The British on intelligence: a collection (SIS, MI5, GCHQ & more)

[davidbfpo]

Yesterday Sir John Sawers, the recently retired SIS (MI6) Chief, gave the annual Kings War Studies Lecture, he used the title The Limits of Security and a transcript is available:http://www.kcl.ac.uk/sspp/department...F-SECURITY.pdf

Kings summary:

Addressing a packed lecture theatre, Sir John offered a rare insight into decades of service for the British diplomatic and intelligence services, and the ongoing battle for ‘shared value and order’ in an increasingly unstable global landscape. He discussed the ideological conflicts currently faced in Europe, where despite initial glimmers of economic, social and political reform, he said Russia has ‘not confronted and overcome its past’, and the foundations on which a post-Cold War society led by President Putin could hope to prosper have been undermined by a lack of ‘serious moral reckoning, and no assertion of new healthy values.’ Sir John warned: ‘Russian politics have slipped back: rather less democratic and more autocratic. Managing relations with Russia will be the defining problem in European security for years to come’.

Curiously he cites and recommends Henry Kissinger's latest book. For many here Dr. K. is not admired, even if memories fade.

I am sure this has been said before:

The test for any policy option is not so much “Is this the right next step?” The more important test is: “Where will we be in two years’ time if we follow this path?

Later he comments on the agents working for SIS:

The secret agents who work for MI6 are mainly not British. Foreign nationals operating in their own countries, directly risking their own lives.They work for us for different reasons. But for many of them one reason comes first. They believe in the British approach to Order and Values.

[Bill Moore]

Thanks for sharing. I think he provides some deep insights to think about.

I tire of security discussions when they focus on existential threats, it is a hangover we can't seem to cure from the Cold War Era. This transcript addresses the possibility that the risk of nuclear annihilation remains, but looks beyond that and discusses the importance of order and values. He correctly identifies that China and the U.S. concepts of order and values diverge, and the risks that poses.

A Chinese minister was asked recently about Ukraine. He said, very aptly,

Ukraine has lost Crimea.
Russia has lost Ukraine.
The United States has lost Russia
We have all lost stability
Stability. Order. Values. It’s easy to pose dilemmas. Sometimes there aren’t good answers

We did not simply focus on existential threats during the Cold War. We also postured large ground forces to oppose a potential USSR invasion of Western Europe. In the purest sense of the definition of existential threat, the loss of Western Europe was not an existential threats to the U.S., but leaders realized the importance of enforcing an international order and promoting certain values (as stated in the paper, you can't have order without values) contributed to national security and prosperity. The world has never policed, and disorder in one location promotes disorder and rule breakers in others that eventually threaten our collective security. We should continue to defend and promote values and an order that benefits our collective security and prosperity with a big BUT,

Vast regions of the World never shared in the Western concept of order, they only acquiesced in it. These reservations are becoming explicit, for example in Ukraine and the South China Sea

Our new century is looking rather different. Long-standing ideas of Order and Values are being challenged, in many different ways. Building new understandings for Order and Values is the central task of our time for political leaders and diplomats. And, yes, intelligence agencies.

The U.S. needs to adapt to the 21st Century, there are new voices and new power that also have increasingly critical roles in defining and maintaining the world order. Unfortunately, while the U.S. may be the most powerful country in the world, but we're a divided nation politically, which in many ways either nullifies our power to shape the world, or results in episodes where we wield it clumsily resulting in less than desired outcomes. There are drawbacks to democracy, especially in today's hyper-interconnected world. Politicians striving to maintain their personal power make decisions based on perceived popularity versus wisdom and the greater good, so at a minimum it makes progress towards to a new world order that may be sustainable difficult.

[OUTLAW 09]

It has always been about "values" the entire Cold War was fought on "values" and the Ukrainian events are also about Russian perceived values over riding what they perceive to be the "false/fake" western liberal democratic and economic values.

Why the attack on "perceived western liberal and economic values" -- they are a truly serious threat to a country that has a far poorer economic system due to oligarchic corruption to the tune of literally billions and a political system bordering on fascism.

[Bill Moore]

ISIL/ISIS/IS also practices fascism. It seems the End of History is no where in sight after all.

