center for strategic counterterrorism communications
isis has al hayat media. the united states has the center for strategic counterterrorism communications (cscc) .
alberto m. fernandez is the state department’s coordinator for the center for strategic counterterrorism communications. (sarah l. voisin / the washington post )
he has been blunt in his critique of the previous messaging efforts by the much - maligned and now defunct center for strategic counterterrorism communications .
the center for strategic counterterrorism communications has developed a strong partnership with the government of nigeria, and in conjunction with other international partners, provided assistance on developing a comprehensive communications strategy .
about 15 to 20 full - time staff, mostly emiratis, will work at the center for now, said rashad hussain, the u. s. special envoy and coordinator for strategic counterterrorism communications .
separately, the united states has been expanding an existing u. s. state department division, which hussain heads and which was set up in 2011. it is known as the center for strategic counterterrorism communications (cscc. )
at the heart of the plan is expanding a tiny state department agency, the center for strategic counterterrorism communications, to harness all the existing attempts at countermessaging by much larger federal departments, including the pentagon, homeland security and intelligence agencies .
made up of employees of google, twitter, and other companies located in silicon valley, new york, and texas, the panel was tasked with analyzing the progress of the center for strategic counterterrorism communications (cscc), a small outfit under the state department .
the review specifically raised doubts about propaganda messages posted under the state department seal — presumably including social media accounts like the the center for strategic counterterrorism communications'
think again, turn away
anti - terrorism campaign, which has already been criticized for its lack of effectiveness, despite an active social media presence .
other accomplishments since the launch include the adoption of various sets of good practices that are intended to both provide practical guidance for countries as they seek to enhance their counterterrorism capacity and bring greater strategic coherence to global counterterrorism capacity building efforts .
the center’s appetite for barbed attacks intensified when lebaron retired in early 2012 and was replaced by fernandez .
the clip was assembled by a special unit at the state department charged with finding ways to contain the spread of militant islamist ideology. the center for strategic counterterrorism communications, or cscc, had direct backing from president obama, help from the cia, and teams of arabic, urdu and somali speakers who were thrust into the fray on twitter and other social - media platforms .
he cscc’s primary objective is to systematise u. s strategic communications to counter the appeal of violent extremist ideologies among foreign populations, particularly as related to al - qaida and its global affiliates .
boko haram and u. s. counterterrorism assistance to nigeria (may 14, 2014 )
an informal, multilateral counterterrorism platform with 30 founding members that promotes a strategic, long - term approach to dealing with the ct threat. the forum identifies urgent needs, devises solutions, and mobilizes resources to address key civilian counterterrorism challenges. the forum was launched in september 2011. please visit urltoken for more information
the report coincided with the departure of rashad hussain, who was installed this year by the white house as head of the state department’s center for strategic counterterrorism communications, or cscc. hussain has taken a position at the justice department, and officials said the shift was not related to the review or to concern about his tenure at state. but his departure has brought new tumult to a unit already associated with frequent changes of strategy and personnel .
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dubai, united arab emirates - the u. s. and emirati governments launched a new mideast digital communications center wednesday focused on using social media to counter islamic state of iraq and syria (isis) propaganda efforts online .
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learn about the bureau of counterterrorism’s various programs to build foreign partner capacity and counter terrorism around the world .
the center’s creators see the changes as a retreat from the war room they envisioned .
the bureau of counterterrorism and countering violent extremism’s mission is to promote u. s. national security by taking a leading role in developing coordinated strategies and approaches to defeat terrorism abroad and securing the counterterrorism cooperation of international partners .
lumpkin has fought to double the center’s budget from $ 10 million last year to more than $ 20 million requested for next year, and he says he’ll ask for more after that .
the center released youtube videos and twitter messages wednesday in arabic and english announcing its launch .
there are three predicates upon which a strategic ci mission would rest. first, the foreign intelligence threat is strategic, meaning that states use their intelligence resources purposefully to gain advantage over the united states and to advance their interests. second, strategic intelligence threats cannot be defeated through ad hoc measures alone. the threats must be countered by a strategic response. and third, there must be a national level system that integrates and coordinates diverse programs, resources, and activities to achieve common strategic objectives .
in for a penny, in for a pound. take it for granted that they' re wrong, and everyone knows it. then annoy the hell out of them with withering wit for being wrong .
matthew levitt is the fromer - wexler fellow and director of the washington institute' s stein program on counterterrorism and intelligence .
we’ve moved! we’ve joined the global engagement center. follow our new twitter handle, @ thegec .
