On Monday, Gina Haspel made a rare public statement. It contained both a small favor and a veiled rebuke to President Trump. It was an intelligence agency kind of statement: opaque in verbiage but clear in meaning if you know the coded language of White House-Langley relations. The CIA director didn’t comment on the multiplying...
Category: Blog
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Russia’s GRU Offered Bounty on U.S. Soldiers; Trump Dismisses CIA Findings
The CIA briefed President Trump on intelligence reports that a Russian military intelligence unit offered bounties to Afghan rebels to kill American soldiers, according to the New York Times and Washington Post. Trump denies he was briefed and says the reports were not credible. The Trump administration took no action. From The Washington Post The...
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Moon Looking for New Spy Chief to Advance Inter-Korean Diplomacy
From the Seoul daily The Hankyoreh comes the latest from the Blue House, as South Korea’s presidential residence is known. President Moon Jae-in, responding to belligerent moves by North Korea’s Kim Jong-Un, plans to shake up his national security team. “It’s not a matter of ‘whether or not’ to replace the foreign affairs and national...
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Spies Wanted: CIA Turns to Online Streaming to Recruit New Officers
“Since becoming director, I prioritized how, where, and whom we recruit to be the next generation of CIA officers,” said CIA Director Gina Haspel in a recent news release. “Advertising on streaming services is an important step forward to reach talented Americans with the diversity of experiences we require to continue to be the world’s...
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Barton Gellman on Edward Snowden and the Threat of ‘Turnkey Authoritarianism’
I recently spoke with Barton Gellman, former Washington Post reporter and author of “Dark Mirror: Edward Snowden and the American Surveillance State.” The book comes seven years after Gellman was one of three reporters whom Snowden entrusted with a trove of NSA documents about the inner working of dozens of top secret U.S. surveillance operations....