Hey SEALS, Turnover your Weapons

Twisted priorities at the Pentagon, mandated by the White House and congressional budgets, then couple that with waste, fraud and abuse, ladies and gentlemen, our problems are much worse than can be defined.

Just WHOA…

SOCOM investigating Navy SEAL weapons shortages

STRIPES: WASHINGTON — The general in charge of U.S. Special Operations Command said Tuesday that he is looking into claims that Navy SEALs and other elite forces have shortages of key equipment.

Gen. Joseph Votel assured House lawmakers that the command will resolve any problems that it discovers in equipping special operators, such as a lack of service weapons, in preparation for increasingly common missions around the world.

Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., and other House lawmakers raised the alarm earlier this month on supply shortages in the special operations community, causing soldiers to dip increasingly into their own pockets to purchase basic military gear such as helmets, global positioning devices and medical supplies.

Most concerning, according to Hunter, is SEALs are now asked to hand over their personalized weapons after returning from deployment so they can be handed off to other SEALs who are deploying.

“I look forward to talking to Navy Special Warfare Command about this specific issue and make sure we understand it,” said Votel, who was testifying to members of the House Armed Services Committee. “If there is something that we are contributing to that is impacting the readiness of our operators, we’ll certainly take immediate actions to kind of correct that.”

Votel said the issue might be related to maintenance and the high usage of SEAL weapons.

“These guys do put a lot of rounds through the weapons,” he said. “What we do try to do is ensure with that many rounds going through our weapons that they do have the right level of depot maintenance when they do come back from deployments or long training periods.”

Hunter, who wrote a letter in February to the Navy Special Warfare Command about the concerns, brushed aside the general’s suggestion.

“This is not a factor of too many rounds going through the weapon barrel, and then you just change out the barrel anyway,” Hunter said.

He said the weapons are the most important pieces of equipment for the SEALs. They put time into calibrating their weapons and applying optics and lasers, then are forced to turn them over for reconfiguration.

“I’ve had multiple SEALs at multiple times over the last six months come to me in San Diego … and tell me how things have changed dramatically from five or six years ago, meaning they don’t get weapons now to work up with for two years,” Hunter said. “They get their weapon when a guy comes back and hands over the weapon.”

The military has increased its reliance greatly on special operations forces since 9/11. As such operations hit a high mark, other reports of supply shortages have come up as well.

Last month, the nonprofit group Troops Direct reported the Marine Corps Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Team deployed to Benghazi, Libya after the embassy attack there and lacked crucial equipment including sniper supplies and batteries.

Meanwhile, troops often have to buy their own medical equipment such as tourniquets, and shell out about $1,000 each for their own helmets or $500 for GPS devices, according to the group.

The shortfalls in SEAL weapons have surfaced, as the Navy Special Warfare Command budget increased by $11 million during the past couple of years, according to Hunter.

Rep. Richard Nugent, R-Fla., a member of the House Armed Services Committee, said he could not understand why the Navy would rotate SEALs’ service weapons and that he wanted answers.

“That’s the [weapon] you sleep with, the one you work with, so I will be interested to hear from Rep. Hunter the answer you come back with,” Nugent told Votel.

****

Lacking basic gear, special operators stuck buying their own equipment

STRIPES: WASHINGTON – Sean Matson, who recently left active-duty as a Navy SEAL, said the military measured his head four times – each time before deployment – with plans to provide him a more advanced ballistic helmet.

But the new helmet never materialized. During a deployment in Africa, Matson and six of his fellow SEALs each shelled out about $900 for updated helmets that held the lights, communications devices and batteries needed for their missions.

“There was never a clear solution to it, so guys were going out spending $800-$900 on their own ballistic helmet,” said Matson, who is now CEO of the military supply company Matbock.

Elite troops such as the SEALs are more and more forced to dip into their own pockets to purchase basic military gear such as helmets, global positioning devices and medical supplies, according to Matson and others involved in the military’s unofficial civilian-side supply network who came to Capitol Hill on Thursday.

House lawmakers have taken notice and said they will request an explanation from Defense Secretary Ash Carter.

“These are the guys we assume have the best gear all the time,” said Rep. Duncan Hunter, R-Calif., a Marine Corps combat veteran.

Hunter said special operations troops have been approaching him in his California district complaining about the inability to get needed materials and he has been investigating the issue.

Numerous individual instances point to a systemic problem in the military’s supply chain but a blind spot exists between Defense Department vendors and the troops who need the gear and supplies, Hunter said.