the ata program’s policy formulation, strategic guidance, and oversight are managed by the u. s. department of state’s bureau of counterterrorism, while implementation and program administration are the responsibility of the bureau of diplomatic security (ds) .
please be sure to follow the global engagement center at @ thegec (previously @ thinkagain _ dos) .
hussain said it sends a powerful message when muslim communities publicly reject extremists' messages, and he expressed appreciation for the emiratis' leadership in supporting the new center .
network analyses to map terrorist supply chains, support infrastructures, financial transactions, communications channels, recruitment and training activities, and other footprints serve to focus collection, identify vulnerabilities and inform strategic operational planning to attack, disrupt, and neutralize terrorist operations. while forensic analyses of terrorist acts remain vital, the us counterterrorism enterprise (including its intelligence community foundations) is strategically oriented proactively to identify, assess, and defeat terrorist operations .
critics blasted not only the video, but also the broader “think again turn away” campaign. rita katz, whose site intelligence group tracks the online communications of terrorist groups, began cataloguing what she considered to be the center’s most embarrassing materials and said the campaign was playing into the islamic state’s hands by bolstering its reputation for cruelty and expanding its audience .
since its launch in september 2011, the gctf has mobilized over us $ 200 million to strengthen counterterrorism - related rule of law institutions, in particular, for countries transitioning away from emergency law .
hedayah, based in abu dhabi, uae, serves as a cve center of excellence and a training hub .
the global engagement center provides information and facts about terrorism and the international community' s activities to end terrorism .
by contrast, “strategic counterintelligence” remains a relatively undeveloped concept, in theory or implementation. isn’t this curious? for if strategic intelligence takes as its touchstone the whole of state interests and the sources of state power, then understanding the purpose and manner in which other states use their intelligence resources to gain advantage and mastering the capability to counter them would seem to be the other side of the strategic intelligence coin .
the obama administration has urged arab allies to do more to combat the media blitz, characterizing the fight on the communications front as a key pillar in the overall effort to defeat the group .
boko haram and u. s. counterterrorism assistance to nigeria (may 14, 2014) | u. s. embassy & consulate in nigeria
the center was conceived by senior officials at the state department, including its counterterrorism chief, daniel benjamin, who was among a group of administration insiders who worried that the white house had become more focused on killing terrorists than preventing the recruitment of new ones .
last june, islamic state supporters warned fighters to beware of the center’s twitter account and not to interact with it .
there is another way. us counterintelligence could seize the strategic initiative and begin by working the target abroad, with the purpose of selectively degrading the hostile foreign intelligence service and its ability to work against us. this is the central objective of strategic counterintelligence .
this analytic work in turn should lead to refined collection requirements to help identify adversary intelligence service vulnerabilities and support strategic operational planning to exploit them—and some thought - provoking new possibilities for advancing us objectives .
1. sherman kent, strategic intelligence for american world policy (princeton, nj: princeton university press, 1949 examples of the literature published since kent’s work include: roger hilsman, strategic intelligence and national decisions. (glencoe, il: free press, 1956); bruce bruce d. berkowitz and allan e. goodman, strategic intelligence for american national security. (princeton, nj: princeton university press, 1989); richard k. betts, and thomas g. mahnken, eds. , paradoxes of strategic intelligence: essays in honor of michael j. handel (london: frank cass, 2003); loch k. johnson and james j. wirtz, eds. , strategic intelligence: windows into a secret world—an anthology. (los angeles: roxbury publishing company, 2004); and loch k. johnson, ed. , strategic intelligence (london: praeger security international, 2007) .
skeptics of the new campaign voiced concerns that the program is an attempt by the white house to end a long - simmering turf war with the counterterrorism center’s director, alberto fernandez, and exercise more control over the kinds of messages that are produced and coordinated with domestic and international partners .
the national ci enterprise must be configured to execute the strategic ci mission. the strategic ci mission requires a supporting infrastructure to orchestrate the resources of the many parts of the ci community to focus collection and analysis of the foreign intelligence service, perform strategic operational planning to address collection gaps, develop options to degrade the foreign intelligence service, and enable coordinated execution to achieve defensive and offensive ci goals .
the starting blocks for the strategic ci mission are in place. in line with the commission’s recommendation, the national clandestine service, under cia, is ideally situated to deliver, for the first time, a genuine ci capability abroad to complement the fbi’s responsibilities at home .
this can work for obvious reasons: bad guys and their sympathizers don’t care what the us government wants them to do, but they can be influenced by peers or cultural in - groups .
