WIKI WAR WARNING? A Yahoo News story on Sunday created quite a splash. It alleged that in 2017, the U.S. considered kidnapping Wikileaks leader Julian Assange from the Ecuadorian embassy in the U.K. and imagined scenarios that might have included shoot outs in the streets of London or shooting out the tires of an aircraft that might be waiting to whisk Assange away to Moscow, or even assassination. The piece, by veteran correspondents Zach Dorfman, Sean Naylor and Michael Isikoff, tied the Assange angst to anger from then-CIA director Mike Pompeo who was reportedly outraged by the role that Wikileaks played in releasing the so-called “Vault 7” hacking tools used by the Agency. We’ve talked with a lot of experienced CIA alumni (none who were involved in this matter) and the consensus, was that the story overhyped the notion that the Agency might trigger gun battles less than two miles from Kensington Palace or open fire on Putin’s plane tires. “Pompeo might have asked for some creative recommendations,” one vet told us, “but anyone who seriously proposed those kinds of ideas would be better suited working in Hollywood than Langley.” The story is headlined: “Inside the CIA’s secret war plans against WikiLeaks” but about 90 paragraphs into the very lengthy piece, you find that suggestions of assassinating Assange were viewed inside the Agency as “unhinged and ridiculous.” The consensus from our sources is that one thing the Yahoo piece is likely to accomplish is increase the likelihood that Assange’s lawyers will be able to successfully fight his extradition to the U.S. The lack of official denials and condemnations of the story suggest that there must be a little “there, there” in the story – but maybe not as much as some would like to believe. On Wednesday, Pompeo also suggested that the authors should “…write such a novel” but undercut the cut – but adding “Whoever those 30 people who allegedly spoke with one of these reporters, they should all be prosecuted for speaking about classified activity inside the Central Intelligence Agency.”
MORE THAN A HALF CENTURY WITHOUT A PROMOTION: Actor Daniel Craig has been made an honorary commander in Her Majesty’s Royal Navy – a rank equivalent to that held by James Bond in countless books and movies going back to the 1960s. In a press release, the Royal Navy quoted him thusly: Commander Craig said: “I am truly privileged and honoured to be appointed the rank of Honorary Commander in the senior service.” It is perhaps not a coincidence that the appointment comes just ahead of the premiere of the latest Bond flick, “No Time to Die.” HMS Dragon, an air defense destroyer, appears in the movie.
BLOCKHEADS: Vice.com recently reported that the NSA, CIA and other agencies within the Intelligence Community are among U.S. government entities that deploy ad blocking technology internally because of the extreme danger of online advertising. Senator Ron Wyden has written to OMB urging that all government agencies apply stricter rules. The article about ad-blocking was picked up in a variety of other publications – including one called “Neowin” which ended its version of the story with a note saying: “As an online publication, Neowin too relies on ads for operating costs and, if you use an ad blocker, we'd appreciate being whitelisted.”
NEW D/COO: The CIA announced on Wednesday the appointment of Maura Burns to be the Agency’s Deputy Chief Operating Officer. Burns is a 33-year veteran of the CIA whose most recent assignment was Assistant Director of the Weapons and Counterproliferation Center. She replaces John Edwards who had been the “D/COO” since 2019. His first public gig in that job was to speak at the 2019 Cipher Brief Threat Conference about innovation at CIA. After retiring, Edwards will be taking his innovation skills to his new job as president of the CIA Officers Memorial Foundation – taking the reins from the retiring Jerry Komisar.
