Go Lean…Caribbean

Go Lean Commentary

“The first casualty when war comes is truth” – US Senator Hiram Warren Johnson (1918).

In the United States, the War on ‘Terrorism’ was declared after the World Trade Center Attacks in September 2001. The war is still waging … some 16 years later. This is the third Commander-in-Chief (President) to lead the American effort; (George W. Bush, Barack Obama and Donald Trump). Now, the lines are starting to blur in terms of who are the enemies and who are the allies.

During the first week of the new Trump administration, the new President issued an Executive Order – fulfilling a campaign promise – banning all immigrants from certain Muslim-majority countries. This is purportedly in conjunction with the ongoing War on ‘Terror’. The problem is that the cited countries have not been the source of the terrorist activities that have attacked the US. The targeting seem arbitrary. We must consider the truth; see the news article and photo/map of this story here:

Title: These Countries with Business Links to Trump Aren’t Part of His Immigration Ban
By: Joseph Hincks

A little over a year ago, then-Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump called for a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States,” until the country’s leadership could “figure out what is going on.”

Along the campaign trail, he modified this blanket ban to a suspension of “immigration from terror-prone regions, where vetting cannot safely occur,” which he promised to enact during his first 100 days in office.

And now, a week into Trump’s presidency, he has tried to make good on that promise—or, at least, partly so. A draft proposal of an executive order obtained by Bloomberg News reportedly shows that Trump is poised to suspend all entry to the U.S. from seven Muslim-majority countries.

Notably missing from the blacklist, however, are several Muslim-majority countries where Trump has business dealings, according to Bloomberg.

The news organization has put together a map of the proposed suspensions, with the Muslim-majority countries where Trump has business interests—Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Azerbaijan—rendered in yellow.

While Muslim-majority countries such as Oman, Qatar, Kuwait, and others are not included on the list, the omission of Turkey and Egypt may be argued as being seen at odds with Trump’s definition. Both Turkey and Egypt endured high-profile terror attacks in 2016.

The President has positions in two companies that may be related to business in Egypt, and has previously praised the country’s autocratic leader, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. In Turkey, Trump has a licensing deal to use his name on two luxury towers in Istanbul.

Source: Fortune Magazine Online Site; posted January 27, 2017; retrieved January 29, 2017 from: http://fortune.com/2017/01/27/donald-trump-muslim-immigration-ban-conflict/

Such a bold move – based on mis-truths – elicits response, feedback and uproar from opposition and pundits alike. In one such salvo on Saturday January 28th, a Security Analyst (with TV News Network MSNBC), Malcolm Nance, identified that terrorists are sourced in many countries around the world, not just the banned 7 and including places like the Caribbean.

Wait, what?!?! Such a scandalous accusation!

This brings to mind a previous blog-commentary by the promoters of the book Go Lean … Caribbean, describing the reality of the terrorism-threat in the Caribbean:

ISIS reaches the Caribbean Region

The Caribbean member-states are all atwitter about such associations. The region’s governments asserts that they are partners in the ‘War on Terror’ and not accessories to any Bad Actors. Consider the formal response from the Bahamas in the Appendix A below.

But truth be told, the US – and other advanced democracy countries – are very alarmed with their Caribbean partners; we have so many societal defects that exacerbate the global attempts to mitigate terrorism. Consider this list of security-based societal defects:

1.  Indiscriminant Citizenship By Investment Program – see the CBS 60 Minutes story about Passports for Sale even to Terror Suspects featured in this previous blog. Can terrorists hide their identity with a passport from a Caribbean member-state? Can we do better going forward?

2.  US PATRIOT Act – Managing ‘the Need and the Greed’ with this law. The measure allowed US authorities to have purview on foreign bank accounts in cooperative countries. This is where the Caribbean member-states were given the opportunity to demonstrate that they were willing to mitigate terrorism. Cooperation with these measures – see Appendix B below – jeopardized the Offshore Banking industry in the region. Can terrorists use our “banking in the shadows” to facilitate their malice? The historicity of the Offshore Banking Regulatory changes were detailed in the Go Lean book (Pages 321 – 326). Consider this sample from Page 321: “In 2001 the development of standards in the fight against terrorism financing was added to the mission of the FATF [(Financial Action Task Force … on Money Laundering)]. In October 2001 the FATF issued the Eight Special Recommendations to deal with the issue of terrorism financing. The continued evolution of money laundering techniques led the FATF to revise the FATF standards comprehensively in June 2003. In October 2004 the FATF published a Ninth Special Recommendations, further strengthening the agreed international standards for combating money laundering and terrorism financing”.

