The structure and functions of the Defense Warning Network were outlined in a new directive issued yesterday by the Department of Defense.

The mission of the Defense Warning Network is to provide notice “of potential threats posed by adversaries, political and economic instability, failed or failing states, and any other emerging challenges that could affect the United States or its interests worldwide.”  See The Defense Warning Network, DoD Directive 3115.16, December 5, 2013.

The Department of Defense budget for research and procurement of unmanned aerial systems (UAS), or drones, is on a distinctly downward slope.

The FY 2014 budget request included $2.3 billion for research, development, and procurement of unmanned aerial systems, a decrease of $1.1 billion from the request for the fiscal year 2013.

“Annual procurement of UAS has gone from 1,211 in fiscal 2012 to 288 last year to just 54 in the proposed FY14 budget,” according to a recently published congressional hearing volume.

See “Post Iraq and Afghanistan: Current and Future Roles for UAS and the Fiscal Year 2014 Budget Request,” hearing before the House Armed Services Committee, April 23, 2013.

Among the questions for the record published in the new hearing volume, DoD officials were asked: “Who is responsible for developing privacy protections for military UAV operations inside the United States?”

Some other noteworthy new doctrinal and congressional defense-related publications include the following.

Joint Intelligence, Joint Publication 2-0, Joint Chiefs of Staff, October 22, 2013

Civil-Military Engagement, ATP 3-57.80, US Army, October 2013

Espionage Threats at Federal Laboratories: Balancing Scientific Cooperation While Protecting Critical Information, hearing before the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, May 16, 2013

Budget Request for National Security Space Activities, House Armed Services Committee, April 25, 2013

Text of the NATO Agreement for the Sharing of Atomic Energy Information (ATOMAL), As Amended, September 19, 2013

Scientists in the nuclear weapons program at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) are feeling blue, according to a recent internal report.

“We heard that there is a sense of increased stress and reduced morale among LLNL technical employees in the weapons program, stemming from a (perceived, at least) combination of reduced resources and increased work requirements,” the report said.

Of course, many people are sad, for many reasons. The Shekhinah is in exile. But low morale among weapons scientists can have negative programmatic and national security consequences.

Therefore, “We recommend attention to the potential danger that activities that are important for long-term stockpile stewardship may be dropped in favor of seemingly urgent near-term requirements,” the report said. See “Predictive Science Panel: Unclassified Report,” LLNL Meeting, August 20-22, 2013.

A new study of the future of the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal proposes “a framework for evaluating future reductions or modifications of the U.S. nuclear force.”  The study, performed for the Department of Energy, warns against irreversible changes in the arsenal (which it calls “roach motels of reduction”), reversible but undesirable changes (“box canyons in the Valley of Disarmament”), and other types of unfavorable actions (“wrong turns on the road to the future”). See “Reductions Without Regret” by John A. Swegle and Douglas J. Tincher, Savannah River National Laboratory, September 2013. The report does not necessarily represent the views of DoE or the US Government (or FAS).

A new report from the CATO Institute calls for the elimination of two legs of the nuclear triad (missiles and bombers) in favor of an entirely submarine-based nuclear force.  See “The End of Overkill?” by Benjamin Friedman, Christopher Preble, and Matt Fay, September 24, 2013.

Meanwhile, Hans Kristensen of FAS discovers a surprising fact: “The latest data from the New START Treaty shows that Russia has reduced its deployed strategic nuclear forces while the United States has increased its force over the past six months.” This is an anomalous result of the counting process, not a new arms buildup, but it is noteworthy nonetheless. See “New START Data Shows Russia Reducing, US Increasing Nuclear Forces,” FAS Strategic Security Blog, October 2.

In its endless pursuit of national security, the United States has compromised core Constitutional values including civilian control of the military and states’ rights, writes William M. Arkin in his new book “American Coup” (Little, Brown, 2013).

Since 9/11, a growing fraction of the population been mobilized and credentialed in support of homeland security — whether as law enforcement, first responders, or those who simply “see something and say something.”

