Sexual privacy under threat in a surveillance society

By Naomi Wolf, Special to CNN
updated 11:04 AM EST, Tue November 20, 2012

Gen. David Petraeus, 60, resigned Friday, November 9, as head of the CIA and admitted having an affair. His mistress was later identified as his biographer, Paula Broadwell. The retired four-star general formerly oversaw coalition forces in Iraq as well as U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan. He and his wife, Holly, have been married 38 years and have two grown children.


STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Naomi Wolf: We live in an increasingly intrusive surveillance society
Wolf says for her, Petraeus story is about terrifying power of Patriot and Espionage acts
She says loss of sexual privacy would be destructive to the human condition
Wolf: We should not rush to judge marriages and those who commit infidelity

Editor's note: Naomi Wolf is the author of "Vagina: A New Biography."

Naomi Wolf

(CNN) -- Once again we see the scenario unfold: A powerful man, with tremendous responsibilities, apparently "caught" in a compromising sexual situation with a woman who is not his wife.

There is the now-familiar ritual of the threats of embarrassing revelations of intimate conversations, the hunted-down "other woman" who either decides to tell more or not, the nationwide harrumphing and moralizing, and the schadenfreude-stoking musings over the humiliations of the loyal wife. And of course, there is the spectacle of another career -- in David Petraeus' case, one that distinguished him in his service to our country -- in tatters.

But while the media tell a familiar narrative of misjudgment and temptation, to me this story is about the terrifying power of the Patriot Act, married to the terrifying power of the resurrected Espionage Act -- and combined with a lethal admixture of our nation's Puritanism, prurience about and ignorance regarding sexuality.

What happened to Petraeus -- and the recent slew of other powerful men or men threatening to some power blocs, from Eliot Spitzer to Bill Clinton? They were surveilled by political elites in an increasingly intrusive surveillance society, and exposed.

We should understand that the surveillance that keeps tripping up these powerful men is not something about which only heads of state, whistle-blower publishers or generals have to worry. It also includes others in which the allegations of what initiated their downfall are more complex and serious, such as Nicolas Sarkozy and Julian Assange.

Because of the Patriot Act, any of us, if we annoy or threaten powerful interests, can have our e-mails read without our knowledge. Any of us can be subject to a search that could lead from one e-mail correspondent to another until the National Security Agency or the FBI, which have both confirmed that they have invested heavily in domestic surveillance of social networks, find something -- anything -- that could be seen as compromising.

At that point, any of us can be subjected to terrible pressure -- even legal threats -- if what is uncovered can be in any way described as "classified information."

When affairs ruin careers

Petraeus affair overshadows Benghazi

Media's Petraeus frenzy

We live at a time in which our government is vastly over-classifying subjects in the name of public interest or that might embarrass the state. Heaven forbid if anyone provides "material support" for the enemy, which is so vague a term that President Barack Obama's own lawyers confirmed to Judge Katherine Forrest, in my presence during the New York hearing on the National Defense Authorization Act this past spring, that it can be used to include basic journalism about, for instance, the Taliban, or other information the government simply does not wish exposed.

Any of us can be threatened with possessing classified information. This is why Bradley Manning has spent months in solitary confinement in prison.

We can be threatened with the Espionage Act. This is why Assange is hiding in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. If Assange were convicted of receiving classified information, and extradited under the Espionage Act, he could theoretically be shipped to Guantanamo -- for which some congressional voices have called. But that precedent casts a shadow over everyone who might have ever heard about or discussed classified information -- something that is routine in Washington.

There are still many unknowns to the Petraeus story. Maybe it really is just about the CIA and the FBI being very, very worried about Petraeus sleeping with his biographer. But we don't need to buy into this theater. If there is a national security breach -- which would be a real issue if one took place -- that can be investigated and addressed without spectacle or bullying.

Opinion: Blame affairs on evolution of sex roles

In working with these two appalling laws, we need to understand what loss of privacy means: Any of us can be brought down, intimidated, silenced, threatened, by exposure of our personal lives, for any reason.

We all have secrets we do not wish made public. Any of us can be threatened with exposure of infidelity, or sex addiction, or flirtatious communications, or addiction to embarrassing pornographic images, or alcoholism or bipolar disorder, or even our discussions with our doctors, psychiatrists or accountants -- about our most personal information.

It is hard to imagine fully what the loss of sexual privacy means to private life -- and to the human condition.