3.  Aversion to Digital Dragnets – The cutting edge technologies to capture meta-data or actual cell phone contents have been frowned on in the Caribbean; in a 2011 WikiLeaks dissemination, whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed that the Bahamas cooperates with US official and records all cell phone calls. This disclosure was assailed as an Abuse of Power. But we must admit, this is an abuse of American power on the Caribbean homeland. Issues abound that need to be addressed and settled. The societal defect is that we are expecting others (the US in this case) to take the lead for our own security. Can we better prepare our own security apparatus for our own security needs? See VIDEO here relating the Privacy Concerns of dragnets. VIDEO – USA Today: Digital Dragnet – Police Scoop Up Cell Phone Data – https://www.occupycorporatism.com/digital-dragnet-dhs-police-stingray-trackers/ Posted December 9, 2013 – Systems like the “Stingray” allow law enforcement entities to “tap into cellphone data in real time . . . capturing information about thousands of cellphone users at a time, whether they are targets of an investigation or not”.

4.  Monitoring for threats (Weapons of Mass Destruction) – like Nuclear weapons. In the Caribbean, the “Sum of our Greatest Fear” is a terrorist detonating a dirty (nuclear) bomb in an unsecured island community. This is not just something we can complain about, no, we must prepare. There is an international accord that affords a solution, through the US. This is addressed in the discussion of the NEST program (Nuclear Emergency Support Team) in Appendix C below. We can facilitate our own arrangement, with US cooperation. We can mount sensors and monitoring equipment; we can grant access and enable the NEST inspectors in our domain.

How we receive, perceive and retrieve security mitigations indicates the impact of our societal defects. Without firing one shot, the Caribbean is able to help or hurt the War Against ‘Terrorism’ with our societal defects. This is commentary 4 of 4 from the movement behind the Go Lean book on the subject of Caribbean societal defects. So how do we move our communities from the deficient-defective status quo to our targeted destination: “a better (safer) place to live, work and play”? By waging war on our defects. All of these commentaries detail that effort, for the following defects:

1. Waging a Successful War on Orthodoxy
2. Waging a Successful War on Stupidity
3. Waging a Successful War on Rent
4. Waging a Successful War on ‘Terrorism’

These commentaries draw reference to the Go Lean book, as it details the quest to reform and transform the Caribbean; it features a how-to guide and roadmap for elevating the region’s societal engines for (1.) economics, (2.) security and (3.) governance. Strategies, tactics and implementations for the War Against Terrorism have relevance for all these three spheres of society.

The book Go Lean … Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) to elevate the region’s societal engines of economics, security and governance. With a brand name like Trade Federation, obviously the primary focus is on economics, but the book asserts (Page 23) that peace, security and public safety must be tantamount to economic prosperity; that bad things will happen to good people and so the community needs to be prepared to contend with the risks that can imperil the homeland. The Go Lean book therefore serves as a roadmap for full Caribbean integration, with the motivation for Greater Good. In all, the Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

• Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy and create new jobs.
• Establishment of a homeland security apparatus to ensure public safety and to protect the resultant economic engines of the Caribbean region.
• Improvement of Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The priority on homeland security was pronounced early in the Go Lean book with the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Page 12) that claims:

x. Whereas we are surrounded and allied to nations of larger proportions in land mass, populations, and treasuries, elements in their societies may have ill-intent in their pursuits, at the expense of the safety and security of our citizens. We must therefore appoint “new guards” to ensure our public safety and threats against our society, both domestic and foreign. The Federation must employ the latest advances and best practices … to assuage continuous threats against public safety.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes, including … forms of terrorism, can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

The Caribbean appointing these “new guards” will include many strategies, tactics and implementations considered “best-practices” in the War Against Terror.

The CU would be established by the sovereign powers of the 30 Caribbean member-states to empower the region with economic, security and governing tools and techniques. This includes a Security / Defense Pact (Armed Forces) with a fully-empowered Naval Force and Expeditionary Marine (ground) Forces. The Security Pact is about action, not attitude; but the right societal attitude (weeding out societal defects) is important, critical even.

