Haft of the Spear

Another overblown, breathless piece on how contractors are running amok in the IC:

About a quarter of the nation’s core intelligence workers are contractors, perhaps as many as 37,000 private employees who work side-by-side with civil servants as analysts, technology specialists and mission managers, according to a report about government outsourcing by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

…Contract workers each cost the government about $207,000 annually, compared with about $125,000 for a civilian government employee’s salary and benefits, officials said.

…”These figures are pretty stunning,” said Tim Shorrock, author of “Spies For Hire: The Secret World of Intelligence Outsourcing.” “It shows that private contractors are operating in the most sensitive areas of intelligence.”

… because that hasn’t been going on for decades. Apparently there is no amount of grasping that intel-haters will undertake to make it look bad (like you have to invent things).

Look, done properly, contracting is an effective, inexpensive way to solve the government’s problems. I stress “properly” because let’s face it, it is not unheard of for people to retire/resign from our Uncle’s employ and then long another 10, 15, 20 years doing the same job in the same office in the same agency they just left. The whole point of using contractors is, as the gov’t clearly understands, is:

[to employ] needed unique expertise that could not be found in the government.

Now, when its clear that a contractor is just filling out an agency’s roster because manpower ceilings preclude the hiring of feds, well, that’s not the contractor’s problem, that’s a fight the Executive and Congress needs to sort out. Don’t blame the dog for wanting to hunt.

If you haven’t been told you’re cool for the DNI OSINT Conference, I’m sorry, but regardless of your status you ought to be pleased at this development. It has been a long time since such an effort was formally undertaken, and even back then the results were impressive.

We’ve had hosting problems. Yes, post from mid-July on were zapped (but, I have some semblance of an archive that I can fat-finger back in). Not going to mess with design fixes till xfer and MT upgrade takes place in the not-too-distant future.

I know what I know and I share what I can. As my colleagues point out, there is no shortage of shake-and-bake “experts” or just plain clueless smart-***** in this domain. Megan’s article certainly rings true, but if anything this is a universal condition and has little to do with levels of education. Who didn’t think they had all the answers at 16 (or perhaps more accurately, everyone else was an idiot, especially parents)? Posner’s Public Intellectuals is a much heavier treatment of the same phenom. War/conflict just exacerbates the problem. Nothing sadder than watching a former General trying to explain how cluster bombs work … and screwing it up beyond belief; every former spook is suddenly qualified to comment on aspects of this business they really no nothing about; writers with no background or requisite education get to critique a wide range of actions by actual experts and face no challenge.

If the ‘sphere does anything I hope it gives rise to a much broader base of actual experts who get sufficient face-time before the public (not just in the tubes). If this is the info age we ought to be getting the best info we can and not just what info the prettiest face can spit out.

I can’t elaborate much on the General’s comments, suffice it to say that this is some of the smarter things someone in his position has said in a long time. Maybe we won’t have to wait a generation for serious change after all …

Bob Gourley’s post is a nice encapsulation of how this very hide-bound community might make a great leap forward.

Two key points not addressed are the fact that in the social media space, in one’s own wheelhouse, any random Joe can be as loud and forceful as any “name.” That is to say, nobody’s with good ideas get as much time/attention as celebrities (who can be less than advertised sometimes). Secondly, it is also unfiltered in the sense that the voice is your own and not a “corporate” or agency voice/position that has been watered down and consensus-ized (for all the good and bad that implies).

Bob is right that the greatest risk we face is not fully, smartly engaging. You fight a network with a network, not an org chart. Clinging to the industrial may make some more comfortable, but it will be the most comfortable hades-bound basket ride ever.

1. Not exactly new; mostly notable because of all the gloating over the death of CIFA (which was never that scary to begin with).
2. Dumbest discussion ever continues …
3. On a related note, somewhere in a filing cabinet my decade-old S/NF version of these same points screams out for release.
4. Smith-Mundt tit-for-tat was mostly, um, tat, and the death of seriousness creeps ever forward.
5. The clowns are running the circus.
6. Couldn’t he have just wiped the honey off?
7. Can you say “superempowered individual?” I knew you could.
8. Contrary to popular belief, the history of US intel is a lot more good (or benign) than evil.
9. Tom thinks he’ll have multiple passports; more likely multiple people will have his.
10. On the CI/CE front, DHS catches up with the rest of those in the business; next up: visits from the DICE Man.
11. It’s so “secret” it’s all over the news.

Three years, 10% of the population, tens of millions lost and some think we’re waiting for a pretense to bring about an i-Patriot Act?