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STRATFOR E-Mail #25: RE: INSIGHT - IRAN - Delegation to Gene

theunpromisedone3
Feb 27th, 2012
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  1. RE: INSIGHT - IRAN - Delegation to Geneva - IR2 - one more thought
  2. Email-ID 287965
  3. Date 2009-10-01 17:06:58
  4. To [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]
  5. One other thing -- from a branding perspective if we're serious about
  6. Quality, Status and Mystique I think showing too much of our inner
  7. workings devalues our Mystique. People don't know how we collect our
  8. intelligence and that's one of the cool, mysterious things about STRATFOR.
  9. Seeing raw intelligence come in would be cool for a few weeks but then it
  10. would become another expected product and we lose our mystique a little on
  11. source collection.
  12.  
  13. ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  14.  
  15. From: Meredith Friedman
  16. Sent: Thursday, October 01, 2009 9:55 AM
  17. To: scott stewart; [email protected]; 'Darryl O'Connor'; 'Aaric
  18. Eisenstein'; 'Peter Zeihan'; 'George Friedman';
  19. [email protected]
  20. Cc: 'Grant Perry'; 'Richard Parker'; 'darryl'
  21. Subject: RE: INSIGHT - IRAN - Delegation to Geneva - IR2
  22. Thanks, Stick, for laying this out. I have to say I support your position
  23. on this. As you mentioned yesterday, our sources would be talking to
  24. Reuters or other news organizations if they wanted their ideas published
  25. directly (even as anonymous sources) but they are not - they are talking
  26. to us because they know we protect not only their identity but use what
  27. they say in a careful way in our analysis or as sitreps.
  28.  
  29. On the reverse side, if we blacked out every category of our source
  30. descriptions and coding it would be silly and make people wonder if we
  31. weren't making them up ourselves. We already show a lot of leg by sharing
  32. our internal intelligence guidance with our customers - that is sexy and
  33. something that makes us unique. I agree we would lose some of our best
  34. sources for intelligence if we began publishing what they send us in raw
  35. format no matter how carefully we try to disguise their identity.
  36.  
  37. Meredith
  38.  
  39. ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  40.  
  41. From: scott stewart [mailto:[email protected]]
  42. Sent: Thursday, October 01, 2009 9:43 AM
  43. To: [email protected]; 'Darryl O'Connor'; 'Aaric Eisenstein';
  44. 'Peter Zeihan'; 'George Friedman'; [email protected]
  45. Cc: 'Grant Perry'; 'Richard Parker'; 'darryl'; 'Meredith Friedman'
  46. Subject: RE: INSIGHT - IRAN - Delegation to Geneva - IR2
  47. OK, I have taken 24 hours to relax, calm down and think about this
  48. concept.
  49.  
  50. Here are my thoughts.
  51.  
  52.  
  53. 1) This may be a decent marketing idea, but in my opinion it is a terrible
  54. intelligence idea. In addition to the point I made yesterday about many of
  55. our sources not wanting to be paraded into the spotlight, it is also
  56. important to remember that we have sources in places like Iran, Syria,
  57. China and Russia who could be traced if we allowed that much of their
  58. writings and information to be published in raw form. Allowing an
  59. intelligence service to isolate all the source reporting coming from that
  60. country would be very attractive to them and they would certainly attempt
  61. to determine who we are talking to, and who is talking to us, on a regular
  62. basis.
  63.  
  64. We have an ethical responsible to do our best to protect our people - and
  65. from a purely selfish perspective if one of our people is identified and
  66. then whacked, arrested, or cowed by the authorities into no longer
  67. reporting, we can quickly lose an asset that have taken us years to
  68. develop. This will hurt our publishing operations, and will not be
  69. sustainable in the long run. We need to protect our most valuable -- and
  70. in most cases, our most sensitive -- sources for the future of the
  71. company.
  72.  
  73. 2) We could do something like this with less-sensitive sources who agree
  74. to be published directly, but those less-sensitive sources will lack the
  75. sex appeal that Aaric is looking for and that will make this a rather
  76. bland product offering.
  77.  
  78. 3) Based on 1 and 2, it is my recommendation that we continue to handle
  79. insight as it is. That is, using it to inform our analysis and to make
  80. sure our published work remains very strong, and our CIS customers stay
  81. informed. We can also continue to use critical pieces of insight directly
  82. as the basis for sitreps.
  83.  
  84. I have calmed down from yesterday, but I still feel very strongly that
  85. continuing to handle insight as we do is the best course of action for us
  86. as an intelligence company.
  87.  
  88.  
  89.  
  90.  
  91. ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  92.  