“It’s been impossible for me to find out how the money is getting stopped and why it is not going down to where it’s supposed to be,” he said.

Aaron Negherbon is the executive director of the nonprofit group Troops Direct, which ships needed and requested supplies – from boot laces to tablet devices — to servicemembers who cannot get it through their commands.

Less than two days after the attack on the U.S. embassy in Benghazi, Libya, Negherbon said he was contacted by the commander of a Marine Corps Fleet Anti-Terrorism Security Team that was being deployed there.

The commander told him the team lacked a variety of crucial equipment, including sniper supplies, he said.

“They came to us for…batteries because they didn’t have any of those … It is kind of like, ‘What the heck is going on?’” Negherbon said.

He said troops often have to buy their own medical equipment such as tourniquets, and shell out about $1,000 each for their own helmets or $500 for a GPS device that they need for duty during a deployment.

“The question is, why can’t you get this?” Negherbon said.

Often the answer seems to be a higher command does not have the money budgeted or the equipment was approved but not available from vendors.

“That is a good thing, we know where the problem is but [those issues] are very profound,” he said.

A small group of House Republican lawmakers gathered Thursday to hear the concerns.

Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., an Air Force combat veteran, said the military has to weigh the concerns of supplying needed equipment with the desire of troops to always have the newest gear on the market.

Still, Kinzinger said the shortfalls in the supply chain could become a major issue if deployments ramp up again to the levels seen during the height of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

Rep. Chris Gibson, R-N.Y., an Army veteran, said the group should write a letter to Carter, saying they have serious concerns about supply breakdowns, including the inability of Matson and his fellow SEALs to get helmets capable of mounting lights, though the equipment was approved.

“If you’ve got a situation where unit is approved for an Ops-Core [brand ballistic] helmet and it’s not getting it, we need to understand what the problem is … that is unacceptable,” he said.

Hey Pentagon, Hiring Hackers, a Good Idea?

Personally I do see some positives, but I see more downsides….what say you?

The Department of Defense announced today that it will invite vetted hackers to test the department’s cybersecurity under a unique pilot program.  The “Hack the Pentagon” initiative is the first cyber bug bounty program in the history of the federal government.

 

Under the pilot program, the department will use commercial sector crowdsourcing to allow qualified participants to conduct vulnerability identification and analysis on the department’s public webpages.  The bug bounty program is modeled after similar competitions conducted by some of the nation’s biggest companies to improve the security and delivery of networks, products, and digital services. The pilot marks the first in a series of programs designed to test and find vulnerabilities in the department’s applications, websites, and networks.

 

Participants in the bug bounty will be required to register and submit to a background check prior to any involvement with the pilot program.  Once vetted, these hackers will participate in a controlled, limited duration program that will allow them to identify vulnerabilities on a predetermined department system.  Other networks, including the department’s critical, mission-facing systems will not be part of the bug bounty pilot program.  Participants in the competition could be eligible for monetary awards and other recognition.

This innovative project is a demonstration of Secretary Carter’s continued commitment to drive the Pentagon to identify new ways to improve the department’s security measures as our interests in cyberspace evolve.

Pentagon to Establish Defense Innovation Advisory Board

WASHINGTON, March 2, 2016 — In an effort to enhance the Defense Department’s culture, organization and processes by tapping innovators from the private sector in Silicon Valley and beyond, Defense Secretary Ash Carter announced plans today to establish a Defense Innovation Advisory Board, Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said.

 Google, CEO

The initiative represents the secretary’s enduring commitment to building lasting partnerships between the public and private sectors, Cook said in a statement.

“Just as the Defense Business Board provides advice to the department on best business practices from the private sector, the Defense Innovation Advisory Board will provide advice on the best and latest practices in innovation that the department can emulate,” Cook added.

The board’s mandate is to provide department leaders independent advice on innovative and adaptive means to address future organizational and cultural challenges, the press secretary said, including the use of technology alternatives, streamlined project management processes and approaches — all with the goal of identifying quick solutions to DoD problems.

Areas Deeply Familiar in Silicon Valley

The board will seek to advise the department on areas that are deeply familiar to Silicon Valley companies, such as rapid prototyping, iterative product development, complex data analysis in business decision making, the use of mobile and cloud applications, and organizational information sharing, Cook said, and will not engage in discussion of military operations or strategy.

