READY, FIRE, AIM: We’ve been scratching our heads trying to remember any other occasion where an incident crisis was as poorly handled as was the firing of the commanding officer of the USS Theodore Roosevelt. In less than a week, Acting Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly went from saying at a press conference that Captain Brett Crozier would “face no retaliation” for sending a memo about the health of his crew, to firing him, to making midnight calls to reporters claiming that Crozier had panicked, to flying to Guam to tell the crew their ex-skipper must have been either “naïve” or “stupid” and should have known his words would leak to the media, to having his own words leak to the media, to issuing a statement saying he stood by every word of his diatribe, to hours later apologizing for some of those words and hours later resigning. For a detailed (mind blowing blow-by-blow timeline, check out Defense One.) Seriously, if you can think of a bigger bungled handling of a significant matter – send us a note.
JOBS REPORT: Who said good jobs are hard to come by these days? Judging by the turnover and turmoil in high government offices – there seems to be a lot of opportunity. We can’t begin to mention all the comings and goings – but here are a couple job developments that caught our eye. Axios reports that the President is considering billionaire Steve Feinberg for some undefined senior intelligence role within the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. It is unclear exactly what job that would be – but Axios says it would be one that doesn’t require senate confirmation. This comes on the heels of the president firing the Intelligence Community’s Inspector General Michael Atkinson and the appointment of Thomas Monheim as interim. Earlier this week, the White House announced the nomination of five other IG’s including Peter M. Thomson, an attorney from New Orleans, to fill the CIA’s IG post, which has not had a confirmed person in the position since 2015. That is not a typo. The Pentagon may also be close to filling one of their most important senior vacancies – that of Under Secretary for Policy. This position has been vacant since late February when John Rood was forced out reportedly for being insufficiently loyal to the president, Now Politico says two finalists for the job are frequent Fox News commentators – retired Army Colonel Douglas Macgregor and retired Army Brigadier General Anthony Tata.
WHO COULD HAVE IMAGINED SUCH A THING? Often, the aftermath of major national crises, such as Pearl Harbor or 9/11, reveals two distinct phases. First, people say: No one could have imagined something like this. Then, shortly thereafter, people say they pretty much predicted exactly what happened and say: “If only they had listened to me.” The same goes with COVID-19. Some administration officials are still in the “no one could have imagined” mode – but others are busy trotting out memos they wrote predicting doom and gloom. (See White House trade adviser Peter Navarro’s memo that somehow magically found its way to The New York Times.) We won’t repeat all the other “I told you so” claims – but we did stumble across an interesting warning worth mention. We bring it up not so much because of the precision of the caution but because of the title. In December 2004, the National Intelligence Council produced one of their unclassified period papers “Mapping the Global Future – Report of the National Intelligence Council’s 2020 Project.” Hmm. 2020. Pretty much nailed that part. The unclassified paper published more than 15 years ago, examined what the world would look like now. Experts cited in the paper said they found it improbable that there would be a major global conflict in 2020 but, “…another large-scale development that we believe could stop globalization would be a pandemic.” The report said, “Some experts believe it is only a matter of time before a new pandemic appears, such as the 1918–1919 influenza virus that killed an estimated 20 million worldwide. Such a pandemic in megacities of the developing world with poor health-care systems—in Sub-Saharan Africa, China, India, Bangladesh or Pakistan—would be devastating and could spread rapidly throughout the world.” It might be worth tracking down those experts and asking them how the world maps its way out of the crisis.
THIS WEEK IN MYTH BUSTING: Hardly a week goes by without us telling you about some story circulating on social media about the U.S. intelligence community that is to coin a phrase: “fake news.” This week, we found a story alleging that the CIA has arrested a Harvard scientist for creating the novel coronavirus. Setting aside the fact that the CIA does not arrest people, the story is based on the true story that Dr. Charles Lieber, the chair of Harvard’s Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology was charged by the Department of Justice with lying about how much money he was getting from the Chinese government and about his affiliation with the “Wuhan University of Technology” (marvelously nicknamed “WUT”.) The allegations about the coronavirus connection were circulated in a YouTube video. A somewhat more reliable source, The New York Times, reported at the end of January Dr. Lieber’s arrest. But the conclusion of various fact-checking outfits was that his arrest was not related to COVID-19.
