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I agree with the general direction of your argument, but wholeheartedly disagree that this doesn't constitute "planning", and find your de-emphasis of 'using th

I agree with the general direction of your argument, but wholeheartedly disagree that this doesn't constitute "planning", and find your de-emphasis of 'using the aircraft in a covert operation to attack the US', disconcerting.

1001101 9y ago
My application of Occam's razor agrees with you.
megaman22 9y ago
The Defense Department has war plans for a thousand and one eventualities. That is their job.
- fapjacks 9y ago
  Indeed. Even SOPs for a zombie apocalypse. Now, before you downvote, I'm being totally serious, even if the SOPs aren't.
  - thephyber 9y ago
    A potential Zombie Apocalypse is not a bad thing to plan for. Sure, a disease outbreak might not turn people into the exact kind of zombie planned (there are as many zombie "rulesets" in movies as there are time travel "rulesets"), but it's an exercise which probably doesn't veer far from an actual worst-case scenario of disease outbreak. Remember that the Spanish Flu outbreak killed 3%-5% of the world population in 3 years[1]. It's not even a bad thing for the CDC to plan for[2]. I have a conservative cousin who is in the Marine reserves and is an FBI special agent. He complained to no end that the CDC was "wasting" our taxpayer dollars on the zombie outbreak preparedness marketing campaign. But he also failed to see that as a marketing campaign, it went viral because of unassuming hosts like him (very meta) and, ironically, it was an extremely efficient use of taxpayer dollars. A false flag attack which attacks US or allied property is just a justification to lie to the American voter and to co-opt American tax dollars. If anything, the author who suggested it for such a purpose is part of the Pentagon "swamp" (in Trump terminology) and is part of the reason the US is currently waning in power (soft, hard, economic, etc). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic [2] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/05/why-did-the-cdc-develop-a-plan-for-a-zombie-apocalypse/239246/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/05/why-did...
    - dragonwriter 9y ago
      The CDC may use zombie apocalypse as a lighthearted framework for training (and, even more, public preparedness) for a generic disease outbreak, but with the military, if they actually use it at all, I expect it is more as an emotionally convenient framework for preparing for the potentiality of widespread domestic counterinsurgency. > A false flag attack which attacks US or allied property is just a justification to lie to the American voter and to co-opt American tax dollars. If anything, the author who suggested it for such a purpose The false flag use wasn't a prominent suggestion, and the highlighted false flag uses started with a false flag attack on a Soviet-allied threat. Elevating a secondary variation of what is itself one of many possible uses for acquired MiGs as if it was a standalone or primary justification for the exercise is dishonest.
      - thephyber 9y ago
        > as an emotionally convenient framework for preparing for the potentiality of widespread domestic counterinsurgency I haven't read the specific docs, so I don't have a frame of reference. Seems like perfectly valid reasoning. > Elevating a secondary variation ... Fair enough
        fapjacks 9y ago
        Just to be clear, the other guy has no idea what he's talking about and is some kind of wacko conspiracy theorist.
      - fapjacks 9y ago
        You have no idea what you are talking about. I think you are talking about the "zombie riot" civic emergency drills conducted in recent years, but I'm talking about specifically something my army unit did (develop SOPs for a zombie apocalypse) as coordination training. Additionally, you should know that you are a conspiracy theorist and completely out of touch with reality if you think that regular US army units will fire on American citizens in some kind of "widespread domestic counterinsurgency". You truly have no idea what you're talking about.
- thowaway1110 9y ago
  Attacking allies with faked Soviet jets to justify military action against the Russians is considered contingency planning?
solatic 9y ago
There's a big ethical difference between "we wrote some generic plans for what now seems to be unethical but who knows how it could be interpreted in the future when decision makers ask for plans and expect something well-researched and not half-cocked, and it's better to be prepared than unprepared" and "decision makers actually decided that they want to do something unethical so they asked for the plans so that they could actually plan some real, unethical operation, and only because of some unforeseen reason did they cancel their unethical plans, and we journalists are reporting today on their unethical intentions." Both are plans. Devising hypothetical plans is not unethical even if the plans as executed wouldn't be ethical.
- thephyber 9y ago
  > Devising hypothetical plans is not unethical even if the plans as executed wouldn't be ethical. I'm torn. This seems like a stretch. Sure, it's possible that the writer here was just stating facts. But if they wrote it as a suggestion for some power-hungry General to "burn the ships"[1] similar to the Russian general in "The Sum of All Fears", then it's certainly unethical. If they did it just to provide options to the rest of the Pentagon in case some rogue general did this, then it's likely neutrally-ethical. There are ethics involved in simply planning a menu of options. What options are on the menu? How are the options ordered? What options are left off? People react based on the options presented to them and in what order they are presented. [1] http://travisrobertson.com/leadership/burn-ships-succeed-die/ http://travisrobertson.com/leadership/burn-ships-succeed-die...
  - solatic 9y ago
    I'm not arguing that devising these plans is ethical. Recall Kranzberg's First Law of Technology: that technology is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral. Rather that the existence of the plans and the decision to develop them cannot be judged on an ethical basis.
LeifCarrotson 9y ago
Sorry, I was trying to emphasize that part in the middle of a quote, and only had italics to work with. I am accustomed to that syntax meaning that there was emphasis in the quoted section. And regarding the definition of the word "planning", I think there is a useful distinction between intent to do a thing and consideration of the possibility. It is useful to consider what could happen if I (or my successor, or someone with my credentials) went rogue and tried to use my company's data to destroy it or cause harm. I agree that the CIA's morals may not be so altruistic as my own, but this memo is step 2 of a 10-step process to initiating a false flag op, not step 10.

