Covert Operations Quotes

You're like a little girl demanding answers to questions during a covert operation. Why is the sky blue, daddy? Can I ask that man with the machine gun where the bathroom is? If you don't stay quiet, I'm going to have to dump you.

It is a little-known fact about covert operations that you will spend a lot of time with people you can’t really trust. They may be traitors and liars. We call them assets or informants. But mostly, in those days, I called him Zach.

Covert Operations Report At approximately 0900 hours on Saturday, October 14, Operative Morgan was given a stern lecture by Agent Townsend, a tracking device by Agent Cameron, and a very scary look from Operative Goode. (She also got a tip that her bra strap was showing from Operative McHenry.) The Operative then undertook a basic reconnaissance mission inside a potentially hostile location. (But it wasn't as hostile as Operative Baxter was going to be if everything didn't go according to plan.)

Far off, I heard a rumble. A land slip perhaps. Or maybe tank fire from thirty miles away. I figured the sounds of war would carry this far into the desert mountains.

I was trying to have an insight, and all I could think of was that I'd backed myself into a corner, and the corner was me.

Quietly, Macey went through her options. Even though the masked men were asking for cell phones, the gunmen were making so much noise that she was sure someone had already called 911. The obvious exits were blocked, and the elevators had no doubt been disabled. The men moved with confidence and order, but they weren’t trying to be quiet. There was nothing covert at all about this operation. Unlike the boy beside her.

House of Krahr!" the vampire with the banner barked quietly. "Krahr," the other four vampires exhaled and glared at me. Usually they roared their house name at the top of their lungs, trying to intimidate... Oh. They were trying to be inconspicuous. I bit my lip to keep from laughing. I'd never had an attempt at intimidation whispered at me before. "My lord, why are you wearing trench coats?" "We must blend in," he said. "This is a covert operation." Don't laugh, don't laugh, don't laugh..."It's very hot," I said. "Trench coats are a cold-weather garment.

The man in 4B wondered if he could have your autograph. He told me his daughter is a huge fan.” Fan? What the hell? Dylan lifted himself up and looked over the back of his seat. Since when did covert operators have fans?

Growing up, I always had a soldier mentality. As a kid I wanted to be a soldier, a fighter pilot, a covert agent, professions that require a great deal of bravery and risk and putting oneself in grave danger in order to complete the mission. Even though I did not become all those things, and unless my predisposition, in its youngest years, already had me leaning towards them, the interest that was there still shaped my philosophies. To this day I honor risk and sacrifice for the good of others - my views on life and love are heavily influenced by this.

You can tell a lot about a society by what it fears.

For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence -- on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed. It conducts the Cold War, in short, with a war-time discipline no democracy would ever hope or wish to match.

Racism is both overt and covert. It takes two, closely related forms: individual whites acting against individual blacks, and acts by the total white community against the black community. We call these individual racism and institutional racism. The first consists of overt acts by individuals, which cause death, injury or the violent destruction of property. This type can be recorded by television cameras; it can frequently be observed in the process of commission. The second type is less overt, far more subtle, less identifiable in terms of specific individuals committing the acts. But it is no less destructive of human life. The second type originates in the operation of established and respected forces in the society, and thus receives far less public condemnation than the first type. When white terrorists bomb a black church and kill five black children, that is an act of individual racism, widely deplored by most segments of the society. But when in that same city - Birmingham, Alabama - five hundred black babies die each year because of the lack of proper food, shelter and medical facilities, and thousands more are destroyed and maimed physically, emotionally and intellectually because of conditions of poverty and discrimination in the black community, that is a function of institutional racism. When a black family moves into a home in a white neighborhood and is stoned, burned or routed out, they are victims of an overt act of individual racism which many people will condemn - at least in words. But it is institutional racism that keeps black people locked in dilapidated slum tenements, subject to the daily prey of exploitative slumlords, merchants, loan sharks and discriminatory real estate agents. The society either pretends it does not know of this latter situation, or is in fact incapable of doing anything meaningful about it.

The very word "secrecy" is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings...Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe...no war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of "clear and present danger," then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent...For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence–on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.

Espionage is the world's second oldest profession.

Where is he living?” “With you.” The room fell silent. Rosalind thought she had misheard. “I beg your pardon?” “Sorry, did I skip that part? You’re getting married. For this mission, the two of you will be abandoning your present code names and becoming one combined operative. Welcome to the covert branch, High Tide.

when a group of individuals gravitated toward one another for no apparent reason, or a group of individuals inexplicably headed in the same direction as if drawn by a magnetic field, or coincidence piled on coincidence too many times, as often as not the shadowy outlines of a covert intelligence operation were somehow becoming visible.

Plus she had to admit that a small part of her secrecy was that she was holding something back, for herself. If she never told Dexter the truth, she was still reserving the right to return to her old life. To one day be a covert operative again. To be a person who could keep the largest secrets from everyone, including her husband, forever.

Secrecy is strength, what people don't know they can't spoil.

The requirements for covert operations weren't for the faint-hearted or overly modest, let me tell you.

And that was the whole point of being a covert operative. Welcome to the dark side.

This is a covert operation, people!” he shouted over his bullhorn. “Covert!

The moon is up, the mice are prancing and the owls are nervous,” she says. “Now is the time for covert operations.