U.S. leadership is absent on the world stage, and it should be clear by now no other country will step up and lead in our absence. However, a lot of bad actors will take advantage of the leadership void.

[Bob's World]

After WWII, when the US still led by example and stood upon the fundamental principles that we ourselves were founded upon, revolutionary people around the world with diverse cultures, such as the Muslim Berbers in Algeria, and the communist rebels led by Ho in Indochina, turned to the US with copies of our universal declaration of independence in hand and cried out, "us too!!"

But we turned our backs on them, and we turned our backs on our principles as well. To exercise a system of control over half the world due to a largely irrational fear of Russia and the decision to lay siege to Russia via containment as a strategy, had made our principles inconvenient - so we watered them down and qualified them with values.

FDR died with a vision of promoting the "four freedoms" (of religion and speech, from fear and want); the end of colonialism; the right to self determination; and a vision of the four emerging powers (US, UK, Russia and China) working together as a new global security partnership to replace the failed league of nations.

But we let our own exaggerated fears drive us to a values based system of directed leadership - and today we still live with the good and bad of that decision.

The neocons are as lost as are the social engineers wishing to conform everyone to our current (certainly not "enduring" or "universal" as arrogantly packaged in the past 2 or 3 National Security Strategies) values.

I for one am not afraid of our founding principles, and believe it is long overdue for the US to assume the risk necessary to be the principled leader by example we believe ourselves to be, and to finally abandon the directive leadership relying upon sloganed "values" that we have actually been employing for the past several decades.

[jcustis]

But we let our own exaggerated fears drive us to a values based system of directed leadership

Sir, could you expand on that and what you mean by directed leadership?

[Bob's World]

Begin with our picking and then protecting governance for a dozen countries that was what we thought would be best for us, over the express, and often violent protest of what those who lived in those places hoped to self determine for themselves. Vietnam, Iran, Iraq and Afghanistan being four painful examples. Two of those in direct support of former colonial powers.

[OUTLAW 09]

After WWII, when the US still led by example and stood upon the fundamental principles that we ourselves were founded upon, revolutionary people around the world with diverse cultures, such as the Muslim Berbers in Algeria, and the communist rebels led by Ho in Indochina, turned to the US with copies of our universal declaration of independence in hand and cried out, "us too!!"

But we turned our backs on them, and we turned our backs on our principles as well. To exercise a system of control over half the world due to a largely irrational fear of Russia and the decision to lay siege to Russia via containment as a strategy, had made our principles inconvenient - so we watered them down and qualified them with values.

FDR died with a vision of promoting the "four freedoms" (of religion and speech, from fear and want); the end of colonialism; the right to self determination; and a vision of the four emerging powers (US, UK, Russia and China) working together as a new global security partnership to replace the failed league of nations.

But we let our own exaggerated fears drive us to a values based system of directed leadership - and today we still live with the good and bad of that decision.

The neocons are as lost as are the social engineers wishing to conform everyone to our current (certainly not "enduring" or "universal" as arrogantly packaged in the past 2 or 3 National Security Strategies) values.

I for one am not afraid of our founding principles, and believe it is long overdue for the US to assume the risk necessary to be the principled leader by example we believe ourselves to be, and to finally abandon the directive leadership relying upon sloganed "values" that we have actually been employing for the past several decades.

What if question---what if we had accepted Ho's requests for assistance against the recolonialization by France of Indochina after WW2--Ho was a great admirer of George Washington and our Constitution and during late WW2 was willing to work with and support the OSS against the Japanese.

Wonder what our Far Eastern policies would be today?

If we look at the Maidan in the Ukraine--driven by a civil societies desire to ditch the oppressive corruption and oligarchs, who have a sense of a reasonable functioning rule of law and transparent good governance looks , they are now willing as a civil society to support a rag tag army by any means, and they are holding their parliament to transparent standards ---we do what again?---not much support coming out of this WH other thans kind words and an occasional Biden visit.

What is wrong with that concept?---and why is it that when a nation's civil society rises up and demands the two items which by the way we basically also demanded from the British we seem to either ignore them or run from the perceived problems of dealing with that civil society.

Or in the case of say IS- we declare them terrorists and that saves us the problem of even trying to engage with them at all--we do not even have to pretend we "understand" what drives them.