U.S.-Canada Integrated Cybersecurity Agenda
by Dana Gabriel
BE YOUR OWN LEADER
November 12, 2012
As part of the Beyond the Border initiative, the U.S. and Canada are strengthening cybersecurity cooperation. In a move that received little attention, both countries recently announced a joint cybersecurity action plan. Cyber threats know no national borders which has made the issue an important security concern. A fully integrated North American security perimeter would be entrusted with preventing and responding to any such attacks.
One of the key priorities identified in the November 2011 Beyond the Border Action Plan is cybersecurity. The agreement lays the framework for enhancing U.S.-Canada, “bilateral cyber-security cooperation to better protect vital government and critical digital infrastructure and increase both countries’ ability to respond jointly and effectively to cyber incidents. This will be achieved through joint projects and operational efforts, including joint briefings with the private sector and other stakeholders, and the enhancement of real-time information sharing between operation centres.” The deal will also work towards strengthening, “cooperation on international cyber-security and Internet governance issues to promote prosperity, enhance security and preserve openness in our networked world.” Merging cyber threat strategies would force Canada to further bring its security practices in line with American ones and under the reach of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
On October 26, Public Safety Canada and the DHS released a Cybersecurity Action Plan which represents a key commitment under the Beyond the Border agreement. A press release explained that the specific goals include, “enhancing collaboration on cyber incident management between each country’s cyber security operations centres, improving information sharing and engagement with the private sector, and continuing the ongoing collaboration between Canada and the U.S. on the promotion of cyber security awareness to the public.” The new joint action plan promotes a shared approach to cybersecurity and digital critical infrastructure protection. Building on these initiatives, both countries also seek to further integrate cyber capabilities into military command structures.
Earlier this year, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta authorized the creation of the Joint Cyber Center (JCC) run by the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and U.S. Northern Command. The JCC will bring together personnel from the intelligence, operations and command control systems divisions. The aim is, “To better integrate cyber into the headquarters missions by improving situational awareness in the cyber domain, improving the defense of the commands’ networks and providing cyber consequence response and recovery support to civil authorities.” In June, DefenseNews reported that Secretary Panetta, “approved a new organizational framework, a plan designed as a ‘first step’ towards standardized cyber operations.” This includes having a JCC at each geographic combatant command which is part of ongoing efforts to not only boost U.S., but continental cyber defense capabilities. In the near future, the U.S. and Canada could create a binational “cyber-NORAD” to protect North America from shared threats.
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) released an updated Policy on Cyber Defence in June 2011. According to NATO’s website, “This revised policy offers a coordinated approach to cyber defence across the Alliance with a focus on preventing cyber attacks and building resilience.” It will act as the framework, “for how NATO will assist Allies, upon request, in their own cyber defence efforts, with the aim to optimise information sharing and situational awareness, collaboration and secure interoperability.” The new policy also, “sets the principles on NATO’s cyber defence cooperation with partner countries, international organisations, the private sector and academia.” In May of this year, the Chicago Summit Declaration, “committed to provide the resources and complete the necessary reforms to bring all NATO bodies under centralised cyber protection.” It also pledged to, “further integrate cyber defence measures into Alliance structures and procedures.” U.S.-Canadian military cooperation also extends through NATO and this includes in the realm of cybersecurity.
There are reports that President Barack Obama may be close to issuing a cybersecurity executive order as a means of bypassing Congress. Under the guise of cybersecurity, the U.S. and Canada have been individually pushing draconian legislation domestically which would grant government agencies sweeping new powers. The implications would be far reaching and pose a risk to privacy and civil liberties. Through the Beyond the Border initiative both countries are pursuing an integrated cybersecurity agenda. As they move forward and address common threats to North America, cyber and perimeter security will be further defined and dominated by U.S. interests.
Related articles by Dana Gabriel
Taking the U.S.-Canada Partnership to the Next Level
Pretext for a North American Homeland Security Perimeter
Strengthening U.S.-Canada Security Interests in North America
Perimeter Security and an Integrated North American Command
Dana Gabriel is an activist and independent researcher. He writes about trade, globalization, sovereignty, security, as well as other issues. Contact: beyourownleader@hotmail.com Visit his blog at Be Your Own Leader
[hat tip: Activist Post]
Agenda 21 Commercial (Official) [video]
P.A.N.D.A. People Against The NDAA
November 14, 2012
Agenda 21. It’s real: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=OzoN0IQsTAE
Don’t fall for it.
Join the movement: http://www.pandaunite.org
The PANDA (People Against the NDAA) Mission Statement:
Our Mission is to nonviolently nullify, strike down, repeal, stop, void and fight the indefinite detention provisions, Sections 1021 and 1022, of the National Defense Authorization Act for the Fiscal Year of 2012, to fight for American civil liberties, to combat laws restricting liberty in the interest of National Security, to support current government officials that are doing so and to engage a younger generation in the politics of the United States so this cannot happen again.
