The Security Industry extract from The "Terrorism" Industry - Revision history

Tom Griffin: /* The Security Industry */

2013-06-23T23:18:25Z

The Security Industry

David: /* From Union Busting to Counterterrorism */

2012-12-03T09:37:15Z

From Union Busting to Counterterrorism

David: /* The Security Industry */

2012-12-03T09:31:20Z

The Security Industry

Show changes

David: /* From Union Busting to Counterterrorism */

2012-12-03T09:09:38Z

From Union Busting to Counterterrorism

David: /* Notes */

2012-12-03T09:08:55Z

Notes

David: /* Political Risk Analysis */

2012-12-03T08:27:22Z

Political Risk Analysis

David: /* From Union Busting to Counterterrorism */

2012-12-03T08:21:10Z

From Union Busting to Counterterrorism

Tom Griffin: /* The Security Industry */

2012-12-02T23:35:15Z

The Security Industry

David at 15:59, 13 January 2009

2009-01-13T15:59:32Z

David: The Secutiry Industry extract from The "Terrorism" Industry moved to The Security Industry extract from The "Terrorism" Industry: spelling~!

2009-01-12T12:09:28Z

The Secutiry Industry extract from The "Terrorism" Industry moved to The Security Industry extract from The "Terrorism" Industry: spelling~!

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 [[George Wackenhut]] packed the company's board with ideological soul mates, many of them members of the [[John Birch Society]] and ASC. Each month during the 1960s, the Wackenhut Security Review, the corporation's house organ, attacked the alleged excesses of the antiwar movement and student radicalism, earning it accolades from a number of ultraright organizations.43 The October 1967 edition of the Security Review reported on a meeting of the Organization of Latin American Solidarity (OLAS) under the heading "COMMUNISM AND YOU!" The Review warned its readers that Castro was eXploiting racial turmoil in the United States for his own revolutionary ends, hoping to unify "American Negroes" against imperialism. Time and again throughout the sixties, TWC attempted to link both the civil rights and free-speech movements with international communism.44
-More recently, the composition ofWackenhut's board of directors has continued to reflect its founder's agenda, and it also displays the firm's strong ties to the V.S. government. In 1986, Frank Carlucci, soon to be V.S. secretary of defense, was a member of the board of directors, along with William Raborn, a former head of the CIA, Clarence Kelley, former director of the FBI, Bernard Schriever, a retired air force general, long associated with ASC, and other former members of the CIA, FBI, and DIA. Prior to becoming head of the CIA, William Casey counted Wackenhut among his corporate clients at the law firm Rogers and Wells. Such ties to the government led a number of Canadian MPs to label the company a CIA-front orga¬nization when it attempted to engage in ajoint venture in the western part of that country in 1982.45
+More recently, the composition of Wackenhut's board of directors has continued to reflect its founder's agenda, and it also displays the firm's strong ties to the V.S. government. In 1986, [[Frank Carlucci]], soon to be V.S. secretary of defense, was a member of the board of directors, along with [[William Raborn]], a former head of the CIA, [[Clarence Kelley]], former director of the FBI, [[Bernard Schriever]], a retired air force general, long associated with ASC, and other former members of the CIA, FBI, and DIA. Prior to becoming head of the CIA, William Casey counted Wackenhut among his corporate clients at the law firm [[Rogers and Wells]]. Such ties to the government led a number of Canadian MPs to label the company a CIA-front organization when it attempted to engage in a joint venture in the western part of that country in 1982.45
 The bulk of Wackenhut's business is in the provision of basic security services. This is low-margin business, however, and TWC and its rivals have been. searching for better opportunities. One pursued by TWC has been strikebreaking - the provision of advice, scabs, and protection - a new line that fitted the Reagan-era demands and the Wackenhut tradition well. Another has been counterterrorism. Wackenhut provides advisory and protective services to hundreds of wealthy individuals worldwide, and in September 1986 it established an antiterrorism division to be run by former CIA, FBI, and State Department agents. According to Conrad V. Hassel, the director of the new division, Wackenhut expected to seek contracts from among TWC's 16,000 U.S. clients, as well as from "unnamed foreign" governments.46 Working with Hassel are Christian Frederick, a thirty-year CIA veteran, and Christopher Ferrante, a one-time special agent with the State Department, specializing in Latin America.

