U.S. Spies Really 'Surprised' By Georgia Attacks?

U.S. Spies Really 'Surprised' By Georgia Attacks?

By Jeff Stein | August 12, 2008 2:19 AM


If Georgia's invasion of South Ossetia took Washington by surprise, as some reports have it, then American intelligence is in far worse shape than we've even imagined.

If the Pentagon and CIA were also caught flat-footed by Russia's response, as the McClatchy Newspapers' crack Washington bureau is reporting, then we have to ask: Why are we spending $55 bllion a year on intelligence? What are we getting out of it?

"I wouldn't say we were blind," a State Department official told McClatchy's Jonathan Landay on Monday.

"I would say that we mostly were focused elsewhere, unlike during the Cold War, when we'd see a single Soviet armor battalion move. So, yes, the size and scope of the Russian move has come as something of a surprise."


A "surprise." My, oh, my.

Except I don't believe it.

As easy as it is to believe that the CIA, etc., blew another huge event, I find it impossible to accept that not one of the 127 Pentagon advisors in Georgia, including Special Forces and intelligence contractors, were clueless about Tblisi's intent -- and preparations -- to move into South Ossetia.

more...

http://blogs.cqpolitics.com/spytalk/2008/08/us-spies-surprised-by-georgia.html

might be a threat to this regime's bloody grip on power.

Not that I'd put it past the thugs.

Pretty strong evidence to me.

What is overlocked in this report is that Georgia attacked Ossetia, a separatist area that leaned toward allignment with Russia. People are acting the same way they did when Bush et al made false claims about Iraq. It seems to me that the warmongers need to have not just one (Iran, for instance) but many enemies. It's as though we can be good only by making others evil. Things are more complex and very few, if any, countries do things just because they're "evil." My god, not only do we need to attack Iran, while remaining in Iraq forever and in Afghanistan, we need to attack Russia. And while we're at it, why not just take on China at the same time? Anyone who doesn't do things we want done is ergo "evil" and must be attacked by our mighty army. This reminds me of how my mother used to tell me, when I didn't do what she wanted, that everyone else in the family agreed with her and wanted nothing more to do with me. I see this as the way authoritarian agents behave. I'm not for or against Georgia or Russia; I just think we should see the complexity of what countries all over the world do, regardless of our interests. Of course we've been trying to get Georgia on our side because we've now decided Russia is once more the Cold War enemy. Remember how Cheney went to Uzbekistan and embraced them against Russia? So we lead these countries to believe we'll support them, just as BushI led the Shias to believe we'd support them against Hussein in 1991. This is telling the world that everyone is against the "enemy" but we have no intention of really risking ourselves by sending in an army. We don't even have the troops necessary to attack Russia. Russia has atomic bombs, remember? What are these warmongers thinking?

Perhaps this is exactly what the Republicanz wanted (and need)

for the most part, not unlike a wall street research tool, and not only insofar as it relates to any as-such terrorism though that is in there to some extent oil and acquisition being key to everything; and so primarily for the benefit of American Corporatism. To try to see that American corporations have leg-up on a world that is passing them by in terms of money, ideas, and cache. Not the security of the American people. Surely SAT photos could have seen military movements on the ground.

If that's what they were looking for.