The amazing efficacy of patriarchy is that it is a covert operation. It is entre nos, just between us - man and woman, sister and brother, father and daughter, queer and not so queer. It takes place behind closed doors, inside la hacienda and back there in the slave quarters. It is so seamlessly woven into the fiber of our lives that to pull at that dangling thread of inequity is to rip open an entire life.

You’d really go all the way to Greece, and run a covert operation again, just so I can have the satisfaction of capturing Nick Fox?” “Sure,” he said. “We don’t get nearly enough quality father-daughter time.

We have the most powerful military in the history of the world, all of Obama’s efforts to weaken it notwithstanding. We do not need them training in our midst, especially doing covert operations in which red

I spent a few more minutes puzzling over the timeline before turning my attention to the notebook’s first page, which contained a pencil drawing of an old-school coin-operated arcade game—one I didn’t recognize. Its control panel featured a single joystick and one unlabeled white button, and its cabinet was entirely black, with no side art or other markings anywhere on it, save for the game’s strange title, which was printed in all capital green letters across its jet black marquee: POLYBIUS. Below his drawing of the game, my father had made the following notations: No copyright or manufacturer info anywhere on game cabinet. Reportedly only seen for 1–2 weeks in July 1981 at MGP. Gameplay was similar to Tempest. Vector graphics. Ten levels? Higher levels caused players to have seizures, hallucinations, and nightmares. In some cases, subject committed murder and/or suicide. “Men in Black” would download scores from the game each night. Possible early military prototype created to train gamers for war? Created by same covert op behind Bradley Trainer?

Gentry had spent sixteen years in covert operations, studied faces and evaluated threats for a living. He knew what an operator looked like when the fight was over, and he knew what an operator looked like when the fight was about to begin.

He was also aware that while the public was dividing and conquering itself by focusing on banal, media-driven conflicts such as Neoconservatives versus Liberals, democracy versus terrorism and the West versus the rest, destructive covert outfits were slowly but surely growing stronger. The special agent also understood how groups like Nexus fostered and benefited from the climate of fear perpetuated in television broadcasts and newspaper headlines. As long as Americans were consumed by fear of evildoers, whether these be communists, terrorists, religious extremists or any other potential enemy, he knew they would never realize the greatest enemy of all was operating within – within the West, within America, within their own Government.

God gave humanity many healing tools, and they exist far beyond circumstances. Some of them are traditionally spiritual: prayer, communion, sanctuary, Scripture. The sacraments have always brought us back home to God. But so many others are tactile, physical, of soil and earth, flesh and blood. Some are covert operators of grace, unlikely sources of joy, like a beautiful piece of art, a song, a perfectly told story around a dinner table, a pool party with friends and margaritas. These also count, they matter, they are to be consumed and enjoyed with gusto, despite suffering, even in the midst of suffering. God gives us both Good News and good times, and neither cancels out the other. What a wonderful world, what a wonderful life, what a wonderful God.

Tell me!” Cecily insisted later, shaking Colby by both arms. “Cut it out, you’ll dismember me,” Colby said, chuckling. She let go of the artificial arm and wrapped both hands around the good one. “I want to know. Listen, this is my covert operation. You’re just a stand-in!” “I promised I wouldn’t tell.” “You promised in Lakota. Tell me in English what you promised in Lakota.” He gave in. He did tell her, but not Leta, what was said, but only about the men coming to the reservation soon. “We’ll need the license plate number,” she said. “It can be traced. “Oh, of course,” he said facetiously. “They’ll certainly come here with their own license plate on the car so that everyone knows who they are!” “Damn!” He chuckled at her irritation. He was about to tell her about his alternative method when a big sport utility vehicle came flying down the dirt road and pulled up right in front of Leta’s small house. Tate Winthrop got out, wearing jeans and a buckskin jacket and sunglasses. His thick hair fell around his shoulders and down his back like a straight black silk curtain. Cecily stared at it with curious fascination. In all the years she’d known him, she’d very rarely seen his hair down. “All you need is the war paint,” Colby said in a resigned tone. He turned the uninjured cheek toward the newcomer. “Go ahead. I like matching scars.” Tate took off the dark glasses and looked from Cecily to Colby without smiling. “Holden won’t tell me a damned thing. I want answers.” “Come inside, then,” Cecily replied. “We’re attracting enough attention as it is.

Ten years later, merely by adding additional digits to be dialed, the Dutch engineer in the resistance had applied complexity theory to covert operations by creating theoretical pathways through the switching gear, thus enabling resistance fighters to call others without knowing whom they called, or even the actual telephone numbers they were calling.

21:00 hours: The Subject admitted to leaving some of The Operative's listening devices within the East Wing. Or he tried to trick The Operative into admitting that there were remaining devices ... Or the subject was just making covert small talk. Or... 21:01 hours: the operative couldn't help but remember how much easier it is talking to regular boys.

Under a $652-million clandestine program code named GENIE, the NSA, CIA, and special military operatives have planted covert digital bugs in tens of thousands of computers, routers, and firewalls around the world to conduct computer network exploitation, or CNE. Some are planted remotely, but others require physical access to install through so-called interdiction—the CIA or FBI intercepts shipments of hardware from manufacturers and retailers in order to plant malware in them or install doctored chips before they reach the customer.