Russia’s Serbia Plays The EU and Clinton [video]
108morris108
November 6, 2012
Serbia is a Slavic brother to Russia, and just as NATO is waging war on the Muslims it is also waging wars on the Orthodox Christians. Neither the Orthodox nor the muslims believe in Usury or the gregarious hedonism of the West. And Serbia along with Russia, Iran, Armenia and they hope Ukraine will create a Pan Eurasian alliance to withstand the NATO onslaught.
MUST SEE DOCUMENTARY: Manufacturing Dissent: The Truth About Syria [video]
Land Destroyer
November 7, 2012
For more information:
- US Army Special Forces Unconventional Warfare Doctrine (2000)
- Color Revolution’s Mystery Gunmen : Explains how opposition militants are used to stage violence against unarmed protesters to further expand violence and destabilize a targeted government.
- London Telegraph: “BBC News uses ‘Iraq photo to illustrate Syrian massacre’“
- Syria: Game Over for Western Propaganda: Syrian Activists Caught Lying, Syrian Rebels Caught Committing Atrocities.
- “Syria, Waco, Occupy, and Los Angeles”: Examples of US using deadly force in riots, protests, and against armed groups inside the United States.
- “BBC Rides with Al Qaeda in Aleppo, Syria“: More on BBC’s role in deceiving the world regarding Syria.
- “NATO Using Al Qaeda Rat Lines to Flood Syria With Foreign Terrorists“: Where the terrorists in Syria are coming from, and who is really behind them.
Gaddafi Tribute – Sukant Chandan Excerpts [video]
108morris108
November 3, 2012
A meeting was held in memory of Gaddafi. And this is excerpts from Sukant Chandan’s introduction. Stating that Gaddafi championed every anti imperialist cause, even wanting a SATO to counteract NATO. And how Africom never got a foothold while Gaddafi was around.
It is almost Guy Fawkes night in Britain which is when fireworks are let off. So if you hear explosions they are just fireworks.
The other speakers at the conference are here: http://www.youtube.com/DiasporaChannel
Green book available here: http://geocities.com/athens/8744/readgb.htm
also at mathaba.net
US-Backed Terrorists Mass Murder Unarmed Civilians in Syria
by Tony Cartalucci
Land Destroyer
November 2, 2012
Washington Post claims “soldiers” were executed – terrorists in video clearly refer to victims as civilian “shabih.” Victims had no weapons, uniforms, or IDs indicating they were soldiers.
An egregious war crime was reported on by the Washington Post, but deceitfully and purposefully spun and shrugged off. In the Post’s article, “Syrian rebels execute unarmed government soldiers; dozens killed in fighting,” it is first reported:
Syrian rebels executed at least a half-dozen unarmed government soldiers Thursday after attacks on checkpoints near the town of Saraqeb in northwest Syria.
Then:
The execution of the soldiers, which was documented in a graphic video [GRAPHIC] posted online Thursday, is not the first time that rebel fighters appear to have committed war crimes. U.N. representatives and human rights organizations have repeatedly criticized the Syrian opposition in recent months for carrying out summary executions and for abusing detainees.
The video clearly shows unarmed men, none of whom are wearing uniforms or equipment typical of “government soldiers.” The Washington Post then links to another video while reporting:
A second video posted online Thursday [GRAPHIC], which appears to have been filmed shortly after the execution, shows at least three other bodies spread out around the checkpoint. The man filming approaches two of the bodies and says, “The shabiha of Assad, the dogs.”
“Shabiha,” of course refers to alleged civilian militias organized locally to resist terrorists entering into and attempting to overrun neighborhoods. The term “shabiha” has been used by the Western media as a catch-all to spin any massacre committed against civilians by US-backed terrorists operating in Syria. That the murderers themselves, filming their own crime, refer to the victims as “shabiha” – indicates that civilians, not Syrian government forces, were murdered – contrary to what the Washington Post reported.
The term suspected “shabiha” has become analogous of the Western media’s use of the term “African mercenaries” in Libya during NATO destabilization and regime change operations there in 2011. These “African mercenaries” were lynched, beheaded, shot, burned, and hacked to pieces, just as terrorists are now doing to suspected “shabiha” across Syria.
Photo: Images and reports eventually trickled out as NATO-backed genocide unfolded throughout Tripoli’s streets, indicating the destruction of infrastructure and the specific targeting of black Libyans written off by the corporate media as “suspected mercenaries.” Benghazi rebels have been long reported to harbor extremist ideologies and an intense ethnic and racial hatred. These very Libyan, Benghazi terrorists are now streaming into Syria to commit similar atrocities against the Syrian people.
It would later turn out these black Africans were not mercenaries, but citizens who had lived in Libya for generations fighting desperately for their lives against sectarian extremists intolerant of their complexion and creed. Racially motivated attacks by NATO-backed terrorists in Libya would culminate in the extermination of the entire city of Tawarga where an estimated 10,000-35,000 inhabitants were either exterminated, imprisoned, or exiled to refugee camps and then beyond Libya’s borders.
