Ken Robinson
Terrorism and national security analyst

The United States government conducted the “mother of all” Secure Video Teleconferences (SVTC) on Thursday night regarding the piracy hostage crisis off the coast of Somalia.

What’s the difference between this week’s seized vessel and any other over the past year?

A big one!

The pirates over-reached, and took as “U.S. flagged vessel” (MV Alabama), triggering a challenge of doctrine as old as the republic, Freedom of Navigation.

The Pirates also didn’t count on the crew being populated by very angry, determined ex-Marines, who fought back, and quickly retook their ship.

Currently the problem is one of the laws of the sea, and the laws of nature.

Three of the pirates made off in a life vessel, intended for deep water, not the shallow and treacherous waters of the Somali coast. The boat is currently out of fuel, and drifting. A quick glance at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) web site will tell you that the boat won’t make it to shore, where according to my sources, no one wants the problems of an American hostage, anyway.

It is listing, heading north.

Some entrepreneur pirate friends are reported to be attempting a link up at sea, with a previously captured German vessel. The thinking being, bring the life boat pirates on the larger vessel, and create a bigger international problem, for all concerned.

What is all this dramas about? Money. Somalia is a failed state. Its waters are predatorily. International shipping has regarded the piracy, and the ransom they demand as part of the cost of doing business, much like our own country did, under President Thomas Jefferson.

Until one day, enough was enough. Jefferson commissioned new Navel ships, armed them, and sent them half way around the earth to crush the Barbary pirates.

The Navy and Marine Corps did its job, and our maritime doctrine of freedom of navigation was clear to the world.

Now, the USS Bainbridge (DDG-96), a guided-missile destroyer, is on station, watching the lifeboat, while a Navy P-3 Orion maritime surveillance aircraft fly’s, and listens, from above.

An entire host of counter-terrorism units including elite U.S. Navy Seals, wait for their orders.

The issue is larger than the rescue of an American citizen. It’s a policy decision, on how to deal with a failed state that humbled the US previously (Black Hawk Down), and uncooperative International shipping owners, and their Insurance providers, who refuse on-board security, because of the price jump in annual premiums.

To date, the pirates have not killed hostages, and have returned vessels, once ransoms are paid.

I am told that these pirates had modified their demand to simply a safe passage home. The U.S., will likely provide humanitarian relief (water, food, medical supplies), but don’t expect any fuel.

Keep in mind; there is a difference between having the capability to launch a rescue, and it being prudent to do so. Sometimes the treatment can be worse than the cure. An invasion of Puntland (where the pirates have safe haven) is unthinkable.

Counter-terror professionals are involved, lives are at stake, and our national patients is required, while a new administrations deals simultaneously with a crisis, and a policy decision whose implications, like Jefferson’s may ripple well into the next hundred years.

Ken Robinson is a terrorism and national security analyst who has conducted intelligence operations in Somalia and other parts of the world.

Programming note: Anderson Cooper will be reporting live from the U.S./Mexico Border with an up-close look at drug-trade violence, kidnappings and HOW this violence is threatening the U.S. Watch The War Next Door Wednesday and Thursday night at 10p ET.

Ken Robinson | BIO
Former Special Operations and Intelligence Officer

I lived in Colombia for three years, chasing the Pablo Escobar and lessor know drug cartel leaders. What I learned:

Law of unintended consequences is always in play.

- When you capture or kill a drug lord, you create a vacuum, and typically a civil war, for new leadership, because so much money is involved.

Devil you know vs. devil you don't.

- Makes it harder to defeat the new organization, as you often start at the bottom, all over again. The decision to capture or kill the leadership, is also the decision to poke your own eyes out, for a considerable time, while a new bad guy, sets up shop.

Also, we will never defeat drug lords, until we curb our own DEMAND. We in the U.S. - our CONSUMPTION - drives the drug lords' production.

Many of these drug lords have power, money, technology, and weapons as good as or better than many NATIONS.