people who are attracted to [ jihadism ] don' t go to the government for their guidance on what to do ,
nicholas rasmussen, the director of the national counterterrorism center, told the senate intelligence committee in early february .
even with clinton’s backing, however, a 2010 meeting at the white house offered an early indication of how contentious the plan would be. the cia’s drone war in pakistan was at full throttle when benjamin pitched the idea for the center to obama and key players on his national security team, including clinton, counterterrorism adviser john brennan and senior aide denis mcdonough .
other officials questioned whether even a newly empowered center at the state department would be up to the task. operating the center on a shoestring budget of about $ 5 million a year, mr. fernandez, a respected middle east specialist and career foreign service officer, and his supporters have long complained that neither the state department nor the white house fully supported or properly financed the center’s activities .
as the center finally began to take shape at the state department, there was a sense that significant ground had already been lost .
countering violent extremism (cve) is a pillar of the administration’s strategic approach to counterterrorism, and is an increasingly critical component of a comprehensive and sustainable counterterrorism strategy that seeks to address the entire life cycle of radicalization to violent extremism. the united states is working with governments and non - governmental partners to address the spread of violent extremism and the conditions that make communities susceptible to violent extremism, including – but not limited to – isil / da’esh’s potent brand of terrorism .
frustratingly for journalists and other advocates of government transparency, the center will seldom reveal who it is supporting, just as special operators don’t reveal the forces they are training unless that nation chooses to reveal it .
greg miller is a national security correspondent for the washington post. he was among the post reporters awarded the 2014 pulitzer prize for coverage of u. s. surveillance programs revealed by edward snowden and a finalist for the 2013 pulitzer prize. he previously worked for the los angeles times. follow
“unfortunately, as we all know, the government is probably not the best platform to try to communicate with the set of actors who are potentially vulnerable to this kind of propaganda and this kind of recruitment, ” nicholas rasmussen, the director of the national counterterrorism center, told the senate intelligence committee last week .
the u. s. - nigeria bi - national commission is a strategic dialogue designed to expand mutual cooperation across a broad range of shared interests .
first established in 2009, the partnership for regional east africa counterterrorism (preact), is a u. s. - funded and implemented multi - year, multi - faceted program designed to build the capacity and cooperation of military, law enforcement, and civilian actors across east africa to counter terrorism in a comprehensive fashion. it uses law enforcement, military, and development resources to achieve its strategic objectives, including :
the global engagement center is charged with leading the u. s. government’s efforts to counter propaganda and disinformation from international terrorist organizations and foreign countries .
in time, strategic ci operations should yield insights into foreign intelligence threats that inform us ci activities globally and diminish the adversary’s ability to work against us. the fbi should realize the most immediate gains from strategic ci operations as collection against foreign intelligence services abroad begins to fill in the (now largely empty) file folders on intelligence personnel arriving on our shores. in other words, the return on investment in the strategic ci mission should more than offset the cost of redirecting current ci resources and effort; conversely if us counterintelligence does not adopt a strategic approach the marginal return on additional ci dollars is likely to be disappointing .
since its inception, the center had purposely avoided posting any material in english. it did so in part to avoid running afoul of rules barring the state department from attempts to influence american citizens. but officials also cited another concern: venturing into english would expose the center’s efforts to more scrutiny in washington .
the global counterterrorism forum (gctf) is a multilateral body that seeks to promote civilian cooperation and good practices to counter terrorism. the gctf is composed of 30 countries and the eu. it consists of a strategic - level coordinating committee and five thematic and regional expert - driven working groups focusing on the criminal justice sector and rule of law; countering violent extremism; and capacity building in the sahel, the horn of africa, and southeast asia. the gctf aims to strengthen the international architecture for addressing 21st century terrorism and promotes a strategic, long - term approach to dealing with the threat .
the proposal languished long after obama’s flash of frustration. in her memoir, clinton said that “despite the president’s pointed comments in july 2010, it took more than a year for the white house to issue an executive order” establishing the center .
what the sawab center will do is, it will begin to rectify the wrong impression that isil is beating us in the information war and the social media war ,
he said, using an alternate name for the militant group .
the consolidation and enhanced professionalization of all of the fbi’s national security functions under a new national security branch should enable a more systematic and strategically - driven approach to the bureau’s intelligence mission, including its ci work. the defense department’s strategic ci orientation has been institutionalized in the mission of counterintelligence field activity and the ongoing work on ci campaign plans now incorporated within the department’s deliberate planning process. and with the issuance of the 2005 national counterintelligence strategy, the office of the ncix engaged the ci community to build central data bases on select foreign intelligence services to support strategic analyses and to identify collection needs, and it established a pilot project for a ci community integration center to conduct strategic operational planning to degrade foreign adversaries intelligence capabilities .