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 With the continued global expansion of the American economy, the intensification of the Cold War, and the conflicts between the West and the Third World, new problems confronted V.S. business and government in the 1960s and thereafter. Foreign sales and investment involved political risks, as American businesses that had invested in Cuba, Iran, Lebanon, and South Africa discovered to their discomfiture. Citizens of these countries sometimes resented the Western and American presence, and held the West responsible for putting into power and supporting the shah of Iran, the Latin American military regimes, and Ferdinand Marcos; for the Israeli assault on Lebanon, and for South Africa's aggressions against its black majority and the front-line states. From the standpoint of Western firms and officials, any such negative reactions from the West's victims were, of course, unreasonable and irrational, and could probably be explained, like union organization and strikes in earlier years, in terms of the sub rosa activities of Moscow and its proxies. These reactions were "terrorism," and Western states, American firms, and the security industry responded accordingly, in "defense" against these forces of subversion and unreason. For the security industry, there was a new demand for "risk analysis," protection of facilities and persons, and service to those wishing to take a more forward role in attacking terrorists.
-In Great Britain as well as the United States, the private security industry evolved in accord with corporate and state demands,  stressing union containment in the 1960s and 1970s, with a later and growing emphasis on risk analysis, security protection against potential terrorists, and provision of advisors and mercenaries to Western-supported states such as Saudi Arabia and to terrorist forces like the contras. The close connection and revolving door between police and intelligence personnel and the security firms has been similar to that in the United States.5 A report by the British secur
+In Great Britain as well as the United States, the private security industry evolved in accord with corporate and state demands,  stressing union containment in the 1960s and 1970s, with a later and growing emphasis on risk analysis, security protection against potential terrorists, and provision of advisors and mercenaries to Western-supported states such as Saudi Arabia and to terrorist forces like the contras. The close connection and revolving door between police and intelligence personnel and the security firms has been similar to that in the United States.5 A report by the British security firm, the [[Research Foundation for the Study of Terrorism]],6 notes that "in Britain, a number of such companies [are] staffed very largely or, in some cases, entirely by former members of the police, special forces ete. . . ."7
 ==Political Risk Analysis ==

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 ==From Union Busting to Counterterrorism==
-In both Great Britain and the United States there have been longstanding and close connections among the security industry, corporate business, and the police and intelligence services. As the demands of corporate business have evolved, the police/intelligence apparatus and the private security business have adjusted to meet them. For a long period in the l1nited States the focus of business demand was on the containment of unions, as well as physical security services (night watchmen, guards, and the like). The Pinkerton organization and "Pinkertonism," which originated in the nineteenth century, symbolized, first and foremost, strikebreaking and union busting in all its forms. The state and federal governments also contributed to union containment at strategic moments in the period 1870-1914.1
+In both Great Britain and the United States there have been longstanding and close connections among the security industry, corporate business, and the police and intelligence services. As the demands of corporate business have evolved, the police/intelligence apparatus and the private security business have adjusted to meet them. For a long period in the l1nited States the focus of business demand was on the containment of unions, as well as physical security services (night watchmen, guards, and the like). The Pinkerton organization and "Pinkertonism," which originated in the nineteenth century, symbolized, first and foremost, strikebreaking and union busting in all its forms. The state and federal governments also contributed to union containment at strategic moments in the period 1870-1914.<ref>Samuel Yellen, American Labor Struggles (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1936); Charles and Mary Beard, The Rise of American Civilization (New York: Macmillan, 1930), 2: 229-41.</ref>
 The surge in union organization during and immediately after World War I was effectively met by linking unionism with the threat of communism. In this effort, business firms, police forces at the federal, state, and local levels, and private vigilantes worked in a mutually supportive relationship. In the Red scare years of 1918-22, the FBI regularly supplied private vigilante groups with "documents" seized in Red raids, just as [[J. Edgar Hoover]]'s FBI leaked information to friends during the Cold War era.2
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 With the continued global expansion of the American economy, the intensification of the Cold War, and the conflicts between the West and the Third World, new problems confronted V.S. business and government in the 1960s and thereafter. Foreign sales and investment involved political risks, as American businesses that had invested in Cuba, Iran, Lebanon, and South Africa discovered to their discomfiture. Citizens of these countries sometimes resented the Western and American presence, and held the West responsible for putting into power and supporting the shah of Iran, the Latin American military regimes, and Ferdinand Marcos; for the Israeli assault on Lebanon, and for South Africa's aggressions against its black majority and the front-line states. From the standpoint of Western firms and officials, any such negative reactions from the West's victims were, of course, unreasonable and irrational, and could probably be explained, like union organization and strikes in earlier years, in terms of the sub rosa activities of Moscow and its proxies. These reactions were "terrorism," and Western states, American firms, and the security industry responded accordingly, in "defense" against these forces of subversion and unreason. For the security industry, there was a new demand for "risk analysis," protection of facilities and persons, and service to those wishing to take a more forward role in attacking terrorists.
-In Great Britain as well as the United States, the private security industry evolved in accord with corporate and state demands,  stressing union containment in the 1960s and 1970s, with a later and growing emphasis on risk analysis, security protection against potential terrorists, and provision of advisors and mercenaries to Western-supported states such as Saudi Arabia and to terrorist forces like the contras. The close connection and revolving door between police and intelligence personnel and the security firms has been similar to that in the United States.5 A report by the British security firm, the Research Foundation for the Study of Terrorism,6 notes that "in Britain, a number of such companies [are] staffed very largely or, in some cases, entirely by former members of the police, special forces ete. . . ."7
+In Great Britain as well as the United States, the private security industry evolved in accord with corporate and state demands,  stressing union containment in the 1960s and 1970s, with a later and growing emphasis on risk analysis, security protection against potential terrorists, and provision of advisors and mercenaries to Western-supported states such as Saudi Arabia and to terrorist forces like the contras. The close connection and revolving door between police and intelligence personnel and the security firms has been similar to that in the United States.5 A report by the British secur
 ==Political Risk Analysis ==