Alphabet Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt will chair the board, which will be composed of up to 12 people who have successfully led large private and public organizations and excelled at identifying and adopting new technology concepts, Cook said.

Carter and Schmidt will jointly select the board, Cook said. “Members will represent a cross-section of America’s most innovative industries, drawing on technical and management expertise from Silicon Valley and beyond,” he added.

As chairman of Alphabet and as the author of “How Google Works,” Schmidt has a unique perspective on the latest practices in harnessing and encouraging innovation and in the importance of technology in driving organizational behavior and business operations, Cook said.

**** Background

US spy chief James Clapper highlights cyber threats

BBC: US intelligence agencies have placed cyber attacks from foreign governments and criminals at the top of their list of threats to the country.

Online assaults would increasingly undermine US economic competitiveness and national security, said Director of National Intelligence James Clapper.

A report issued by his office said Russia’s military was setting up a cyber command to carry out attacks.

The report also describes China, Iran and North Korea as leading threats.

In testimony to a congressional committee on Thursday, Mr Clapper said he no longer believed the US faced “cyber Armageddon”.

The idea that major infrastructure such as financial networks or power grids could be disabled by hackers now looked less probable, he said.

However he warned: “We foresee an ongoing series of low-to-moderate level cyber attacks from a variety of sources over time, which will impose cumulative costs on US economic competitiveness and national security.”

Mr Clapper highlighted the case of Russia, which he said posed the greatest a cyber risk to US interests. He said that threat from the Russian government was “more severe” than previously realised.

He also said profit-minded criminals and ideologically driven hackers were also increasingly active.

Over the past year there have been a series of high-profile cyber attacks against US targets.

North Korea was accused of being behind the theft of a huge data cache from Sony Pictures in November.

Mr Clapper also mentioned the example of an alleged Iranian attack on the Las Vegas Sands Casino Corporation last year.

Meanwhile in January the Twitter and YouTube accounts of the US military command were hacked by a group claiming to back Islamic State (IS).

During the hearing, Mr Clapper acknowledged that the US had its own “offensive capabilities”.

In 2010 Iran experienced a cyber attack on its nuclear program. Tehran accused Israel and the US of planting malware.

bin Ladin’s Book Shelf, Declassified

The Usama bin Ladin Book Shelf, all links are functional, Posted by ODNI

 

In the weeks following the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan by United States forces, U.S. Intelligence Community analysts sifted through the recovered digital and hard copy materials in search of clues that would reveal ongoing al-Qa`ida plots, identities and locations of al-Qa`ida personnel, and other information of immediate importance.

On May 20, 2015, the ODNI released a sizeable tranche of documents recovered from the compound used to hide Osama bin Laden. March 1, 2016, marks the release of the second tranche of material gleaned from the Abbottabad raid.  These releases, which followed a rigorous interagency review, align with the President’s call for increased transparency–consistent with national security prerogatives–and the 2014 Intelligence Authorization Act, which required the ODNI to conduct a review of the documents for release.

Pointer Declassified Material – March 1, 2016  (113 items)  new


| HIDE SECTION |

Pointer Declassified Material – May 20, 2015  (103 items)
Pointer Publicly Available U.S. Government Documents   (75 items)
Pointer English Language Books   (39 items)
Pointer Material Published by Violent Extremists & Terror Groups   (35 items)
Pointer Materials Regarding France   (19 items)
Pointer Media Articles   (33 items)
Pointer Other Religious Documents   (11 items)
Pointer Think Tank & Other Studies   (40 items)
Pointer Software & Technical Manuals   (30 items)
Pointer Other Miscellaneous Documents   (14 items)
Pointer Documents Probably Used by Other Compound Residents   (10 items)
The Intelligence Community will be reviewing hundreds more documents in the near future for possible declassification and release.  An interagency taskforce under the auspices of the White House and with the agreement of the DNI is reviewing all documents. All documents whose publication will not hurt ongoing operations against al-Qa‘ida or their affiliates will be released.This list contains U.S. person information that is being released in accordance with the Fiscal Year 2014 Intelligence Authorization Act (section 309) requirement that the Director of National Intelligence conduct a declassification review of certain items collected during the mission that killed Osama bin Laden on May 1, 2011, and make publicly available any information declassified as a result of such review.

All publications are unclassified and available commercially or in the public domain. The U.S. Intelligence Community does not endorse any of the publications appearing on this list.

