CIA Workers Killed in Afghanistan as U.S. Steps Up Spying Role

[OntarioVanMan]

Who wrote what OVM? By the way, there are at least 3 others in this forum from time to time that do have first hand experience.

Tell me, why is it that you choose to only believe the so-called bad stuff you read? I know you have no first hand experience, so intell agents are always bad and guilty?

I am open to ALL ideas..good and bad..just because you say so? Does that make it so? You could be protecting your past employer, that is your duty...
am I to ignore declassified documentation on the covert operations of the CIA?

I am weighing both Rlents and your statement..and it is hard to believe that the CIA is all roses with no thorns.

Do they do more good then bad? I have no idea...Never said they were nor do I believe they are innocent bystanders either.

 

[layoutshooter]

I am well aware of mistakes this Nation has made. I am well aware of wrong doing in the CIA. No different than any organization that man is involved in. That does not put the blame of all the ills and problems we face as a nation only on their doorstep. It does not mean that everyone in that business is wrong and bad. It does not mean that even most are.

OVM, you might at least try looking, since you feel that I don't know anything. I guess I just made up a story about my life, must have a really sick imagination. eh?

 

[RLENT]

Tell me, why is it that you choose to only believe the so-called bad stuff you read?

That's an assumption on your part - at least if your comment is directed at me.

I know you have no first hand experience,

You don't know jack about me.

so intell agents are always bad and guilty?

Well, they clearly aren't (and I have said so on more than one occasion I believe) - as evidenced by my bringing up Michael Scheuer (as but one example) - a 22 veteran of the CIA (although he was an analyst, not an agent) - a man who, from what I know of him, is a good and decent fellow - inspite of the fact that he may have been involved in some questionable activities (he was the author of the CIA's extraordinary rendition program)

However, he (unlike you) is not uncritical of certain things - the difference is you can't admit, or won't acknowledge, that not all is as rosy as you try to portray it (rather unsuccessfully, I might add)

Furthermore, it appears, by your comments, that you seek to shutoff public debate on the matter of what the proper role of an intelligence organization such as the CIA, should be in our nation.

 

[layoutshooter]

Seriously, are you saying that the only way to have knowledge of something is in the first hand ?

In the reverse, you clearly do not have firsthand knowledge of everything this nation, or it's minions, have done.

Everything in life is different from the inside out. I never claimed to know everything about this nation or it minions. Neither do you. Without first hand experience every thing you learn is at best second hand, often but not always skewed, and often wrong. But hey, you know everything I did. Kinda reminds me of my little brother when he told my dad that he did not do what he did in WWII. He then proceeded to tell my dad what my dad did.

It seems that you are still not able to answer a simple question.

 

[layoutshooter]

Got it wrong on one thing, I know OVM has no first hand experience. Was not talking about you. Still no answer to a very simple question. What first hand experience do you have? Did you serve in an itell agency or in the military? I don't see how that is such a hard question to answer. Maybe it's too easy, that must be it.

 

[Jack_Berry]

what their job is should be no concern. they worked for the cia. so what? both sides employ the same kind of people. lost in this discourse is the fact that there is no security within our bases shared with afghan forces. it is now beyond obvious we cannot trust the local allies to not turn on us. each locl coming on base now needs to be security scanned for explosives. one incident ruins every ones lives now.

 

[layoutshooter]

Security was very lax in this incident. They should know better than that. It is a very dangerous business and when you skip steps that should be taken it can be fatal.

 

[RLENT]

Are you able to answer a simple question? .....

Oh - I certainly am. But before you call me on the carpet on that one, you might to take a look in a couple of other threads where I posed questions directly to you and you were non-responsive.

Do you have any first hand experience? Seems like an easy question to answer, yes or no.

It's easy enough - but isn't really relevant - and it's a strawman.

Without first hand experience every thing you learn is at best second hand, often but not always skewed, and often wrong.

I would submit to you that much (if not most) of what one learns is done indirectly, without the benefit of direct personal observation (at least initially) - the fact this occurs, does not lessen in the least, the validity of data when it is, in fact, true.

But hey, you know everything I did.

I really have no idea what you did (beyond what you have claimed on EO) - and have so stated on more than one instance, I believe.

Kinda reminds me of my little brother when he told my dad that he did not do what he did in WWII. He then proceeded to tell my dad what my dad did.

