The chart below outlines the charges for each defendant.  The charges of conspiracy to commit visa fraud and making a false statement each carry a maximum potential penalty of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine.  The charges of conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit and H1-B Visa fraud each carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and $250,000 fine.

The charges and allegations contained in the complaints are merely accusations and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

U.S. Attorney Fishman credited special agents of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, under the leadership of Director Saldaña; HSI Newark, under the leadership of Special Agent in Charge Opiola; U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Counterterrorism and Criminal Exploitation Unit, under the leadership of Unit Chief Robert Soria;  U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Fraud Detection and National Security Section, under the leadership of Associate Director Matthew Emrich; the Student and Exchange Visitor Program, under the leadership of Deputy Assistant Director Louis M. Farrell; U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Vermont Service Center, Security Fraud Division, under the leadership of Associate Center Director Bradley J. Brouillette; U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Consular Affairs, Office of Fraud Prevention Programs, under the leadership of Director Josh Glazeroff; and the FBI, Joint Terrorism Task Force, under the leadership of Timothy Gallagher in Newark, for their contributions to the investigation.

He also thanked the Accrediting Commission of Career Schools and Colleges (ACCSC), under the leadership of Executive Director Michale S. McComis, and the New Jersey Office of Higher Education, under the leadership of Secretary of Higher Education Rochelle R. Hendricks, for their assistance.  In addition, U.S. Attorney Fishman thanked the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission and the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles, as well as the U.S. Attorney’s Offices for the Central District of California, Eastern District of New York, Eastern District of Virginia, Southern District of New York, Central District of Illinois, Peoria Division, and the Northern District of Georgia for their help.

The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Dennis C. Carletta of the U.S. Attorney’s Office National Security Unit and Sarah Devlin of the Office’s Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Unit.

Defendant Name Age Residence Charges
Jun Shen aka Jeanette Shen 32 Levittown, New York – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Jiaming Wang aka Celine Wang, 34 Los Angeles, California – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Philip Junlin Li

 

 33 Los Angeles, California – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Zitong Wen aka Kate Wen 27 Rowland Heights, California – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Chaun Kit Yuen aka Alvin Yuen 24 Rowland Heights, California – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Ting Zue aka Tiffany Xue 28 Flushing, New York – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Yanjun Lin aka Aimee Lin 25 Flushing, New York – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Zheng Zhang aka Vicky Zhang 26 New York, New York – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Xue Yong Liu aka Jack Liu 29 New York, New York – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Minglu Li aka Vivian Lee 36 Los Angeles, California – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Jason Li aka Jason Liu aka Fen Lee 43 Flushing, New York – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit
Tajesh Kodali 44 Edison, New Jersey – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Jyoti Patel 34 Franklin Park, New Jersey – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Shahjadi M. Parvin aka Sarah Patel 54 Hackensack, New Jersey – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Narendra Singh Plaha 44 Hillsborough, New Jersey – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Sanjeev Sukhija 35 North Brunswick, New Jersey – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Harpreet Sachdeva 26 Somerset, New Jersey – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Avinash Shankar 35 Bloomington, Illinois – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Karthik Nimmala 32 Smyrna, Georgia – Conspiracy to commit visa fraud

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Govardhan Dyavarashetty aka Vardhan Shetty 35 Avenel, New Jersey – H1-B Visa fraud

– False statements

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 
Syed Qasim Abbas aka Qasim Reza aka Nayyer 41 Brooklyn, New York – H1-B Visa fraud

– False statements

– Conspiracy to harbor aliens for profit

 

Who is APT6?

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Darkhotel APT hackers campaign ‘followed’ global CEOs using hotel networks

A state-backed espionage group has spent years targeting senior executives from large global companies using a specialised Advanced Persistent Threat (APT) that can follow and steal data from them as they move around the globe from hotel to hotel, Kaspersky has revealed.

TechWorld: Interestingly, despite some smarts, the sophistication level isn’t always top drawer, which points towards China rather than the US or Russia. The victim list is another hint at that too.

“Overall, victims in our sinkhole logs and KSN data were found across the globe, with the majority in Japan, Taiwan, China, Russia, Korea and Hong Kong,” (in that order) noted Kaspersky Lab’s researchers.

