SpyTalk: September 19, 2010 - September 25, 2010

A subterfuge by a group of ex-spies?

All summer the Association of Former Intelligence Officers had advertised the big catch for its annual fall luncheon: Michael J. Morell, the new deputy director of the CIA. With so many major CIA issues in play -- Afghanistan and the...

By Jeff Stein  | September 24, 2010; 6:10 PM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (2)
Categories:  Entertainment, Financial/business, Intelligence, Media  
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GlobalOptions sues ex-exec in security firms tiff

Updated on Sept. 20, 2012: This lawsuit has been settled. GlobalOptions, the private Washington security firm that once billed itself as “a private CIA,” is suing a former top executive who left the company for a competitor this summer and...

By Jeff Stein  | September 23, 2010; 6:43 PM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)
Categories:  Financial/business, Intelligence, Lawandcourts  
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Gimigliano departs, CIA has a new top ‘voice’

CIA spokesman Paul Gimigliano is turning over his megaphone to his deputy, he announced Thursday afternoon. “I am delighted to report that Director [Leon] Panetta has asked George Little to head the Office of Public Affairs here at CIA,” the...

By Jeff Stein  | September 23, 2010; 5:17 PM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (0)
Categories:  Backchannel chatter, Intelligence  
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British spy chief fretted over U.S. intelligence leaks

Following their victorious collaboration with the American OSS during World War II, British intelligence leaders were eager to continue a close relationship with their U.S. counterparts in the looming Cold War against the Soviet Union. But they worried about leaks...

By Jeff Stein  | September 23, 2010; 2:48 PM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (3)
Categories:  Intelligence, Media  
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CIA drones killed U.S. citizens in Pakistan, book says

CIA drones killed “many Westerners, including some U.S. passport holders” in Pakistan’s tribal area during the George W. Bush administration, the new book by Bob Woodward says. Woodward,a longtime Washington Post journalist, writes in "Obama's Wars" that then-CIA Director Gen....

By Jeff Stein  | September 22, 2010; 11:19 PM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (10)
Categories:  Foreign policy, Intelligence, Justice/FBI  | Tags:  Asif Ali Zardari, Leon J. Panetta, Michael Hayden, Steven Kappes  
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White House, CIA ignore reported Pollard gambit

Jonathan Pollard (AP Photo/Karl DeBlaker) The Obama administration is publicly ignoring a reported offer from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to extend a settlements freeze in exchange for the release of Jonathan Pollard, the convicted Israeli spy. Pressure to...

By Jeff Stein  | September 21, 2010; 6:20 PM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (9)
Categories:  Foreign policy, Intelligence, Lawandcourts  
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Woodward dismisses CIA guard's dispute of Casey deathbed visit

Washington Post editor Bob Woodward ON Monday dismissed the allegation of a former CIA security officer that his famous account of interviewing CIA Director William Casey on his hospital deathbed was “fabricated.”

By Jeff Stein  | September 21, 2010; 8:57 AM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (2)
Categories:  Entertainment, Intelligence  | Tags:  Simon & Schuster  
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FBI misled Justice about spying on peace group

There was a time in the 1960s when the FBI’s illegal surveillance of left-wing groups seemed, and maybe even was, sinister if not broadly menacing. Parts of today’s Justice Department report on its more recent activities, however, evoke that old...

By Jeff Stein  | September 20, 2010; 2:35 PM ET  |  Permalink  |  Comments (12)
Categories:  Intelligence, Justice/FBI, Lawandcourts  | Tags:  Greenpeace, PETA, Quakers, Robert S. Mueller III, Thomas Merton  
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