I learned while in Pakistan of a novel program in Iran, very successful, to get their poppy growers to crop substitute and transition to pistachio nuts.

The significance of this is important for Afghanistan, where heroin now supplies 80 percent of the global demand.

The problem is: We don't talk to Iran, and won't let a delegation from Iran interact with poppy growers.

Instead, their product comes in to the U.S. via - say it with me, now - Mexico.

Life is like a Seinfeld episode - everything is related to everything else.

Ken Robinson | BIO
Former Special Operations and Intelligence Officer

The new perceived “crisis” in the stimulus initiative is the claim that there is no way to prioritize projects to get the greatest value from taxpayer dollars.

It’s true that not every “shovel ready” project merits funding. When prioritizing stimulus resources, the hard part is explaining the value of projects beyond how many jobs they create for one or two years.

But this is a manufactured crisis. A unique category of business software already is proving it wrong. The overall category is called “Decision Support Software.” I was using this software ten years ago, for the Special Operations, and Intelligence community. This methodology has successfully allocated tens of billions dollars for DOD, and special programs. But, most important, it left an audit trail, on how the decisions were made, and where the money went. Allowing for a measure of its effectiveness, and insuring due diligence and accountability!

Today, this same decision support software is undergoing innovation for federal stimulus-related decision-making, in organizations ranging from the AMTRAK to the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority.

The reason stimulus project prioritization is complicated is that each project has numerous stakeholders. Each stakeholder has his or her own opinion of why the project is important – how it serves the government, how it serves the taxpayers, and how it can help the company. Weighing these interests is like comparing apples and oranges.

This software smokes out all those agendas, and fixes responsibility, and allows users to see, simply and graphically, how an agency’s money should be spent to best meet those needs.

That same software gives agencies easy-to-understand reporting that they can use to justify their decisions that will pass muster with the stimulus oversight responsibilities that President Obama has given to his Vice President (as the Sheriff of the stimulus).

You’ll find that decision support software companies will not be shy in talking about why stimulus prioritization is a complicated but not unsolvable problem.

This is no longer an American issue, it’s a global economy issue, it requires a process that can defend against earmarks, and actually show the world what the government’s short term goals are (jobs, and economic stimulus), and where the long-term value will be derived.

But, most important, we all deserve to know “where our money is being spent!”

Editor’s note: Ken Robinson is now working as a writer and executive producer in Hollywood.

President Obama on Thursday signs several orders, one of which dealt with interrogating terror suspects.

Ken Robinson | BIO
Former Special Operations and Intelligence Officer

"In war, truth is the first casualty." Aeschylus said it 2500 years ago. Yet we are rediscovering this lesson all over again in the debate over torture.

Yesterday, President Obama signed an executive order unequivocally stating that the United States will not condone torture of any human being.

Period.

For years, there will be partisan arguments on both sides of this opposition to torture, some claiming it is Pollyannaish and giving up the only effective tool we have at our disposal.

But people on both sides seem to have forgotten a key detail – the truth.

And the truth is - torture doesn't work.

Last June, 15 former interrogators and intelligence officials (including me) met in Washington, DC to confront the Bush Administration with a truth we've learned from more than 350 years of experience between us - that torture is not only against international law, it is simply "ineffective and counterproductive."

We released a set of findings including this: "The use of torture and other inhumane and abusive treatment results in false and misleading information, loss of critical intelligence, and has caused serious damage to the reputation and standing of the United States. The use of such techniques also facilitates enemy recruitment, misdirects or wastes scarce resources, and deprives the United States of the standing to demand humane treatment of captured Americans."

"There must be a single well-defined standard of conduct across all U.S. agencies to govern the detention and interrogation of people anywhere in U.S. custody, consistent with our values as a nation," we wrote.

"There is no conflict between adhering to our nation's essential values, including respect for inherent human dignity, and our ability to obtain the information we need to protect the nation."

We shared this expertise - learned the hard way, in the field - with Presidential campaign advisors and members of Congress. But our efforts were drowned out by heavy partisanship, from otherwise good men who were unwilling to listen to reason - or to experience.