1001101 9y ago

My application of Occam's razor agrees with you.

megaman22 9y ago

The Defense Department has war plans for a thousand and one eventualities. That is their job.

fapjacks 9y ago
Indeed. Even SOPs for a zombie apocalypse. Now, before you downvote, I'm being totally serious, even if the SOPs aren't.
- thephyber 9y ago
  A potential Zombie Apocalypse is not a bad thing to plan for. Sure, a disease outbreak might not turn people into the exact kind of zombie planned (there are as many zombie "rulesets" in movies as there are time travel "rulesets"), but it's an exercise which probably doesn't veer far from an actual worst-case scenario of disease outbreak. Remember that the Spanish Flu outbreak killed 3%-5% of the world population in 3 years[1]. It's not even a bad thing for the CDC to plan for[2]. I have a conservative cousin who is in the Marine reserves and is an FBI special agent. He complained to no end that the CDC was "wasting" our taxpayer dollars on the zombie outbreak preparedness marketing campaign. But he also failed to see that as a marketing campaign, it went viral because of unassuming hosts like him (very meta) and, ironically, it was an extremely efficient use of taxpayer dollars. A false flag attack which attacks US or allied property is just a justification to lie to the American voter and to co-opt American tax dollars. If anything, the author who suggested it for such a purpose is part of the Pentagon "swamp" (in Trump terminology) and is part of the reason the US is currently waning in power (soft, hard, economic, etc). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1918_flu_pandemic [2] https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/05/why-did-the-cdc-develop-a-plan-for-a-zombie-apocalypse/239246/ https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2011/05/why-did...
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    The CDC may use zombie apocalypse as a lighthearted framework for training (and, even more, public preparedness) for a generic disease outbreak, but with the military, if they actually use it at all, I expect it is more as an emotionally convenient framework for preparing for the potentiality of widespread domestic counterinsurgency. > A false flag attack which attacks US or allied property is just a justification to lie to the American voter and to co-opt American tax dollars. If anything, the author who suggested it for such a purpose The false flag use wasn't a prominent suggestion, and the highlighted false flag uses started with a false flag attack on a Soviet-allied threat. Elevating a secondary variation of what is itself one of many possible uses for acquired MiGs as if it was a standalone or primary justification for the exercise is dishonest.
    - thephyber 9y ago
      > as an emotionally convenient framework for preparing for the potentiality of widespread domestic counterinsurgency I haven't read the specific docs, so I don't have a frame of reference. Seems like perfectly valid reasoning. > Elevating a secondary variation ... Fair enough
      - fapjacks 9y ago
        Just to be clear, the other guy has no idea what he's talking about and is some kind of wacko conspiracy theorist.
    - fapjacks 9y ago
      You have no idea what you are talking about. I think you are talking about the "zombie riot" civic emergency drills conducted in recent years, but I'm talking about specifically something my army unit did (develop SOPs for a zombie apocalypse) as coordination training. Additionally, you should know that you are a conspiracy theorist and completely out of touch with reality if you think that regular US army units will fire on American citizens in some kind of "widespread domestic counterinsurgency". You truly have no idea what you're talking about.
thowaway1110 9y ago
Attacking allies with faked Soviet jets to justify military action against the Russians is considered contingency planning?

solatic 9y ago

There's a big ethical difference between "we wrote some generic plans for what now seems to be unethical but who knows how it could be interpreted in the future when decision makers ask for plans and expect something well-researched and not half-cocked, and it's better to be prepared than unprepared" and "decision makers actually decided that they want to do something unethical so they asked for the plans so that they could actually plan some real, unethical operation, and only because of some unforeseen reason did they cancel their unethical plans, and we journalists are reporting today on their unethical intentions." Both are plans. Devising hypothetical plans is not unethical even if the plans as executed wouldn't be ethical.

thephyber 9y ago
> Devising hypothetical plans is not unethical even if the plans as executed wouldn't be ethical. I'm torn. This seems like a stretch. Sure, it's possible that the writer here was just stating facts. But if they wrote it as a suggestion for some power-hungry General to "burn the ships"[1] similar to the Russian general in "The Sum of All Fears", then it's certainly unethical. If they did it just to provide options to the rest of the Pentagon in case some rogue general did this, then it's likely neutrally-ethical. There are ethics involved in simply planning a menu of options. What options are on the menu? How are the options ordered? What options are left off? People react based on the options presented to them and in what order they are presented. [1] http://travisrobertson.com/leadership/burn-ships-succeed-die/ http://travisrobertson.com/leadership/burn-ships-succeed-die...
- solatic 9y ago
  I'm not arguing that devising these plans is ethical. Recall Kranzberg's First Law of Technology: that technology is neither good nor bad; nor is it neutral. Rather that the existence of the plans and the decision to develop them cannot be judged on an ethical basis.

LeifCarrotson 9y ago

Sorry, I was trying to emphasize that part in the middle of a quote, and only had italics to work with. I am accustomed to that syntax meaning that there was emphasis in the quoted section. And regarding the definition of the word "planning", I think there is a useful distinction between intent to do a thing and consideration of the possibility. It is useful to consider what could happen if I (or my successor, or someone with my credentials) went rogue and tried to use my company's data to destroy it or cause harm. I agree that the CIA's morals may not be so altruistic as my own, but this memo is step 2 of a 10-step process to initiating a false flag op, not step 10.