“What is military and what is civilian is increasingly obscured,” Arkin writes. “The state and local police forces are militarized and networked into one; states have their own intelligence establishments; the big cities make their own foreign policies.”

What concerns Arkin, and what his book helps to illuminate, is what he describes as a parallel apparatus of executive authority that has developed outside of Constitutional norms (and beyond public awareness) to respond to national emergencies– catastrophic acts of terrorism, nuclear disasters, threats to presidential survival, or other extraordinary events.

Some of this is familiar ground, and has been previously described under the rubric of Continuity of Government, or Continuity of Operations, dating back to the Eisenhower Administration. But it has expanded and been formalized, Arkin says, in a series of classified Presidential Emergency Action Documents (PEADs) that assert all but unchecked executive power.  And while those administrative instruments are technically dormant most of the time, they exercise a baleful influence on the normal conduct of political life, he argues.

Despite its garish and off-putting title (and subtitle: “How a Terrified Government is Destroying the Constitution”), “American Coup” is not a manifesto, nor a call to action.

What makes the book interesting and valuable, rather, is its close reading of official documents in search of clues to undisclosed power structures. Arkin is a careful student and a subtle analyst of military doctrine, a neglected genre rich with insights waiting to be discovered.  For some readers, the 100 pages of endnotes will be the most rewarding part of the book.

Arkin observes, for example, that an official U.S. Army history states that martial law has only been declared once in United States history. But an Army field manual reports that martial law has been imposed four times. The Justice Department said there had been two such cases.  All of these are in error, he concludes, and reflect inconsistent definitions of the term. Meanwhile, he reports that the Army issued a new official definition of martial law in 2010 “for the first time in years.”

Arkin is the co-author (with Dana Priest) of “Top Secret America,” and many other works of research into national security policy.

“American Coup” was written prior to the revelations by Edward Snowden of unsuspected bulk collection of American telephone records by the National Security Agency, and such practices are not specifically discussed in the book. But Arkin would likely argue that the Snowden revelations are a special case of a more general phenomenon, in which national security is invoked to justify secret actions that exceed the bounds of public consent.

Arkin does not propose any kind of policy response to the political problems he perceives.  In fact, beyond some marginal steps that might be taken, he says that “bigger changes are blocked” by the powers that be.  Those who believe otherwise will need to look elsewhere.

“Modern combat is chaotic, intense, and shockingly destructive. In your first battle, you will experience the confusing and often terrifying sights, sounds, smells, and dangers of the battlefield–but you must learn to survive and win despite them…. You must keep faith with your fellow Soldiers, remember your training, and do your duty to the best of your ability. If you do, and you uphold your Warrior Ethos, you can win and return home with honor.”

So begins the Introduction to a newly updated US Army Training Circular on The Warrior Ethos and Soldier Combat Skills (TC 3-21.75, August 2013, very large PDF file), which aims to communicate and instill core military values.

Another newly updated Pentagon publication presents joint doctrine on Homeland Defense (HD). It “defines and clarifies the domestic use of rules of engagement and rules for the use of force in HD operations.”  And it “Clarifies and elaborates thoroughly the role of planning for cyberspace operations and the duties involved.”

The document also provides lots of incidental details of interest, such as a reference to a previously unheard-of Presidential Policy Directive 10 on US Ballistic Missile Defenses.  “PPD-10 acknowledges that ballistic missile systems present an increasingly important challenge and threat to the security of the US, its deployed forces, and its allies and partners. PPD-10 provides policy and guidelines for the development and deployment of US BMDs.” See Joint Publication 3-27, Homeland Defense, July 29, 2013.

The Navy has issued new guidance to combat the Insider Threat, as the Army did last month.

The insider threat program places unauthorized disclosures (or “leaks”) on a par with espionage or terrorism, and prior to either of them in the official definition.  Thus an insider threat, as defined by the Department of Defense, is “a person with authorized access, who uses that access, wittingly or unwittingly, to harm national security interests or national security through unauthorized disclosure, data modification, espionage, terrorism, or kinetic actions resulting in loss or degradation of resources or capabilities.”  See Department of the Navy Insider Threat Program, SECNAV Instruction 5510.37, August 8, 2013.