UK Muslim Brotherhood, Cross/Double-Cross

China to lay off five to six million workers

Hank Paulson: China needs to let ‘failing companies fail’

Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, who oversaw bank bailouts during the global financial crisis, has different advice for China: Let companies fail.

“They can show right now they’re very serious about dealing with inefficient state-owned enterprises as they take capacity out of the steel industry, coal industry and others by letting some failing companies fail,” Paulson, who was Treasury secretary from 2006-2009, told CNBC’s Squawk Box on the sidelines of an Institute of International Finance event organized in conjunction with the G20 meeting in Shanghai.

As Treasury secretary, Paulson oversaw a $700 billion government-funded bailout of U.S. financial institutions that were seen as “too big to fail” in the global financial crisis.

Paulson, who is also a former chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs, added that China needed to move faster to promote competition.

“Competition is about opening up to the private sector, which is the future, and it’s about putting the state-owned enterprises on a level playing field,” said Paulson,, who earlier this decade founded the independent think tank Paulson Institute promoting sustainable and environmental projects. “There’s clearly room to move faster.”

Last year, China issued guidance on reforming often-inefficient state enterprises, such as introducing mixed public-private ownership as well as pushing for mergers and share sales, but the market isn’t always certain of progress on this front.

Exclusive: China to lay off five to six million workers, earmarks at least $23 billion

Reuters: China aims to lay off 5-6 million state workers over the next two to three years as part of efforts to curb industrial overcapacity and pollution, two reliable sources said, Beijing’s boldest retrenchment program in almost two decades.

China’s leadership, obsessed with maintaining stability and making sure redundancies do not lead to unrest, will spend nearly 150 billion yuan ($23 billion) to cover layoffs in just the coal and steel sectors in the next 2-3 years.

The overall figure is likely to rise as closures spread to other industries and even more funding will be required to handle the debt left behind by “zombie” state firms.

The term refers to companies that have shut down some of their operations but keep staff on their rolls since local governments are worried about the social and economic impact of bankruptcies and unemployment.

Shutting down “zombie firms” has been identified as one of the government’s priorities this year, with China’s Premier Li Keqiang promising in December that they would soon “go under the knife”..

The government plans to lay off five million workers in industries suffering from a supply glut, one source with ties to the leadership said.

A second source with leadership ties put the number of layoffs at six million. Both sources requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media about the politically sensitive subject for fear of sparking social unrest.

The ministry of industry did not immediately respond when asked for comment on the reports.

The hugely inefficient state sector employed around 37 million people in 2013 and accounts for about 40 percent of the country’s industrial output and nearly half of its bank lending.

It is China’s most significant nationwide retrenchment since the restructuring of state-owned enterprises from 1998 to 2003 led to around 28 million redundancies and cost the central government about 73.1 billion yuan ($11.2 billion) in resettlement funds.

On Monday, Yin Weimin, the minister for human resources and social security, said China expects to lay off 1.8 million workers in the coal and steel industries, but he did not give a timeframe.

China aims to cut capacity gluts in as many as seven sectors, including cement, glassmaking and shipbuilding, but the oversupplied solar power industry is likely to be spared any large-scale restructuring because it still has growth potential, the first source said.

DEBT OVERHANG

The government has already drawn up plans to cut as much as 150 million tonnes of crude steel capacity and 500 million tonnes of surplus coal production in the next three to five years.

It has earmarked 100 billion yuan in central government funds to deal directly with the layoffs from steel and coal over the next two years, vice-industry minister Feng Fei said last week.

The Ministry of Finance said in January it would also collect 46 billion yuan from surcharges on coal-fired power over the coming three years in order to resettle workers. In addition, an assortment of local government matching funds will also be made available.

However, the funds currently being offered will do little to resolve the problems of debts held by zombie firms, which could overwhelm local banks if they are not handled correctly.

“They have proposed this dedicated fund only to pay the workers, but there is no money for the bad debts, and if the bad debts are too big the banks will have problems and there will be panic,” said Xu Zhongbo, head of Beijing Metal Consulting, who advises Chinese steel mills.

Factories shut down would have to repay bank loans to avoid saddling state banks with a mountain of non-performing loans, the sources said. “Triangular debt”, or money owed by firms to other enterprises, would also have to be resolved, they added.

Although China has promised to help local banks transfer the bad debts of zombie steel mills to asset management firms, local governments are not expected to gain access to the worker lay-off funds until the zombie firms have actually been shut down and debt issues settled.

($1 = 6.5476 Chinese yuan)