Video: Wiped out. Tawarga, once home to 10,000 (this video claims up to 35,000) people, many part of Libya’s black community who had resided in the country for generations, had its inhabitants either exiled, imprisoned or exterminated. NATO-backed militants told the Telegraph in 2011, ” every single one of them has left, and we will never allow them to come back.” And just as the Western media initially covered up these atrocities by merely labeling all black victims of NATO terrorists as “African mercenaries,” a similar propaganda campaign is underway in Syria, labeling civilian victims of NATO-backed foreign terrorists as suspected “shibiha.”
In Syria, suspected “shabiha” are in actuality Syrians unwilling or unable, because of their ethnicity or creed, to capitulate to roving bands of foreign-armed sectarian extremists. The Washington Post and others throughout the corporate-driven Western media are willfully covering up crimes against humanity through overtly deceitful reporting and semantics.
It should be remembered, that these terrorists who have video taped themselves committing a massacre of unarmed men, out of uniform, and referred to as civilian “shabiha,” not soldiers – are at the center of renewed US, NATO, Saudi and Qatari efforts to refocus Western support for the violent, armed overthrow of the Syrian government.
Who pocketed Gaddafi (LIBYA!) ’s billions?
CounterPsyOps
November 3, 2012
By Andrei Ontikov, GlobalResearch.ca
NATO’s military campaign in Libya is remarkable, among other things, for the following two reasons.
First – the damage that the air raids by the Western anti-Gaddafi alliance caused to Libya is estimated to be 7 times bigger than the damage which bombing by the Nazis caused in Europe during WWII.
Second – Muammar Gaddafi and his associates had, in total, $ 150 bln on bank accounts in various parts of the world. After the beginning of the Libyan revolution, the West froze these accounts. Now, this money has disappeared somewhere.
Russian expert in Eastern affairs Anatoly Egorin tries to analyze these two cases in his recently published book, titled “The Ousting of Muammar Gaddafi. A Libyan Diary. 2011-2012.”
Speaking about the damage which Western bombing attacks caused to Libya, one may probably say that every war causes damage. This is true, but the amount of damage can be greater or smaller. It may be doubted that the ousting of Gaddafi, however tyrannical he might have been, was really worth the damage which NATO bombs caused to Libya – to say nothing of the fact that introducing a no-fly zone over a country and then bombing it is, to put it mildly, not very consistent.
However, the sum which Gaddafi and his associates had in bank accounts, and which the West, in fact, has stolen – $ 150 bln – might have been enough to reconstruct the Libyan infrastructure after the damage caused by the bombs – if not fully, then, at least, partially. But now, that money has disappeared. Why and where? Here is what Anatoly Egorin says:
“The West most likely decided right after the very start of the anti-Gaddafi rebellion in Libya to do whatever possible to prevent Gaddafi from staying in power. His and his associates’ bank accounts were immediately frozen. Or, it would be probably better to say that it was only officially announced that they were frozen, but in reality they were stolen. Nobody can say for sure precisely who stole this money and where it is now. There is only some vague information that it was allegedly pocketed by the bankers themselves and that these bankers allegedly tried to launder this money in offshore zones. Attempts to find this money are now under way, but I doubt that it will ever be found.”
“However,” Mr. Egorin continues, “it would be wrong to say that only the West has stolen the money of the former Libyan regime. It is known that those people who fought against Gaddafi and who are now in power in Libya have conveyed many trucks literally stuffed with money abroad.”
The Head of the International Association for Democracy in Libya Fatima abu an-Niran confirms what Mr. Egorin says:
“The chaotic situation in Libya enabled everyone to steal anything that lay in his or her temptation’s way. The West was quite aware of that, but didn’t try to stop it. I can back my words with facts, and the former head of Libya’s Central Bank can also confirm this.”
“The $ 150 bln on Gaddafi’s and other former Libyan leaders’ bank accounts is not the only money that was stolen during the period of anarchy in Libya,” Ms. an-Niran continues. “Lots of money was trafficked and is still being trafficked abroad by the Libyan “revolutionaries” themselves. To a large extent, the situation in Libya still remains chaotic. The new authorities seem to be incapable of controlling the situation in many of the country’s provinces. These provinces are in fact controlled by groups of bandits who do whatever they want with those who try to resist them.”
“When the West threw bombs on Libya, Western politicians said that this allegedly was done to help Libyans oust the tyrant and establish democracy in their country,” Ms. an-Niran says. “Now, it has turned out that these words were mere demagogy. The real aim of the West was to try to steal Libya’s riches.”
True, it looks like now that Gaddafi has been ousted, the West doesn’t care anymore about what is happening in Libya. It also looks like the current Libyan leaders care more about staying in their posts – or occupying higher posts if possible – than about trying to return the $ 150 bln which mysteriously disappeared back into their country, which now badly needs restoration after the war.
PN 