US executives were on the list but far below the prevalence for targeting Japanese CEOs and managers. And the attackers seem to go after almost everyone with the right job title, with sectors hit including electronics, finance, manufacturing, pharma, cosmetics, chemicals, automotive, defence, law, military and even NGOs – the last one has been an obsession for Chinese actors. More here.

FBI Says a Mysterious Hacking Group Has Had Access to US Govt Files for Years

Motherboard: The feds warned that “a group of malicious cyber actors,” whom security experts believe to be the government-sponsored hacking group known as , “have compromised and stolen sensitive information from various government and commercial networks” since at least 2011, according to an FBI alert obtained by Motherboard.

The alert, which is also available online, shows that foreign government hackers are still successfully hacking and stealing data from US government’s servers, their activities going unnoticed for years. This comes months after the US government revealed that a group of hackers, widely believed to be working for the Chinese government, had for more than a year infiltrated the computer systems of the Office of Personnel Management, or OPM. In the process, they stole highly sensitive data about several millions of government workers and even spies.

In the alert, the FBI lists a long series of websites used as command and control servers to launch phishing attacks “in furtherance of computer network exploitation (CNE) activities [read: hacking] in the United States and abroad since at least 2011.”

Domains controlled by the hackers were “suspended” as of late December 2015, according to the alert, but it’s unclear if the hackers have been pushed out or they are still inside the hacked networks.

“Anybody who’s been in that network all this long, they could be anywhere and everywhere.”

“Looks like they were in for years before they were caught, god knows where they are,” Michael Adams, an information security expert who served more than two decades in the US Special Operations Command, and who has reviewed the alert, told Motherboard. “Anybody who’s been in that network all this long, they could be anywhere and everywhere.”

For Adams, this alert shows that the US government still is not in control of what’s going on inside its most sensitive networks. This alert, he said, is an admission of that.

“It’s just flabbergasting,” he told me. “How many times can this keep happening before we finally realized we’re screwed?”

The FBI wouldn’t comment on the alert, only saying that it was just another example of a routine notice to private partners, “provided in order to help systems administrators guard against the actions of persistent cyber criminals.”

This group of “persistent cyber criminals” is especially persistent. The group is none other than the “APT6” hacking group, according to sources within the antivirus and threat intelligence industry. There isn’t much public literature about the group, other than a couple of old reports, but APT6, which stand for Advanced Persistent Threat 6, is a codename given to a group believed to be working for the Chinese government.

“This is one of the earlier APTs, they definitely go back further than 2011 […] more like 2008.”

“This is one of the earlier APTs, they definitely go back further than 2011 or whatever—more like 2008 I believe,” Kurt Baumgartner, a researcher at the Russian security firm Kaspersky Lab, told me. (Baumgartner declined to say whether the group was Chinese or not, but said its targets align with the interest of a state-sponsored attacker.)

Kyrk Storer, a spokesperson with FireEye, confirmed that the domains listed in the alert “were associated with APT6 and one of their malware backdoors,” and that the hackers “targeted the US and UK defense industrial base.”

Another researcher at a different security company, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak publicly about the hacker’s activities, said this was the “current campaign of an older group,” and said there “likely” was an FBI investigation ongoing. (Several other security companies declined to comment for this story.)

At this point, it’s unclear whether the FBI’s investigation will lead to any concrete result. But two years after the US government charged five Chinese military members for hacking US companies, it’s clear hackers haven’t given up attacking US targets.

Guccifer Appears in U.S. Court, Remember Hillary and Sid

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Are we to make anything of the timing of this court appearance? We cant get our hopes up but this is for sure curious.

The grand jury indictment full text is here.

Romanian Hacker “Guccifer” Appears in U.S. Court

SecurityWeek: Lazar Lehel, the 44-year-old Romanian national accused of hacking into the online accounts of many public figures, has been extradited to the United States where he made his first court appearance last week.

Romania’s High Court of Cassation and Justice agreed to extradite Lehel, known online as Guccifer, to the United States for a period of 18 months. U.S. authorities said the man hacked into the email and social media accounts of two former presidents, a former cabinet member, a former presidential advisor, and a former member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff between December 2012 and January 2014. The indictment does not name any of the victims and refers to them as “victim” 1 through 5.

