DUST OFF THE TUX FOR SPY PROM: Who doesn’t love a Washington black-tie dinner? Especially one where the ‘who’s who’ of the national security world comes to mingle. Former Congressman Will Hurd dubbed last year’s Cipher Brief HONORS Dinner as ‘spy prom’ and the label stuck given that national security luminaries like George Tenet, Dr. Michael Vickers, General Michael Hayden, The Hon. Stephanie O’Sullivan, The Hon. Sue Gordon and other leaders came to honor those who have helped us better understand national security and where it’s headed. Last year’s dinner recognized a range of honorees from CIA Director Bill Burns to award-winning journalist Walter Pincus to Hollywood Showrunner Howard Gordon, of ‘24’ and ‘Homeland’ fame. We’re psyched to see who will be honored this year as the envelopes are opened later this month.
SO SOON? With confirmation hearings of cabinet-level nominees for the new administration already underway, and the ‘inside-the-beltway’ guessing game about who will be confirmed and who might not be, a recent piece in Politico seemed a bit premature but that’s Washington for you. The column speculated that Marco Rubio – yet to be confirmed as Secretary of State – may be among the first cabinet officials to be ousted from his future job. Nahal Toosi, Politico’s senior foreign affairs correspondent, suggested that Rubio will be “lucky to last a year at Foggy Bottom.” Speculation has already begun as to who will replace Rubio.
WANNA BET? We did notice that there seems to be a boom in betting on political prospects. There are lots of sites where you can wager on which Trump administration nominees will be confirmed and even by how many votes. For example, PredictIt.org allows prognosticators to buy shares in candidate prospects. When we last checked, they were bullish on Pete Hegseth’s chances of squeaking through as Secretary of Defense, but thought the odds were that Tulsi Gabbard would get 49 or fewer votes to be Director of National Intelligence. Another outfit called “Kalshi” was taking wagers on who will attend Trump’s inauguration with people like New York City mayor Eric Adams being a coin toss – while former quarterback Tom Brady came in at only 14%. A site called “Polymarket” offers chances to wager your cryptocurrency on whether the Trump inauguration will be watched by more people than those who watched Biden’s. While it may be a safe bet to assume that there will be heavy wagers on that question coming in from Mar-a-Lago, we’re betting that most people really don’t care.
THE NAME GAME: Whenever a U.S. presidential administration is about to change – particularly from one party to another, it is interesting to watch the outgoing crew try to take care of unfinished business and make last-minute decisions on matters that will long outlive their tenure. Sometimes these issues are big – other times small and symbolic. But in either case – they often carry great meaning. One example of that has been the recent spate of announcements on the naming of U.S. Navy ships. The authority to name ships rests in the hands of the Secretary of the Navy and the current occupant of that office, Carlos Del Toro is about to “go ashore” (as they say in the fleet.) But not without leaving his mark. A couple of his decisions were so big – he let President Biden take credit for them – those being the naming of an aircraft carrier USS WILLIAM J. CLINTON (CVN 82), and another USS GEORGE W. BUSH (CVN 83.) The latter may cause some confusion because there already is a USS GEORGE H.W. BUSH – so when the new one comes on line – they may have to keep them in different oceans to avoid confusion – but that date is so far off in the future – there will be plenty of time to sort it out. If CVN 82 is on schedule and not operating on “Clinton time” (aka: late) it won’t be commissioned until 2036. No one is guessing when the GEORGE W. BUSH will hit the fleet but it will be some time after CLINTON. Del Toro also named a destroyer after former Senator Bob Kerrey, who was the first Navy SEAL to earn the Medal of Honor. But wait, there’s more. Del Toro also announced the naming of attack submarines POTOMAC, NORFOLK, and BROOKLYN and a ballistic missile submarine GROTON. Separately, he named an amphibious transports dock ship TRAVIS MANION after a Marine Silver Star recipient. Del Toro also named a couple surveillance ships for oceanographers and an expeditionary ship. As we were writing this – Del Toro named four more ships. At last count, he was up to 16 for this month alone. If he were as prolific at building ships as he is at naming them – they’d have to name some future ship USS DEL TORO. But the slow pace of Navy shipbuilding matched with the fast pace of Del Toro’s naming may mean that the incoming Trump administration will have to wait years for new construction in need of a moniker.
