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Introduction
Warfare and socio-culturally and politically influenced
instability and animosity have practically become
norms within the communal features and characteristics
of global society within which we contemporaneously
survive and interact. And this, moreover, is something
that tends to be accentuate quite strongly when
considering it in light of the prevalent features
of the current global scenario, particularly in
the wake of the ghastly attacks that were carried
out on the US on the 11th of September, 2001.
It is ironic moreover, that in spite of the exceptionality
of the advancement and development that is presently
apparent within virtually all societal segments
and sectors; the human element of brutal animosity
leading the stark destructivity appears to be
as rampant as it would ostensibly have been within
the significantly primitive, Neanderthal era (s).
It would, however, be relevant to acknowledge
that in spite of the predominantly savage primitivism
that such socio-psychological elements indicate;
the mannerisms with which such inclinations are
acted upon have come to be greatly diversified
as a result of being influenced by the collective
boom in technological integration. This, moreover,
is something that tends to be especially exemplified
when considering it in light of such obvious,
technologically influenced warfare factors nuclear
weaponry, remote detonation, and extensive all-terrain
defense surveillance. Take into consideration,
for instance, the issues of espionage and/or counterespionage
and they have advanced, developed and evolved
over the course of time that has elapsed since
the earliest known records of warfare between
two or more groups of particular and profiled
humans. While the medium of their operations have
been dramatically revised as a result of the significance
of the day and age, using spies to obtain secret
information, as about another government or a
business competitor continues to represent and
essential component of passive warfare (Dickson,
2001).
Considering the history of military roles in
concern to espionage & counterespionage
Before carrying on, however, it would be relevant
to consider the fundamentality underlying the
need for there to be effectual espionage as well
as counterespionage existing within governmental
infrastructures. This is something that is clarified
to an extent when considering that espionage provides
governments the key to their opposing counterparts’
variously respective plans and strategies. This
consequently leads to a situation within which
the former yields a measure of power over the
latter, something that would be especially in
in the case of the latter not being associated
with any effective counterespionage bodies. This
is something that tends to attain maximal simplicity
when considering that while the dictionary entry
for espionage lists it as an act or practice of
spying or of using spies to obtain secret information,
as about another government or a business competitor;
counterespionage is termed as espionage undertaken
to detect and counteract enemy espionage. And
despite the fact that espionage as well as counterespionage
contemporarily reflects an uncharacteristically
crucial portion of the virtually all warfare,
this is not something that is entirely new to
the segment of warfare. Indeed, it would be noteworthy
to acknowledge that espionage is known to have
been employed as a war tactic as far back as the
1700s and 1800s.
Take into consideration, for instance, the fact
that espionage, and inevitably, counterespionage
too, was widely resorted to within the entireties
of such predated wars as the American War for
Independence and the Civil War in the US. It would
also be relevant to consider that although such
issue of national security have presently come
to be influenced by an ascribing of dependence
upon technological relevance, the fundaments remain
the same; to obtain information from the opposition
that can used either in favor of oneself or negativity
to the country whence the data has been retrieved.
The historical relevance of espionage and counterespionage,
moreover, is something that is accentuated quite
strongly when considering that even such socio-historically
renowned names as Benjamin Franklin, John Jay,
and Washington tend to yield relativity to espionage/counterespionage
activities typically adhered to within wartime.
Counterespionage in the 1700s: The US Revolution
The prime character trait that set apart these
men from their lesser known contemporaries tends
to be the fact that they have come to be exceptionally
associated with ensuring victories that were of
utmost essentiality to bringing about the existence
of America as it stands today. And one of the
prime reasons for the exceptionality of their
successes, furthermore, was that they tended to
be uncharacteristically comprehensive and appreciative
towards the wartime advantageousness of effectually
employed political/military information and/or
intelligence. They were well aware of the positivistic
uses of the element of surprise, and in addition
to this, were also aware of the equally crucial
need to apprehend the respective enemy wherever
and whenever possible. ‘Espionage, counterespionage,
diplomatic sleight-of-hand, propaganda, scouting,
partisan warfare, code making, code breaking,
sabotage, bribery, deception, and disinformation’
(Crews, 2004) were subsequently used with outcomes
that proved to be surprisingly satisfactory. Contemplate,
for instance, the collective features and characteristics
of the numerous battles and skirmishes that constituted
the entirety of the American Revolution, approximated
to have transpired during the mid to late 1770s.
The significance of the use of espionage and counterespionage
within this war is underscored when considering
that it was the first war to rely so heavily on
intelligence tactics on both sides. Indeed, virtually
the entire length of the course that the Revolution
took appears to have been fundamentally influenced
by the various secret activities that each side
had begun to become increasingly dependent upon.
While the British generals moved on Concord in
1775 because they learnt from spies that the munitions
were there; counterespionage bodies, in the form
Colonial agents, informed the Americans of the
British plans and consequently frustrated the
British efforts (Crews, 2004). Furthermore, an
even more relevant instance of the use of counterespionage
in such a manner is apparent within Washington’s
1781 use of deception so as to induce the Brits
into assuming that there was a Franco-American
assault pending on New York. While the prevalence
of the British forces stood by for the attack,
however, Washington’s proved his military
genius, in as much as covertly going with Marquis
de Rochambeau to defeat Lord Cornwallis at Yorktown
at Virginia. It turned out that the attack, or
rather, the idea of the attack, was naught more
than an American ploy to get the British forces
so concentrated on New York that Washington and
Rochambeau managed to get to Virginia unnoticed
where, again as a result of the engineered misdirection
of the British troops, they were met with minimal
resistance (O'Toole, 1991).