The hacker has been accused of releasing private emails, personal photographs, and medical and financial information belonging to his victims.

Lehel has been charged in the United States with three counts of wire fraud, three counts of gaining unauthorized access to a protected computer, cyber stalking, aggravated identity theft, and obstruction of justice. The U.S. Attorney’s Office in the Eastern District of Virginia said the man faces up to 20 years in prison, with a two-year mandatory minimum for the identity theft charges.

In an interview last year with a Romanian journalist, Lehel said that if he is extradited to the United States, he will “plead guilty, no problem.”

During the time he was active, Guccifer also hacked into the accounts of various actors, journalists and businessmen, but the charges filed by U.S. authorities appear to focus on the attacks targeting officials.

Lehel was arrested by Romanian authorities in January 2014 after hacking into the email accounts of Romanian politician Corina Cretu and George Maior, the head of the Romanian Intelligence Service (SRI). He was sentenced by a Romanian court to seven years in prison for these attacks.

The hacker had been known by Romanian law enforcement as “Little Fume.” He had previously received a three-year suspended sentence for hacking into the accounts of many Romanian celebrities.

****

2013, Daily News:

Online hacker ‘Guccifer’ breaks into email accounts of former Clinton aide Sidney Blumenthal

Guccifer got into the email account of Sidney Blumethal, a former aide to Bill Clinton and a senior adviser to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. The attack comes just days after breaking into Colin Powell’s Facebook account.

He’s a real political hack, all right.

The online prankster known as “Guccifer” has crossed party lines and hacked the AOL account of a former Bill Clinton aide — just days after the cyber creep breached former Secretary of State Colin Powell’s Facebook and email accounts.

“Guccifer” had seemed to be targeting the GOP before his latest round of online assaults — he’d spent recent weeks hacking into the emails of George W. Bush’s family and friends.

But last week “Guccifer” got into former Clinton aide Sidney Blumethal’s email account, according to thesmokinggun.com.

Blumenthal, 64, worked as an assistant and senior adviser to Clinton during the President’s second term.

He was also a senior adviser to Hillary Clinton’s 2008 campaign and has stayed close with her since.

“Guccifer” accessed Blumenthal’s correspondence with Clinton dating back to 2005, including sensitive foreign policy and intelligence memos shared while Clinton was secretary of state in the Obama administration, according to thesmokinggun. The hacker sent screen grabs of the sensitive Clinton emails — stamped with his “Guccifer” logo — to the website, it reported.

His cyber assault on the high-profile Democrat came just a few days after “Guccifer” defaced Powell’s Facebook page.

“Guccifer” hacked in Monday morning and uploaded messages berating former President George W. Bush.

“You will burn in hell, Bush!” read one post.

“Kill the illuminati! Tomorrow’s world will be a world free of illuminati or will be no more!” he wrote in another.

Powell later apologized on his Facebook page for “all the stupid, obscene posts that are popping up.”

 

Rising Threats, Increased Marine Duty

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Barack Obama at nuclear summit: ‘madmen’ threaten global security

Barack Obama used his final nuclear security summit on Friday to deliver the stark warning that “madmen” could kill and injure hundreds of thousands of innocent people using only plutonium the size of an apple.

“The danger of a terrorist group obtaining and using a nuclear weapon is one of the greatest threats to global security,” said Obama, convening the meeting of more than 50 world leaders in Washington.

Obama argued that since the first such summit six years ago, the world has measurably reduced the risk of nuclear terrorism by taking “concrete, tangible steps”. Enough material for more than 150 nuclear weapons has been secured or removed, he said. More here.

*****

Rand: In light of the global increase in the number and lethality of terrorist attacks, it has become imperative that nations, states, and private citizens become more involved in a strategic vision to recognize, prepare for, and — if possible — prevent such events. RAND research and analysis has provided policymakers with objective guidance and recommendations to improve preparedness, international collaboration, response, and recovery to this global threat. Various summaries here.

