How private intelligence companies became the new spymasters
engelsbergideas.com
engelsbergideas.com
The software industry turned out so different from how I thought it would. When I decided to pursue it as a career, I thought that software engineers would be treated and given responsibilities like managers.
It's crazy when you think about it; managers are responsible for their people, whom they have limited control over... Yet software engineers have zero responsibility for the software they produce, which they have almost full control over.
2. They install computers in the electronics cave below the wheelhouses because nobody knows what most of the electronics there do in the first place.
Today there are hundreds of mega yachts in Fort Lauderdale, Florida with thousands of unscreened workers maintaining the yachts before they leave in November for a season of cruising and charters in the Caribbean.
3. They get caught by Russian mafia while in Martinique or St. Lucia.
4. They MacGyver their way out of the Caribbean while being chased by thugs with unlimited resources.
I'll get around to writing it one of these days.
Personally, I had planned to spend a season working in a restaurant in Miami Beach and was evacuated from the inter-coastal because of hurricane Irma. The only bed I could find was in a crew house in Fort Lauderdale. All the windows were boarded with plywood and they had several kegs and dozens of bottles on the table as we waited out the storm with a party. Fortunately the storm tracked the West Coast. Someone asked what I did and I said I was a chef. They suggested I become a private yacht chef. Two weeks later I was cooking on a private sailing yacht in the Bahamas.
Probably more interesting if a storm blows the protagonist into a situation.
Sounds like the accountability sink[0].
0. https://www.ft.com/content/2e1042d5-5e89-4fb6-bbee-de605a534...
Even with projects that went to extreme cost to maintain secrecy ultimately failed to do so, IE the Manhattan project.
Most tech companies (and non-tech companies) take a fairly pragmatic approach. Generally trust your employees but configure systems with an audit trail so you can hold them accountable later for malicious actions. If accidental, there's not much you can do anyway so just buy insurance.
State spies are basically illegals without accountability, like the various mafia networks. (CIA did have close connections to the Italian mafia, btw in their various illegal activities, such as drugs and torture. The NSA is regularly above the constitution.) Private spies are not yet connected like the mafia, but still can get caught operating out of the legal or constitutional boundaries.
The thing is, these documents were kinda bad. The information in them was not any better than the work of open source intelligence, and analyses were as good (bad) as that of many armchair analysts.
So it's no wonder that spy agencies are getting left behind.
Battle of Bakhmut: Late February 2023: Russian flanking maneuvers near Bakhmut, Ukrainian military discussions on response, and supply shortages. February 25: Ukrainian forces nearly encircled; low morale among soldiers. Kyrylo Budanov described the situation as “catastrophic”; offered to deploy elite units to safeguard the supply line. Deployment of reinforcements, including elite units, prevented encirclement but depleted seasoned forces needed for the spring counter-offensive.
Casualty Estimates: Documents cover U.S.-provided military resources, Pentagon estimates on casualties, and Ukraine’s planned counteroffensive. U.S. estimates: 189,500 to 223,000 Russian casualties, 124,500 to 131,000 Ukrainian casualties. Soldiers killed in action: 15,500 to 17,500 Ukrainian, 35,500 to 43,000 Russian. Significant casualties for Spetsnaz GRU due to their use in the war.
Russian Military Planning: Russian General Staff plans to counter NATO-provided tanks, including paying soldiers who destroy NATO tanks. U.S. aware of Russian plans to destroy a hangar containing drones near Odesa.
Russia–NATO Aircraft Encounters and Near Shootdown: September 2022: Russian fighter jet nearly shot down a British surveillance plane off Crimea. Incident disclosed by Ben Wallace in October; involved two Sukhoi Su-27 jets, one firing a missile at the Rivet Joint. Potential NATO response if the missile had hit the plane. Document details other encounters with Russian jets, including the 2023 Black Sea drone incident. French and British reconnaissance flights between the near-shootdown and February 26, 2023. U.S. defense officials stated the Russian pilot misunderstood commands from a radar operator.
Weapons Use by Ukraine: Ukraine’s air defense (S-300 and Buk missile systems) expected to be depleted by May. Documents refer to Ukraine using weapons within Russia; Zelenskyy suggested UAV strikes in Rostov Oblast. Potential increase in Chinese aid to Russia if Ukraine strikes within Russia. Exposure of LAPIS, an advanced satellite system used by the Ukrainian military. Proposed “Combat Power Build” of 9 planned brigades supplied by the U.S. and allies.
Weapons Use by Russia: Russia attempted to disrupt Starlink systems provided by SpaceX to Ukraine.
Western Special Forces: List of countries with special forces in Ukraine: UK (50), Latvia (17), France (15), U.S. (14), Netherlands (1). U.S. special forces at the U.S. embassy in Kyiv for VIP security and oversight of U.S. equipment and supplies.
Now look at the dates on those documents.
Big difference between knowing the Japanese fleet is off Pearl Harbor at 7AM versus 8:01.
To be clear, CIA and other agencies probably have HUMINT sources that are still ahead of the open source intelligence.
Their SIGINT is likely still ahead as well, although even that advantage is fading. During the Ukrainian conflict, we were able to track the activities of the armies by using NASA's publicly available infrared brush fire tracker satellites (FIRMS - https://firms.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/map/#d:24hrs;@38.1,48.0... ). And you can literally pay $100 and get a picture of any area on the planet, with a resolution that is good enough to track vehicles.
The decline in quality that you're describing not withstanding, I'm not surprised that private intelligence companies are on the rise as opposed to state agencies. I reckon that won't be for long though and that eventually any distinction between the two will be nominal.
Me, neither. The private sector almost universally pays more for top talent, so much of the top talent will go there. It's also probably a better culture.
As more government agencies outsource intelligence (and consequently, decision-making) to the private sector, companies like Palantir and OpenAI will become even more the de-facto government than they already are.
This is basically what I was alluding to. The stage is set all too well for this not to occur.
Maybe it always was, and the US Revolution was to allow this by tearing down unitary monarch power.