Societal defects are destructive and self-defeating for the interior of our communities. But in the case of security gaps, far-away communities can be imperiled as well. The War on Terrorism is fought by many stakeholders on many different ‘battlefields’.  Consider airport screening; once every passenger has been screened for weapons and explosives, the plane is considered “sanitized” and can then enter any airspace with a presumed label of “safe-and-secured”. Poor security executions in the Caribbean can therefore impact the public safety of far-away places. So our defects can result in bad cause-and-effect for other (innocent) people.

This is the attitude – community ethos – that we must adopt, that our battles in the War Against Terror can help/hurt the rest of the world. “Community Ethos” is defined here as:

“… the fundamental character or spirit of a culture; the underlying sentiment that informs the beliefs, customs, or practices of a group or society; dominant assumptions of a people or period practices of a group or society; dominant assumptions of a people or period”.

The Go Lean book details the series of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to wage a successful ‘War on Terrorism’; this includes proactive and reactive public safety/security measures in the Caribbean region:

Other subjects related to security and governing empowerments for the region’s defense have been blogged in other Go Lean…Caribbean commentaries, as sampled here:

An effort to provide better security solutions in the Caribbean should be welcomed here.

The new Caribbean must foster good security habits … and ‘War against Bad Ones’ – societal defects. This is how to secure our homeland: monitor for threats, gather intelligence, investigate incidences, police communities, arm a defense apparatus and prepare for the worst.

This level of response is new … for our region; we normally sit back and let someone else do the heavy-lifting for security. But it is time now to grow up and secure our own communities and our economic engines.

All Caribbean stakeholders are therefore urged to lean-in to this roadmap, to this conceivable, believable and achievable plan to make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Appendix A – Statement By The Bahamas Ministry of Foreign Affairs

On Reported ‘Terrorism Threat From The Bahamas’

28 January 2017

For Immediate Release

Today on MSNBC Cable News, on a show hosted by Joy-Ann Reid, a guest Malcolm Nance, a reported expert in security and terrorism, made the following statement:

” We [ the United States] have not banned terrorists from Brazil. ISIS has dozens of members from Brazil or Trinidad or The Bahamas who have more terrorists members than any of those other countries.”

In today’s atmosphere, the video clip is being spread around at a clipped pace.

Upon hearing the report, the Minister of Foreign Affairs Fred Mitchell spoke with the Prime Minister, the National Security Minister, the Head of SIB in the Royal Bahamas Police Force. all of whom are responsible for the country’s national security and they have no knowledge of any such terrorists or group of terrorists or any individual terrorist that is related to ISIS or any other terrorist organization in The Bahamas.

In speaking with ZNS TV news this evening, the Minister said the report is rubbish.

He indicated that the U S Mission in the United States has been asked to reach out to US counterparts, to MSNBC and the Mr. Nance himself to find out what the source of the allegation is. The Mission has been asked to ask for a retraction forthwith.

Source: Retrieved January 29, 2017 from: http://www.thebahamasweekly.com/publish/bis-news-updates/Bahamas_Gov_t_responds_to_MSNBC_regarding_reported_terrorism_threat_from_The_Bahamas52287.shtml

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Appendix B – USA Patriot Act

The USA PATRIOT Act is an Act of Congress that was signed into law by President George W. Bush on October 26, 2001.^[1] With its ten-letter abbreviation (USA PATRIOT) expanded, the full title is “Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001”.^[2]

On May 26, 2011, President Barack Obama signed the PATRIOT Sunsets Extension Act of 2011, a four-year extension of three key provisions in the USA PATRIOT Act:^[3] roving wiretaps, searches of business records, and conducting surveillance of “lone wolves”—individuals suspected of terrorist-related activities not linked to terrorist groups.^[4]

Following a lack of Congressional approval, parts of the Patriot Act expired on June 1, 2015.^[5] With the passage of the USA Freedom Act on June 2, 2015, the expired parts were restored and renewed through 2019.^[6] However, Section 215 of the law was amended to stop the National Security Agency (NSA) from continuing its mass phone data collection program.^[6] Instead, phone companies will retain the data and the NSA can obtain information about targeted individuals with permission from a federal court.^[6]

From broad concern felt among Americans from both the September 11 attacks and the 2001 anthrax attacks, Congress rushed to pass legislation to strengthen security controls.