In the film "The Lives of Others," set in East Germany before the Berlin Wall came down, the state listened in on lovers doing what lovers do: quarrelling, engaging in highly intimate acts of desire and passion, and sometimes, yes, betraying their spouses. But what is clear from the depiction is that whatever private pain such betrayal as infidelity causes, the general pain and the deadening quality for everyone, of living in a society in which there is no privacy -- and no sexual privacy -- is far, far more destructive and more distorting of the human condition.

Sexual privacy is absolutely necessary for human beings to have basic dignity, and that includes the space to make mistakes or do things one may regret. A third of couples, husbands and wives, report that they have committed infidelity. What if all of those marriages were subject to surveillance and exposure?

What if the power regarding who tells you that your spouse has betrayed you, becomes not a private struggle in private life, but a matter for the state to decide? And how many people in marriages that might have survived an infidelity, might have their lives and relationships further shattered by the state, as it can do now, from knowing the details of every single e-mail or credit card record or gift?

Finally, add to this toxic mess American Puritanism and prurience. It is easy to look at what seems to be a man, a mistress and a furious wife, and to assume that one knows all about what has gone on.

But often such situations are complex. Women commit adultery as often as men do, though the media are full of stories asking: Why do men cheat? Indeed, women initiate divorce more often than men do. Female unhappiness in intimate relationships is rife in America, because of some basic misunderstandings of female desire that I have detailed in my new book.

It is not our place to judge and condemn, or to cast the first stone. A new understanding of the dangers of the Patriot and Espionage acts should show us why it is more important than ever for couples to be permitted to experience the pain and betrayal of a possible infidelity in private, without the power of the state breathing down the necks of all involved.

Of course, there is no way ever to justify an infidelity -- betrayal is always wrong. One cannot know from the outside what kind of sexual or emotional loneliness may have been part of any given marriage, what kinds of demons any one of us might struggle with.

Understanding the toxic sexual culture in which American marriages try to thrive should lead us, at least, to see such breakdowns without snap judgments. And understanding the role of a surveillance society in the state's choosing which adulterers to go after should give us pause about joining into to any theatrics of public condemnation.

Unless there was a serious state security issue in relation to this infidelity, what happened between Petraeus and Paula Broadwell should be, personally speaking, the equivalent of classified information: in other words, absolutely none of our business.

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Mainstream Media Now Openly Admits The FBI And CIA Are Reading All Your Emails

Add caption

Sunday, November 18, 2012 by: J. D. Heyes

For years, those of us who have tried to warn the American public that Big Brother monitors all Internet users were demonized, vilified and ridiculed.

Now, the mainstream media has proven us correct.

“The U.S. government — and likely your own government, for that matter — is either watching your online activity every minute of the day through automated methods and non-human eavesdropping techniques, or has the ability to dip in as and when it deems necessary — sometimes with a warrant, sometimes without,” ZDNet reported earlier this month. “That tin-foil hat really isn’t going to help. Take it off, you look silly.”
The Petraeus case

Where’s the proof that the government has this capability?

You might recall a fellow by the name of (retired) Gen. David Petraeus. He’s been in the news lately.

This four-star general-turned-CIA chief just resigned his post after news broke that he had engaged in an extra-marital affair with is biographer, herself a West Point graduate and former Army officer.

What led to this shocking discovery was Petraeus’ use, of all things, Google’s online email service, Gmail.

According to federal law, mind you, authorities are not legally permitted to electronically snoop around in your email box.

“The government can’t just wander through your emails just because they’d like to know what you’re thinking or doing,” Stewart Baker, a former assistant secretary at the Homeland Security Department who’s now in private law practice, told The Associated Press. “But if the government is investigating a crime, it has a lot of authority to review people’s emails.”

Or, in the case of the CIA, if the agency wants to track a suspect ostensibly for “national security” purposes. Ditto the NSA.

The wrangling of Petraeus’ email account has certainly landed him in a world of trouble, but his story has also, once again, ignited a new the debate over when, how and why governments and law enforcement agencies alike are able to access the email accounts of ordinary citizens – even if they head up the most powerful spy agency in the world.

Granted, experts say “the little people” needn’t worry much about having their online presence tracked. Agencies like the CIA generally tend to have bigger fish to fry, so to speak. But nevertheless, the technology to pilfer email accounts at will obviously exists.

“Forget ECHELON, or signals intelligence, or the interception of communications by black boxes installed covertly in data centers,” writes Zack Whittaker for ZDNet. “Intelligence agencies and law enforcement bodies can access – thanks to the shift towards Web-based email services in the cloud – but it’s not as exciting or as Jack Bauer-esque as one may think or hope for.”

