Swedish Vacation Update - Estonian edition

I just came back from a brief trip to Tallinn via the Victoria ferry.  The ferry system connects many of the countries bordering the Baltic Sea and (if I understand correctly) us part of the European highway system.  They are more than just a way to get from point A to point B however and offer travellers all you can eat buffets, gambling, duty free shopping, lame house bands and tacky shows.  In short, it’s like a weekend in Atlantic City.  The ferry I was on was staffed primarily by Estonians so between the boat ride and a day in Tallinn, I’m now prepared to make the following superficial and sweeping generalizations about a whole nation of people.

1. Estonians can’t make good beer.  I tried two types of local beer in Estonia and both reminded me of that cat piss known as Coors Light.  Even worse, I saw locals buying lots of the stuff which indicates that Estonians not only can’t make good beer, they don’t seem to even know what good beer is.
2. Don’t get a tattoo in Estonia.  I saw a lot of Estonians with tattoos and they all looked like they got them in the gulag from a blind guy.  I’m not a big tattoo fan to begin with but if you’re going to get one make sure your artist can draw better than your average first grader before he puts ink to skin.
3. Customer service as a concept hasn’t worked its way into the Estonian mind.  Estonians regard customers as an inconvienience and will go to great lengths to encourage you to go somewhere, anywhere else, just so long as you’ll stop bothering them.  At one cafe, a lady asked if we could hold off ordeering for ten minutes so they could change shifts (apparently preparing a couple of cups of coffee would have disrupted the intricate process of changing the wait staff) only to see the very same people working after the suppossed shift change (and, coincidently, after it became clear we wouldn’t be going to search for another cafe).  I’m sure old Joe was smiling wherever he wan as. 
4. Estonia has no Surgeon General.  You don’t notice how few people smoke in the states until you go somewhere else.  Estonians smoke like chimneys and they do it everywhere.  This, despite the fact that cigerrettes have warning labels that put ours to shame in their size and directness of consequences. 

Other than that, it was a good trip.  Good weather, (hopefully) nice pictures and a fun time.

Fusion Centers - Where are they now? Part 1.

1. A little while ago I came across this thesis from the Naval Postgraduate Institute about fusion centers.  I’ve written about them before and my opinion of them is pretty low.  I do think they have enormous potential for either good or ill but generally have just been wallowing in oceans of mediocrity and bureaucratic self interest.  They are important to follow though because of their potential and so I try to keep current on their latest (d)evolutions. 

I’m not a total masochist so I didn’t bring the entire report with me to read on vacation, but just the most interesting looking chapter titled:  Analysis of Current Practice for Fusion Centers.  I recommend checking it out, even if you read nothing else because it raises some interesting issues (I suspect some unintentionally) that are in desperate need of discussion .

So, here are my comments on what I’ve read so far.  I’ll try to give enough context from the original paper to give you an idea of what prompted my comments without quoting the paper at length.  My perspective on this issue is based on work I did with one fusion center (rather extensive but more than a year ago) as well as regularly reviewing the products of several fusion centers.  I feel I have a pretty good picture of the analytical capability and internal operating environment of fusion centers generally and that is responsible for my generally pessimistic outlook on them.  That being said, I have had some contact with a member of one center who leads me to believe that there may be hope out there. We’ll have to wait and see.

Customer Identification: 

