Friday Finale & This Time Last Year Yesterday
FROM THE DESK OF CLEARANCEJOBS.COM
Identity theft and bankruptcy. Contributor and in-house counsel Sean Bigley advises, “Regardless of who files the fraudulent bankruptcy, it usually doesn’t take more than a few months for the bankruptcy to be dismissed by the federal court – often after the thief fails to show up for a mandatory meeting with creditors. But the damage is already done to the unwitting victim: the bankruptcy is now a public record that appears on the victim’s credit report.”
Follow-up follow through. Editor Lindy Kyzer offers, “If you completely flubbed a question, it’s probably best to not bring it up. No recruiter is going to be fooled if you completely stumbled over a question about a technical program, but then magically have the correct answer in the email you send the next day. . . . But if you feel that you didn’t have time to address a specific topic or issue in the interview, then it’s definitely okay to mention it (succinctly) it in the follow-up email. It’s also okay to follow-up with a question you forgot to ask in the interview. If you’re not sure when they’ll be making a hiring decision, ask it in the follow-up.”
THE FORCE AND THE FIGHT
ISIS unfazed. AP’s Ken Dilanian, Zeina Karam, and Bassem Mroue report, “After billions of dollars spent and more than 10,000 extremist fighters killed, the Islamic State group is fundamentally no weaker than it was when the U.S.-led bombing campaign began a year ago, American intelligence agencies have concluded. The military campaign has prevented Iraq’s collapse and put the Islamic State under increasing pressure in northern Syria, particularly squeezing its self-proclaimed capital in Raqqa. But intelligence analysts see the overall situation as a strategic stalemate: The Islamic State remains a well-funded extremist army able to replenish its ranks with foreign jihadis as quickly as the U.S. can eliminate them.”
Saudis seek Patriots. Defense One’s Marcus Weisgerber reports, “Just two weeks after Western nations and Tehran struck a deal to limit Iran’s nuclear program, the Pentagon says Saudi Arabia wants to buy 600 new Patriot missile interceptors. The $5 billion-plus purchase is likely just the first of many more as America’s Middle Eastern allies arm themselves in response to the nuclear deal, which would lift Iran’s conventional-arms embargo sanctions in five years and sanctions on long-range missile projects in eight. ‘We saw this coming’ . . . .” See also, “Saudi Arabia Requests $5.4 Billion Worth of PAC-3 Missiles.”
Mysterious Mullah Omar. Afghan Zariza’s Syed Zafar Mehdi reports, “Mullah Omar, who was born in 1960 in Chah-i-Himmat village of Khakrez district in southern Kandahar province, remained a mysterious figure. He refused to meet anyone outside his close inner circle. After the death of his father in 1965, he shifted along with his family from Kandahar to Deh-Rawud district of southern Uruzgan province. He belonged to ‘Tomzi’ clan of ‘Hotak’ tribe which constitutes a large chunk of Pashtun population in southern provinces of Afghanistan. According to his biography published by the Taliban in April to mark the 19th anniversary of the ‘historical gathering’ in which he was declared the leader of Taliban in Afghanistan, Mullah Omar joined armed rebellion following the bloody coup engineered by communists in late 1970s.”
CONTRACT WATCH
Defense’s top 100. Defense News’ Andrew Clevenger reports, “Lagging defense spending and the large-scale drawdown of US troops in the Middle East spelled another year of decreased revenues for defense contractors. But industry has largely avoided the dramatic upheavals of previous industrial downturns, with mergers and acquisitions being driven more by opportunistic business decisions than panic over a dwindling pot of money.” See the full ranking.
Raytheon gets Sea-Based Joint Precision Approach and Landing System (JPALS) sole source. Military Aerospace & Electronics Editor John Keller reports, “Sea-Based JPALS is an all-weather, all-mission GPS-based landing system that provides landing guidance for carrier-based fixed-wing aircraft and helicopters, and features anti-jam protection for operating in electronic warfare (EW) environments. The EMD contract for Sea-Based JPALS will run from 2016 to 2022, and will include the design, development, manufacture, integration, demonstration, and test of the Sea-Based JPALS system. The contract will also include 13 engineering development model units and other weapons replaceable assemblies, developmental test and operational test support, and a technical data package.”