 

The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 generally prohibits military forces from performing ordinary civilian law enforcement functions such as arrest, surveillance, interdiction, search and seizure.

But a newly updated Department of Defense doctrinal publication notes that, despite this prohibition, “There are several forms of direct assistance to civilian law enforcement by military personnel that are permitted under the Military Purpose Doctrine. The Military Purpose Doctrine provides that law enforcement actions that are performed primarily for a military purpose, even when incidentally assisting civil authorities, will not violate the PCA [Posse Comitatus Act].”

These may include investigations related to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, enforcement actions on a military installation, and measures to protect classified military information or equipment, among others identified by the DoD document.

The publication broadly addresses crisis response, support to law enforcement, and other forms of assistance. See “Defense Support of Civil Authorities,” Joint Publication 3-28, July 31, 2013.

The publication introduces a new addition to the DoD lexicon: “complex catastrophe.”

A complex catastrophe (which may “magnify requirements for defense support of civil authorities”) is defined as:  “Any natural or man-made incident, including cyberspace attack, power grid failure, and terrorism, which results in cascading failures of multiple, interdependent, critical, life-sustaining infrastructure sectors and causes extraordinary levels of mass casualties, damage or disruption severely affecting the population, environment, economy, public health, national morale, response efforts, and/or government functions.”

On July 30, a military judge found Army Pfc. Bradley Manning guilty of multiple violations of the Espionage Act and other laws because of his unauthorized disclosure of restricted government records to the WikiLeaks website.

On July 31, the Secretary of the Army formally established the Army Insider Threat Program. Remarkably, this is still a pending initiative rather than an accomplished fact.

The program “will ensure the security and safety of Army computer networks by establishing an integrated capability to monitor and audit user activity across all domains to detect and mitigate activity indicative of insider threat behavior,” wrote Army Secretary John M. McHugh in Army Directive 2013-18.

The directive requires development and implementation of “a technical capability to monitor user activity on the Secure Internet Protocol Router Network” used by Manning as well as on the Joint World Intelligence Communication System.

In order to facilitate the identification of insider threats, the directive authorizes the sharing of counterintelligence and a variety of other sensitive information, including personal medical information.  (“The Surgeon General will provide information from medical sources, consistent with privacy laws and regulations, to authorized personnel to help them recognize the presence of an insider threat.”)

The new Army directive was issued in response to a November 21, 2012 Obama White House memorandum on “National Insider Threat Policy and Minimum Standards for Executive Branch Insider Threat Programs.”

Some government insider threat programs go beyond encouraging sensible security practices, and seem to promote free-ranging suspicion in the workplace.

A slide prepared by the Defense Information Systems Agency for an online training module on insider threats suggests that an employee who “speaks openly of unhappiness with U.S. foreign policy” may represent a risk.  (The only thing more troubling might be someone who speaks openly of happiness with U.S. foreign policy.)  See “Unhappy With U.S. Foreign Policy? Pentagon Says You Might Be A ‘High Threat'” by Matt Sledge, Huffington Post, August 7.

On June 21, 2013 the Director of National Intelligence issued Intelligence Community Directive 703 on “Protection of Classified National Intelligence, Including Sensitive Compartmented Information.”

The directive summarizes and re-states classified information security policy, including little-known facts such as: “The Director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) provides SCI access determinations and Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility (SCIF) accreditation for the legislative and judicial branches of the U.S. Government.”

The Department of Defense this week released the 2012 update of its doctrine on “Peace Operations” including new guidance on so-called Mass Atrocity Response Operations that are designed to prevent or halt genocide or other large-scale acts of violence directed at civilian populations.

A mass atrocity consists of “widespread and often systematic acts of violence against civilians by state or non-state armed groups, including killing, causing serious bodily or mental harm, or deliberately inflicting conditions of life that cause serious bodily or mental harm,” the updated Pentagon guidance said in Joint Publication 3-07.3 on Peace Operations.

“Mass atrocities can erupt at any time during any operation even in an initially uncontested peacekeeping or humanitarian relief operation,” it stated.

