Word: stratfor
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...Israelis tighten the noose on Hizballah in Lebanon, these communication nodes become critical," said Fred Burton, a former U.S. counterterrorism official and now vice president of Stratfor, a security consulting and forecasting company in Austin, Tex. In today's asymmetrical warfare, the Internet is vital to groups like Hizballah who use it to recruit, raise money, communicate and propagandize, Burton said, including transmissions from Hizballah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah...
...there are strong arguments--beyond the sentimental ones--in favor of keeping New Orleans where it is. In a piece posted online in the Stratfor Geopolitical Intelligence Report, Stratfor chairman George Friedman points out that the Mississippi River is the centerpiece of the nation's internal-waterway transit system and that the ports around New Orleans are the "key exit" of North America. They are located as far north as they can be and still be accessed by oceangoing vessels. And those essential ports require a skilled force--a city--to make them work. "New Orleans is not optional...
...agreement between the U.S. and Britain prevents the two from spying in each other's country, Baer says. That means the U.S. could not have useful operatives in London mosques, and the British just did not. And some businesses make the same mistake, according to George Friedman, founder of STRATFOR, an intelligence firm in Austin, Texas. "The expat community in Iran missed the fall of the Shah. In Russia they missed the fall of communism," he says. "They tend to rely too much on their personal contacts. They think, 'If I know the Shah's brother...
...Stratfor merits more than just a curt dismissal. The company used the same techniques to accurately forecast the economic crisis in Asia as well as the social and political troubles in Indonesia, the 1998 India-Pakistan nuclear standoff, and the 1998 rapprochement between Iran and the U.S. Stratfor has missed a few calls--most notably predicting that the euro would flop--but its gritty analysis has already won 15,000 subscribers to its free website...
...turn all of this into a business, Friedman relies on a lean staff of 20 in Austin. Several of his staff members have military-intelligence backgrounds. He sees the firm's outsider status as the key to its success. Stratfor's briefs don't sound like the usual Washington back-and-forthing, whereby agencies avoid dramatic declarations on the chance they might be wrong. Stratfor, says Friedman, takes pride in its independent voice. The Web's resources provide such a tremendous advantage that the Stratfor team has already been able to do away with at least one staple of 20th...