Another strawman, factually in error, and off-point.

 

[layoutshooter]

(although he was an analyst, not an agent)


By the way, everyone who works at an agency is an agent. It is just a term used. Agents work all kinds of jobs. I was an analyst for a while, a collection tech, collection officer, collection manager, signals analyst (not very good at that one) and a few other things. I was still a agent.

 

[layoutshooter]

You may think it is a strawman, I don't. I can read everything you ask me too, I will be reading some for sure. That will give me another person's view. Then I will be able to bounce that off of my personal experience. If you don't have that experience yourself you only have second hand info. Nothing more.

 

[aristotle]

In our nation's struggle for survival, it will ALWAYS be necessary to have rough men(and women) ready to do violence on our behalf. I appreciate the high-mindedness of wishing all conflict could be resolved in a pristine courtroom where truth and justice invariably prevailed. Such idealism is admirable, but Pollyannish.

Human nature being what it is, we had better hope the United States has a solid core of dedicated folks who will conduct the nation's "dirty business" overseas without blinking. Ask the families of slain Americans if we need a more aggressive or more passive approach to hunting down terrorists. The terrorists do not follow law or rules of engagement. We must defeat them any way we can at every opportunity. Let the Liberals wring their hands and curse America. It's what they do.

 

[RLENT]

it is now beyond obvious we cannot trust the local allies to not turn on us.

[Mercenaries] "..... are useless and dangerous ..... and bring nothing but loss ..... Experience has shown that only princes and republics are achieve solid success."
Niccolò Machiavelli

 

[layoutshooter]

Don't worry, that core exists.

 

[RLENT]

By the way, everyone who works at an agency is an agent. It is just a term used. Agents work all kinds of jobs. I was an analyst for a while, a collection tech, collection officer, collection manager, signals analyst (not very good at that one) and a few other things. I was still a agent.

Whatever ..... it's really irrelevant and not much germane to the discussion at hand.

The point I was making was that his duties were that of an analyst, and not what the general populace (erroneously) thinks of as an intelligence agent, or a US national who is a covert operative.

 

[wimpy007]

Layout, from one OLD spook to another, they do not have a need to know. Remember the old saying "trust your freind, but monitor closely.

 

[layoutshooter]

Yep Wimpy, you are right. How you been? Have not seen you for a bit.

 

[wimpy007]

Hanging loose, for an old man, remember this , all gave some, but some gave all. Some people thing we all ran around in a trench coat and stood in the shadows. KEEP THE FAITH.

 

[layoutshooter]

I will always stand strong my friend. I am not quite old yet but getting there fast!! LOL!! Later this year I get to crack the big 60. You didn't have a trench coat? They were standard issue by the time I went in!!!

 

[RLENT]

..... they do not have a need to know.

Such a statement is utterly arrogant almost beyond belief, and I would expect it more from some apparatchik in the Soviet Union, than I would from someone who has laid claim to be a public servant of the American people.

Such a view stands in stark contrast to held by the very people who founded this country:

"An informed citizenry is the only true repository of the public will.. . . The People cannot be safe without information." - Thomas Jefferson

"There is in the nature of government an impatience of control that disposes those invested with power to look with an evil eye upon all external attempts to restrain or direct its operations. This has its origin in the love of power. Representatives of the people are not superior to the people themselves." - Alexander Hamilton - Federalist Paper No.15, 1787.

"Since the general civilization of mankind, I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations." - James Madison - 1788

"...There is no nation on earth powerful enough to accomplish our overthrow. ... Our destruction, should it come at all, will be from another quarter. From the inattention of the people to the concerns of their government, from their carelessness and negligence. I fear that they may place too implicit a confidence in their public servants, and fail properly to scrutinize their conduct; that in this way they may be made the dupes of designing men, and become the instruments of their own undoing." - Daniel Webster, June 1, 1837

"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." - Thomas Jefferson

Further, I would submit that anyone who declares such a thing to effectively hide or cover up their own, or their associates crimes, is in fact, an enemy of the American people.

 

[layoutshooter]

Lighten up RLENT, that is just an "old spy term". I am quite proud to say that I followed in the footsteps of Wimpy007. I picked up the fight where he left off. Just as others have taken up where I left it for them. The "Shadow War" never ends.

You should also show some respect for your elders, he earned it.