CAN’T THAT BE UNDONE? We hear you saying, ‘Sure, the outgoing Biden administration has issued press releases naming aircraft carriers for past presidents – including ones who Donald Trump is not big fans of and since the ships won’t actually be built for years – couldn’t the new Secretary of the Navy undo what Del Toro just did?’ Short answer: yes – but. The “but” isthat there is a centuries old superstition that renaming ships angers the sea gods and brings badluck. But the incoming administration is not known for hewing to tradition – so don’t rule outone of these ships eventually being re-named USS HULK HOGAN or some such.
DON’T UNDO THIS ONE, THOUGH: Sliding in to homebase just in time, the Biden Administration released a 50+ page Executive Order on ‘Strengthening and Promoting Innovation in the Nation’s Cybersecurity’ this week. Now, technically, this EO, like all others could be ‘undone’ come Monday but this one includes language on cyber that is being applauded by experts from both political parties. One unnamed source told us they liked the language on space systems and endpoint (a cyber nerd term that describes characteristics of a service endpoint - like how expensive it is or how good it is). Another source reminded us that the Biden Administration – while taking over from the former Trump Administration – did not ‘undo’ many of the EO’s pertaining to cyber from the former administration, so perhaps – if not everyone can come together on everything – we can at least show some unity on the cyber front, eh?
BAIT AND SWITCH: There’s no debate. You don’t want to be assigned a “bait mission” for a North Korean infantry unit deployed in Russia’s war on Ukraine. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that documents found on a dead North Korean soldier who had been sent to the European warfront, showed that he and others had been instructed on how to deal with the threat of Ukrainian drones. With crudely drawn stick figure illustrations, the documents indicated that one member of his unit would be designated as the “bait” and told to stand still in a field to lure a drone while two of his hidden battle buddies would try to shoot it down. The WSJ reproduced the jottings found on the now-dead soldier: “If a UAV is spotted, gather in groups of three. One person must act as bait to lure the drone while the other two take aim and neutralize it with precision shooting. The bait must maintain a distance of 7 meters from the drone. The other two should prepare to shoot down the drone from a distance of 10–12 meters. When the bait stands still, the drone will stop and it can be shot down.” Apparently, at least in his case, the tactic did not work.
CRAMPED QUARTERS FOR Q: A British court recently heard about the exploits of a Bulgarian national who has pleaded guilty of running spy operations on behalf of Russia. According to Sky News, Orlin Roussev told his controller that “he was becoming like the James Bond character known as ‘Q’ as he prepared his spying ‘toys’ for kidnap and surveillance operations across Europe.” Roussev apparently was a film fan because he also described the stockpile of spy gear he amassed in a seaside hotel as being his “Indiana Jones warehouse.” Included in the stash, according to The Daily Mail, was “a black cap with a concealed camera, a one-litre plastic Coke bottle with waterproof camera behind the label, and a surveillance camera and micro SD card hidden in a soft toy Minion character from the cartoon Despicable Me.” Sounds like his calling may have been more geared toward the entertainment industry.
POCKET LITTER: Dead Droplets and bits and pieces of interesting stuff we discovered:
SOME DISASSEMBLY REQUIRED: Don’t you hate it when you misplace stuff around the office? Maj. Gen. Artur Kepczynski of the Polish armed forces can relate. He was fired recently because some anti-tank mines that he was responsible for went missing. Missing that is, until they turned up at an IKEA warehouse. It is unclear how the mines were mislaid in June 2024 but, according to press accounts, the devices which contained over 1,000 tons of explosives, traveled around Poland on a train for a while and then somehow ended up in the furniture store warehouse. Apparently, there was an attempt by some folks to cover up the loss of the mines until IKEA called to ask the Polish military “when they would collect their mines.”
PLEASE CHECK THE WAREHOUSE – TO SEE IF THOSE NEWS TIPS YOU HAVE BEEN MEANING TO SHARE WITH US HAVE BEEN LEFT BEHIND. IF SO, PLEASE SEND THEM TO US AT: TheDeadDrop@theCipherBrief.com
The intersection of technology, defense, space and intelligence is critical to future U.S. national security. Join The Cipher Brief on June 5th and 6th in Austin, Texas for the NatSecEDGE conference. Find out how to get an invitation to this invite-only event at natsecedge.com
Read more expert-driven national security insights, perspective and analysis in The Cipher Brief because National Security is Everyone’s Business.