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 ==Notes==
 <references/>
-. Samuel Yellen, American Labor Struggles (New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1936); Charles and Mary Beard, The Rise of American Civilization (New York: Macmillan, 1930), 2: 229-41.
 . Frank Donner illustrates this point by noting that "the documents seized in a 1922 raid of a Communist party convention, at Bridgman, Michigan, were exclusively made available by Bureau Chief Burns to R. M. Whitney of the American Defense Society, and together with other material from confidential Department of Justice  files formed the basis for his pioneering compilation, The Reds in America." See  Donner, Age of Surveillance, p. 414. On Hoover's use of leaks to blackmail, among  many other purposes, see Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters: America in the King Years  1954-63 (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1988), chap. 15; Nelson Blackstock, Cointelpro (New York: Vintage, 1976), passim.
 . Donner, Age of Surveillance, p. 416.

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 ==Political Risk Analysis ==
-One segment of the security industry that grew rapidly in the wake of the new terrorist threat of the 1970s and 1980s was political risk analysis. This proved to be such a growth industry that in 1980 a trade group was formed in the United States called the Association of Political Risk Analysts. The firms in this industry have been run and staffed mainly by former FBI, CIA, DIA, and Secret Service officers whose backgrounds enabled them to claim special knowledge on political risk. According to Ted Kobrin,a former "outplacement officer" for the CIA who sought jobs forretiring agents, "The field of political risk is one to which many former agents would turn because of their experience. There are quite a few ex-CIA people doing that sort of thing."10
+One segment of the security industry that grew rapidly in the wake of the new terrorist threat of the 1970s and 1980s was political risk analysis. This proved to be such a growth industry that in 1980 a trade group was formed in the United States called the Association of Political Risk Analysts. The firms in this industry have been run and staffed mainly by former [[FBI]], [[CIA]], [[DIA]], and Secret Service officers whose backgrounds enabled them to claim special knowledge on political risk. According to [[Ted Kobrin]], a former "outplacement officer" for the CIA who sought jobs forretiring agents, "The field of political risk is one to which many former agents would turn because of their experience. There are quite a few ex-CIA people doing that sort of thing."10
 Risk consultants compile information on political hot spots worldwide and advise on potential terrorist threats to businesses; they may also provide introductions to friendly dictators and other "influentials" in Third World countries seeking to create a better climate for business. In fact, given the large number of ex-CIA agents currently working in the field and the agency's history of using front groups for covert purposes, "it is reasonable to ask whether agency sponsored activities are now being conducted under the rubric of risk analysis."11
-Indeed, several former cabinet members and agency heads with inside connections to such friendly governments as Chile, Argentina, Taiwan, and South Africa have become private risk consultants, among them Henry Kissinger, William Colby, Richard Helms, and, prior to his 1989 elevation to National Security Advisor to President George Bush, Brent Scowcroft. Among the terrorologists who do risk analysis are Yonah Alexander, Ray Cline, Neil Livingstone, and Michael Ledeen. Colby, a former director of the CIA, currently heads International Business Government Counsellers, Inc. (IBGC), which prepares custom-tailored studies, ranging in price from $20,000 to $100,000 each, for a clientele of dozens of major firms, from Abbott Labs to Xerox. It offers analyses of political trends in particular locales and "strategic counseling." In 1983, IBGC prepared a report on the future of the Pinochet regime in Chile for wary business executives.12 Former UN Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick and her husband, Evron, a longtime OSS and State Department specialist in psychological warfare and propaganda, co-own Opera¬tions and Policy Research, Inc. (OPR, Inc.), which advises govern¬ments and businesses on matters relating to counterinsurgency, propaganda, and political behavior.13
+Indeed, several former cabinet members and agency heads with inside connections to such friendly governments as Chile, Argentina, Taiwan, and South Africa have become private risk consultants, among them [[Henry Kissinger]], [[William Colby]], [[Richard Helms]], and, prior to his 1989 elevation to [[National Security Advisor]] to President [[George H. W. Bush|George Bush]], [[Brent Scowcroft]]. Among the terrorologists who do risk analysis are [[Yonah Alexander]], [[Ray Cline]], [[Neil Livingstone]], and [[Michael Ledeen]]. Colby, a former director of the CIA, currently heads [[International Business Government Counsellers, Inc.]] (IBGC), which prepares custom-tailored studies, ranging in price from $20,000 to $100,000 each, for a clientele of dozens of major firms, from [[Abbott Labs]] to [[Xerox]]. It offers analyses of political trends in particular locales and "strategic counseling." In 1983, IBGC prepared a report on the future of the Pinochet regime in Chile for wary business executives.12 Former UN Ambassador Jeane Kirkpatrick and her husband, Evron, a longtime OSS and State Department specialist in psychological warfare and propaganda, co-own Opera¬tions and Policy Research, Inc. (OPR, Inc.), which advises govern¬ments and businesses on matters relating to counterinsurgency, propaganda, and political behavior.13