Here’s where the Marines have stood up new embassy guard posts after Benghazi

MarineTimes: The Marine Corps is taking big steps to help prevent another attack like the one on a diplomatic post in Benghazi, Libya, in 2012 that left four Americans dead.

The service has established about two dozen new Marine security guard detachments and beefed up 117 others as part of a multifaceted plan to protect U.S. embassies and consulates around the globe.

Twelve additional locations will get new security detachments by 2018 as the Corps boosts its number of embassy guards to counter increasing threats and attacks against diplomatic facilities.

The new detachments are be located across the continents in places like Turkey, China, Lebanon, Sierra Leone and South Africa. The locations are not confined to third-world countries where anti-American sentiment is strong; Marines are also boosting their presence in places like Italy, Laos and Mexico.

New Marine security guard detachments:

Land-based Marine crisis response units are also equipped and trained for events such as the Sept. 11, 2012, terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi. No MSG detachment was present there or in the Libyan capital, Tripoli, which prompted lawmakers to better protect diplomatic personnel and facilities across the globe.

The boost is necessary, even amid a military drawdown, said Col. Rollin Brewster, the commanding officer of the Marine Corps Embassy Security Group.

“The world is a dynamic, changing place,” he said. As the Marine Corps works through what that new normal looks like, the expansion provides greater anti-terrorism measures — what he called “meaningful work that matters.”

The changes have the full backing of the Obama administration and Congress, and have been well received by diplomats and Foreign Service officers. In fact, the State Department has another 15 diplomatic posts where officials would like to add MSG detachments in coming years. This would put a Marine presence nearly 200 embassies and consulates.

Commandant Gen. Robert Neller recently told lawmakers on Capitol Hill that the Marine Corps now has 174 embassy guard detachments in 147 countries. Of those, 44 qualify for hostile fire pay and 22 are designated as combat zones.

However, some ambassadors who have served in the most challenging locations say there’s one important step missing. They strongly recommend the Marine Corps and State Department review assignment policies and update decades-old rules of engagement to better address evolving and emerging threats.

“I would urge a rethink of detachment ROE to give an ambassador greater flexibility in how to deploy the Marines in a contingency,” said retired Ambassador Ryan Crocker, who has served as the U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Kuwait and Lebanon. “Those ROEs have not changed in probably three decades. The world has.”

The embassy security plus-up

In 2013, Congress mandated that the Corps add 1,000 new Marine security guards, which essentially doubled the size of the Embassy Security Group. The move allowed the service to keep an additional 1,000 Marines at the end of its post-war drawdown.

Neller said the Corps has thus far added 603 of those 1,000 Marines. About 200 are assigned to new Marine security guard detachments, and another 274 have been sent to boost existing detachments. The remaining 130 are assigned to the Marine Security Augmentation Unit, which can dispatch teams of MSGs to embassies in distress at the direct request of an ambassador, chief of mission or regional security officer on the ground.

The Marine Corps is working closely with the State Department to stand up each new detachment, Brewster said. The State Department must meet certain diplomatic and logistics requirements prior to activating new MSG detachments.

The Embassy Security Group works with diplomatic security personnel to determine the detachment size needed at new locations. It can take up to a year to stand up new units, but normally less if existing conditions are good.

The new teams are composed of seasoned Marine security guards with at least one 12-month tour at another post. The group is encouraging Marines to extend their special duty assignments, if possible.

Sgt Maj. Juan Alvarado, the Embassy Security Group’s top enlisted Marine, recently visited the new Iraq detachment. He said the Marines there were motivated.

“They all kept saying, ‘This is what I signed up for,’” Alvarado said.

Filling the gaps 

The Marine Corps’ mission to keep embassies safe expands far beyond traditional Marine security guard duty.

The Marine Security Augmentation Unit, or MSAU, stood up in July 2013 as a quick reaction force that can augment embassies at a moment’s notice.

Each squad-sized team is assigned to a region. The Virginia-based unit has been tapped for about 60 missions so far, including a call to beef up security at the U.S. Embassy in Paris in November following the series of sophisticated attacks there by members of the Islamic State group.