a status report in the final analysis, the decision whether or not to pursue a strategic ci capability is ultimately a policy call. president bush made the initial call in approving the first national counterintelligence strategy in 2005. 13 while broadly a vision statement for the many ways in which counterintelligence should support national security, the strategy’s central feature is reorientation of the ci enterprise to enable proactive strategic operations against foreign intelligence threats as national security priorities dictate. the national security leadership has every reason to expect that the ci community is hard at work to deliver this new strategic ci capability .
he and anwar gargash, the emirati minister of state for foreign affairs, said in a joint statement the center' s aim is to support coalition efforts, challenge isis propaganda and
amplify moderate and tolerant voices from across the region .
the center’s ability to fend off the criticism was hampered by the difficulty of measuring the effectiveness of its work. the group could point to the size of its following on twitter and argued that all the death threats and efforts to shut down its accounts were evidence that the center had gotten under the islamic state’s skin .
since its creation, the center’s budget had hovered between $ 5 million and $ 6 million per year, a range that barely registers on washington’s spending scale .
matthew levitt is the fromer - wexler fellow and director of the stein program on counterterrorism and intelligence at the washington institute. this article originally appeared on the wall street journal blog
think tank .
more work still needs to be done. the center does not yet have an active website of its own, and a planned facebook presence and a dedicated youtube channel are expected to take several more weeks to develop. officials say they hope the center will eventually launch
proactive online messaging campaigns
to target isis propaganda .
that finding was interpreted as an endorsement of the center’s work under hussain to set up messaging centers overseas with the expectation that their postings would have greater credibility and impact than those coming from the u. s. government. a center in the united arab emirates became operational this year. others are planned in malaysia and nigeria .
despite these accomplishments, the ability to execute strategic ci operations remains a far - off goal. it is uncertain whether plans for the new external ci cadre at cia will survive in the face of competing demands on the agency’s humint collection and other clandestine resources .
counterterrorism support to nigeria focuses on building critical counterterrorism capabilities among nigeria’s civilian and law enforcement agencies. this supports the larger u. s. objective of encouraging nigeria to develop and implement a comprehensive approach to counter bh that upholds and enforces the rule of law, provides civilian protection, respects human rights and international norms, and addresses the underlying grievances that bh exploits (including through development gains and through responsive governance) .
mr. fernandez, who is retiring in april, declined to comment for this article .
china says it' s' fully prepared' for trade war with u. s .
all ata courses emphasize the importance of the rule of law and respect for human rights .
here' s the url for this tweet. copy it to easily share with friends .
richard stengel, a former time magazine managing editor who is the u. s. undersecretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs, traveled to the emirates for the launch .
is a menacing phantom, a headline, and news clip. for some like alex ,
that is why the center will need to leverage “a network of networks” to be effective in preventing or mitigating extremist violence, mr. stengel and other american officials said .
journalists were not allowed to attend the project' s unveiling or visit the center, which has been testing its operations and developing its branding over the past three months .
the un is a close partner of and participant in the gctf and its activities. the gctf serves as a mechanism for furthering the implementation of the universally - agreed un global counter - terrorism strategy and, more broadly, to complement and reinforce existing multilateral counterterrorism efforts, starting with those of the un .
operational risks. the risks associated with strategic ci are of particular concern to those responsible for clandestine humint. there is an inherent tension between the work of humint collectors and the work of counterintelligence operations. intelligence collection values above all the information, but ci insists on acting on that information, which is a very different operational dynamic. for example, if a penetration within a foreign government were used as a ci agent (for example, serving as a channel for deception), that ci operation would introduce a new risk of compromising the asset, to the detriment of the collection effort. yet the very same organizations that are responsible for humint are also being asked to take on expanded ci operational responsibilities, which means they must weigh the costs and benefits of the strategic ci mission against their other standing responsibilities .
there were also death threats. most were vague vows by islamic state followers to track down the center’s employees. but in one case, isis managed to identify one of the center’s contract workers by name and singled him out as a target. the threat was traced to a militant in spain who was subsequently arrested, u. s. officials said .
it is a problem that has proved more difficult to solve than almost any other for counterterrorism officials. in the 14 years since the sept. 11 attacks, the united states has degraded al - qaeda, tracked down and killed osama bin laden and protected the country from any mass - casualty follow - up attacks .
learn how the cia is organized into directorates and key offices, responsible for securing our nation .