-Early Warning, currently excerpted on a weekly basis in the Moon owned magazine Insight on the News (edited by de Borchgrave), is the extension of an operation once run by Rees called Information Digest. Rees's Digest was little more than a private domestic spy sheet for the right, which gathered and reported data on "subversive" organizations. The "inside" intelligence that appeared in the pages of Information Digest was circulated to the CIA, IRS, and NSA, the House and Senate Internal Security Committees, the Customs Service, and the DIA. Each of these agencies has, at one time or another,used materials appearing in the pages of ID.17 Rees's information has also been used by Reader's Digest, and a number of his pseudonymous articles have appeared in National Review and Human Events. He is also a regular contributor to the John Birch Society's Review of the News, in one issue of which he reproduced a lengthy interview with de Borchgrave and Moss.
+Several risk assessment firms regularly update terrorism data bases and make their findings known to private subscribers and government agencies. The best known, [[Risks International, Inc.]], based in Alexandria, Virginia, and founded by a retired air force intelligence officer, regularly publishes its chronologies of terrorist incidents in [[Yonah Alexander]]'s journal, Terrorism, and offers weekly risk assessment reports to subscribers. Risks International was purchased in 1987 by Business Risks International, a security firm that specializes in coping with industrial sabotage and counterterrorism. Business Risks International was founded in 1980 by [[Don Walker]], a former FBI agent, and currently employs many former members of the FBI and DIA.14 [[Eugene Mastrangelo]], the president of [[Risks International]] and a counterinsurgency warfare veteran, is also a noted terrorism expert and a regular contributor of articles to journals and papers at conferences.15
-Several times, Rees's materials were used to instigate counterterrorism investigations against a number of peace and anti-interventiongroups such as CISPES. According to Frank Varelli, a former contract employee for the FBI charged with the task of infiltrating CISPES, the bureau provided him with materials prepared by Rees and published by the John Birch Society and Western Goals, the foundation run by the late congressman and Birchite Larry McDonald.18 Rees joined Western Goals in 1980 in order to create a private data base on subversives in the United States. In his book The War Called Peace: The Soviet Peace Offensive, Rees argues that the V.S. peace movement is essentially run and financed by MoSCOW.19 In 1982, Rees forwarded information to the FBI that charged that the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) was controlled by the Soviets. The bureau then passed this information along to the State Department, which officially declared WILPF to be a "Soviet front organization." The State Department later withdrew its charge20
+Robert Moss [[and [[Arnaud de Borchgrave]] are and were, respectively, co-owners of a risk analysis enterprise called [[Mid-Atlantic Research Associates]] (MARA), founded by [[John Rees]].16 Rees, Moss, and de Borchgrave]] jointly edit a monthly private intelligence report called ''[[Early Warning]]'', a "confidential" publication that offers subscriptions, by invitation only, at $1,000 per year. Subscribers are expected to sign a statement in which they promise to respect the confidentiality of the newsletter and its sources. Early Warning purports to offer informed predictions of political turmoil and watches the worldwide terrorist scene, offering readers analyses written by Rees, Moss, and de Borchgrave themselves.
 In the late 1970s, the emphasis in Rees's Information Digest began to shift away from domestic subversion to international terrorism. With the aid of Robert Moss, it began carrying stories such as "Cuban Subversion in the V.S." (Oct. 7, 1983) and "Libya and Terror in the Americas" (Feb. 9, 1979). Over time, the publication evolved - following the ideological demands of the Reagan administration - into Early Warning, focusing on international terrorism and political risk analysis. Rees's new venture, run with Moss and de Borchgrave, became MARA, a risk analysis firm. MARA's new target audience was corporate, and offered "inside information" to investors, plan¬ners, and executives. Rees himself has appeared at several briefing panels and seminars in his capacity as a terrorism expert.21
 Rees's operation, like other risk analysis firms, maintains a data base of worldwide terrorist incidents and regularly publishes its findings and figures in Early W arning.'iMARA's figures.~re always higher than "official" CIA and State Department estiMates. For example, while the State Department had reported sixty-seven terrorist attacks involving V.S.-owned businesses in 1985, and Security World magazine, an industry publication,testimated forty such attacks, MARA topped them with its figure of close to oneitJ.undred attacks.22
-Firms like Risks International and MARA serve an important function in the terrorism industry as they supply seemingly "objec¬tive" data, in the form of numbers and "independent" reports, for use by terrorologists seeking to corroborate their claims in books, papers, and articles. We noted earlier Samuel T. Francis's heavy reliance on Rees's Information Digest in his book The Soviet Strategy of Terror. Likewise, Cline and Alexander's State-Sponsored Terrorism uses statistics and graphs drawn from both Early Warning and Risks International.
+Firms like Risks International and MARA serve an important function in the terrorism industry as they supply seemingly "objective" data, in the form of numbers and "independent" reports, for use by terrorologists seeking to corroborate their claims in books, papers, and articles. We noted earlier [[Samuel T. Francis]]'s heavy reliance on Rees's Information Digest in his book The Soviet Strategy of Terror. Likewise, Cline and Alexander's State-Sponsored Terrorism uses statistics and graphs drawn from both Early Warning and Risks International.
 ==The Security Industry==