Embassy guards are also supported by three new land-based special-purpose Marine air-ground task forces. Each is assigned to a specific combatant command and can be tailored to respond to crises at diplomatic posts in that part of the world. They support U.S. Africa, Central and Southern commands. The units have dispatched infantrymen to patrol diplomatic compounds and have helped evacuate personnel at embassies in places like Libya and South Sudan. The crisis response forces can also augment Marine Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Teams, which are dispatched to embassies in distress.

Additionally, the Marine Corps has used infantry companies to fill security gaps in places like Iraq, Libya and Yemen. A Marine company was assigned to secure the compound when Crocker opened the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, after the fall of the Taliban. Since they were infantrymen, he said they were not bound by “restrictive rules of engagement.”

But such scenarios are not common outside of combat zones. The typical MSG detachment has only eight Marines: one staff NCO who serves as detachment commander, and seven sergeants and below. The largest detachments have 24 Marines.

Boosting the size of detachments at high-risk embassies allows Marines to patrol the perimeter, provide internal security for the chancery, and adds one more trigger puller — should things heat up.

All of those missions have led to new training for Marines.

At the MSG schoolhouse at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia, the Embassy Security Group is wrapping up the third and final phase of a 10-acre training compound. It includes barracks; a $10 million, 29,000 square-foot training facility with seven functional guard stations; an Indoor Simulated Marksmanship Trainer system; and a new group headquarters modeled after actual U.S. embassies.

Marines deploying with crisis response units also undergo nonlethal weapons training for riot situations. Grunts deployed to Europe recently spent three days at the U.S. Embassy in Portugal where they were tasked with securing a facility overrun by terrorists, active shooters and violent rioters.

The prevalence of embassy security missions is also evident at Infantry Officer Course, where lieutenants now regularly conduct long-range rescue training missions.

Rethinking rules of engagement 

Ambassadors and Foreign Service officers have lauded the plan to boost the number of Marines at embassies and consulates. But some caution that “throwing Marines at the problem” is not enough if the embassy doesn’t get the right MSGs — and if those MSGs don’t get the right rules of engagement.

Retired Ambassador Barbara Bodine, who served as U.S. Ambassador to Yemen from 1997 to 2001, said officials need to take a careful look at the precarious situations diplomats sometimes find themselves in.

“I do think every U.S. Embassy should have a contingent of Marine security guards, without question,” she said. “… [But] there has to be a recognition of the limits placed on Marines. There does need to be a very careful thinking through of the rules of engagement.”

An MSG’s primary duties include access control, safeguarding classified material and emergency response. While protection of personnel is assumed, the MSGs remain limited to designated areas and have strict rules that govern engagement. Security is instead managed by nearly 800 State Department regional security officers in more than 250 posts worldwide.

In a time of need, they call on combat-equipped troops like FAST Marines to provide security. Assuming that help may not arrive on time, some feel the Marines at the embassies should be tasked with defending their fellow Americans.

Crocker, who reopened the embassy in Kabul, has seen MSGs in action on more than one occasion in his 37 years of service. When a mob breached the embassy walls in Syria in 1998, the small MSG detachment was ready. Countless hours of training enabled them to launch tear gas at precise points and quell the uprising.

“That’s just one example of what a half-dozen of America’s finest can do at maybe 2,000 miles from the nearest reinforcements,” said Crocker, who in 2012 became only the 75th civilian to be named an Honorary Marine since the Corps’ founding in 1775. “In such places, that’s all you’ve got — those Marines.”

But sometimes those Marines are not enough. Because their rules of engagement are too restrictive, Crocker opted for a Lebanese security force when he reopened the Beirut embassy in 1990.

“I needed to be sure we could fight in any way we might need to, not just to defend the chancery building but to defend on the wire,” said Crocker, who pointed out that the compound was surrounded by a heavily wired perimeter rather than a wall. “So instead of a Marine detachment, I brought in additional regional security officers who could shoot anywhere I told them to shoot.”

Maj. Clark Carpenter, a Marine spokesman at the Pentagon, said Corps officials “continually” have conversations with the State Department on how to improve security. That’s “absolutely critical and something we take very seriously,” he added.

“We always want to look at ways to improve our security and keep the enemy off balance,” Carpenter said.