(Editor’s Note: ECHELON, for those who are unfamiliar with it, is the name of “a global Communications Interception (COMINT) system created by the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand to routinely and indiscriminately monitor and record all forms of electronic communications worldwide (both military and civilian) and overseen by the National Security Agency,” according to one published description of the program.)
How the top CIA official got busted

When he set up his private Gmail account, Petraeus used a pseudonym and composed email messages but never sent them. They were instead saved as drafts. His lover, Paula Broadwell, would then log in under the same account, read the drafts then reply to them in the same manner – as a draft, without actually sending the message.

The exchanges would not be sent across the networks through Google’s data centers, which would make it nearly impossible for the NSA or any other ELINT (electronic intelligence) agency (like Britain’s GCHQ or the Israeli Mossad) to “read” the messages while they are in transit between accounts.

Other sinister operators – terrorists, pedophiles and the like – have been known to use the same trick to avoid detection, ZDNet reported.

“But surely IP addresses are logged and noted? When emails are sent and received, yes. But the emails were saved in draft and therefore were not sent. However, Google may still have a record of the IP addresses of those who logged into the account,” the report said.

In the end, the FBI used a little-know law called the Stored Communications Act, which is part of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, as the basis for getting a warrant to view Petraeus’ private Gmail account. And that’s how agents found the stored messages that were never actually sent.

“Once it knew Ms. Broadwell was the sender of the threatening messages, the FBI got a warrant that gave it covert access to the anonymous email account,” the BBC’s Mark Ward reported.

Sources:
http://www.zdnet.com
http://finance.yahoo.com
http://actionamerica.org/echelon/echelonwhat.html

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CIA Talking Points Changed, Petraeus Says

Petraeus: CIA talking points on Benghazi attack edited to play down al Qaeda links





Gen. Petraeus, Rep. King / AP


BY: Bill Gertz
November 16, 2012 12:00 pm

Former CIA Director David Petraeus testified at a closed hearing on Friday that the CIA’s original talking points on the Sept. 11 terror attack on Benghazi were edited to play down al Qaeda links to the attackers.

The latest revelation of the Obama administration’s mishandling of the terror attack that killed four Americans in Libya was made by Rep. Peter King (R., N.Y.), chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, who said the disclosures by Petraeus were made during a closed-door House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence hearing.

“He said it went through a long process involving many agencies including the Department of Justice, the State Department, and no one knows yet exactly who came up with the final version of the talking points, other than to say the original talking points that were prepared by the CIA were different from the ones finally put out,” King told reporters after a House Intelligence Committee closed-door hearing.

Petraeus met for 90 minutes with the House committee before moving to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.

White House spokesmen did not return emails seeking comment on who changed the talking points.

King said Petraeus testified that “from the start” he told lawmakers on Sept. 14—three days after the attack—that “there was significant terrorist involvement” in the attack.

“That was not my recollection,” King said of Petraeus’ Sept. 14 comments.

King said his “clear impression” of Petraeus’ original comments was that the overwhelming evidence was the events in Benghazi “arose out of a spontaneous demonstration.”

A State Department official told a congressional hearing a week later that it was a terrorist attack. That was the first contradiction in the administration’s false statements, King said.

The security scandal in Benghazi has called into question pre-election statements by President Barack Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice who insisted the attack was a reaction to demonstrations against an anti-Muslim video posted to YouTube.

U.S. intelligence officials told the Washington Free Beacon in early October that intelligence of al Qaeda’s growing presence in Libya was covered up by the Obama administration because it contradicted Obama’s statements at the Democratic National Convention that al Qaeda was on the path to defeat.

Numerous classified reports also revealed direct Iranian support for jihadists throughout North Africa and the Middle East, as well as increasing al Qaeda penetration into Egypt and Libya in the months before the Sept. 11 terrorist attack on the U.S. compound in Benghazi. The attack killed U.S. Ambassador to Libya Chris Stevens and three other Americans.

“The Iranian strategy is two-fold,” one official said at the time. “Upping the ante for the Obama administration’s economic sanctions against Iran and perceived cyber operations against Iran’s nuclear weapons program by conducting terror attacks on soft U.S. targets and cyber attacks against U.S. financial interests.”

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) issued a statement Sept. 28 that said: “In the immediate aftermath, there was information that led us to assess that the attack began spontaneously following protests earlier that day at our embassy in Cairo.”

“As we learned more about the attack, we revised our initial assessment to reflect new information indicating that it was a deliberate and organized terrorist attack carried out by extremists,” the ODNI statement said. “It remains unclear if any group or person exercised overall command and control of the attack, and if extremist group leaders directed their members to participate. However, we do assess that some of those involved were linked to groups affiliated with, or sympathetic to al Qaeda.”

