Tuesday, January 04, 2011

Making Waves

The counter-intelligence officer briefed us on, among other things, the case of Daniel James, the British corporal convicted of spying on ISAF for Iran.  I had never before heard of James, who, his name notwithstanding, had emigrated to Britain from Iran as a child.

“So how many other Iranian born people have the Brits sent us?” I asked during the final Q&A.

I almost felt sorry for the poor CI guy, as this question clearly caught him off guard.  Visibly struggling to regain his footing, he stammered, “Well, I don’t have any specific numbers . . . .  Mainly we rely on you folks to flag suspicious behavior for us . . . and anyway, [finding his stride] there’s no reason to be suspicious of someone just because they were born in Iran.”

“So what you’re telling us, as a counter-intelligence professional,” I replied, “is that there is no relationship between James’ country-of-origin and his successful recruitment by the intelligence agency of his country-of-origin?”

“Well, we wouldn’t think that every person from Iran was a potential spy just because he was born in Iran.”

4 comments:

Elusive Wapiti said...

I think the Chinese or the Israelis would disagree with the pretty lies this CI pro is telling.

Justin said...

hahah, phi, you rabble rouser!

Dexter said...

"there’s no reason to be suspicious of someone just because they were born in Iran."

First of all, as a CI guy, it is your job to be suspicious of everybody regardless of where they are born. That's what you do, that's your raison d'etre. Leave the "diversity is strength" crap to the State Dept pukes.

Secondly, maybe there’s no reason to be suspicious of someone just because they were born in Iran, but someone born in Iran who works for ISAF or wants to must be considered an Iranian spy until they prove otherwise.

WTF are they teaching at CI school these days? This is the level of naivete after 9 years of war in Afghanistan, in which the Iranians have been meddling from Day One? Sheesh.

Anonymous said...

That would be racial profiling and that would be more evil than hitler gassing the Jews. So don't look under that rock. Poor CI guys. He is everything we have come to expect from years of government service.

**BONUS. Word verification is Kabul.