Bodine called Marines “a tremendous addition to every embassy,” adding that they should have been in Benghazi and could have made a significant difference there. But she still cautioned against turning embassies into something that looks like an armed camp. To do so could project hostility and adversely affect the embassy’s  mission.

“There is a drive to make our embassies perfectly safe so that nothing bad ever happens to anybody. The only way to do that is to keep people inside the walls,” she said. “But embassies cannot be fortresses, and diplomats can’t be hermetically sealed in embassies and still do their job.”
Bodine now serves as director of Georgetown University’s Institute for the Study of Diplomacy. Her 30-plus years in Foreign Service were spent primarily on Arabian Peninsula, including a tour as deputy chief of mission in Kuwait during the Iraqi invasion and occupation in 1990-1991 (for which she received the Secretary’s Award for Valor).

While she would want no other force guarding the compound, she does feel that young Marines may not always be the best choice to face the increasingly complex threats faced at the most at-risk embassies.

“They are really good guys and I absolutely adore them, but they are really, really young,” she said. “The Marines may have to think about sending more seasoned, at least [in their] late 20s. I have quite literally on occasion entrusted my life to those 19- and 20-year-olds, but the … change in mission is going to take someone with just a little bit more time under his belt.”

All MSGs currently serve 12 months at three posts, while detachment commanders serve 18 months at two posts. Marines typically aren’t sent to the more challenging posts until their second assignment. Even then, many are not of legal drinking age back in the U.S.

 

 

 

 

WH/Jack Lew Helping Iran Launder Money

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During the Obama summit, did Obama violate government secrets?

WASHINGTON, April 1 (UPI) — For the first time in more than a decade, the United States has made public its inventory of nuclear uranium components, President Barack Obama said Friday. Much more here.

                                                         

 

The White House Cedes More, Even As Iran’s Economy Recovers

Mark Dubowitz, Annie Fixler
01 April 2016 – FDD Policy Brief

While U.S. and European diplomats celebrated the conclusion of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action last summer, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and his government saw that deal as not the end of the negotiations but the beginning. This has become increasingly clear in their criticism of sanctions relief and demand for more.

The Obama administration appears ready to comply. Reportsconfirm that the administration is preparing a general license authorizing the use of the U.S. dollar in Iran-related transactions. This is intended to encourage large European and other banks to return to business with Iran and help alleviate its concerns about the legal risks associated with engaging with a country still under U.S. sanctions for money laundering, terrorism and missileproliferation, and human rights abuses.

The license would contradict repeatedadministrationpromises to Congress, and goes beyond any commitments made to Iran under the JCPOA. It also contradicts the evidence: Tehran has already received substantial sanctions relief, a major “stimulus package.”

In 2012 and 2013, Iran’s economy was crashing. It had been hit with an asymmetric shock from sanctions, including those targeting its central bank, oil exports, and access to the SWIFT financial messaging system. The economy shrank by six percent in the 2012-13 fiscal year, and bottomed out the following year, dropping another two percent. Accessible foreign exchange reserves were estimated to be down to only $20 billion.

This changed during the nuclear negotiations. During the 18-month period starting in late 2013, interim sanctions relief and the lack of new shocks enabled Iran to movefrom a severe recession to a modestrecovery. During that time, the Islamic Republic received $11.9 billion through the release of restricted assets, while sanctions on major sectors of its economy were suspended. This facilitated strong imports that supported domestic investment, especially from China. The Obama administration also de-escalated the sanctions pressure by blocking new congressional legislation. Jointly, these forces rescued the Iranian economy and its leaders, including the Revolutionary Guard, from an imminent and severe balance of payments crisis. In the 2014-15 fiscal year, the Iranian economy rebounded and grew at a rate of 3 to 4 percent.

Now, under the JCPOA, Iran has received access to an additional $100 billion in previously frozen foreign assets, significantly boosting its accessible foreign exchange reserves. Sanctions were also lifted on Iran’s crude oil exports and upstream energy investment, and on key sectors of the economy and hundreds of Iranian banks, companies, individuals, and government entities. The additional access of Iranian institutions to global financial payments systems has reduced transaction costs and the need for intermediaries.