Intelligence officials said the intelligence on a surge by al Qaeda in the region included information from both technical spying and human agents showing an alarming rise in clandestine al Qaeda activity months before the attack in Benghazi.

One official said the handling of Benghazi appeared to be a “disinformation campaign” about the attack that included the information given to Rice for her appearance on five Sunday talk shows when she said the raid was a “spontaneous” response.

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney then repeated the false information from the White House pressroom. Then Clinton was provided a partial explanation that the intelligence showed only an al Qaeda surge in nearby Mali.

On the Petraeus testimony, King said the former CIA director told the committee that his affair with Paula Broadwell did not have any impact on his testimony about the Benghazi attack.

King said the original talking points done by the CIA were “much more specific about al Qaeda involvement.” However, the final talking points mentioned “indications of extremism” despite CIA’s original points that there was al Qaeda involvement.

The talking points from CIA went through a long vetting process and when the final statement was presented the al Qaeda reference was taken out, he said.

CBS News disclosed the final talking points on Thursday. They were:
“The currently available information suggests that the demonstrations in Benghazi were spontaneously inspired by the protests at the US Embassy in Cairo and evolved into a direct assault against the US diplomatic post in Benghazi and subsequently its annex. There are indications that extremists participated in the violent demonstrations.
This assessment may change as additional information is collected and analyzed and as currently available information continues to be evaluated.
The investigation is on-going, and the US Government is working with Libyan authorities to bring to justice those responsible for the deaths of US citizens.”

King said the House is continuing to investigate the events of Benghazi and whether “anyone at the White House changed the talking points.”

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What timing?

As they say 'Timing is Everything';  And this past presidential election week takes the cake:

Benghazi Cover Up: Petraeus Resignation May Have Been A Bit Too Perfectly Timed

Ethan Case



Benghazi Cover Up Petraeus Resignation May Have Been A Bit Too Perfectly Timed


General Petraeus, director of the CIA has resigned, abruptly, in a short letter made public. At first, I was skeptical that there was an affair at all, convinced General Petraeus was either being set up, or voluntarily falling on a sword for the Obama administration. The timing of his departure is perfect for two reasons.

1. He resigns after, and not before the election.

2. He resigns just days before he was scheduled to be the key witness in congressional hearings on the Benghazi incident.

The affair was, according to inside sources but not Petraeus himself, with Paula Broadwell, the author of Petraeus's autobiography All In. She would be a likely candidate. She is not only a Westpoint graduate herself, but she is young and attractive and because she was writing Petraeus' biography, she spent an inordinate amount of time with him with the specific purpose of getting to know him. Also keep in mind, Petraeus was in Afghanistan with Broadwell when the relationship started, away from his wife, in a stressful place. He is not the first soldier to crack, it's even hard for the spouses left at home, the ones not facing war every day to stay committed to such long distance relationships. He won't be the last to go through this mess. Reportedly, the two broke it off shortly after Petraeus came home and assumed his current post, but still maintained an active correspondence via email.

The affair was discovered by accident. The FBI was investigating an unrelated matter regarding security leaks, possibly related to the massive amount of leaks in the months following the Bin Laden raid. During their investigation, which is still ongoing, Broadwell appeared on their radar. They were investigating her specifically for unauthorized access to Petareus' email, which undoubtedly would have contained top secret information. It was there that the FBI discovered emails between Petraeus and Broadwell that revealed their affair. Petraeus seems to have found out about the discovery from the FBI themselves, who were concerned that Petraeus was actually a victim. Though that turned out not to be the case.

Given how much information has become available about the specific details of the affair, it is hard to believe Petraeus would willingly ruin his reputation, much less other people's reputations all to protect the Obama administration, so it is likely thish affair actually happened.

In the days leading up to the election, the CIA, in a surprise move, released a detailed timeline of the events in Benghazi that, frankly, are rather damning to the Obama administration. At best, they were incompetent, displaying a shocking lack of coordination ability and a callous disregard for the truth as they tried to cover themselves during the campaign. At worst, they knowingly abandoned soldiers on the battlefield who were waiting for air support that never came and lied about it to secure the election.