TECH, PRIVACY, & SECRECY
National Strategic Computing Initiative. Wired’s Klint Finley reports, “President Barak Obama has signed an executive order authorizing the creation of new supercomputing research initiative called the National Strategic Computing Initiative, or NSCI. Its goal: pave the way for the first exaflop supercomputer—something that’s about 30 times faster than today’s fastest machines. . . . The new initiative will bring together scientists and government agencies such as the Department of Energy, Department of Defense and the National Science Foundation to create a common agenda for pushing the field forward.”
Hacking infrastructure. Defense One’s Patrick Tucker reports, “U.S. Cyber Command officials say this is the threat that most deeply concerns them, according to a recent Government Accountability Office report. ‘This is because a cyber-physical incident could result in a loss of utility service or the catastrophic destruction of utility infrastructure, such as an explosion,’ the report said. The most famous such attack is the 2010 Stuxnet worm, which damaged centrifuges at Iran’s Natanz nuclear enrichment plant. (It’s never been positively attributed to anyone, but common suspicion holds that it was the United States, possibly with Israel.)”
Social media’s social obligations. FierceGovernmentIT’s Dibya Sarkar reports, “Former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said social media companies may have a social obligation to suppress videos of beheadings by terrorist groups and report information to law enforcement that a user might commit a violent act, but he said he was ‘nervous’ about imposing any legal duty or regulatory mechanism on companies to take such actions.”
Hi-tech hijacks. Wired’s Kim Zetter reports, “Vulnerabilities in asset-tracking systems made by Globalstar and its subsidiaries would allow a hijacker to track valuable and sensitive cargo—such as electronics, gas and volatile chemicals, military supplies or possibly even nuclear materials—disable the location-tracking device used to monitor it, then spoof the coordinates to make it appear as if a hijacked shipment was still traveling its intended route. Or a hacker who just wanted to cause chaos and confusion could feed false coordinates to companies and militaries monitoring their assets and shipments to make them think they’d been hijacked . . . .”
POTOMAC TWO-STEP
Crazy Ivan. “Adm. John Richardson sailed through his Senate confirmation hearing this morning. But two ominous issues breached the surface, hinting at growing conflict between the administration and Hill Republicans over how to handle China. Richardson, an experienced submariner nominated for Chief of Naval Operations, deftly dodged the difficult questions from Senate Armed Services Committee: Does US-China cooperation on nuclear reactors help their military? Should the US challenge China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea? But as both Beijing and Capitol Hill step up the pressure, he may not be able to dodge for long. ‘Admiral, is China an adversary?’”
The weight. “In recent days, President Obama, Vice President Biden and other top officials have made a number of outreaches to persuade Democrats — especially in the House — to back the agreement, amid signs that the crucial bloc may be splintering. . . . ‘As big of a bully pulpit as I have, it’s not enough,’ the president told his supporters. ‘I can’t carry it by myself.’ . . . As the days tick by until a September vote on the Iran deal, the White House is making clear that it will pull out all the stops to ensure that the agreement — a top priority Obama wants for his legacy — isn’t undone by members of his own party.”
OPINIONS EVERYONE HAS
“Why the Naysayers Are Wrong About the Iran Deal.” New York Times contributor Nicholas Kristof argues, “Diplomacy is rarely about optimal outcomes; it is about muddling along in the dark, dodging bullets, struggling to defer war and catastrophe for the time being, nurturing opportunities for a better tomorrow. By that standard, the Iran deal succeeds. Sure, it is flawed, and yes, it makes us safer.” See also, “Iran nuclear agreement: Is a ‘better deal’ possible – and at what cost?”
“Why the West may miss the Taliban’s Mullah Omar.” Reuters contributor David Rhode argues, “As odd as it may seem to some Americans, Omar’s death could not come at a worse time. Omar’s brutality was medieval. But for more than a decade, he served as the unifying force of the Taliban.” See also, “The Taliban confirms Mullah Omar is dead.”