Mass Atrocity Response Operations, or MARO, is a newly adopted doctrinal concept that is detailed in Appendix B to the DoD Joint Publication on Peace Operations.  The document, dated 01 August 2012, was withheld from online public access on the DoD Joint Electronic Library.  But a copy was released to the Federation of American Scientists this week under the Freedom of Information Act.

The MARO concept (and even the term itself) is traceable to an influential advocacy effort by Sarah Sewall and her colleagues at the Harvard Kennedy School over the past several years.

In a 2010 Handbook on MARO, they wrote that “The United States does not currently recognize mass atrocities as a unique operational challenge, and there is no operational concept or doctrine that might help commanders understand the dynamics and demands of responding to mass atrocities. As a result, the US is not fully prepared to intervene effectively in a mass atrocity situation.”

Their project aimed to change that state of affairs, and they succeeded to a remarkable extent.  “The term MARO is not yet enshrined in military doctrine,” they wrote then, “but it should be.”  And now, with the new Joint Publication on Peace Operations, it is.

(Along the way, in the August 2011 Presidential Study Directive 10, President Obama declared that “Preventing mass atrocities and genocide is a core national security interest and a core moral responsibility of the United States.”)

But the Harvard MARO Project was not without critics.  Alan J. Kuperman of the University of Texas wrote that the 2010 MARO Handbook emphasized operational issues to the detriment of larger strategic considerations:  “Unfortunately, since military intervention can unintentionally increase the likelihood of atrocities, the ‘how’ of intervention is inextricably linked to debates about ‘whether’ such action is advisable.”

“Since the advent of widespread humanitarian military intervention in the 1990s, such operations have frequently backfired strategically, by increasing civilian suffering, contrary to their political objective,” he wrote.  (“Mass Atrocity Response Operations: Doctrine in Search of Strategy,” Genocide Studies and Prevention, April 2011, pp. 59-65.)

The new DoD doctrine appears cognizant of these ambiguities and countervailing factors, without being to resolve them in any categorical way.

“The PO [peace operations] force may face difficulties when conducting MARO,” the doctrine notes, “including the challenge of distinguishing between perpetrator and victim groups when the groups are intermingled, when atrocities are being committed by multiple groups, or when the actions are reciprocal… Because a MARO can alter power balances, former victim groups may be able to conduct their own revenge atrocities…. Many people may be misled into assisting in the commission of atrocities by being convinced that they are acting in self-defense.”

“MARO can include unique escalatory dynamics,” as further detailed in the Joint Publication.  “By pursuing MARO, the PO force may change the dynamics on the ground, leading to the potential for MARO to generate second- and third-order effects, intended or unintended.”

These are not issues that can be conclusively settled in military doctrine. “Most of the complexity in MARO — e.g., how to identify perpetrators, whether to treat the symptoms of the violence and/or the root causes, and the degree of risk to assume in moving swiftly — should be addressed by interagency mechanisms such as the President’s Atrocities Prevention Board.”

It will still be up to policymakers “to provide the PO [peace operations] force commander with clear guidance and objectives.”

The procedures by which the U.S. Air Force establishes international agreements for the exchange of intelligence information with foreign military services were described in a new Air Force Instruction.

“Foreign military organizations being considered for inclusion in an IIA (international intelligence agreement) must clearly support U.S. security and foreign policy objectives. The foreign government must have favorable relations with the United States; a well-developed, secure intelligence service; and a stable domestic environment and military unity. Known national characteristics of the foreign government in question must fall within the guidelines of the United States national disclosure and security policy, and be reasonably expected to have adequate fiscal means, and conform to legal guidelines,” the Instruction states.

Such agreements must “Provide for mutual support (quid pro quo)” and must “Provide intelligence that would otherwise be denied to the United States.”  See Air Force Instruction 14-102, International Intelligence Agreements, April 29, 2013.

Another new Department of Defense Instruction governs records management within the Office of the Secretary of Defense.