Counterespionage running into and through the
1800s & into the 1900s
It would be relevant to here acknowledge that
Washington displayed an uncharacteristically obsessive
flair for espionage/counterespionage. In addition
to being responsible for operational agents and
networks in Philadelphia and New York, he is also
credited with such wartime, espionage criticalities
as uncovering the treachery of Benjamin Church,
a Continental US Army medical chief who served
as a British spy and; the effectual use of espionage
to deduce the laxity of Hessian troops in Trenton,
following which he falsely persuaded them of his
passivity towards them and ended up victorious
after crossing the Delaware River at night (Crews,
2004). In spite of the implications of this early
use of espionage and counterespionage, however,
neither the Union nor the Confederacy had established
a full-scale espionage system or a military intelligence
network even by the time of the Civil War, nearly
a century later.
This, however, was clearly not a status report
reflected by the South, where there was already
an operationally embryonic spy ring radiating
out of Washington, D.C.; this ring had been established
towards the beginning of the 1860s and had been
initiated by Thomas Jordan, a U.S. Army officer
turned Confederate colonel. Like Washington, Jordan’s
experiences had led him to become absolutely comprehensive
and deeply appreciative in regard to ‘the
benefits of placing intelligence agents in the
North's military and political nerve center’
(Faust & Longacre, 2004). It is apparent,
moreover, that this was a conceptualization that,
similar to that of Washington’s eventually
had and exceptionally advantageous outcome. In
1861, for instance, when Jordan tuned over the
scope of his espionage operations over to his
most trusted operative, Rose O'Neal Greenhow;
the latter’s significance in some of Washington’s
more flighty circles enabled her to secure intelligence
of great value to the Confederacy.
Furthermore, it was towards the end of this very
century that the US began to focus exclusively
upon the improvement of their counterespionage
skills. Their success in this field, moreover,
was strongly reflected within the Spanish-American
War of 1898, when the US infiltrated a Spanish
spy network in Montreal. Another example of America’s
evolution in counterespionage, moreover, came
forth later on when, in World War I, Franz von
Papen, future chancellor of Weimar Germany, organized
a spy and sabotage ring in the US. This ring,
however, was effectually apprehended and eliminated
by the Secret Service and the FBI, then a fledgling.
And in the 1930s, when the FBI had attained exceptionally
more significance of stature and relevance, the
Bureau was effective in conclusively tackling
Nazi agents in the United States as well as South
America. The 1940s represented an especially significant
period for US espionage and counterespionage.
The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December
7, 1941, for instance, surprised the defending
forces to the point of offering minimal resistance,
a circumstance that suggested a need for improved
U.S. facilities for the collection and analysis
of intelligence (Miller, 1997).
Mid 1900: up to present day: CIA & the present
day stance on US counterespionage
It was in the 1940s that the US began to display
its most prolific streak in regard to espionage;
the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December
7, 1941, surprised the defending forces to the
point of offering minimal resistance. This was
a circumstance that suggested a need for improved
U.S. facilities for the collection and analysis
of intelligence. The Office of Strategic Services,
as a result of the increasingly apparent need
for effective espionage/counterespionage skills,
attempted to meet these needs and subsequently
came to establishing for itself a covert operational
role. By 1945, the traditional American distrust
of espionage had resurfaced with a vengeance,
and consequently, and the world's first superpower
was temporarily shorn of a large-scale intelligence
capability. But the most significant factor surfaced
on July 26, 1947, when, as a result of ‘Section
102 of the National Security Act’, (Jeffreys-Jones,
2003) the CIA, the world's first democratically
sanctioned secret service was formed. This heralded
the most significant trial of diversification
for counterintelligence within the US, as Presidents
came to increasingly rely on the CIA’s effectual
covert operational capabilities to produce quick
solutions to political demises that showed signs
of going uncharacteristically messy. Some of the
more notorious examples of these ‘solutions’
moreover, were the overthrow of the democratically
elected, if leftward leaning, governments of Guatemala
and Chile in 1954 and 1973, respectively (Jeffreys-Jones,
2003). After the failure of the 1961 Bay of Pigs
venture however, which was an attempt to overthrow
the Fidel Castro regime in Cuba, the CIA inevitably
came to be increasingly vulnerable to public criticism
(Miller, 1997). It would furthermore be relevant
to contemplate that from this period onwards,
the public opinion of the collective espionage/counterespionage
began to go rather sour, and rather understandably
too. The relevance of this is something that is
made quite clear when considering it in light
of the details underlying such dramatically contentious
issues as the Iran-Contra affair, as well as the
far more recent, 9/11 commission report. The former,
an issue that emerged in the 1980s, alleged the
intelligence agencies to be indirectly involved
in an illegal scheme to sell weapons to Iran.
The theme of the scheme was to divert the profits
into the pockets of the Contra resistance movement
in Nicaragua. The evident lack of ethicalities
and/moralities reasserted to the public the fundamentally
contentious and risky nature of the counterespionage
business. This sentiment, moreover, was ingrained
even more deeply into the public following the
publicizing of the 9/11 reports pertaining to
the commission’s investigation. This is
since the reports, which were part and parcel
of the commission’s investigation, brought
forth startling insinuations decreeing that US
intelligence agencies had a good idea of the date
and nature of the attacks as a result of their
significant espionage/counterespionage activities
and rings. ‘The commission showed that the
Bush administration, in the months prior to Sept.
11, had much more warning of an impending terrorist
attack than previously known’ (Eland. 2004).
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