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 The surge in union organization during and immediately after World War I was effectively met by linking unionism with the threat of communism. In this effort, business firms, police forces at the federal, state, and local levels, and private vigilantes worked in a mutually supportive relationship. In the Red scare years of 1918-22, the FBI regularly supplied private vigilante groups with "documents" seized in Red raids, just as [[J. Edgar Hoover]]'s FBI leaked information to friends during the Cold War era.2
-Private detective agencies with surveillance capabilities, closely connected to the police, also grew rapidly during this period. They were regularly staffed with former government officials and agents who had served in parallel activities. Donner notes that after World War I, the agencies "offered career opportunities to military person¬nel who, after every war, seek private employment in intelligence specialties acquired in military conflict."3 Donner also points out that in this Red scare era, "The involvement of career personnel with some claim to professionalism in political surveillance did not reduce the hysterical quality of the radical hunt. The private agencies deliberately took an overheated view of the Menace because it was good for business."4 A similar interest in menace inflation characterized the terrorism industry in the 1980s.	.
+Private detective agencies with surveillance capabilities, closely connected to the police, also grew rapidly during this period. They were regularly staffed with former government officials and agents who had served in parallel activities. Donner notes that after World War I, the agencies "offered career opportunities to military person¬nel who, after every war, seek private employment in intelligence specialties acquired in military conflict."3 Donner also points out that in this Red scare era, "The involvement of career personnel with some claim to professionalism in political surveillance did not reduce the hysterical quality of the radical hunt. The private agencies deliberately took an overheated view of the Menace because it was good for business."4 A similar interest in menace inflation characterized the terrorism industry in the 1980s. An important feature of the antiunion/antisubversion emphases of the V.S. private and public political intelligence system was the compilation of lists of union activists and "security" risks. These lists were put together by individuals, private agencies, corporations, and trade associations, as well as police and official intelligence bodies. They were used for blacklisting and propaganda, the latter through publication in pseudo-official congressional documents and leaks to right-wing authors who would funnel them into scandal sheets, articles, and books. As was noted in chapter 5, the [[American Security Council]] (ASC) came into existence as an antilabor intelligence and propaganda agency, acquiring the files of the anti-Semite and labor spymaster [[Harry Jung]]. It gradually broadened its activities to serve the military-industrial lobby, and accordingly broadened its antisubversive focus to include an international Red menace, against which it urgently demanded accelerated weapons acquisitions, and terrorism.
 With the continued global expansion of the American economy, the intensification of the Cold War, and the conflicts between the West and the Third World, new problems confronted V.S. business and government in the 1960s and thereafter. Foreign sales and investment involved political risks, as American businesses that had invested in Cuba, Iran, Lebanon, and South Africa discovered to their discomfiture. Citizens of these countries sometimes resented the Western and American presence, and held the West responsible for putting into power and supporting the shah of Iran, the Latin American military regimes, and Ferdinand Marcos; for the Israeli assault on Lebanon, and for South Africa's aggressions against its black majority and the front-line states. From the standpoint of Western firms and officials, any such negative reactions from the West's victims were, of course, unreasonable and irrational, and could probably be explained, like union organization and strikes in earlier years, in terms of the sub rosa activities of Moscow and its proxies. These reactions were "terrorism," and Western states, American firms, and the security industry responded accordingly, in "defense" against these forces of subversion and unreason. For the security industry, there was a new demand for "risk analysis," protection of facilities and persons, and service to those wishing to take a more forward role in attacking terrorists.