in addition, the gctf served as impetus for the development of three “inspired” institutions in order to address the forum’s areas of strategic priority: countering violent extremism (cve) and strengthening the rule of law. these institutions provide a vehicle for the operationalization, promotion, and implementation of some of the gctf good practices surrounding cve and rule of law. these three institutions include :
based inside the state department, a team of around 50 people man the center, working on its own set of videos, images for sharing on facebook, tweets, anything to blunt the spread of extremist communcations on social media. the concept behind the center was first born in 2010 out of a desire to, rather than just ignoring the messaging that al - qaeda and other terrorist groups published, actually counter their message with one of our own .
there is a parallel for thinking about counterintelligence as a strategic mission. just as us intelligence is mapping the essential features and activities of terrorist groups, so ci analysts could determine how foreign intelligence services are built and operate—call it ci order - of - battle preparation. key questions would include :
the new sawab center is one of the most concrete responses to that call yet in the region. named for the arabic word for
the right or proper way ,
it will be based in abu dhabi, the oil - rich capital of the united arab emirates, a key american ally and a member of the u. s. - led coalition against the isis group .
trump shrugs off u. k. ’s brexit flap, still jazzed for visit with pm theresa may
the institutions and people responsible for the formulation and implementation of american plans, intentions, and capabilities .
this report provides the department of state’s annual, statutorily mandated assessment of trends and events in international terrorism that transpired in 2016, including country - by - country breakdowns of foreign government counterterrorism cooperation, and profiles of designated foreign terrorist organizations .
amid the rash of negative coverage, marie harf, a state department spokeswoman, began urging that the cscc be reined in. in an e - mail to white house communications adviser ben rhodes and others, she said that she was “supremely uncomfortable” with the graphic images that were “going out under the state department seal. ”
in the summer of 2015, who was a target recruit for the islamic state. her story provides a chilling illustration of the group’s reach and the persistence of its messaging. for most in the west ,
overall, the most formidable obstacle to progress has been the lack of understanding or consensus behind the purpose and value of the strategic ci mission. even the end goal behind the creation of the ncix remains a matter of some dispute. is the objective to establish a new national capability to execute the strategic ci mission or simply to become more efficient at performing the standing missions of the several ci agencies ?
and it may well be the case that the best sources on those intelligence operations are to be found not in iraq but in other parts of the world, another reason why coordinated strategic planning for global ci operations and exploitation to advance theater objectives has been deemed essential (if not yet fully realized) .
1. enabling and enhancing the capacity of north and west african militaries and law enforcement to conduct counterterrorism operations; 2. integrating the ability of north and west african militaries and law enforcement, and other supporting partners, to operate regionally and collaboratively on counterterrorism efforts; 3. enhancing border security capacity to monitor, restrain, and interdict terrorist movements; 4. strengthening the rule of law, including access to justice, and law enforcement’s ability to detect, disrupt, respond to, investigate, and prosecute terrorist activity; 5. monitoring and countering the financing of terrorism (such as that related to kidnapping for ransom); and 6. reducing the limited sympathy and support among communities for violent extremism .
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patrick tucker is technology editor for defense one. he’s also the author of the naked future: what happens in a world that anticipates your every move? (current, 2014). previously, tucker was deputy editor for the futurist for nine years. tucker has written about emerging technology in slate, ...
fortunately, such reflexive protectiveness commonly is overcome in the field, where people with a shared duty station and purpose are clear that they are working on the same team. without some way of instilling that spirit and incentive structure in washington interagency planning groups, strategic operational planning for ci will remain an elusive goal .
let me be clear: operations to identify, assess, neutralize and exploit foreign intelligence services as a strategic target are not an entirely new concept for us counterintelligence. over the course of 70 years, us and british intelligence acquired just such specialized insights into the gru and the kgb, to inform ci operations against the soviet union. 8 while not presently configured to work as a strategic whole, us counterintelligence, nevertheless, unquestionably could produce and execute collection strategies to characterize other foreign intelligence services of concern, exploit those sources for their positive intelligence value, and develop options to degrade those services as national security objectives may dictate .
as the center’s campaign intensified, the islamic state showed flashes of irritation. the group launched a twitter account, @ al - bttar, specifically to engage in running arguments with the state department team .
“there was irritation” in obama’s voice, the former official said, aimed at aides he had been pressing for options to keep al - qaeda’s ideology from spreading. “everybody on his counterterrorism team had a little bit of egg on their face at that point, ” said the former official, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the meeting and requested anonymity .
the cscc began with more going for it than any of its predecessors, but it also faced major obstacles .