The very word "secrecy" is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings...Our way of life is under attack. Those who make themselves our enemy are advancing around the globe...no war ever posed a greater threat to our security. If you are awaiting a finding of "clear and present danger," then I can only say that the danger has never been more clear and its presence has never been more imminent...For we are opposed around the world by a monolithic and ruthless conspiracy that relies primarily on covert means for expanding its sphere of influence–on infiltration instead of invasion, on subversion instead of elections, on intimidation instead of free choice, on guerrillas by night instead of armies by day. It is a system which has conscripted vast human and material resources into the building of a tightly knit, highly efficient machine that combines military, diplomatic, intelligence, economic, scientific and political operations. Its preparations are concealed, not published. Its mistakes are buried, not headlined. Its dissenters are silenced, not praised. No expenditure is questioned, no rumor is printed, no secret is revealed.

Our side has agents. Their side has spies.

Good tradecraft keeps espionage routine and boring.

This has been a covert preparation for an overt operation." - Rory in NEVER GO ALONE

the Secret Service had unearthed a covert industrial spy network operating at the behest of a German commercial attaché

One way to ruin your life is to have dreams bigger than your abilities.

By using repetition, images, and other strategies - all of which communicate truths in ways that are not cognitively or propositional - marketing forms us into the kind of persons who want to buy beer to have meaningful relationships, or to buy a car to be respected, or buy the latest thing to come along simply to satisfy the desire that has been formed and implanted in us. It is important to appreciate that these disciplinary mechanisms transmit values and truth claims, but not via propositions or cognitive means; rather, the values are transmitted more covertly...This covertness of the operation is also what makes it so powerful: the truths are inscribed in us through the powerful instruments of imagination and ritual.

In my view, if you don’t understand how repression operates, real growth is nearly impossible since you’re unlikely to come into contact with that pain you’re warding off. Even if you’re able to overcome some kind of maladaptive behavior or thought pattern, you’re likely to develop another equally maladaptive strategy to keep the repressed at bay. Freud always insisted that unconscious material is “indestructible.” Just because you’re not consciously aware of how much anger you feel toward your father, that doesn’t mean the anger has disappeared. It will inevitably continue to make its presence known in covert ways – humorous little digs, for instance, or sarcasm.

Are we in Turkey right now?” The director only glared at Curt, refusing to answer. “Exactly,” Curt said. “You have no jurisdiction on US soil. In fact, you are forbidden from conducting operations on US soil. So play nice and stand down.

In Panama, I knew Noriega himself was the object of controversy. The "arms deal" was the final stage of Operation Carrier Pigeon where the planes were to wait in Saudi Arabia until all bank transactions were cleared and the load was ready for disbursement. Saudi Arabian King Fahd would then fund the Contras via Noriega for Reagan after all evidences had been properly covered up -- just as he had done in Afghanistan. After the shipment, there would be no further deals through Noriega involving Fahd, because Noriega could no longer be trusted. Besides, Fahd had increased diplomatic relations with Mexico for covert operations, and Iran-Contra was just beginning to heat up. Noriega did not seem to be upset by the news of losing Saudi Arabian business, although he was somber and took some time to respond. His translator was working over some complex computer equipment after I delivered the message. I left Noriega's yacht with John and a brief message for Dick Cheney at the Pentagon.

Dust. You forget about the dust. It hangs over the landscape like a ragged curtain. It scratches your throat. The air tastes of sulphur, saltpetre, cordite, burning rubber and burning oil from the pipelines and wells sabotaged by ISIS to disrupt aerial surveillance.

Convinced that the isolationists, particularly Lindbergh, posed a major threat to the country and himself, Roosevelt and his supporters, assisted by a covert British intelligence operation, embarked on a campaign to destroy their credibility, influence, and reputations

Because of the way that covert narcissists operate, you may often find yourself doubting who your mother’s “true” self is, as you see her move from being warm, caring, open, and vulnerable to cold, callous, and abusive–without any warning, as if a button has been pushed.

Lexi frowned again, a little distracted, trying to follow what they were all saying. She knew they were trying to divert her attention. She tried to remember who Uri Sorbacov was. He was the son of the man who had murdered the Prakenskiis’ parents and abducted all seven brothers, separating them and forcing them into schools to become covert operatives and worse. He also had been the one to order a hit on most of the Prakenskii brothers and had tried to abduct Airiana. He had a litany of sins to answer for, but was safe in Russia, far from retaliation.