Given the fishy timing of his resignation, there are a few possibilities:

1. Petraeus wanted to resign as soon as possible, but without creating a distraction: I find this to be the most likely case. Petraeus is too honorable not to resign ahead of a scandal like this, even though every person on planet Earth seems to have forgiven him almost immediately. However, Petraeus also is not a crass, self-absorbed politician. Petraeus never wanted to run for office, but this affair also puts the decision to outright reject Romney's VP nod into perspective as well. Petraeus is not one to cause a scene. He does his job to the best of his ability and maintains the highest standard of professionalism ... 99.9% of the time. It does the country no good to create such a huge distraction in the middle of such a contentious election. It is likely Petraeus had planned this departure in his head for a while, and waited until the first possible moment after the election to make it happen. President Obama seemed very confident deputy CIA director Mike Morrell could take over in the interim and handle the Benghazi fallout, leaving me to assume that Petraeus, Obama, and Morrell have been planning this abrupt departure for months, and preparing Morrell to step in. Anything less would have been highly unprofessional and irresponsible on Petraeus's part.

2. Petraeus is being forced to resign and this affair was used as a weapon: President Obama couldn't have been happy with Petraeus releasing that CIA timeline that not only reopened the Benghazi issue, but made the administration look exceptionally bad. Especially since it was only a week before the election. It is possible that the administration is forcing him out as retribution. However if they waited until the end of Obama's term for Petraeus to cleanly step out, that would mean a disgruntled Petraeus would be before congress next week, going into even more details about Benghazi. Something that could potentially be both very embarrassing and very bad for the administration. Once Obama's reelection was assured, they could act on removing Petraeus without worrying how the electorate would perceive it. They could have held this affair over his head, telling him that if he didn't lie to protect them, they'd go public. Rather than be blackmailed, Petraeus probably came out with it to disarm them, and left them without a replacement going into the hearings on purpose.

A spin on this possibility is that Petraeus is voluntarily resigning this way, because there is something to hide on Benghazi. If Petraeus has to get up in front of all that media scrutiny and invoke "that information is classified" over and over again, it will look terrible for both himself and the administration, and depending on the kind of questions that are asked, could invite a lot of unwanted speculation on issues that need to remain top secret — for national security reasons. Who was on the ground there in Benghazi? Who were the sources for the original tip-offs that something might happen? And the list of possible questions goes on. Petraeus may have decided that letting the investigation go with him involved in it was too risky, and opted to use the affair he had as an excuse to bail. Protecting not himself or the administration, but top secret information, the secrecy of which would protect everyone. It sounds like something out of a spy novel, but then again, so does this very well-timed affair.

3. The FBI is making the details public and Petraeus wanted to stay ahead of the news coverage: The FBI has been adamant that they do not believe the investigation will end in criminal charges. However, if she is about to face arrest, or if there is some kind of Freedom of Information Act request coming through the pipeline, it may be that Petraeus' secret was likely to be revealed and he wanted to get to the media first, so he could tell his story himself. In this scenario, the timing is merely a coincidence, though what a coincidence it is.

I tend not to be one to take conspiracy theories seriously. But there are so many unanswered questions on Benghazi, that will conveniently remain unanswered now because of this affair, I can't help but think there is something deeper going on.

One thing is for sure, there doesn't seem to be a single person, other than Petraeus's wife and possibly Broadwell's husband, who holds this against him. Despite this ungraceful exit, General Petraeus is still going down in history as an American hero and one of the greatest generals in our nation's history. He completely rewrote the book on how our country runs wars and is one of the few people who truly changed the world.

A man of his talents is not likely to disappear for very long. I am confident we will see General Petraeus again.

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Related:


CIA chief Petraeus resigns over affair

Neither Hillary Clinton Nor David Petraeus Will Testify At Benghazi Hearings
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CIA Chief: We’ll Spy on You Through Your Dishwasher

By Spencer Ackerman Author March 15, 2012 5:35 pm

CIA Director David Petraeus unwinds with some Wii Golf, 2008. Photo: Wikimedia

More and more personal and household devices are connecting to the internet, from your television to your car navigation systems to your light switches. CIA Director David Petraeus cannot wait to spy on you through them.

Earlier this month, Petraeus mused about the emergence of an “Internet of Things” — that is, wired devices — at a summit for In-Q-Tel, the CIA’s venture capital firm. “‘Transformational’ is an overused word, but I do believe it properly applies to these technologies,” Petraeus enthused, “particularly to their effect on clandestine tradecraft.”

All those new online devices are a treasure trove of data if you’re a “person of interest” to the spy community. Once upon a time, spies had to place a bug in your chandelier to hear your conversation. With the rise of the “smart home,” you’d be sending tagged, geolocated data that a spy agency can intercept in real time when you use the lighting app on your phone to adjust your living room’s ambiance.