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u. s. consul general f. john bray graduation – ceremony for fellows of the carrington youth fellowship initiative
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even though it has been six years since the office of the national counterintelligence executive (ncix) was created to lead and integrate the us counterintelligence enterprise, at present we have neither the ability to perform the mission of strategic counterintelligence nor a common understanding of what it means, much less an appreciation of its value to national security. [ a ] indeed, it is one thing to have a national - level office to bring strategic coherence to wide - ranging ci activities, as the law provides; it is quite another matter (to paraphrase henry kissinger) to answer the question, “what is strategic counterintelligence and what do you do with it? ”
the national security strategy of the united states, and in particular the strategy behind the global war on terrorism, embodies just such a national offensive orientation. 6 in times past, the most pressing terrorism - related intelligence question was most often, “who did this? ” in turn leading to manhunts, apprehension and rendition for trial. today the strategic imperative is to stop the terrorists before they strike, with derivative requirements for operational intelligence support .
established in 2005, the trans - sahara counterterrorism partnership (tsctp) is a multifaceted, multi - year strategy implemented jointly by the department of state, the u. s. agency for international development, and the department of defense to assist partners in west and north africa increase their immediate and long - term capabilities to address terrorist threats and prevent the spread of violent extremism .
the tradecraft of counterintelligence and its several tactical functions, which are properly within the separate cognizance and competence of units within the fbi, cia, and the department of defense, have well established objectives and processes that are not at issue here. what is at issue, what the very concept of “strategic counterintelligence” implies, is the potential for engaging ci collection and operations as tools to advance national security policy objectives, and, at the strategic level, to go on the offense to degrade hostile external foreign intelligence services and their ability to work against us .
from prevention of terrorist attacks to responding to and mitigating terrorist attacks, ata helps partner nations build critical capabilities across a wide spectrum of counterterrorism skills. ata will continue to provide training courses, consultations, mentorships, seminars, and equipment relevant to investigations, border security, protection of critical targets, leadership and management, regional coordination and cooperation, critical incident response and management, and cyber security. as terrorist networks continue to adjust their tactics and strategies, ata will continue to adapt and refine its counterterrorism training initiatives to meet evolving threats .
the state department’s counterterrorism finance (ctf) program provides training that aims to restrict boko haram’s ability to raise, move, and store money. ctf’s current focus provides nigeria with cross border financial investigations training to work effectively with counterparts in neighboring countries on critical ctf cases .
the threat is strategic foreign intelligence operations against the united states are now more diffuse, more aggressive, more technologically sophisticated, and potentially more successful than ever before. in recent years, we have seen a growing number of intelligence operations within our borders, facilitated by an extensive foreign presence that provides cover for intelligence services and their agents .
transcript: briefing on the 15th anniversary of the u. s. president’s emergency plan for aids relief (pepfar )
a team from university college london, one of the few groups to broaden their understanding of' extremism' to include white supremacist and nativist strains, designed a website for mental health workers to peruse warning signs for
radicalization .
“its main shortcoming was that it operated too independently and rarely integrated its efforts with others in the federal government focused on countering violent extremism, ” said john d. cohen, a former top counterterrorism official at the department of homeland security who is now a professor at rutgers .
under the new plan, the digital outreach teams will continue, but a new entity called the information coordination cell, staffed by intelligence and pentagon analysts among others, will be responsible for the broader coordination functions. with just 30 people in that cell, and 50 more in the center, the overall effort will still be quite small .
previous u. s. efforts have ranged from covert cia propaganda programs to a walt disney - produced film. their ineffectiveness has hindered attempts to rebalance u. s. counterterrorism policy, leaving the government heavily dependent on armed drones, commando teams and other instruments of lethal force .
the center’s troubles were compounded as its supporters in the administration dwindled. benjamin, who had pushed to create the group, left the state department at the end of 2012 for an academic position at dartmouth college. clinton resigned as secretary of state weeks later and was replaced by john f. kerry, who overhauled the department’s public diplomacy ranks .
twitter’s nu wexler was pointed in his reply about cooperation with the center. “twitter is largely a public service and the u. s. government may review public accounts on its own. government requests for non - public information are reviewed pursuant to our privacy policy and law enforcement guidelines, and disclosed in our transparency report, ” he wrote .
cj is not on the verge of becoming the first ever west point - educated member of the islamic state. quite the opposite: his facebook activity is sanctioned by the state department and the combatting terrorism center at west point .
message for u. s. citizens: renew u. s. passports and perform notarials in jos city, plateau state
strategic assessments of foreign intelligence capabilities can help inform policy deliberations and frame options for actions. narrowly, as part of a warning template, the activities of foreign intelligence services may number among the most useful early indicators of changes in threat conditions. more broadly, there is scarcely an area of national security concern—from iranian or north korean wmd activities to chinese military space activities to fielding effective ballistic missile defenses—that does not have a critical foreign intelligence dimension. when integrated with other foreign policy tools, the insights and operations of strategic counterintelligence operations could make the difference between favorable and unfavorable outcomes in world events .
then there’s the delivery of the content. that’s where the big data analysts come in. lumpkin will be contracting private companies that crunch the public trail of information internet users leave behind, just like they do for large retailers looking for new buyers .