Darkness seems to have prevailed and has taken the forefront. This country as in the 'cooperation' of The United States of America has never been about the true higher-good of the people. Know and remember this. Cling to your faith. Roll your spiritual sleeves up and get to work. Use your energy wisely. Transmute all anger, panic and fear into light and empowerment. Don't use what fuels them; all lower-energy. Mourn as you need to. Console who you need to—and then go get into the spiritual and energetic arena. There's plenty work for us to do; within and without. Let's each focus on becoming 'The President of Our Own Life. Cultivate your mind. Pursue your purpose. Shine your light. Elevate past—and reject—any culture of low vibrational energy and ratchetness. Don't take fear, defeat or anger—on or in. The system is doing what they've been created to do. Are you? Am I? Are we—collectively? Let's get to work. No more drifting through life without your higher-self in complete control of your mind. Awaken—fully. Activate—now. Put your frustrations or concerns into your work. Don't lose sight. There is still—a higher plan. Let's ride this 4 year energetic-wave like the spiritual gangsters that we are. This will all be the past soon. Let's get to work and stay dedicated, consistent and diligent. Again, this will all be the past soon. We have preparing and work to do. Toxic energy is so not a game. Toxic energy and low vibrations are being collectively acted out on the world stage. Covertly operating through the unconscious weak spots and blind spots in the human psyche; making people oblivious to their own madness, causing and influencing them to act against–their–own–best–interests and higher-good, as if under a spell and unconsciously possessed. This means that they are actually nourishing the lower vibrational energy with their lifestyle, choices, energy and habits, which is unconsciously giving the lower-energy the very power and fuel it needs—for repeating and recreating endless drama, suffering and destruction, in more and more amplified forms on a national and world stage. So what do we do? We take away its autonomy and power over us while at the same time empowering ourselves. By recognizing how this energetic/spiritual virus or parasite of the mind—operates through our unawareness is the beginning of the cure. Knowledge is power. Applied knowledge is—freedom. Our shared future will be decided primarily by the changes that take place in the psyche of humanity, starting with each of us— vibrationally. In closing and most importantly, the greatest protection against becoming affected or possessed by this lower-energy is to be in touch with our higher vibrational-self. We have to call our energy and power back. Being in touch with our higher-self and true nature acts as a sacred amulet, shielding and protecting us from the attempted effects. We defeat evil not by fighting against it (in which case, by playing its game, we’ve already lost) but by getting in touch with the part of us that is invulnerable to its effects— our higher vibrational-self. Will this defeat and destroy us? Or will it awaken us more and more? Everything depends upon our recognizing what is being revealed to us and our stepping out of the unconscious influence of low vibrational/negative/toxic/evil/distraction energy (or whatever name you relate to it as) that is and has been seeking power over each of our lives energetically and/or spiritually, and step into our wholeness, our personal power, our higher self and vibrate higher and higher daily. Stay woke my friends—let's get to work.

Propaganda is an important weapon of the fascist state. TV and the media are filled with clandestine agents, some posing as liberal writers, whose purpose is to break the credibility of researchers or discredit evidence that would confirm conspiracies.1 Colleges and academic institutions offer no courses on agents provocateurs or how to recognize covert operations.2 When an accurate history of the violence in the 1960’s and ’70’s is written, facts will reveal that government provocateurs created most of it. A series of our own Reichstag fires was the justification for a sweeping domestic operations program designed to deny liberties guaranteed by the Constitution.3

It was not until November 25, 1996, that an American academic, Thomas E. Mahl, researching Britain’s various secret service archives, came across the Williams file. He has now published Desperate Deception, as full a story as we are ever apt to get of “British Covert Operations in the United States 1939–44.” Although media and schools condition Americans to start giggling at the mention of the word “conspiracy,” there are, at any moment, all sorts of conspiracies crisscrossing our spacious skies and amber fields of grain, and of them all in this century, the largest, most intricate and finally most successful was that of the British to get us into the Second World War.

channel as the rest of the team, but now he could not hear the transmission. Strange. Court turned to the three men next to him on the bench. From their posture, from their facial expressions, Gentry determined that, just like their leader, they weren’t decompressing after the tension of the extraction from the hot zone. No, they moved and looked like they were about to go into action. Gentry had spent sixteen years in covert operations, studied faces and evaluated threats for a living. He knew what an operator looked like when the fight was over, and he knew what an operator looked like when the fight was about to begin. Surreptitiously he unhooked the strap securing him to the bench and swiveled in his seat to face the men around him.

A contagious psycho-spiritual disease of the soul, a parasite of the mind, is currently being acted out en masse on the world stage via an insidious collective psychosis of titanic proportions. This mind-virus—which Native Americans have called “wetiko”—covertly operates through the unconscious blind spots in the human psyche, rendering people oblivious to their own madness and compelling them to act against their own best interests. Wetiko is a psychosis in the true sense of the word, “a sickness of the spirit.

The Hawaiian shaman system is similar to other systems of thought which deal with the mind and its effect on the Universe, but some of the differences are considerable. Many centuries ago Hawaiian spiritual masters came to the same conclusions reached by others in various times and places: that there is an aspect of consciousness which operates covertly and indirectly (the subconscious); that there is an aspect of consciousness which operates openly and directly (the conscious mind); and that there is an aspect of consciousness which transcends yet includes them both (the superconscious). The differences in Hawaiian thought have to do with their nature, their functions, and their relationships. In the title of this chapter I have called them heart, mind, and spirit, and understanding what they are and how they work from the Hawaiian point of view can be one of the most practical things you will ever learn.