In the current fiscal year – with declining oil prices and a tight monetary policy to rein in inflation – Iran’s economy grew only slightly, and may have even experienced a modest contraction. But in the coming fiscal year, its economy is projected to grow at a rate of 3 to 6 percent, according to estimates from the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, and private sector analysts. Assuming that Iran continues to make modest economic reforms to attract investment, the country’s economic growth is projected to stabilize around 4 to 4.5 percent annually over the next five years.

The future success of Iran’s economy depends on privatization, encouraging competition, addressing corruption, recapitalizing banks, and strengthening the rule of law. If Tehran wants to encourage foreign investment and alleviate international banks’ concerns, it also needs to end its support for terrorism, missile development, and destabilizing regional activities, and to reduce the economic power of the Revolutionary Guard Corps and the supreme leader’s business empire. All of these increase the risks of investing in the Islamic Republic, regardless of what deal sweeteners the White House provides.

Meanwhile, there is Russia who did NOT attend the Obama Nuclear Security Summit, but Russia is quite busy.

FreeBeacon: Russia is doubling the number of its strategic nuclear warheads on new missiles by deploying multiple reentry vehicles that have put Moscow over the limit set by the New START arms treaty, according to Pentagon officials.

A recent intelligence assessment of the Russian strategic warhead buildup shows that the increase is the result of the addition of multiple, independently targetable reentry vehicles, or MIRVs, on recently deployed road-mobile SS-27 and submarine-launched SS-N-32 missiles, said officials familiar with reports of the buildup.

“The Russians are doubling their warhead output,” said one official. “They will be exceeding the New START [arms treaty] levels because of MIRVing these new systems.”

The 2010 treaty requires the United States and Russia to reduce deployed warheads to 1,550 warheads by February 2018.

The United States has cut its warhead stockpiles significantly in recent years. Moscow, however, has increased its numbers of deployed warheads and new weapons.

The State Department revealed in January that Russia currently has exceeded the New START warhead limit by 98 warheads, deploying a total number of 1,648 warheads. The U.S. level currently is below the treaty level at 1,538 warheads.

Officials said that in addition to adding warheads to the new missiles, Russian officials have sought to prevent U.S. weapons inspectors from checking warheads as part of the 2010 treaty.

The State Department, however, said it can inspect the new MIRVed missiles.

Disclosure of the doubling of Moscow’s warhead force comes as world leaders gather in Washington this week to discus nuclear security—but without Russian President Vladimir Putin, who skipped the conclave in an apparent snub of the United States.

The Nuclear Security Summit is the latest meeting of world leaders seeking to pursue President Obama’s 2009 declaration of a world without nuclear arms.

Russia, however, is embarked on a major strategic nuclear forces build-up under Putin. Moscow is building new road-mobile, rail-mobile, and silo-based intercontinental-range missiles, along with new submarines equipped with modernized missiles. A new long-range bomber is also being built.

SS-N 30

SS-N 30

“Russia’s modernization program and their nuclear deterrent force is of concern,” Adm. Cecil Haney, commander of the U.S. Strategic Command, which is in charge of nuclear forces, told Congress March 10.

“When you look at what they’ve been modernizing, it didn’t just start,” Haney said. “They’ve been doing this quite frankly for some time with a lot of crescendo of activity over the last decade and a half.”

By contrast, the Pentagon is scrambling to find funds to pay for modernizing aging U.S. nuclear forces after seven years of sharp defense spending cuts under Obama.

Earlier this month, Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Congress that Russia continues to pose the greatest threat to the United States.

“The one that has the greatest capability and poses the greatest threat to the United States is Russia because of its capabilities—its nuclear capability, its cyber capability, and clearly because of some of the things we have seen in its leadership behavior over the last couple of years,” Dunford said.

In addition to a large-scale nuclear buildup, Russia has upgraded its nuclear doctrine and its leaders and officials have issued numerous threats to use nuclear arms against the United States in recent months, compounding fears of a renewed Russian threat.

Blake Narendra, spokesman for the State Department’s arms control, verification, and compliance bureau, said the Russian warhead build-up is the result of normal fluctuations due to modernization prior to the compliance deadline.