POCKET LITTER: Bits and pieces of interesting /weird stuff we discovered:
PICK A CARD – ANY CARD: A lot of people are finding that they now have some unexpected time on their hands and some in the media are trying to help by suggesting ways to spend that time. Washington’s City Paper points out that “Collection Deck” is a trading card game developed by the CIA to train its officers. Thanks to the Freedom of Information Act, you can print out everything you need to play the game at home for free.
I FEEL THE NEED FOR LESS SPEED: On several occasions, The Dead Drop has relayed some of the hype for the upcoming sequel to “Top Gun” – this one known as “Top Gun: Maverick” (Because “Top Gun 2” would have been too easy.) Military Times reports that the planned release date of June 24th has been pushed back by at least six months. While Maverick can shoot down most opponents – apparently COVID-19 has caused him to cool his jets.
SHOW BIZ REPORT: Well, “Top Gun: Maverick” may be deploying the speed brakes – but there are lots of other national security TV series and movies on the horizon. Here are a few items of interest.
HAVANA JOB: Trioscope Studios is working on a TV series about the CIA in Fidel Castro’s Cuba. Based on the book, The Havana Job, the story is about three CIA “agents” who “bungle their way into Castro’s clutches while attempting to bug diplomatic offices in Havana and end up in Cuba’s most notorious prison. Trioscope is only beginning to “package” the show – meaning don’t look for it on your TV any time soon. Producer L.C. Crowley, quoted in Deadline, hypes it thusly: “It’s a bonkers story. It’s like The Dirty Dozen, it’s got heist, it’s got a wily Castro playing chess with the CIA, a lot of really good set piece work that lends itself to Trioscope.”
BLACK FILES: Looking for something sooner? The Science Channel just started airing a series called “Black Files Declassified” airing on Thursday nights at 10PM. Former CIA operative (at least they didn’t call him “agent”) Mike Baker hosts the series. He reportedly “will look at different top-secret government programs steeped in cutting edge science. Conducting his own research, speaking with journalists, experts, former government and black file officials and scientists, he'll stop at nothing to delve deeper into these black files than has ever been done before.”
SPY WARS: Also airing in a limited run on the Smithsonian Channel is a series called “Spy Wars with Damian Lewis.” New episodes air Sunday evenings at 8PM where host Damian Lewis (Brody from “Homeland”) “invites you into the world of clandestine ops as he examines some of the modern era's most remarkable intelligence and security missions. Through declassified items and firsthand accounts from high-ranking officials from the FBI, CIA, KGB, and MI6, we reveal stories of daring escapes, thrilling rescues, notorious spy swaps, and undercover stings, featuring a cast of double agents, moles, heroes, and traitors.” Sounds like fun.
STOP THE PRESSES: If you DO have a little extra time on your hands these days – you might just pick up a book. The are some recommendations of books you might like (and a few you might hate) in The Cipher Brief’s Under Cover book review section. Fortunately, there are a lot of books to choose from because a lot of books have had their publication dates delayed due to COVID-19. For example, “The Spymasters: How the CIA Directors Shape History and the Future” by Chis Whipple was due out this month but the publisher, Scribner has delayed it until September. Look for a review in The Cipher Brief – when the book does come out.
NATIONAL SECURITY NEWS SOURCES: If you’re looking for the latest national security news that you are not hearing about everywhere else, sign up for WTOP national security correspondent JJ Green’s Inside the SCIF newsletter.
WASH YOUR HANDS, DON YOUR MASK AND ANSWER THIS QUESTION: Have you got any pressing news that would look good in The Dead Drop? If so, shoot us a note at TheDeadDrop@theCipherBrief.com.
