more on US Military cognitive dissonance hits a new low

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: "Stephen D. Poe" <sdpoe () acm org>
Organization: Nautilus Solutions
Reply-To: sdpoe () acm org
Date: Sat, 30 Nov 2002 01:22:06 -0600
To: dave () farber net
Subject: Re: <[IP]> US Military cognitive dissonance hits a new low

Dave -

Three comments on Mr. McCandlish's post.

1. DEFCON

"DEFCON" is not a single condition, nor is it set by the Air Force, or
NORAD. Instead:
"Defense readiness conditions (DEFCONs) describe progressive alert
postures primarily for use between the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the
commanders of unified commands. DEFCONs are graduated to match
situations of varying military severity, and are numbered 5,4,3,2, and 1
as appropriate. DEFCONs are phased increases in combat readiness. (from
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/usa/c3i/defcon.htm).

"DEFCON 1" does not mean "being at war with nukes" as Mr. McCandlish
states; rather: 
"In general terms, these are descriptions of DEFCONs:
DEFCON 5 Normal peacetime readiness
DEFCON 4 Normal, increased intelligence and strengthened security
measures 
DEFCON 3 Increase in force readiness above normal readiness
DEFCON 2 Further Increase in force readiness, but less than maximum
readiness 
DEFCON 1 Maximum force readiness."
(also from http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/usa/c3i/defcon.htm).

DEFCON in the post Cold War era is no longer an indicator of how close
we are to nuclear war with the Soviets; rather, it is a measure of the
threat environment in a particular theatre. So the appropriate question
might be rephrased as "What is the DEFCON for a particular Theatre
today?" 

In terms of discussing DEFCON with the public, I quote Victoria Clarke
at a DOD News Briefing,
"Q: Torie, is the DEFCON status -- what is the DEFCON status in the
Philippines, especially the southern Philippines? And has it changed
since the explosion? And have U.S. soldiers been told to stay away from
public areas, such as markets?
A: Clarke: Well, we try hard not to talk about DEFCON status. They
change. They go up and down. A great deal of leeway is given, if you
will, to the local commanders to decide what they think is appropriate.
And I am absolutely confident the commander is taking any appropriate
measures." (from
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Oct2002/t10042002_t1004asd.html).

A public discussion of the DEFCON status for a particular location might
reveal that we have received intelligence of an imminent attack and are
increasing our security to respond to it, not necessarily something we'd
want the other side to know. It's a matter of balancing the freedom of
the press and of the public to know versus the value of not letting the
other side know how much you know, especially of tactical matters.

2. NORAD 
NORAD's home page can be found at http://www.norad.mil/.

The top link of the page reads: "For Current United States Threat Level
(click here)". 

NORAD is not run by the Air Force. See the 2002 Unified Command
announcement:

"As the secretary said, we're going to create a new combatant command,
U.S. Northern Command, and assign it the mission of defending North
America and supporting the military's responsibilities to civil
authorities. 
The commander of Northern Command will also be the commander of North
American Aerospace Defense Command, or NORAD. NORAD's missions to deter,
detect, and defend against air and space threats to North America will
not change. 
U.S. NorthCom's geographic area will include, as the secretary said, the
continental United States, Alaska, Canada, and Mexico, portions of the
Caribbean, and the contiguous waters out -- in the Atlantic and Pacific
Oceans, out to a minimum of 500 miles, so they can defend in depth."
(from http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Apr2002/t04172002_t0417sd.html)

3. "WHAT AND WHO THE HELL ARE WE BOMBING TODAY"

DOD provides briefings, when appropriate, of who we have bombed (notice
past tense). It is not appropriate to provide advance notice of
potential tactical military activities; it would put the troops
performing them at too great a risk. It is no more appropriate than it
would be appropriate for a police department to pre-announce what
addresses they were going to raid and who they expected to arrest there.

Finally, going to the stated "initial contact point" for the US Govt. -
http://www.firstgov.gov - and entering the search "Iraq No Fly 2002
bombing" yielded 452 hits, so the US Govt. is certainly providing a fair
amount of information about who we're bombing and when.

Thanks,
Stephen
-- 
P.S. Are We Too Risk Averse, Part II,
http://www.edocmagazine.com/vault_articles.asp?ID=25259&header=e_webexclusiv
e_header.gif
--------------------------<sig>-------------------------------
Stephen D. Poe, CEO                         Nautilus Solutions
sdpoe () nautilussolutions com                    +1.214.532.0443
               http://www.nautilussolutions.com
      Helping management turn technology into profits.™

In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice.
   But, in practice, there is. - Jan L.A. van de Snepscheut
-------------------------</sig>-------------------------------



> Subject: US Military cognitive dissonance hits a new low
> Date: Wed, 27 Nov 2002 19:51:18 -0500
> From: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
> To: ip <ip () v2 listbox com>
>
> ------ Forwarded Message
> From: Stanton McCandlish <mech () cryptorights org>
> Date: Wed, 27 Nov 2002 16:24:55 -0800
> To: dave () farber net
> Subject: <<[For IP?]>> US Military cognitive dissonance hits a new low
>
> So here I am thinking, "Hmm, I wonder whether or not all this War on
> Terrorism (TM) business has affected our national DEFCON?" (DEFense
> CONdition; in peacetime it is usually stable at 5; as war becomes more
> imminent the number decreases, with DEFCON 1 being "at war with nukes",
> as I understand it anyway.)  This seems to me to be a pretty reasonable
> question/concern for any American citizen (or any foreign one for that
> matter, given that we have the most powerful military in the world and
> are sitting on the hugest stockpile of bombs and other ordnance and
> weapons in human history.  Not to mention there's something
> suspiciously similar to a war going on right this moment.)
>
> Google reveals nothing useful, even with searches like "NORAD DoD
> DEFCON current status".  All I get is stuff about hacker conventions
> and video games, and a few bits about what the DEFCON was at some
> former point in time.  Ask.com, when fed the simple question, "What is
> the current DEFCON status?" yields similar results.  The only way this
> can happen is if the US government simply doesn't provide any
> easy-to-find information about this.
>
> So I try a second tactic.  I head over to www.af.mil (the US Air Force,
> which controls NORAD, which controls the status of the DEFCON.)  They
> even have a big, long index page of all Air Force websites.  Is NORAD
> listed?  Nope.  What about a DEFCON page?  Nope.  Shees, even "No Such
> Agency" has a pretty elaborate website these days; why doesn't NORAD?
>
> As if this "uninformation" situation were not bad enough, the real
> cognitive dissonance slammed home actually as soon as I got to the Air
> Force home page.
> The top news item on it is a *chow line in a mess hall*.  I'm couldn't
> make this up, go look for yourself.  What about WHAT AND WHO THE HELL
> ARE WE BOMBING TODAY?  This is beyond disinformation and propaganda;
> it's more like an utter disconnect from reality and our citizenry's
> urgent concerns regarding that reality.  If I were a more Zen person
> I'd probably find this funny.
>
> --
> _____________________________________________________________________
>   Stanton McCandlish                     chief communications officer
>   +1.415.334.5533 #1                  CryptoRights Foundation (501c3)
>   https://www.cryptorights.org/       Securing Human Rights Worldwide


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