Today, it's a new day. Besides the unquestionable fact that torture does not provide reliable intelligence, it has been rejected because it is not who we are as a people.

Yet many remain unconvinced. If you are among them, please consider this: from a purely intelligence perspective – we must understand that interrogations have only one purpose, to illicit "accurate information," which when analyzed and processed becomes "intelligence."

Intelligence is an art, not a science, and will never be a policy panacea, a cure-all for the threats against us.

The most important use of the Presidents Daily (intelligence) Brief is to inform, and enable a presidential executive decision. That decision is often made in the face of a ticking clock, and the fog of uncertainty. That's why the primacy of intelligence ceases at the oval office door, and judgment must prevail.

There will never be perfect intelligence, but there may be perfect decisions. And when there are imperfect decisions, they will likely be traced back to "imperfect intelligence."

Do you really want the President of the United States making strategic decisions, impacting millions of people, based on a tortured person saying anything - and everything "just to make the pain stop?"

In Roman mythology, Veritas (truth) was the goddess, who hid deep in the bottom of a holy well because she was so elusive.

We've learned through recent American history just how elusive the truth can be. But there is no question that when a nation selects torture as its shield, it sets the conditions for never finding the truth, and potentially even burying it.

Today, the nation stepped back, onto the right side of history.

Editor’s note: Ken Robinson is now working as a writer and executive producer in Hollywood. Check out the 14-minute film he worked on in association with Human Rights First called "Primetime Torture." It explores the way torture and interrogation are portrayed on TV.

Ken Robinson
AC360° Contributor

It's very unfortunate, but it looks like the resources in Washington, DC are going to be focused on politics, over and above solving the financial crisis, terrorism, or something minor, like our national security. During these dangerous times, this generation is really faced with a choice. At a minimum, we should all demand that our elected officials get to work on the nation's business. It's only our future that's at stake.

Dante said it best. "The darkest places in hell are reserved for those who maintain their neutrality in times of moral crisis."

For more, check out this article.

Ken Robinson | BIO
Former Special Operations and Intelligence officer

I am writing in response to David Gewirtz and his Open letter to President-elect Barack Obama on the White House email controversy. Mr. Gewirtz makes the argument that the computers located in the White House - including the Executive Office of the President, the West Wing, and the Eisenhower Executive Office Building - should be treated as a crime scene.

At first glance, the casual reader might consider this a laughable suggestion. I submit that this idea has merit. It may be the only unbiased opportunity that Americans will have to discover what people knew, and when they knew it, and what people said, and when they said it, regarding the divergence from International and Federal Law by the Bush Administration.

I have been involved in the business of intelligence and forensic auditing of computers during several tragic events in history. The first was attempting to discover who had directed and financed the massacre of 8,000 Bosniaks (Bosnian Muslims) at Srebrenica in July 1995.

Another example was my involvement in the forensic examination of millions of classified government files generated by President Clinton's Presidential Advisory Committee on Gulf War Illnesses (PAC).

Both these cases involved an enormous effort on the part of many men and women with on singular pursuit. Truth.

As awful as the prospects of this effort may be, finding out "the truth" is more important than the pain of discovery. It will bring Americans closer to the new beginning the Obama administration has promised.

I hope they are listening.

Editor's note: Ken Robinson is now working as a writer and executive producer in Hollywood.

A commando in disguise give details of what went down in the Taj hotel when commandos went in.

Ken Robinson
Security analyst & former military intelligence officer

Many reports from Mumbai cite gunfire and "grenade" explosions coming from the 5-Star Taj Mahal hotel, the scene of previous terrorist attacks.

It is very possible the gunfire and explosions are actually "room clearing" tactics used by Counter Terrorism forces as they clear rooms.

The tactic of choice is to use what's known as a Flash Bang Simulator, which creates a loud, explosive shock wave, enabling the CT forces to enter a room dynamically, gain a tactical advantage, and overwhelm anyone barracaded inside.