“Items of interest will be located, identified, monitored, and remotely controlled through technologies such as radio-frequency identification, sensor networks, tiny embedded servers, and energy harvesters — all connected to the next-generation internet using abundant, low-cost, and high-power computing,” Petraeus said, “the latter now going to cloud computing, in many areas greater and greater supercomputing, and, ultimately, heading to quantum computing.”

Petraeus allowed that these household spy devices “change our notions of secrecy” and prompt a rethink of “our notions of identity and secrecy.” All of which is true — if convenient for a CIA director.

The CIA has a lot of legal restrictions against spying on American citizens.
But collecting ambient geolocation data from devices is a grayer area, especially after the 2008 carve-outs to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Hardware manufacturers, it turns out, store a trove of geolocation data; and some legislators have grown alarmed at how easy it is for the government to track you through your phone or PlayStation.

That’s not the only data exploit intriguing Petraeus. He’s interested in creating new online identities for his undercover spies — and sweeping away the “digital footprints” of agents who suddenly need to vanish.

“Proud parents document the arrival and growth of their future CIA officer in all forms of social media that the world can access for decades to come,” Petraeus observed. “Moreover, we have to figure out how to create the digital footprint for new identities for some officers.”

It’s hard to argue with that. Online cache is not a spy’s friend. But Petraeus has an inadvertent pal in Facebook.

Why? With the arrival of Timeline, Facebook made it super-easy to backdate your online history. Barack Obama, for instance, hasn’t been on Facebook since his birth in 1961.

Creating new identities for CIA non-official cover operatives has arguably never been easier. Thank Zuck, spies. Thank Zuck.

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Jesuit trained bureaucrats switch posts

Leon Panetta, new United States Secretary of Defense

Leon Panetta was born in Monterey, California, the son of Carmelina Maria (née Prochilo) and Carmelo Frank Panetta, Italian immigrants from Siderno in Calabria^[6] who owned a restaurant in Monterey. He was raised in the Monterey area, and attended Catholic schools San Carlos Grammar School and Carmel Mission School. He continued his education at Monterey High School, a public school where he became involved in student politics, and was a JSA member.^[7] As a junior he was Vice President of the Student Body, and became President of the Student Body as a senior.^[8]

In 1956, he entered Santa Clara University, and in 1960 he graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science. He also received a Juris Doctor in 1963 from the Santa Clara University School of Law, and soon after began practicing law. In 1964, he joined the United States Army as a Second Lieutenant, where he served as an officer in Army Military Intelligence.^[9] There he received the Army Commendation Medal, and was discharged in 1966 as a First Lieutenant.^[10]

General David Patraeus is the new CIA Director (replacing Leon Panetta):

Petraeus has a Bachelor of Science degree from the United States Military Academy from which he graduated in 1974 as a distinguished cadet (top 5% of his class). He was the General George C. Marshall Award winner as the top graduate of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College class of 1983.^[6] He subsequently earned an M.P.A. in 1985 and a Ph.D. in International Relations in 1987 from the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs at Princeton University. He later served as Assistant Professor of International Relations at the United States Military Academy and also completed a fellowship at Georgetown University.

Robert Gates retired from Secretary of Dept. of Defense post on July 1, 2011.

A native of Wichita, Kansas, Gates attained the rank of Eagle Scout in the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) and received the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award from the BSA as an adult.^[12][13] He graduated from Wichita High School East in 1961, with straight A's.^[14] Gates is also a Vigil Honor member within the Order of the Arrow, Scouting's National Honor Society.

Gates then received a scholarship to attend the College of William and Mary, graduating in 1965 with a B.A. in history. At William & Mary, Gates was an active member and president of the Alpha Phi Omega (national service fraternity) chapter and the Young Republicans; he was also the business manager for the William and Mary Review, a literary and art magazine.^[15] At his William & Mary graduation ceremony, Gates received the Algernon Sydney Sullivan Award naming him the graduate who "has made the greatest contribution to his fellow man." ^[15]

Gates then pursued an M.A. in history from Indiana University in 1966. Finally, he completed his doctorate in Russian and Soviet history, while working for the CIA, from Georgetown University in 1974. The title of his Georgetown doctoral dissertation is "Soviet Sinology: An Untapped Source for Kremlin Views and Disputes Relating to Contemporary Events in China" and is available from University Microfilms International as document number 7421652. He received an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from both William & Mary (1998) and the University of Oklahoma (2011)

Biographical data from WIKIPEDIA.
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[2/3] General David H. Petraeus (Georgetown Student Protest)

http://

The new world order

Written by Paul Wells on Monday, February 16, 2009 10:50

The new world order

The U.S. says it will do more for its allies, writes Paul Wells, but it wants more, too

For all the assorted domestic and foreign woes weighing down on it, the administration of U.S. President Barack Obama is still in the relatively sunlit early days when it can afford to plan a few steps ahead. So when Vice-President Joe Biden showed up at the Munich Security Conference with a sunny and soothing speech, his largely European audience should have known other emissaries with a darker message wouldn’t be far behind.