ARMY PUBLIC AFFAIRS AND THEIR TERRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD WEEK: Last week, we told you about how, BGen Amy Johnston, the chief of Army public affairs, was suspended from her job after 97% of the respondents to an official survey of her command reported “workplace hostility.” Things couldn’t get much worse for Army PAOs, right? Well, on September 23rd multiple news organizations reported that there was an active shooter loose on the Army base at Fort Meade, Maryland – only to find out it was just a drill. Military.com says as part of active shooter training – Fort Meade public affairs posted on social media: "Exercise Exercise Exercise— Reports of an active shooter, please shelter in place. We will provide more information as it becomes available. Exercise Exercise Exercise." Chad Jones, the base public affairs chief, said his staff was supposed to make up simulated social media announcements for the exercise – but he didn’t make it clear enough to them not to actually post them. When real-world reporters saw the alert – and called the PAO shop to ask if there was a shooter – whomever answered the phone assumed that they were exercise participants pretending to be reporters for the drill – and so they confirmed an ongoing threat. "It was my fault," Jones said. "Next time this happens, I guarantee you I'm asking my staff if this is a real reporter."
DON’T WATCH THIS SPACE: Rep. Jared Huffman (D, CA) is apparently not a fan of Star Wars – not the movie – the actual concept. He has reportedly introduced a bill in Congress that would force the disestablishment of the Space Force. Huffman huffed that “The long-standing neutrality of space has fostered a competitive, non-militarized age of exploration every nation and generation has valued since the first days of space travel. But since its creation under the former Trump administration, the Space Force has threatened longstanding peace and flagrantly wasted billions of taxpayer dollars.” Somehow, we don’t see the Space Force going away – after all, they’ve put all that effort into designing new uniforms and titles and besides, the Congressman apparently hasn’t learned that federal bureaucracies - once established - almost never go away.
DEPARTMENT OF CRAZY DEPARTMENTS: As you may have heard – the audit of the 2020 Arizona presidential election found that Joe Biden actually got more votes than originally thought. This likely came as a surprise to a lot of folks – like Arizona Congressman Paul Gosar who was captured on camera, on September 11,th just days before the audit results were announced, saying, "If it's what I've been told, and I had people come to me in the early hours of the day after (the election) from the Security Exchange Fraud Department to the CIA Fraud Department, that between 450,000 and 700,000 votes Arizona were altered in the state of Arizona." Sounds like another intelligence failure for the CIA. Some folks (like people who used to work there) would tell you there is no CIA Fraud Department – but that’s just what they want you to believe. But in the June 18 Dead Drop, we shared video of Roy Baker, a TikToker, who tells spam callers: “Hello. Thank you for calling the CIA. You’ve reached our Scam and Fraud Division. All of our agents are currently assisting other callers. To further assist you, please hold while we download your incoming and outgoing call logs to be analyzed against our database of known scam and fraud operations.” So maybe it was Roy Baker who tipped Congressman Gosar off.
CUOCO TO THE MAX: We’ve mentioned before the HBO Max series “The Flight Attendant” staring Kelly Cuoco. According to press accounts, in the upcoming second season, Cuoco’s character will be living in Los Angeles “while moonlighting as a CIA asset in her spare time.” She is said to work in “CIA’s civilian asset program.” We’re not sure exactly what that is – but it may be part of the Fraud Department.
POCKET LITTER: Bits and pieces of interesting / weird stuff we discovered:
FLOAT LIKE A BUTTERFLY, STING LIKE A SEAL: NBC.COM recently reported on how former Navy SEAL Mark Matzeldelaflor spent years after leaving uniform hunting for a mission that would give him the same sense of fulfillment that he got from being a sniper. The answer came to him after trying psychedelic “magic mushrooms.” He decided to reconnect with nature and help rescue monarch butterflies. Those must have been some strong mushrooms.
IT’S A BIRD, IT’S A PLANE, IT’S NOT A GOOD IDEA, MATE: Words alone cannot adequately describe the scene recently as a giant Australian C-17 flew VERY low through Brisbane City, seemingly swerving among the high rises. Check out the video here. Turns out it was a rehearsal for a flyby for the annual “Sunsuper Riverfire festival.” Apparently, the Aussie RAF has been doing this for several years – but the word had not reached the bystanders you can hear in the video expressing alarm.
NOTICE FOR CIA FRAUD DEPARTMENT ALUMNI: Got any leftover tips, scams, or un-conducted assassination attempts you want to share with the world? Drop a note to: TheDeadDrop@theCipherBrief.com.