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 In Great Britain as well as the United States, the private security industry evolved in accord with corporate and state demands,  stressing union containment in the 1960s and 1970s, with a later and growing emphasis on risk analysis, security protection against potential terrorists, and provision of advisors and mercenaries to Western-supported states such as Saudi Arabia and to terrorist forces like the contras. The close connection and revolving door between police and intelligence personnel and the security firms has been similar to that in the United States.5 A report by the British security firm, the Research Foundation for the Study of Terrorism,6 notes that "in Britain, a number of such companies [are] staffed very largely or, in some cases, entirely by former members of the police, special forces ete. . . ."7
-Paralleling U.S. practice, British industry funded organizations that produced lists of threatening worker activists and engaged in continuous surveillance and clearance (referred to in Britain as "vetting"). British industry tried hard in the 1970s, as we mentioned earlier, to smear the labor movement by attributing its strike and organizational activity to external (Red) influence. These activities were carried on by institutions that specialized in gathering such lists and engaged in antiunion propaganda,8 and by security firms. We saw also that one of the principal organizations that tried to tie labor unions and strife to "subversion," the Institute for the Study of Conflict (ISC), was not only a CIA-British intelligence creation but also a terrorism institute, already leading the vanguard into the new area of establishment interest.
+Paralleling U.S. practice, British industry funded organizations that produced lists of threatening worker activists and engaged in continuous surveillance and clearance (referred to in Britain as "vetting"). British industry tried hard in the 1970s, as we mentioned earlier, to smear the labor movement by attributing its strike and organizational activity to external (Red) influence. These activities were carried on by institutions that specialized in gathering such lists and engaged in antiunion propaganda,8 and by security firms. We saw also that one of the principal organizations that tried to tie labor unions and strife to "subversion," the [[Institute for the Study of Conflict]] (ISC), was not only a CIA-British intelligence creation but also a terrorism institute, already leading the vanguard into the new area of establishment interest. In both Britain and the United States, the evolution from an emphasis on subversion in union activity (and defense plants) to terrorism was simple. Terrorism was the new metaphor for the actions of subversives. Subversives, as defined by the British philosopher of counterinsurgency, Frank Kitson, were any persons who protested and pressured in ways that challenged established institutions and made their leaders uncomfortable. Subversion included "the use of political and economic pressure, strikes, protest marches, and propaganda" designed to force the governing class "to do things which they do not want to do."9 It is this supremely undemocratic world view that causes so many members of the terrorism industry to move easily from plane hijackers and saboteurs of airplanes to animal rights, antiapartheid, and peace groups as part of a continuing spectrum of subversives or terrorists.
 As terrorism has a more international dimension than traditional subversion, the security business now involved more external risk assessment, the need for a multinational protection capability, and the ability to provide mercenary forces to advise, train, and kill. The industry grew rapidly to meet this new and enlarged demand.