In May 1981, Yuri Andropov, chairman of the KGB, gathered his senior officers in a secret conclave to issue a startling announcement: America was planning to launch a nuclear first strike, and obliterate the Soviet Union. For more than twenty years, a nuclear war between East and West had been held at bay by the threat of mutually assured destruction, the promise that both sides would be annihilated in any such conflict, regardless of who started it. But by the end of the 1970s the West had begun to pull ahead in the nuclear arms race, and tense détente was giving way to a different sort of psychological confrontation, in which the Kremlin feared it could be destroyed and defeated by a preemptive nuclear attack. Early in 1981, the KGB carried out an analysis of the geopolitical situation, using a newly developed computer program, and concluded that “the correlation of world forces” was moving in favor of the West. Soviet intervention in Afghanistan was proving costly, Cuba was draining Soviet funds, the CIA was launching aggressive covert action against the USSR, and the US was undergoing a major military buildup: the Soviet Union seemed to be losing the Cold War, and, like a boxer exhausted by long years of sparring, the Kremlin feared that a single, brutal sucker punch could end the contest. The KGB chief’s conviction that the USSR was vulnerable to a surprise nuclear attack probably had more to do with Andropov’s personal experience than rational geopolitical analysis. As Soviet ambassador to Hungary in 1956, he had witnessed how quickly an apparently powerful regime might be toppled. He had played a key role in suppressing the Hungarian Uprising. A dozen years later, Andropov again urged “extreme measures” to put down the Prague Spring. The “Butcher of Budapest” was a firm believer in armed force and KGB repression. The head of the Romanian secret police described him as “the man who substituted the KGB for the Communist Party in governing the USSR.” The confident and bullish stance of the newly installed Reagan administration seemed to underscore the impending threat. And so, like every genuine paranoiac, Andropov set out to find the evidence to confirm his fears. Operation RYAN (an acronym for raketno-yadernoye napadeniye, Russian for “nuclear missile attack”) was the biggest peacetime Soviet intelligence operation ever launched.

In August 1977 Canadians reacted with horror and revulsion when they learned that in the 1950s and early 1960s, one of the most eminent psychiatrists in the country had used his vulnerable patients as unwitting guinea pigs in brainwashing experiments funded by the CIA and the Canadian government. Behind the doors of the so-called sleep room on Wards 2 South, Dr. Ewen Cameron, the director of Montreal’s Allan Memorial Institute, exposed dozens of his own patients to barbaric treatments from which some never fully recovered. Operating under the belief that he could wipe brains clean of "bad behavior" and program in new behaviour, Cameron kept patients in a chemical sleep for weeks and months at a time exposing them to massive amounts of electro-shock and drugs such as LSD, and forced them to listen to tape-recorded messages repeated endlessly through headphones. Cameron was not alone in his desire to reprogram the human brain. The U.S. intelligence establishment found in him an eager collaborator, and funded his work substantially and covertly. Eventually, after years of stonewalling by the CIA, nine of the dozens of victims were at last given a chance to claim restitution for Cameron’s “treatments” by taking the powerful U.S. intelligence agency to court.

In the late 1940s and early 1950s, Olson had traveled across the United States overseeing field tests that dispersed biological agents from aircraft and crop dusters in San Francisco, the Midwest, and Alaska. Some field tests involved harmless simulants and others involved dangerous pathogens, as Senate hearings later revealed. One such dangerous experiment was conducted by Olson and his Detrick colleague Norman Cournoyer. The two men went to Alaska and oversaw bacteria being sprayed out of airplanes to see how the pathogens would disperse in an environment similar to that of a harsh Russian winter. “We used a spore,” Cournoyer explained, “which is very similar [to} anthrax, so to that extent we did something that was not kosher. Because we picked it up all over [the United States] months after we did the tests.” A third man involved in the covert tests with Cournoyer and Olson was Dr. Harold Batchelor, the bacteriologist who learned airborne spray techniques from Dr. Kurt Blome, whom Batchelor consulted with in Heidelberg. Olson and Batchelor also conducted covert field tests in closed spaces across America, including in subways and in the Pentagon. For these tests, the Special Operations Division used a relatively harmless pathogen that simulated how a deadly pathogen would disperse. A congressional inquiry into these covert tests found them “appalling” in their deception.

In 1934, strongman Fulgencio Batista forced President Grau’s resignation. Then in 1940, Grau lost his bid for the Presidency to his adversary Batista. Four years later in 1944, he did win the election and took office for a four-year term starting on October 10th. After Grau won the election and was the President elect, Batista still in office, blatantly attacked the National Treasury, leaving the cupboards bare by the time Grau was actually sworn in as President. Since Grau and Batista were staunch adversaries, it is highly unlikely that any deal could have been made in 1946 to allow “Lucky” Luciano into Cuba, especially with Luciano having been exiled to Sicily by the United States government that preceding February. Still, Lansky had enough political pull within the Cuban government to prepare for a strong Mafia presence in Havana. In October of 1946, in an attempt to keep his whereabouts a secret, “Lucky” Luciano covertly boarded a freighter taking him from Naples, Italy, to Caracas, Venezuela. Then Luciano flew south to Rio de Janeiro and returned north to Mexico City. On October 29, 1946, he arranged for a private flight from Mexico City to Camagüey, Cuba, where Meyer Lansky met him. Having the right connections, Luciano passed through Cuban customs unimpeded and was whisked by car to the splendid Grand Hotel. Luciano, having just arrived in Cuba, was looking forward to setting up operations. Cuba would actually be a better place than the United States for what he had in mind.

