TIMELY TV: With targeted attacks on terrorist leaders much in the news, HBO and Israeli-based entertainment producer Keshet International are developing a limited series about the secret history of Israel’s targeted assassinations. According to Deadline Hollywood, the focus of the first season is on an alleged joint operation between the CIA and Mossad to take out Imad Mughniyeh who was killed in Damascus in 2008. Mughniyeh was walking past a car when a bomb, placed in a spare tire, killed him instantly. The series was inspired by a book called Rise and Kill First by Ronen Bergman.
YOU CAN’T RUN, AND YOU CAN’T HIDE: Speaking of terrorist takedowns, last week ISIS leader Abu Abdul Bari was captured in Iraq. Dubbed “Jabba the Jihadi” and “Jabba the Hutt,” it would not be accurate to say he had been “on the run” for a while. Bari weighed in at 560 pounds. Arresting forces had to haul him away in the back of a pickup truck because he couldn’t fit in a police car.
FOURTH TIME THE CHARM? Various media outfits are reporting that on Friday January 17th, Andrew Peek, the senior director for European and Russian Affairs at the NSC, was escorted off the White House grounds and placed on administrative leave. Sources told Axios that it had something to do with a “security-related investigation.” Peek had only been on the job for a short while – having followed Tim Morrison who replaced Fiona Hill (both of whom testified in the House impeachment hearings, as the senior NSC staff working on Russia for the Trump administration. Peek is a former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State and former Army intelligence officer. We know that National Security Advisor Robert O’Brien is hard at work slimming down the NSC staff (which had grown to resemble Jabba the Jihadi in size) but it doesn’t sound like Peek’s departure was part of that kind of restructuring.
AREN’T PLUMBERS SUPPOSED TO STOP LEAKS? Financial Times reports that Swiss police think they uncovered two Russian spies, posing as plumbers, who planned to bug world leaders at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week. The untrustworthy tradesmen were reportedly picked up way back in August when officials grew suspicious after noting that the plumbers were staying an unusually long time at the high-end resort. Oddly, the Russian plumbers claimed diplomatic immunity. The Swiss cops couldn’t pin any illegal acts on the pair but think they thwarted attempts to gather sensitive information from the politicians and billionaires who descend on Davos for the annual winter event. No charges were filed – but the plumbers were sent packing after what was no doubt a wrenching interrogation.
EVEN MORE DIRT ON THE PLUMBERS: Be sure to sign up for “Inside the SCIF”, JJ Green’s national security newsletter blast. Coming up in the next edition, exclusive details about the alleged “Plumbers Plot”. The scheme to wiretap and possibly harm participants so alarmed authorities, that some people got calls warning them about coming to the event.
UNDIPLOMATIC MUSTACHE: Harry Harris is a retired four-star Navy admiral. He was set to become U.S. ambassador to Australia when someone had a better idea and re-routed him to Seoul to be U.S. ambassador to South Korea. It hasn’t been entirely smooth sailing for Harris at his new post. He has noted that some people don’t like his newly grown mustache. Others point out that it might be his Japanese ancestry (his mom was Japanese, his father a U.S. naval officer). And, according to AP, some South Koreans blame Harris’s “outspoken manner that they see as undiplomatic and rude.” But it might just be that Harris is getting lip from the South Koreans for demanding on behalf of the administration $5 billion a year for U.S. forces stationed there. That demand has been lowered substantially, but if a new deal isn’t negotiated soon the U.S. may start sending furlough notices to local nationals employed on U.S. bases there.
IS YOUR TV WATCHING YOU? The FBI is recommending that you keep an eye on your smart TVs and other smart devices to make sure those high-tech toys aren’t snooping on you. “Unsecured devices can allow hackers a path into your router, giving the bad guy access to everything else on your home network that you thought was secure," one FBI field office is quoted as saying by the website BleepingComputer.com.
SUE GORDON COMES OUT IN STYLE: Former Principal Deputy DNI Sue Gordon has maintained a low public profile since being shown the door by the Trump administration last August. But she recently dropped the cloak of secrecy (a bit) in the fashion magazine InStyle. Gordon reveals that on the day the president appointed her to her job as PDDNI she found out she had cancer. And her first day on the job was also her first day of radiation. Nevertheless, she worked long hours leading the IC (getting her husband a puppy to keep him company during her absence.) Gordon is also featured in an InStyle article: The Badass 50 2020: Meet the Women Who Are Changing the World.
THE HIGH COST OF BEARING WITNESS: In the November 15, 2018 Dead Drop we mentioned that State Department, DOD, NSC Staff and IC personnel who were swept up in the ongoing impeachment debate were running up high legal bills. Veteran journalist Robin Wright now adds to the story writing in The New Yorker about The Staggering (and Uncovered) Legal Bills Facing Impeachment Witnesses. Wright says that despite State Department assertions that Foggy Bottom would help cover legal fees incurred by Department employees, some witnesses have accrued as much as a half million dollars in legal fees that are not being covered by the Department. Apparently, the State Department has a plan to reimburse legal fees up to $300 an hour. But partners at bigtime DC law firms charge up to $1200 an hour – and even low-level associates bill at twice the amount that State is authorized to pay. Those lucky enough to have had professional liability insurance in advance, are finding that it also pays only a small portion of typical fees. Some of the high-priced attorneys are working pro bono – and support groups like the American Foreign Service Association are soliciting donations to help but the prospect of running up big bills because your job required you to be in the wrong place at the wrong time has left many witnesses with a worrisome cloud hanging over them.
POCKET LITTER: Bits and pieces of interesting /weird stuff we discovered:
FLASH MOB: CBS News correspondent Melissa Quinn got her hands on a pocket-sized flash card suggesting it had been given to Senators advising them how to evade reporters during the current impeachment bruhaha. The card arms the Senators with handy phrases like: “Please move out of my way,” “You are preventing me from doing my job,” “Please excuse me, I am trying to get to the Senate Floor,” and “Please do not touch me.” A number of pundits immediate speculated that the flip side of the card might have the phrase: “You’re a liberal hack – I’m not talking to you” which Senator Martha McSally, (R, AZ) deployed recently on CNN correspondent Manu Raju. But it turns out the card predates the current flap and was designed by Capitol Police to help Senators and staffers deal with any protestors they might encounter. Our question: do our elected leaders need help in thinking up” “Please move out of my way” and “Please don’t touch me”?
DON’T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY: A French publisher said this week that it “bitterly regrets” putting out a new high school textbook which said that the 9/11 attacks on the U.S. were orchestrated by the CIA. The book is titled “History of the 20th Century in Cards” (which must have lost something in the translation.) The New York Times says the publisher, a company called Ellipses, “said that the conspiracy theory was “devoid of any factual basis” and “does not reflect the editorial line of Ellipses or the position of its author.”
OUT OF THIS WORLD UNIFORM NEWS: In this week’s edition of “Silly Military Uniform News” we bring you word that the new U.S. Space Force has unveiled its new working uniform – very similar to the woodland camouflage design sported by the Army and Air Force. This prompted nearly the entire Twitterverse to come up with the same joke: why do you need to be able to blend in with trees and shrubs in space? An all-black working uniform might have made more sense – but we suspect the leadership didn’t want their troops to look like storm troopers. We also learned that the Space Force or “USSF” (which sounds like a second-tier football league) already has its own twitter feed. The site says it was created in March 2009. Since the USSF was formally established just days ago – this may mean they may have already mastered time travel.
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