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 In addition to the creation of OSAC, the U.S. government asked Congress in December 1985 to authorize a $4.2 billion budget to fund a ten-year project of counterterrorism training, construction, and security upgrading at over three hundred government facilities worldwide. According to the State Department, 75 percent of all , contracts generated by the plan were earmarked for U .S. security I corporations. And twice each year, the General Services Administration's Interagency Committee on Security Equipment invites representatives from the private security industry to conferences in order to let them know what they will be buying.34
-Such innovations have been welcomed by the membership of ASIS, the security industry's trade, professional, and lobbying organization. Since 1982, ASIS has sponsored annual government - industry conferences on terrorism to encourage just such interaction between the state and private sectors, featuring keynote speakers like Edwin Meese, George Shultz, and Nestor Sanchez, former deputy assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs. Despite its nonpartisan claims, speakers at ASIS functions and contributors to its monthly magazine, Security Management, have consistently argued the Reagan administration's line on terrorism. Sanchez, speaking on "the Cuban threat," traced much of the West's problems with political violence to plots hatched in Havana,35 while Meese repeated several standard administration canards, among them the charge that the Sandinistas support "narcoterrorism.:”36 Two additional articles in the ASIS periodical have made similar claims.37
+Such innovations have been welcomed by the membership of ASIS, the security industry's trade, professional, and lobbying organization. Since 1982, ASIS has sponsored annual government - industry conferences on terrorism to encourage just such interaction between the state and private sectors, featuring keynote speakers like [[Edwin Meese]], [[George Shultz]], and [[Nestor Sanchez]], former deputy assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs. Despite its nonpartisan claims, speakers at ASIS functions and contributors to its monthly magazine, Security Management, have consistently argued the Reagan administration's line on terrorism. Sanchez, speaking on "the Cuban threat," traced much of the West's problems with political violence to plots hatched in Havana,35 while Meese repeated several standard administration canards, among them the charge that the Sandinistas support "narcoterrorism.:”36 Two additional articles in the ASIS periodical have made similar claims.37
 Overlap between the risk analysis and security businesses is common, and many of the larger private security firms provide both risk analysis and the training, personnel, and paraphernalia necessary to counter the terrorist threat described in detail in their own reports. Like risk assessment businesses, private security firms provide a haven for retiring government agents and sometimes conduct "off the shelf" operations for the CIA, MI6, and the like. A 1985 study prepared for the Department of Justice found that some 80 percent of the managers of proprietary security firms had a background in law enforcement or military service, and a sizable proportion of the hired personnel of security firms have similar backgrounds.38

← Older revision		Revision as of 15:59, 13 January 2009
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−	This page is an extract (chapter 6 The Security Industry) from Ed ~~herman~~ and Gerry O'Sullivan, The "Terrorism" Industry, 1989, Praeger, pages 117-147	+	This page is an extract (chapter 6 'The Security Industry') from '''Ed Herman and Gerry O'Sullivan, The "Terrorism" Industry''', 1989, Praeger, pages 117-147. It is reproduced with the permission of Ed Herman.

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← Older revision	Revision as of 12:09, 12 January 2009
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