“It is DoD policy,” it states, “to limit the creation of records to those essential for the efficient conduct of official business and to preserve those of continuing value while systematically eliminating all others.”  See OSD Records and Information Management Program, Administrative Instruction 15, May 3, 2013.

Other noteworthy new military publications include the following.

Information Operations (IO), DoD Directive 3600.01, May 2, 2013

Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), DoD Directive 5134.10, May 7, 2013

The Department of Defense has revised its 1996 directive on non-lethal weapons (NLW) to guide future development and procurement of this category of weaponry.

“Unlike conventional lethal weapons that destroy their targets principally through blast, penetration, and fragmentation, NLW employ means other than gross physical destruction to prevent the target from functioning. NLW are intended to have relatively reversible effects on personnel or materiel,” the revised directive explains.

“It is DoD policy that NLW doctrine and concepts of operation will be developed to reinforce deterrence and expand the range of options available to commanders.”

The directive does not apply to information operations, cyber operations or electronic warfare capabilities.  See DoD Executive Agent for Non-Lethal Weapons (NLW), and NLW Policy, DoD Directive 3000.03E, April 25, 2013.

Other noteworthy new or updated DoD issuances include the following.

DoD Nuclear Weapons Surety Program, DoD Directive 3150.02, April 24, 2013

DoD Counterfeit Prevention Policy, DoD Instruction 4140.67, April 26, 2013

Assistant to the Secretary of Defense for Intelligence Oversight (ATSD(IO)), DoD Directive 5148.11, April 24, 2013

Use of Excess Ballistic Missiles for Space Launch, Directive-Type Memorandum (DTM) 11-008, July 5, 2011, Incorporating Change 3, April 25, 2013

Just as law enforcement relied upon surveillance cameras and personal photography to enable the prompt identification of the perpetrators of the Boston Marathon bombing, U.S. armed forces increasingly look to the collection of still and motion imagery to support military operations.

Combat camera (COMCAM) capabilities support “operational planning, public affairs, information operations, mission assessment, forensic, legal, intelligence and other requirements during crises, contingencies, and exercises around the globe,” according to newly updated military doctrine.

COMCAM personnel are “highly trained visual information professionals prepared to deploy to the most austere operational environments at a moment’s notice.”

COMCAM units “are adaptive and provide fully qualified and equipped personnel to support sustained day or night operations” in-flight, on the ground or undersea, as needed.

“Effectively employed COMCAM assets at the tactical level can potentially achieve national, theater strategic, and operational level objectives in a manner that lessens the requirement for combat in many situations,” the new doctrine says.  “Their products can counter adversary misinformation, disinformation, and propaganda and help commanders gain situational awareness on operations in a way written or verbal reports cannot.”

“The products can also provide historical documentation, public information, or an evidentiary foundation… for forensic documentation of evidence and legal proceedings. They can provide intelligence documentation to include imagery for facial recognition and key leader engagements, and support special reconnaissance.”

The newly issued COMCAM doctrine supersedes previous guidance from 2007.  See Combat Camera: Multi-Service Tactics, Techniques, and Procedures for Combat Camera (COMCAM) Operations, April 2013.

In last Friday’s Federal Register the Department of Defense published a final rule on Defense Support of Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies. The rule specifies and defines the support that DoD may provide to federal, state and local law enforcement agencies, “including responses to civil disturbances.”

“The President is authorized by the Constitution and laws of the United States to employ the Armed Forces of the United States to suppress insurrections, rebellions, and domestic violence under various conditions and circumstances,” the new rule states.

“Planning and preparedness by the Federal Government, including the Department of Defense, for civil disturbances is important due to the potential severity of the consequences of such events for the Nation and the population. The employment of Federal military forces to control civil disturbances shall only occur in a specified civil jurisdiction under specific circumstances as authorized by the President, normally through issuance of an Executive order or other Presidential directive authorizing and directing the Secretary of Defense to provide for the restoration of law and order in a specific State or locality.”

The new rule, which forms part of the Code of Federal Regulations, is almost identical to DoD Instruction 3025.21 on “Defense Support of Civilian Law Enforcement Agencies” that was issued on February 27, 2013 (noted by Public Intelligence on April 11).