“The Treaty has no interim limits,” Narendra told the Free Beacon. “We fully expect Russia to meet the New START treaty central limits in accordance with the stipulated timeline of February 2018. The treaty provides that by that date both sides must have no more than 700 deployed treaty-limited delivery vehicles and 1,550 deployed warheads.”

Both the United States and Russia continue to implement the treaty in “a business-like manner,” he added.

Mark Schneider, a former Pentagon official involved in strategic nuclear forces, however, said he has warned for years that Russia is not reducing its nuclear forces under the treaty.

Since the New START arms accord, Moscow has eliminated small numbers of older SS-25 road-mobile missiles. But the missiles were replaced with new multiple-warhead SS-27s.

SS-27 Mod 2

SS-27 Mod 2

“The Russians have not claimed to have made any reductions for five years,” Schneider said

Additionally, Russian officials deceptively sought to make it appear their nuclear forces have been reduced during a recent nuclear review conference.

“If they could have claimed to have made any reductions under New START counting rules they would have done it there,” Schneider said.

The Obama administration also has been deceptive about the benefits of New START.

“The administration public affairs talking points on New START reductions border on outright lies,” Schneider said.

“The only reductions that have been made since New START entry into force have been by the United States,” he said. “Instead, Russia has moved from below the New START limits to above the New START limits in deployed warheads and deployed delivery vehicles.”

Deployment of new multiple-warhead SS-27s and SS-N-32s are pushing up the Russian warhead numbers. Published Russian reports have stated the missiles will be armed with 10 warheads each.

Former Defense Secretary William Perry said Thursday that New START was “very helpful” in promoting strategic stability but that recent trends in nuclear weapons are “very, very bad.”

“When President Obama made his speech in Prague, I thought we were really set for major progress in this field [disarmament],” Perry said in remarks at the Atlantic Council.

However, Russian “hostility” to the United States ended the progress. “Everything came to a grinding halt and we’re moving in reverse,” Perry said.

Other nuclear powers that are expanding their arsenals include China and Pakistan, Perry said.

Perry urged further engagement with Russia on nuclear weapons. “We do have a common interest in preventing a nuclear catastrophe,” he said.

Perry is advocating that the United States unilaterally eliminate all its land-based missiles and rely instead on nuclear missile submarines and bombers for deterrence.

However, he said his advocacy of the policy “may be pursuing a mission impossible.”

“I highly doubt the Russians would follow suit” by eliminating their land-based missiles, the former secretary said.

Additionally, Moscow is building a new heavy ICBM called Sarmat, code-named SS-X-30 by the Pentagon, that will be equipped with between 10 and 15 warheads per missile. And a new rail-based ICBM is being developed that will also carry multiple warheads.

Another long-range missile, called the SS-X-31, is under development and will carry up to 12 warheads.

Schneider, the former Pentagon official, said senior Russian arms officials have been quoted in press reports discussing Moscow’s withdrawal from the New START arms accord. If that takes place, Russia will have had six and a half years to prepare to violate the treaty limits, at the same time the United States will have reduced its forces to treaty limits.

“Can they comply with New START? Yes. They can download their missile warheads and do a small number to delivery systems reductions,” Schneider said. “Will they? I doubt it. If they don’t start to do something very soon they are likely to pull the plug on the treaty. I don’t see them uploading the way they have, only to download in the next two years.”

The White House said Moscow’s failure to take part in the nuclear summit was a sign of self-isolation based on the West’s sanctions aimed at punishing Russia for the military takeover of Ukraine’s Crimea.

A Russian official said the snub by Putin was directed at Obama.

“This summit is particularly important for the USA and for Obama—this is probably why Moscow has decided to go for this gesture and show its outrage with the West’s policy in this manner,” Alexei Arbatov, director of the Center for International Security at the Russian Academy of Sciences, told the business newspaper Vedomosti.

A Russian Foreign Ministry official, Mikhail Ulyanov, told RIA Novosti that the summit was not needed.

“There is no need for it, to be honest,” he said, adding that nuclear security talks should be the work of nuclear physicists, intelligence services, and engineers.

“The political agenda of the summits has long been exhausted,” Ulyanov said.