“welcome to isis land” sat largely unnoticed on the center’s youtube channel after it was posted on july 23, 2014. it was part of a much larger collection that included nearly 300 other clips, including more than 200 in arabic .
the center will also employ data analysts who will work with private industry partners to sift through the public information any user leaves on social media, to determine who might be leaning toward radicalism and message them directly—though how isn’t clear yet .
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fernandez had made sure that the “isis land” video was approved in advance by officials from the white house, the cia, the pentagon and the state department. but the public reaction emboldened insiders who were already skeptical of the center’s work .
richard stengel, a former managing editor of time magazine hired by kerry as head of public diplomacy, had concerns about the center’s “snarky tone. ” he pushed an approach he had employed at time: “curate more and create less. ”
even the department of defense, with its long wartime experience in counterintelligence operations and its highly developed deliberate planning process, has been late to incorporate strategic ci campaign plans as part of standing theater operations plans. 9 in the six months leading up to operation iraqi freedom, an interagency ci strategic planning team came together under dod leadership to develop a common operating picture of iraqi intelligence operations worldwide. in response to command authority direction, the team was chartered to develop operations to render iraqi intelligence ineffective .
the center occupies a cramped second - floor office at the state department that officials said is the only space in the department’s public diplomacy bureau equipped with the locks, alarms and other systems needed to serve a classified facility. inside, employees track terrorist propaganda and devise responses at computers that are equipped with access to reports from the cia’s open source center and other channels. most of the front - line work on social media is carried out by contractors in a separate building nearby .
even so, fernandez pressed ahead late last year with an ambitious proposal to double the center’s budget. he made his case in a memo that detailed how badly the center was overmatched. because of budget constraints, the outreach team could be online only five days a week, rarely during hours that corresponded with peak internet activity in the middle east. the proposal cited the poor production quality of its videos as proof that even its equipment was inferior to that of the islamic state .
that resurrection, even as twitter and other social media platforms selectively target isis’ accounts, shows that there will be no shortage of targets for the center’s outreach efforts. it remains uncertain whether these long - term efforts to end the threat that ideologies like those of isis and al - qaeda pose will be successful or just screams into the dark void that is the internet .
us ci professionals have made tremendous contributions to the security of our nation. thanks to their dedicated work there is no reason to doubt that we are deriving about as much value as is possible from the current business model of us counterintelligence. the question is whether our national security leadership thinks that is good enough, because the sum of what our ci agencies do will not bring us a strategic offensive gain against foreign intelligence threats unless orchestrated to a common purpose. that is the mission of strategic ci .
its creation in 1983, the antiterrorism assistance (ata) program has served as the primary provider of u. s. government antiterrorism training and equipment to law - enforcement agencies of partner nations throughout the world, and has delivered counterterrorism training to more than 90, 000 law enforcement personnel from 154 countries .
president barack obama wanted a counterterrorism achievement in time for the state of the union address, and he got two: a state department office focused on countering terrorist narratives abroad has been refocused and an interagency task force established to coordinate efforts against violent extremism within the u. s. to make the tuesday deadline, the changes were announced before all details were finalized. still, what might sound like bureaucratic reshuffling could lead to important developments .
maybe we are overstating the threat. in a conversation with me about the concept of strategic ci, an old hand in the british secret intelligence service dismissed it summarily: “you’re scaring yourself. the bad guys are nowhere near so formidable as to warrant such a broad undertaking. it’s enough to deal with them prudentially; you don’t have to go looking for new dragons to slay. ”
isis supporters themselves... characterized the effects of the suspensions as' devastating' in strategy documents, and repeatedly emphasized the importance of creating new accounts ,
berger and morgon write, adding that hashtag mentions of the group have dwindled from 40, 000 a day in september 2014 to 5, 000 last month–a result of efforts by twitter staff in san francisco to disrupt the group' s communications .