By itself Biden’s was an extraordinary speech, and when he delivered it on Saturday morning to the world’s foreign policy elite in a packed ballroom at the Bayerischer Hof hotel, it was obvious why Barack Obama had chosen him for the No. 2 slot. Biden enhances the credibility of his boss’s foreign policy message simply by being the guy who delivers it. A veteran U.S. senator, he knows the Munich crowd well. He has attended the annual weekend getaway in the Bavarian capital many times. He knows it is a more focused, less ostentatious and arguably more important gathering than the glittering World Economic Forum in Davos. A perfect place for the Obama team to road-test its message to the world.

Biden entered to a standing ovation, paused to engulf Javier Solana, the European Union’s foreign policy representative, in a bear hug, and chatted for long minutes with Henry Kissinger. Then he headed to the podium to deliver a basic message: Obama wants to make America a more deserving partner for its traditional allies.

“America will not torture,” he said. “We will uphold the rights of those we bring to justice. And we will close the detention facility at Guantánamo Bay.” He opened his kit bag of Helping Words, offering to “engage,” to “listen” and to “consult.” He promised talks with the bellicose regime in Iran, increases to foreign aid and a global environmental strategy. Catnip for European listeners who had waited long years to see the back of George W. Bush.

Biden barely hinted at the quid pro quo that everyone knew was coming. “America will do more—that’s the good news. The bad news is that America will ask more from our partners as well.”

To find out what “more” entailed, the Munich crowd had to wait only a day. The bill was delivered by David Petraeus, the four-star general in charge of the U.S. Central Command and therefore of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Richard Holbrooke, the veteran diplomat who serves as Obama’s special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan.

“I would be remiss if I did not ask individual countries to examine very closely what forces and other contributions they can provide,” said Petraeus. And if anyone was unsure what might help, Petraeus had brought along a wish list, like a blushing bride who had registered at the Counterinsurgency Boutique. “More intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance platforms,” he said. “More military police, engineers and logistics elements. Additional special-operations forces and civil-affairs units. More lift and attack helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft. Additional air medevac assets, increases in information operations capabilities, and so on.”

How could this much new effort be needed in a war that is already in its eighth year? It fell to Holbrooke to deliver the grim explanation: much of the work of the first seven years was wasted and counterproductive. “Let’s not kid ourselves,” he said in the conference’s closing minutes. “The task ahead of us is far, far more difficult than anything that has been said this morning. I have never, in my experience in the U.S. government that started in Vietnam, ever seen anything as difficult as the situation that confronts the countries involved in Afghanistan and Pakistan at this point.”

The “story of Afghanistan,” Holbrooke said, is full of pledges to do more and coordinate better that lead nowhere. In the U.S. government’s foreign-assistance program, “I have never seen anything remotely resembling the mess we have inherited.” He concluded: “In my view it’s going to be much tougher than Iraq.”

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Source: http://blog.macleans.ca/2009/02/16/the-new-world-order/

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Iraq: Stability and Boosting Oil Production

ALI AL-SAADI/AFP/Getty Images
Iraqi Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani

January 7, 2009 0017 GMT

Summary

Iraq’s oil minister has announced a new tender for the development of 11 major energy fields. The tender is part of a plan to restore — and expand upon — Iraq’s status as a major energy exporter. Whether the plan succeeds, however, depends upon Baghdad’s ability to maintain domestic stability.

Analysis
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Iraqi Oil Minister Hussein al-Shahristani on Dec. 31 announced a new international tender for the development of 11 major energy (mostly oil) fields as part of an effort to increase oil production. This second bid round comes six months after the first round of bidding was opened; six oil and two natural gas fields were offered for development in the first round. Al-Shahristani said developing the two sets of fields should allow Baghdad to increase production from its current 2.5 million barrels per day (bpd) to some 6 million bpd in the next four to five years. The Iraqi government plans to sign the contracts of the first round in mid-2009, while the second round is to be concluded by the end of the same year.