1. Who are the customers for fusion center products?  The thesis says that one survey “overwhelmingly identified investigators and law-enforcement as their primary customer” yet a discussion with analysts in those centers revealed confusion about who their customers were supposed to be and what they should be producing.  Fusion centers are often run by state law enforcement agencies, usually by people who understand how to run criminal investigations but have a weak grasp of what intelligence is and how it can be used.  As a result, fusion centers tend to flail about and can’t seem to claify what their mission is or how they intend on doing it.  What they do is hide their confusion in a bunch of management speak gibberish and throw around words like ’symatry’, ‘paradigm’, or ‘value added’ without having the slightest idea of what they’re talking about.  The confusion drips down to lower levels and before you know it, no one knows what they should be doing.
2. This jives with my experience where fusion centers, anxious to be the ‘one stop shop’ for every conceivable issue (so that they can stick their hand into every possible funding source) sell themselves as having a focus on ‘All threats, all hazards’.   Fusion centers don’t want to turn away any potential customer so they promise everything to everyone. 
3. Since fusion centers have a heavy investigative bent in their management and a weak grasp of intelligence they, de facto, overwhelmingly become case support focused in their production.  There are many ways to look at potential customers for a fusion center and as far as I know, very little time is spent on identifying who they should be before the center opens its doors (the best time to figure out what you’re going to do is before you start).  Are you going to target police makers, managers, line supervisors or rank and file?  Perhaps you want to focus on one component;  law enforcement, EMS, fire, etc.  Maybe it’s some combination of those.  Still, that needs to be clearly  articulated and far too often, it is not.
4. This is also a difficult problem because many (most?  all?) of the potential customers out there are unfamiliar with the concept of intelligence in their operations and decision making processes and so fusion centers have to take it upon themselves to educate potential customers about what they can and can’t do and given #1 above, that’s a pretty tall order if the leadership doesn’t know itself.

Tasking:

• The author cites an unnamed analyst who seems brilliant and I really want to buy him/her a beer.  In one quote (s)he says:
  • “One of the biggest problems facing fusion centers is getting law enforcement administrators to establish standing requirements.  Law enforcement administrators cannot become effecient consumers of intelligence if they do not take an active part in establishing what requirements are established or why.  The standing requirements of a fusion center should not be established in an ad hoc fashion.” 
• I think law enforcement is loath to establish standing requirements, in part, because they fear repurcussions if they don’t pick the ‘right’ requirements.  What happens if some criminal or  crime type grabs the headlines and sparks fear in the population and it turns out that our brave little fusion center wasn’t tracking that particular threat.  I think the perception is that could end a career.  Better to not establish any priorities so that when times are good you can claim to be tracking every possible threat to mankind and when times are bad you can hope no one will notice.

I don’t want this post to get too unwieldy so I’m going to have to break it up.  Stay tuned for part 2.

Swedish Vacation Update Part 2

My last post was all about the good things I’ve been finding here in Sweden.  But, all is not well in the land of the eternally pale people.  Here is the downside to traveling here in Sweden.

1. Computer keyboards:  Swedish computer keyboards are set up differently than our to accommodate their extra letters (å, ö, ä) and that throws the whole thing out of whack.  The world will be a much better place when everyone speaks American…just like Jesus did.
2. The price of gas:  Holy Cripes!!!  You think it’s expensive to fill up your gas tank?  Well, buckle up bonehead cause you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.  I rented a Nissan Note (by the way, a fun little car with tons of room) and it cost me 484 Swedish Kronar to fill it up with 35 litres.  Now for those of you not up on your Kronar to dollar and litre to gallon conversions, that works out to just over $10 per gallon. 
   

   You'll need a loan to pay for your gas soon...

3.  The price of everything else:  If you think discussions about U.S. monetary policy are exclusively for pencil necked geeks in Washington D.C. and don’t effect you then just take a trip out of the country.  Our weak dollar policy may mean that foreign nations can buy our goods and services cheaply but it also means that you can’t get a decent meal in Sweden for less than 25 or 30 dollars and a nice (not fancy, just nice) meal with a drink or two is going to propel you into the 50-60 dollar range (per person of course).  In fact, it’s pretty hard to do anything here without spending gobs of money.  I think even a no-frills trip (backpacking on a Euro-rail ticket, camping or sleeping on the train, living off of sandwiches you put together from the cheapest stuff in the supermarket…ah, the good ol’ days) would cost you a pretty penny.
4. Stretch pants:  While summer in Sweden can hardly be described as ’scortching’, it is warmer than the locals are generally used to.  Also, there is some truth to the stereotype about Swedes being beautiful.  So, why Swedish women seem to insist on wearing stretch pants with everything is totally beyond me.  It makes you feel like you’re having some sort of bad 1980s flashback or something.
5. Low speed limits:  Given how well Swedes can drive and the amazing condition of their roads (I can’t remember a single pot hole in over 700 miles of road) some of their speed limits are maddeningly slow.  You’ll be able to resist the urge to speed though, since traffic cameras are everywhere ready to snap your picture and send you a ticket in the mail.
6. No greens:  Swedes donät seem to have fully grasped the concept of the salad.  When you see it on the menu, it usually means you’ll be getting a few pathetic strips of iceberg lettuce next to your entree.  I suspect it’s there more to fill up your plate than your stomach.  The explanation for this lack of green stuff in the diet may be explained by #7, below.
7. Toilet paper:  Sweden is a highly industrialized, civilized nation and its citizens are among the most happy and satisfied in the world.  Yet, the idea that toilet paper can be both efficient and comfortable seems to be beyond them.  I swear that some of the material that passes for toilet paper here and that I’ve unfortunately had to experience, would do a better job at removing paint and varnish than any 30 grit sandpaper you could get at Home Depot.