as the president noted in his national defense university speech in may 2013, countering terrorism requires a holistic approach. we continue to work with nigeria and other international partners to help promote and support such an approach to boko haram. the united states has been working to counter bh for many years, and we will continue to do so. the first part of this fact sheet provides information about bh and the many atrocities it committed in nigeria prior to its attack on a girls’ secondary school in chibok, borno state, where it kidnapped approximately 300 girls. the latter part provides information about various u. s. department of state initiatives and programs to assist nigeria’s counterterrorism efforts, such as the antiterrorism assistance program and the trans - sahara counterterrorism partnership .
by working the foreign intelligence service as a strategic target globally, us counterintelligence should be able to leverage insights into adversary activities and vulnerabilities to direct ci operations to maximum effect. at home, this means that the operational and analytic focus of us counterintelligence would need to be transformed from its case - driven approach to one that includes strategic assessments of adversary presence, capabilities, and intentions. this in turn would drive operations to neutralize the inevitable penetrations of our government and protect national security secrets and other valuable information .
in late 2013, the center unveiled an english - language campaign dubbed “think again turn away” aimed at the islamic state. in a typical skirmish last year, the terrorist group launched a barrage of messages on twitter under the hashtag # calamitywillbefallus. the center tried to disrupt the stream with caustic replies. one showed a feeble - looking bin laden watching television in the compound where he was killed and warned islamic state followers: “i want to remind you what happens to terrorists who target us. ”
strategic threats require a strategically coherent response. instead of looking at the broader implications of these foreign intelligence operations, we have for the most part adopted a case - by - case approach to dealing with the threat they represented. and by concentrating our ci resources overwhelmingly inside the united states, rather than engaging the foreign intelligence service abroad, we have ceded advantage to adversaries. [ d ]
foreign powers have seized the initiative, and moved their operations to us soil, where our institutions are not constituted to work against growing foreign intelligence networks embedded within american society. here, ci investigations may result in prosecutions for espionage or related offenses, demarches, or the expulsion of diplomatic personnel for activities inconsistent with their status. but with rare exception, their disposition is decided on the merits of each case at hand and not as part of a larger effort to counter the foreign intelligence service as a strategic target. [ e ]
the abu dhabi center' s staff will engage social media users on various platforms and partner with prominent individuals and organizations to counter is messaging, according to hussain. it will also host a content - sharing platform so partners can upload and download files .
in thinking about intelligence, sherman kent began with an understanding of national power that was well within the mainstream of contemporary american strategic thought. kent’s contribution was to apply thinking about strategy and national power to an ordered conception of intelligence analysis as an intellectual discipline. 2
the office of public affairs (opa) is the single point of contact for all inquiries about the central intelligence agency (cia) .
when richard lebaron, a career u. s. diplomat, was asked to be the center’s first director, he described the job offer to his wife. noting that it had been nine years since the sept. 11 attacks, she reacted with disbelief .
“welcome to isis land” went on to be viewed in numbers never approached by any of the center’s other films. but even now it is not clear that any of those viewers were ever at risk of joining the islamic state, let alone diverted from that path .
yet to the extent strategic counterintelligence (ci) is addressed within ci or intelligence circles, it is controversial, poorly understood, and even more poorly executed because it does not fit comfortably within the existing architecture and approach to counterintelligence as it has developed within the united states .
probably the most effective and most troubling government strategy is to get ngos, grassroots groups, and individual influencers to do your messaging for you .
in my view, however, larger national security considerations argue for a purposeful ability to deny, degrade, or manipulate the intelligence capabilities of america’s adversaries. if our national security leadership judges that the united states requires such a strategic ci capability, then the dni, the ncix, and the whole of the community must step up to that task. that is a much higher bar. but it is not beyond our reach.
the center for strategic counterterrorism communications ( cscc ) was an american government enterprise established in 2011 at the direction of the president and the secretary of state to coordinate , orient , and inform government-wide foreign communications activities targeted against terrorism and violent extremism . the global engagement center , based at the state department , replaced the cscc in 2016 . 
the center for strategic counterterrorism communications (cscc) was an american government enterprise established in 2011 at the direction of the president and the secretary of state to coordinate, orient, and inform government-wide foreign communications activities targeted against terrorism and violent extremism. the global engagement center, based at the state department, replaced the cscc in 2016.
the center for strategic counterterrorism communications (cscc) was an american government enterprise established in 2011 at the direction of the president and the secretary of state to coordinate, orient, and inform government-wide foreign communications activities targeted against terrorism and violent extremism. the global engagement center, based at the state department, replaced the cscc in 2016.