The 11 fields are Majnoon, West Qurna Phase 2, Halfaya, Gharraf, Badrah, East Baghdad, Kifl/West Kifl/Merjan, Qamarim/Gullabat/Naudman, Najmah/Al-Qayara, Khashm al-Ahmar, and Siba (the last two are natural gas fields). Each field is in a politically sensitive area. Majnoon, West Qurna Phase 2, Halfaya, Gharraf, Kifl/West Kifl/Merjan, Khashm al-Ahmar, and Siba are located in southern provinces where rival Shiite factions are pitted against one another. The East Baghdad field in the capital is in a stronghold of the al-Sadrite movement. The Najmah/Al-Qayara field is in Ninawa province contested between the Kurds and the Sunnis. Khashm al-Ahmar and the Qamarim/Gullabat/Naudman field is in the communally mixed Diyala province.
In addition to the domestic issues, three of the fields are jointly owned with neighboring Iran and Kuwait. Majnoon and Badrah are located on the Iran-Iraq border, while Siba is on the Iraq-Kuwait border. Developing them will require agreements between Iraq and its two neighbors, something that will be complicated by a row over oil fields that led to the 1990 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait and by Iranian interests in Iraq.

Political and security conditions allowing, the development of these fields could allow Iraq to re-emerge as a major oil-exporting state. Despite the global economic downturn, Iraq is the one place that could attract investment from global energy majors given the low cost of development and the potential for success.
As much as 80 percent of Iraq’s energy resources have long remained untapped. Whatever development took place occurred before the former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein became president in 1979. From there onward, Iraq’s links to the wider world became constrained. The process began with the 1980-88 war with Iran and exacerbated in the wake of the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Perhaps the worst period began with the 1991 Persian Gulf War and continued through twelve years of sanctions. The country then experienced nearly five years of insurgency in post-Baathist Iraq.
Together, this sequence of events took the country out of the select club of major oil exporters. This meant there is huge potential for increasing oil production, especially in the light of the technological developments that have taken place in the last three decades and the fact that Iraq has not barely been exposed to them.
The introduction of technology into the country will work well with the nature of Iraq’s oil fields - highly shallow and horizontal pool - and thus immensely facilitate development work. Unlike other oil fields around the world, which are deep below the surface and are in the vertical shafts, Iraq’s oil fields are in many ways large lakes that don’t require a whole lot of drilling. This aspect is extremely important from the point of view of the cost of enhancing production, which is why Iraq is the one place where the world’s energy majors are drawn to.
Having oil fields that require little work to begin production constitutes half the undertaking; being able to ship it is an equally important part of developing the energy sector. The world has many places — like Russia — where there is plenty of oil but where the fields are nowhere near any means of transport, which renders the project cost prohibitive. In Iraq, however, most of the fields are located near existing export points and other transit infrastructure. This means it does not require much effort to transport Iraqi crude.
Najmah/Al-Qayara and East Baghdad are not far from a pipeline running from Baghdad through Baiji to the tri-border area with Syria and Turkey. The Khashim al-Ahmar and Qamarim/Gullabat/Naudman are a little west of the same line. Meanwhile, the pipeline from Basra to Hadith runs through the Kifl/West Kifl/Merjan field near Najaf and runs close to Gharraf. And the Halfaya, Majnoon, West Qurna Phase 2, and Siba are located very close to the pipeline network hubbed at Basra. This leaves Badrah as the only field that is far from any existing pipeline. But since it is close to East Baghdad, it can be linked to the pipeline running north from the capital.
Despite these logistical positives, two key factors have prevented energy majors from leaping at the opportunity since the U.S. move to effect regime-change. The first has been the lack of an internationally recognized government, and the second has been a multifaceted security problem.
The Petraeus strategy allowed the United States to collapse the Sunni insurgency from within in 2007, while U.S.-Iranian dealings took care of the Shiite militia problem. The prospect of violence remains, however, given ongoing Sunni-Shiite and Arab-Kurdish tensions. On the political front, the Shiite-dominated central government has considerably extended its writ in the country. Even so, numerous faultlines at both the intra- and inter-communal levels continue to threaten the gains made over the last two years.
The issue of autonomy, which pits the central government against the Kurdistan Regional Government — especially over energy — continues to prevent the enactment of a national hydrocarbon law. Furthermore, 2009 is an election year, with provincial elections scheduled for Jan. 31 and parliamentary polls slated for later in the year. These votes are the next step in the process toward stabilizing the Iraqi state. If Iraq’s various stakeholders can move past these tensions, they will enhance the chances for success of the Oil Ministry’s plans to expand production.
Given the number of moving parts in the new Iraqi republic, any number of things could go wrong. But so long as Baghdad can maintain status quo in terms of Iraq’s relative security and stability, it stands a good chance to greatly exceed its past status as a major oil-exporting nation.

Source: http://www.stratfor.com/