  93. From: George Friedman [mailto:[email protected]]
  94. Sent: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 12:31 PM
  95. To: scott stewart; Darryl O'Connor; 'Aaric Eisenstein'; 'Peter Zeihan';
  96. George Friedman; [email protected]
  97. Cc: 'Grant Perry'; 'Richard Parker'; 'darryl'
  98. Subject: Re: INSIGHT - IRAN - Delegation to Geneva - IR2
  99. We need to sit down and consider this. Sources we can't use are useless.
  100. Promiscuous use of sensitive sources is dangerous. This is an ongoing
  101. dilemma of intelligence. Since we aren't journalists there may be ways to
  102. deal with this. We need a policy. Stick, please put out your thoughts on
  103. this and then we will follow up. In the meantime we fold sensitive
  104. intelligence into analyses or sitreps on a case by case basis.
  105.  
  106. Sent via BlackBerry by AT&T
  107.  
  108. --------------------------------------------------------------------------
  109.  
  110. From: "scott stewart"
  111. Date: Wed, 30 Sep 2009 12:18:26 -0400
  112. To: 'Darryl O'Connor'; 'Aaric
  113. Eisenstein'; 'Peter
  114. Zeihan'; 'George
  115. Friedman';
  116. Subject: RE: INSIGHT - IRAN - Delegation to Geneva - IR2
  117.  
  118. This is what I said to Aaric Monday. We really need to protect our people
  119. and our sources.
  120.  
  121. ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  122.  
  123. From: Darryl O'Connor [mailto:[email protected]]
  124. Sent: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 12:05 PM
  125. To: 'Aaric Eisenstein'; 'scott stewart'; 'Peter Zeihan'; 'George
  126. Friedman'; [email protected]
  127. Cc: 'Grant Perry'; 'Richard Parker'; 'darryl'
  128. Subject: RE: INSIGHT - IRAN - Delegation to Geneva - IR2
  129. my concern:
  130.  
  131. does the source have website access? let's assume so. would they
  132. have the piss scared out of them to see their own words on our website?
  133. enough piss scared out of them to not want to be a source anymore?
  134.  
  135. this is not really my area and not trying to horn in on someone else's
  136. territory, but i thought it wouldn't hurt to ask the question.
  137.  
  138. over and out.
  139.  
  140.  
  141. ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  142.  
  143. From: Aaric Eisenstein [mailto:[email protected]]
  144. Sent: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 10:55 AM
  145. To: 'scott stewart'; 'Peter Zeihan'; 'George Friedman';
  146. [email protected]
  147. Cc: 'Grant Perry'; 'Richard Parker'; 'darryl'
  148. Subject: FW: INSIGHT - IRAN - Delegation to Geneva - IR2
  149. Can we publish the Insight below - redacted on source of course - as a
  150. test of the "raw" format as opposed to putting it into an article? It'll
  151. be interesting to see what kind of feedback we get on the new format.
  152. This Insight as good flavor in its raw form.
  153.  
  154. Aaric S. Eisenstein
  155. Chief Innovation Officer
  156. STRATFOR
  157. 512-744-4308
  158. 512-744-4334 fax
  159. [email protected]
  160. Follow us on http://Twitter.com/stratfor
  161.  
  162.  
  163. ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  164.  
  165. From: Peter Zeihan [mailto:[email protected]]
  166. Sent: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 10:51 AM
  167. To: Aaron Colvin
  168. Cc: Secure List
  169. Subject: Re: INSIGHT - IRAN - Delegation to Geneva - IR2
  170. interesting -- they've put in a clod because they don't think he's smart
  171. enough to do anything
  172.  
  173. would hate to be the clod
  174.  
  175. clods are disposable
  176.  
  177. Aaron Colvin wrote:
  178.  
  179. SOURCE CODE: IR2
  180.  
  181. PUBLICATION: Not Applicable
  182.  
  183. SOURCE DESCRIPTION: Tehran-based freelance journalist/analyst who is
  184. well plugged into the system
  185.  
  186. ATTRIBUTION: Not Applicable
  187.  
  188. SOURCE RELIABILITY: B
  189.  
  190. ITEM CREDIBILITY: 2
  191.  
  192. SPECIAL HANDLING: Not Applicable
  193.  
  194. DISTRIBUTION: Secure
  195.  
  196. SOURCE HANDLER: Kamran
  197.  
  198. I think the composition is very interesting. Jalili is no seasoned
  199. diplomat but he is someone both SL and Sepah could trust since his lower
  200. intellectual and political stature makes it less likely that he shows
  201. any independent streaks on tactical matters-- as someone like Larijani
  202. could have. The other two are career diplomats-technocrats with
  203. extensive knowledge of their respective fields. Jalili needs them for
  204. advice on legal niceties and for general political considerations. The
  205. third negotiator's presence is in indeed interesting. As you have
  206. noted, the presence of someone from the Minstry of Economic Affairs
  207. serves to show Iran's seriouness in the talks. But it is just for the
  208. show as Iran knows that the talks will fail.
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