…

…

Title III: Anti-money-laundering to prevent terrorism

Title III of the Act, titled “International Money Laundering Abatement and Financial Anti-Terrorism Act of 2001,” is intended to facilitate the prevention, detection and prosecution of international money laundering and the financing of terrorism. It primarily amends portions of the Money Laundering Control Act of 1986 (MLCA) and the Bank Secrecy Act of 1970 (BSA). It was divided into three subtitles, with the first dealing primarily with strengthening banking rules against money laundering, especially on the international stage. The second attempts to improve communication between law enforcement agencies and financial institutions, as well as expanding record keeping and reporting requirements. The third subtitle deals with currency smuggling and counterfeiting, including quadrupling the maximum penalty for counterfeiting foreign currency.

…

Restrictions were placed on accounts and foreign banks. It prohibited shell banks that are not an affiliate of a bank that has a physical presence in the U.S. or that are not subject to supervision by a banking authority in a non-U.S. country. It also prohibits or restricts the use of certain accounts held at financial institutions.^[47] Financial institutions must now undertake steps to identify the owners of any privately owned bank outside the U.S. who have a correspondent account with them, along with the interests of each of the owners in the bank. It is expected that additional scrutiny will be applied by the U.S. institution to such banks to make sure they are not engaging in money laundering. Banks must identify all the nominal and beneficial owners of any private bank account opened and maintained in the U.S. by non-U.S. citizens. There is also an expectation that they must undertake enhanced scrutiny of the account if it is owned by, or is being maintained on behalf of, any senior political figure where there is reasonable suspicion of corruption.^[48]Any deposits made from within the U.S. into foreign banks are now deemed to have been deposited into any interbank account the foreign bank may have in the U.S. Thus any restraining order, seizure warrant or arrest warrant may be made against the funds in the interbank account held at a U.S. financial institution, up to the amount deposited in the account at the foreign bank.^[49]

Source: Retrieved January 29, 2017 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patriot_Act

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Appendix C – Nuclear Emergency Support Team

The Nuclear Emergency Support Team (NEST) (formerly known as the Nuclear Emergency Search Team) is a team of scientists, technicians, and engineers operating under the United States Department of Energy‘s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). Their task is to be “prepared to respond immediately to any type of radiological accident or incident anywhere in the world”.^[1]

History

Concerns over scenarios involving nuclear accidents or incidents on American soil are not recent. As early as the 1960s, officials were concerned that a nuclear weapon might be smuggled into the country, or that an airplane carrying a nuclear weapon might crash and contaminate surrounding areas.^[2] In late 1974, President Gerald Ford was warned that the FBI received a communication from an extortionist wanting $200,000 (equivalent to $971,000 in 2016) after claiming that a nuclear weapon had been placed somewhere in Boston. A team of experts rushed in from the United States Atomic Energy Commission but their radiation detection gear arrived at a different airport. Federal officials then rented a fleet of vans to carry concealed radiation detectors around the city but forgot to bring the tools they needed to install the equipment. The incident was later found to be a hoax. However, the government’s response made clear the need for an agency capable of effectively responding to such threats in the future. Later that year, President Ford created the Nuclear Emergency Search Team (NEST), which under the Atomic Energy Act is tasked with investigating the “illegal use of nuclear materials within the United States, including terrorist threats involving the use of special nuclear materials”.^[1]

One of its first responses was in Spokane, Washington on November 23, 1976. An unknown group called the “Days of Omega” had mailed an extortion threat claiming they would explode radioactive containers of water all over the city unless paid $500,000 (equivalent to $2,104,000 in 2016). Presumably, the radioactive containers had been stolen from the Hanford Site, less than 150 miles (240 km) to the southwest. Immediately, NEST flew in a support aircraft from Las Vegas and began searching for non-natural radiation, but found nothing. No one ever responded, despite the elaborate instructions given, or made any attempt to claim the (fake) money, which was kept under surveillance. Within days, the incident was deemed a hoax, though the case was never solved. To avoid panic, the public was not notified until a few years later.^[3][4]

Today

According to the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, NEST has the ability to deploy as many as 600 people to the scene of a radiological incident, though deployments do not usually exceed 45 people.^[5] NEST has a variety of equipment (weighing up to 150 tons) and has the support of a small fleet of aircraft which includes four helicopters and three airplanes, all outfitted with detection equipment.

When an airborne response to an incident is underway, the Federal Aviation Administration grants NEST flights a higher control priority within the United States National Airspace System, designated with the callsign “FLYNET”.

Since 1975, NEST has been warned of 125 nuclear terror threats and has responded to 30. All have been false alarms.

Source: Retrieved January 29, 2017 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_Emergency_Support_Team