The century of Einstein and Planck was also the century of Hitler. The Gestapo and the scientific renaissance were children of the same age. How humane the nineteenth century seemed, that century of naive physics, when compared with the twentieth century, the century that had killed his [Viktor's] mother. There is a terrible similarity between the principles of Fascism and those of contemporary physics. Fascism has rejected the concept of a separate individuality, the concept of "a man," and operates only with vast aggregates. Contemporary physics speaks of the greater or lesser probability of occurrences within this or that aggregate of individual particles. And are not the terrible mechanics of Fascism founded on the principle of quantum politics, of political probability? Fascism arrived at the idea of the liquidation of entire strata of the population, of entire nations and races, on the grounds that there was a greater probability of overt or covert opposition among these groupings than among others: the mechanics of probabilities and of human aggregates. But no! No! And again no! Fascism will perish for the very reason that it has applied to man the laws applicable to atoms and cobblestones! Man and Fascism cannot co-exist. If Fascism conquers, man will cease to exist and there will remain only man-like creatures that have undergone an internal transformation. But if man, man who is endowed with reason and kindness, should conquer, then Fascism must perish, and those who have submitted to it will once again become people.

One might pause here to wonder how it is that the United States claims to support democracy and freedom in the world when it so often backs dictators like the Shah and Somoza. As I tell my human rights class every year, the United States always supports democracy and freedom, except when it doesn’t, which is all the time…. As political analyst Stephen Gowans explains, the United States is simply not what it claims to be, and most likely never has been: The United States—which began as 13 former British colonies on the Atlantic coast of North America pursuing a “manifest destiny” of continental expansion, (the inspiration for Nazi Germany’s lebensraum policy); which fought a war with Spain for colonies; which promulgated the Monroe Doctrine asserting a sphere of influence in the Americas; which stole Panama to create a canal; whose special operations forces project US power in 81 countries; whose generals control the militaries of the combined NATO members in Europe and the military forces of South Korea; whose military command stations one hundred thousand troops on the territories of former imperialist rivals, manifestly has an empire. And yet this reality is denied, as assuredly as is the reality that the United States, built on the genocide of Native Americans and the slave labor of Africans, overtly white supremacist until the mid-1960s, and covertly white supremacist since, is unequivocally not a beacon of Enlightenment values, unless liberalism is defined as equality and liberty assigned exclusively to white men who own productive property. Indeed, so antithetical is the United States to the liberal values of the equality of all peoples and nations, freedom from exploitation and oppression, and the absence of discrimination on the bases of class, race, and sex, that it’s difficult to apprehend in what sense the United States has ever been liberal or has in any way had a legitimate claim to being the repository of the values of the Enlightenment.2

That month, the head of the Cambodian army, Lieutenant General Lon Nol, flew to Beijing to confirm a secret treaty already approved by Sihanouk for use of Sihanoukville’s port to transship Chinese arms and supplies to PAVN sanctuaries along the border. Chinese shipments were passing through Sihanoukville by the following year; these were carried by the Hak Ly Trucking Company, a Phnom Penh–based entity that was actually led by an officer from PAVN’s General Rear Services Department.7 In return, the Cambodian military received at least 10 percent of all weapons shipments, as well as hefty port and transportation fees.8 The Cambodians also reportedly allowed PAVN to make use of a military hospital in Kompong Cham.

Time is fixed and time is flexible. It is an invention by man and the curse of man. We all need more time.

Only five percent of the people need to be organized in this fashion to install a fascist dictator in the United States. That is the ultimate objective of the greatest covert operation ever, the one in which the oligarchs steal everything you own.

Martha Crenshaw notes that terrorists tend to exhibit an intense obsession with morality, in particular with sexual purity—in the name of a “higher good.’’ It brings to mind the so-called Moral Majority (which feminists exposed as being neither). It also brings to mind the now-infamous marine lieutenant colonel Oliver North, who, from the offices of the National Security Council, coordinated the U.S. bombing raid on Libya, supervised the U.S. invasion of Grenada, oversaw the mining of Nicaraguan harbors, organized the Contra operations in Central America, and devised the Iran-Contra-diction of selling weapons to Iran. This is the man Ronald Reagan called “a national hero” (though North himself chuckled that “I have also been described as a terrorist” by others). This is the man who has adventuristically waded through scores of illegal and covert murderous actions with a boyish grin on his all-American face. And this is the "born-again" Christian who states that he has "a personal relationship with Jesus Christ as a driving force" in his life. This is the anti-reproductive-choice zealot, one who is "pro-life" and whose car bumper sticker boasts "God is Prolif-ic.

