Tradecraft is the term used to describe how spies should behave in order to keep their spying secret.
We have a whole system in America for making criminals who live tradecraft. We make them by the millions. It is called Prohibition.
Who did we go to first when we wanted to penetrate Germany in WW2? The German criminal underground.
Another reason why Prohibitions are a very bad idea. We have 10% of the population now disposed – more or less – to violate conventional morality and who live tradecraft. Far too many. And if a Foreign Intelligence Service finds a person in a useful position it has a blackmail tool to get leverage. Our intel services may be – in part – behind gay acceptance. The loss of Alan Turing still hurts.
The trouble gets very large because about 1/2 of people from age 18 to about 60 have at least tried an illegal drug. So many that they can no longer automatically be ruled out when they tell the truth on a security form. And of course some will lie.
And it gets worse. In Redmond and many other places in the computer industry they don’t even test for drugs. Because far too many of the good or better people are users. They don’t want to know. All they say is “if you have an accident on the job and test positive or get caught we will have to get rid of you.”
As you know I follow the subject closely. And in my estimation our intel people have decided that Prohibition no longer provides the value it once did. It is now a liability. They have withdrawn their defense. Which does not call attention to their change of heart but does have the required effect.
I know you don’t like it my prohibitionist friends – but the sooner we integrate all those people back into society the safer we will be. Look at all the trouble gays caused us in the cold war.
You want to know the big tell for me? (I had been getting small hints for the last 4 or 5 years) Newt Gingrich – once a top drug warrior – campaigned for the decrim of heroin (and pot) in Calif. It passed. And it was so uncontroversial that except in Calif. it hardly made the news. What is another tell? Georgia (IIRC) passed a gay marriage bill.
Social liberalism is a requirement for defense against espionage. We should make as few people criminals as is possible. Reduce the recruiting pool. And our liberalism also gives us a recruiting tool against those not so liberal.
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One response to “Training Spies”
I suspect the reason that we haven’t already had tremendous problems is for the same reason that the mafia assisted the U.S. government in WW2. Our gangs are, for the most part, integrated into city politics. They participate in the power structure, so why would they destroy it?
Gangster government has been a fact of urban America at least since Tammany Hall days, and it’s probably a necessary part of integrating immigrant or otherwise disadvantaged populations. The only question is whether it’s still working, and if not, why not?