Vacation Update - Tourist trap alert!

I have two guidebooks for my vacation here:  The Lonely Planet and Frommers.  The latter is far superior but still far from perfect.  Lonely Planet is going to have a hard time winning back my trust after daring to recommend Grönäsens Älgpark, a ‘moose park’ which sounds like it would be interesting and fun but really  is just an excuse to waste your time and money.  Your $8 admission fee enables you to walk around a 1.3 km enclosure that has about 5 moose in it (you may or may not get to see any), a look into the ‘museum’ (which consists of 3 stuffed moose in various death scenes and no accompanying information whatsoever), a gift shop demonstrating the ability of Chinese slave laborers to put moose images on virtually any type of mass produced crap product and access to the BBQ where you can cook and eat your own meal (as long as you buy all the food from the gift shop).

That’s an hour of my life I definitely want back.

A bad day in Afghanistan

Bad news today that 9 soldiers were killed and more injured in an attack on a base near the Afghan-Pakistan border.  ‘I told you so’ is really getting less and less satisfying after 5 years but this is really another indication that the U.S. hasn’t lost the initiative in its “War on Terror” but that it has never really tried to win it.  We got roped into Iraq based upon our own hubris, wacked out ideology and theology, then let Al-Qaeda decide that would be the focus of all our attention.  We then spent the next four years with the famous ‘whack-a-mole’ strategy only to switch to the glorious, answer to all our problems SURGE. 

So, what happens next?  Exactly what you’d expect of an enemy who decides the rules.  They just moved to an area where we don’t have a preponderance of force.  We’re just seeing the same old ‘whack a mole’ strategy except now it’s on a regional scale instead of a national one.  What’s the administration’s answer?  Let’s go chase the enemy and declare Afghanistan the ‘central front’.  Great, we’ll take troops out of Iraq ship them off to Afghanistan and then we can ship them back to Iraq in a couple of years when that place falls apart without the huge influx of money, men and arms that we’re putting into it.

Now, don’t get me wrong.  I’m a big fan of sending extra support to Afghanistan and have been since we invaded.  The problem is the reason for the recent interest in such a plan.  It’s got everything to do with reacting to what the enemy is doing and is not part of any coordinated grand strategy on our part. 

We should be deciding where (if anywhere) the main focus of our anti-Islamist efforts should be, not the Islamists we’re fighting.

Vacation update

I usually plan to write a vacation wrap up post when I get home, but unfolding events always take over and before I know it so much time has elapsed that the things I want to write about seem a bit stale.  So, with about a week of Sweden under my belt, another to go and some free time on my hands I’ve decided to write down my impressions thus far.  I’ve just sort of naturally begun to create a mental ‘good/bad’ list about my impressions and here they are:

The Good:

1. Swedish Drivers:  Because Swedes have to devote a great deal of time, money and practice in order to get a drivers licence (as opposed to our ‘Get a free drivers licence with every purchase of giant sized slurpee!’ system) Swedes actually know and follow the rules of the road.  It’s an American passtime to say that bad drivers are confined to a particular state (like New Yorkers who seem determined to actually win the title for the worst drivers in America) but let’s face it.  We all suck at driving.  Don’t believe me?  Perhaps you think all my wine and brie eating has turned me into some sort of pinko, America-hating, Eurotrash wannabe?  Just do to your nearest four way stop or traffic circle and see how well our fellow citizens do.
2. No (well, very few anyway) billboards:  You might not even realize how pretty the countryside is that you drive through every day but get the opportunity to drive somewhere not clogged with crappy advertisements for junk you don’t want and you might actually like the view.
3. Fewer extras in the food:  Check out the labels of the food you buy.  Can you tell me why it needs all that high fructose corn syrup and all those chemical additives?  Didn’t they used to make bread, cookies, juice, mustard and everything else without that crap just a few short decades ago?  It seems a bit easier to find crap free food here. 
4. People treated like adults:  As I’ve been bouncing around I’ve noticed a lack of warning labels, barriers, overseers, and other contrivences to sterilize our lives into a Disneyfied simulation of real life.  Here you’re expected to know that it’s not a good idea to touch an electrified fence without being told.  Seems like common sense to me.
5. Allansrätten:  Swedish custom views property and land rights differently than we do.  So long as you steer clear of homes (about 70 meters according to the Lonely Planet guide), cultivated areas or a few restricted places, don’t be an ass or trash the place you can go anywhere you like in the country.  Someone owns a few hundred acres of forest?  You can hike or even camp there overnight if you’d like.  It’s an incredibly civilie zed concept and one I wish we had every time I have to take the hour drive past tons of private lakes in order to put my kayak in the water.
6. Swedish radio:  Perhaps itäs because it reminds me of the feel good news of the 1970s AM radio or the fact that I don’t understand a word of it but I actually enjoyed listening to pop radio in Sweden.  The music seems to be written with the understanding that it’s not going to change civilization and, in fact, might not even make it through the summer but who cares?  Tap your feet and enjoy the next few hundred replays until you’re sick of it and we’ll move on to the next one. 
7. Daylight:  There’s so much of it here you run out of energy before the sun does.  If you’re trying to cram as much sightseening as you can into a short amount of time you can’t being this close to the top of the world during summer.

That’s it so far for the good stuff…Next time we move on to the bad….

I better quit screwing around…the end is near

Apparently, the European Organization for Nuclear Research is going to do a little experimenting that some people say will lead to the creation of a black hole that will destroy the planet and cause the human race to go extinct.

It’s suppossed to happen in late August which means you might not want to make any big plans for Labor Day.

The agency and its media flunkies say there’s no problem.  Others disagree.

All I know is I can’t do anything about it either way.

On the bright side, at least it’ll prevent that zombie invasion I’ve been worrying about.

You’ve got to be kiddding me

I just wanted to check.  This is 2008, right?

Then how the hell do we explain the fact that only yesterday was Nelson Mandela taken off of the U.S. terrorist watch list?

I thought we had thousands of sharp people working in our counter-terrorism/homeland security sector.  Is it possible that no one could figure this out over the past 18 years?

Afghanistan update

Bad news continues to flow out of Central Asia.  Part of me wants to think (hope?) that the latest string of reporting is really just the news media looking for another interesting story since the Iraq war has fallen into a bit of a lull (at least in terms of Americans dying - Iraqi deaths never seem to generate any interest) but I can’t help feeling that six years of neglect in Afghanistan is getting ready to take a huge bite out of our rear end.

Yesterday’s Washington Post has a story about Pakistan’s military moving in to Peshwar because of concerns about imminent attacks by Islamic extremists.   Pakistan’s media takes an even more alarmist view quoting  in saying:

“Officials in the home department, who evaluate the situation on an almost daily basis, believe declaring a state of red alert is now only a matter of time…Peshawar is in a state of siege and if Peshawar falls, the rest of the districts in the NWFP would fall like ninepins,”

Now Peshwar isn’t some puny collection of mud huts in the middle of nowhere.  It’s a city of 3 million people and if the Pakistani government can’t maintain control of something that big, what can it be expected to do?  An initial report implies that the forces of the government of Pakistan aren’t exactly filled with motivation to act decisively against the militants.

There’s always been suspicions that elements within the Pakistani military/intelligenceservices weren’t necessarily ‘on board’ with this whole ‘War on Terror’ thing and regard the Taliban as good friends.  The recent RAND report (no, I haven’t read it yet and don’t even think about recommending it to me to read while I’m on vacation) asserts that Pakistani forces have provided the Taliban with intelligence and other support.

So what do we do if large portions of Pakistan become’officially’ ungovernable and we can’t even have the current charade in which everyone pretends the central government is in control?

Beats me, but it doesn’t look good.

Better bring comfortable shoes

Looks like I’ll be doing a lot of walking over the next few weeks…