Dulles usually favored amnesty for those whose class or economic status seemed to make them useful for postwar economic revival, and for people who had assisted him in intelligence gathering or covert operations. Culpability for Nazi crimes should be limited in most cases to German leaders who remained diehard Nazi enthusiasts,

Everyone is now so eager to see the government "reveal" this long-awaited information that no one questions the reality of the basic facts and the political motivations that could inspire a manipulation of those facts. Trying to outsmart the CIA and the Pentagon has become such a national pastime that lawsuits against federal agencies under the Freedom of Information Act have begun to accumulate. All that has been shown so far is that these agencies were involved – often covertly – in many aspects of the UFO problem. I suspect that they are still involved. Discovering the secret of the UFO propulsion mechanism could be such a military breakthrough that any research project connected with it would enjoy the highest level of classification. But these UFO enthusiasts who are so anxious to expose the government have not reflected that they may be playing into the hands of a more sophisticated coverup of the real situation. Because of their eagerness to believe any indication that the authorities already possess the proof of UFO reality, many enthusiasts provide an ideal conduit for anyone wishing to spread the extraterrestrial gospel. The purpose of such an exercise need not be complex or strategically important. It could be something as mundane as a political diversion, or a test of the reliability of information channels under simulated crisis conditions, or a decoy for paramilitary operations. None of these rumors is likely to lead us any closer to a solution that can only be obtained by careful, intelligent, and perhaps tedious scientific research. The truth is that the UFOs may not be spacecraft at all. And the government may simply be hiding the fact that, in spite of the billions of dollars spent on air defense, it has no more clues to the nature of the phenomenon today than it did in the forties when it began its investigations.

The sad fact is that, alien as the attacks of September 11 may seem, they were in fact a refraction, distorted beyond recognition over the years, of policies and practices emanating from Washington, the blowback, more horrible than anyone could have imagined, of covert operations gone disastrously awry.

Learn from history, maintain your mystery, take your victory.

Sixty seconds is a long time on the battlefield.

The agency’s ranks were filled with thousands of patriotic Americans in the 1950s. Many were brave and battle-hardened. Some had wisdom. Few really knew the enemy. Where understanding failed, presidents ordered the CIA to change the course of history through covert action. “The conduct of political and psychological warfare in peacetime was a new art,” wrote Gerald Miller, then the CIA’s covert-operations chief for Western Europe.

The CIA’s covert operations were by and large blind stabs in the dark. The agency’s only course was to learn by doing—by making mistakes in battle. The CIA then concealed its failures abroad, lying to Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy. It told those lies to preserve its standing in Washington. The truth, said Don Gregg, a skilled cold-war station chief, was that the agency at the height of its powers had a great reputation and a terrible record.

If we are one world then the only patriotism can be for the world.

There was a unanimous feeling within the establishment that the Soviet capacity to do anything in Bangladesh on a major scale was limited.

Patience isn’t a gift. It is learned.

The correct answers to questions are only found in school books. In real life, one must always take firm decisions based on incomplete information.

no battle plan survives contact with the enemy.

A leader is judged not just by the actions he takes, but also by the actions he fails to take.

It was the law of diminishing returns. After a point of time, the productivity wouldn't improve however much additional time he sat on the chair.

It's all here and now. Whatever I have to do, I have to do it now; there is no tomorrow.

The FBI, led by J. Edgar Hoover, responded by operating a covert counterintelligence program, known as COINTELPRO, that targeted civil rights leaders and activists, including Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X, who were deemed dangerous or suspected of Communist Party affiliation.

Her family does,” I said, making things up as quickly as I could. “His name is Gumbo and he’s a golden retriever. And these bad guys have kidnapped the dog and told Erica that they’ll kill him if she doesn’t do their bidding.” “Oh no!” Chip exclaimed, horrified. I thought I saw tears welling in his eyes. Zoe gave him a withering look. “You don’t honestly believe this, do you?” “Er… maybe,” Chip said. “Erica could have a dog.” “She’s never mentioned it,” Zoe pointed out. “She never mentioned that she had a mother who was a covert operative for MI6 either,” I said.

they’ve turned increasingly to the importance of understanding anger and aggression, demonstrating how girls—operating in a vacuum of information about their negative emotions—channel their anger and aggression covertly, resorting to gossiping and spreading untruths about others, for example. Girls also police themselves to avoid the negative judgment of other girls.

As a new nation, Bangladeshis were very conscious of their new identity. At the same time, they were sensitive and apprehensive regarding India which had given its freedom fighters large-scale assistance.

In 1982, Smith enrolled at the Pakistan Army’s prestigious Command and Staff College in Quetta, where he befriended Pakistani officers on track for promotion. He kept up those relationships when he deployed to the U.S. embassy in Islamabad as an attaché in the late 1980s, just as the C.I.A.’s covert action program to thwart the Soviet Union in Afghanistan was winding down, and then again in the mid-1990s, as the Taliban rose to power. By the time the D.I.A. recruited Smith in late 2000 to return to Islamabad under light cover, the Pakistan Army officers he had first met almost two decades earlier had risen to become commanding generals. One of them was Mahmud Ahmed, the director-general of the Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate, or I.S.I., Pakistan’s most powerful intelligence agency, the locus of the country’s covert operations to aid Taliban rule in Afghanistan.

Lucius Lucretius Strabo will soon become a frumentarius, a member of the Roman Empire’s special service. Initially responsible for the legions’ grain supply, the Frumentarii morphed into the Empire’s secret policemen, spy agents, military couriers, and covert operatives. Although frumentum means grain, don’t let the innocuous name fool you—their reputation was so ferocious that Emperor Diocletian had to disband them in the early 4th Century AD.

Life isn’t what it is. It’s what it can be.

When trees are treated as a commodity, cutting them down is good for business. When people are a commodity, enslaving them, exploiting them and underpaying them is good for business. When everything is a commodity, the landscape grows barren, and the earth turns to dust.

limiting the CIA’s ability to pursue covert operations, and eventually dismantling

The only thing the English have left is their past.

Monarchs, autocratic rulers and democracies have used informers and agents provocateurs for the security of their realms, to wage war and for their own protection against assassins.

Intelligence is not a science, certainly not a natural science. It is an art or a craft, and as such it cannot be governed by the basic tenets of logic.

A senior member of the Washington diplomatic corps, Bandar has played racquetball with Secretary of State Colin Powell in the late seventies. He had run covert operations for the late CIA director Bill Casey that were so hush-hush they were kept secret even from President Ronald Reagan. He was the man who stashed away thirty locked attache cases that held some of the deepest secrets in the intelligence world. And for two decades, Bandar built an intimate personal relationship with the Bush family that went far beyond a mere political friendship.

The historical record is unequivocal. The United States is ham-handed and brutal in conceiving and executing clandestine operations, and it is simply no good at espionage; its operatives never have enough linguistic and cultural knowledge of target countries to recruit spies effectively. The CIA also appears to be one of the most easily penetrated espionage organizations on the planet. From the beginning, it has repeatedly lost its assets to double agents.

girls—operating in a vacuum of information about their negative emotions—channel their anger and aggression covertly, resorting to gossiping and spreading untruths about others, for example. Girls also police themselves to avoid the negative judgment of other girls.

This was my time at the MUN; not just a symbol of international cooperation, but a dark and mysterious nexus of conspiracy and intrigue. Indeed, a place where the forces of chaos and order collide in an endless struggle for dominance. But let's not kid ourselves, behind the facade of diplomatic protocols and bureaucratic banalities lurks a dark underbelly. A shadow world of secret meetings and covert operations, where the true rulers of the world pull the strings of fate like puppeteers in a grand cosmic theater. Here, in the labyrinthine corridors and dimly lit backrooms, the fate of nations is not decided by the will of the people, but by the whims of those who dwell in the shadows.

The wild and woolly climate of deregulation created an ambience in which normal, well-run savings banks were surpassed by fast-track banks which catered to dubious monies with no questions asked. Banks laundered funds for covert operations of the CIA, as well as covert operations of the Bonano or other organized crime families. The son of the Vice President, Neil Bush, was a director of the Silverado Savings and Loan in Colorado, later indicted by the government for illegal practices. Son Neil had the good taste to “resign” the week his father received the Republican nomination for president in 1988.9

The words clandestine and covert do not mean the same thing, even though they are often used interchangeably. Clandestinity conceals the operation, while covertness conceals the operator. Most of what has been discussed previously in this book falls into the category of clandestine activities-inter-nal security and intelligence collection operations performed in such a way that they are not publicly visible. Clandestine means secret; something is done so that only those involved in it know it is happening. Most intelligence operations are clandestine, because if they became public, sensitive sources and methods could be damaged or eliminated. However, the sponsoring government does not usually hide its involvement in the operation. For example, when an intelligence service pitches a HUMINT source, the source usually knows for what government he/she is working, unless the service is using a false flag to deliberately misrepresent its affiliation. Covert means the sponsoring government does not reveal its involvement. Although covert operations are usually clandestine in the planning stages, the result of a covert activity often becomes public, even intentionally. That includes covert sabotage, in which an object is damaged: for example, when a bomb explodes or a computer system goes offline. The primary element of covert activities is the phrase "plausible deniability," which means the action is visible, but the perpetrator's identity is hidden.

A special operations element known as Zaslon is reportedly directly subordinate to the SVR director. Zaslon is responsible for protecting senior Russian embassy officials and other Russian government officials when they travel to dangerous locations. For example, Zaslon officers provided security when then-Russian Vice Prime Minister Dmitriy Rogozin traveled to Syria in 2014. The element also conducts covert action missions. Little is publicly known about the group, but it reportedly was created in 1998 to replace special forces units that had been subordinate to the KGB First Chief Directorate during the Soviet era and moved to the Ministry of Security after the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

the club had become a gathering place for international spies, who traded classified information about the Soviet Union’s infiltration into Africa. Code-named the “Safari Club,” the covert group was comprised of intelligence operatives from France, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Morocco and Iran, which were united in the fight against Communism.

As the global reach of American industry and finance grew during the postwar era, so did the U.S. national security complex. America's vast system of military and covert power was aimed not just at checking the Soviet threat but at protecting US. corporate interests abroad. Behind the rapid international growth of multinational giants like Chase Manhattan, Coca-Cola, Standard Oil, and GM lay a global network of U.S. military bass, spy stations, and alliances with despotic regimes. The twin exigencies of the Cold War and U.S. empire gave the national security establishment unprecedented free rein to operate. The CIA was empowered not only to engage in the deadly "spy versus spy" antics against the KGB that became the stuff of Cold War legend but to subvert democratic governments that were deemed insufficiently pro-American and to terminate these government's elected leaders.

What our time has labeled covert intelligence operations were described in the Arthashastra as an important tool. Operating in “all states of the circle” (that is, friends and adversaries alike) and drawn from the ranks of “holy ascetics, wandering monks, cart-drivers, wandering minstrels, jugglers, tramps, [and] fortune-tellers,” these agents would spread rumors to foment discord within and between other states, subvert enemy armies, and “destroy” the King’s opponents at opportune moments.