The TALON team: Real American Heroes?

In May of 2003, Paul Wolfowitz of the Defense Department created a special group within the top-secret group Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA). The special group was a "force-protection" outfit known as TALON (short for Threat and Local Observation Notice) and their job was to collect information about terrorist threats on American soil and to assist in the Pentagon's terrorist threat warning process.

One of the first major breakthroughs that TALON made was information that it collected on a group of about 10 peace activists who put on a bit of spontaneous street theatre, giving out peanut butter-and-jelly sandwiches to employees of Haliburton outside the corporation's Houston headquarters. They were trying to call attention to the growing scandal of Haliburton overcharging the US military for food service in Iraq.

The second victory for the daring and courageous TALON was their busting wide open the well-known terrorist group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals. They followed that up with an infiltration of a cell of the worldwide terrorist organization Greenpeace. Both PETA and Greenpeace, it was learned, had been organizing peaceful protests against corporations involved in either mistreatment of animals or destruction of the environment. But TALON wasn't fooled by these peaceful protests. It was the work of TALON that led to the report filed by Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez last week stating that the number ONE domestic terror threat was from ecoterrorists, although they haven't really gotten around to killing anyone yet.

I mentioned eralier that both TALON and CIFA are "force protection" units. This means that their job is making sure that terrorists don't attack military installations or personnel. So what are they doing, you may ask, acting as security for some of the largest, best-connected corporations in America? The answer to this question cuts to the very heart of the War on Terrorism.

We know that there are people in this world who want to kill Americans. Some of them are in Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, North Korea, Indonesia, Pakistan, Africa. But for some reason, the "War on Terror" has focused only on the parts of the world that have 90% of the world's remaining oil. Besides being a contractor that provides everything from cafeteria services to security for Army Generals travelling overseas (can you imagine that the Army needs to hire security?), Haliburton is the world's number ONE company for providing infrastructure to the oil industry. Oh, the companies that PETA and Greenpeace were protesting against when they came into the crosshairs of the brave men of TALON? ExxonMobil and Shell Oil.

Last month, NBC News got its hands on a 400 page report on Talon's surveillance efforts. That report described how TALON kept tabs on nearly 50 antiwar protests, including a meeting of about 20 Quakers in Florida and a demonstration held by Students Against the War on the University of California's campus. No indications that any violent or subversive activity took place were given in the TALON report. The most extreme act described in the report was the burning of an effigy of George W. Bush. Another group described as presenting a "national threat" turned out to be about 15 protestors waving a giant "Bush Lied" banner in front of an Army recruitment office.

An interesting part of the TALON report dealt with the secret organization's efforts to glean information on terrorists from the World Wide Web. It was here that it was first learned that efforts were being made to get the records of searches made by people searching the web with tools such as Google, MSN or Yahoo. Special attention was paid to online forums which had discussions of terrorist or political issues (say "cheese", ATS!).

TALON has a motto (don't they all). It is:
"Counterintelligence 'to the Edge'"
It appears that the "Edge" to which they referred is the boundary of the right to speak, to assemble, to think.



God Bless America.

Thank God for these brave and intrepid souls, protecting the American public from the nefarious plots of Quakers and hippies. Why just the other day I caught a couple of Quakers trying to suicide-bomb the local GOP (Gods Own Party) office.

While weaklings and cowards may think that going after the actual terrorists is the way to win this fight, those of us who place our trust in God and his right hand on Earth, George Bush, know that the only way to defeat the menace of terrorists is to destroy our democracy before they do. The freedom to dissent brings only weakness and doubt, and saps our resolve. Those who oppose Bush and our holy Crusade in Iraq are the real enemies, and these traitors must be stopped at all costs.

(do I really need to put this in sarcasm tags?)


[edit on 1/22/06 by xmotex]

Talk about Nazi'sm and Facism all the way, Greenpeace as terrorists? Jeez the govt. is scared of its own shadow. That group is not couragous at all, its a freaking death trap for those who do not unquestioningly support the govt. So much for land of the free.
How about a link to the info you got this from?

[edit on 22-1-2006 by Vekar]

although not a terrorist group, PETA scares the hel out of me. those people are just....odd.

anywho. i watched a program on the history channel the other day that is quite similar to the topic. the FBI kept tabs on john lenon, and staked out various concerts in hopes of cathing everything from commies to terrorists! i was truly shocked by this at first, then realization smil;ed upon me and i remembered the US Gov is absolutely paranoid. then i wondered. when i was at the green day concert in Giants Stadium, were they watching the Bush BAshers there also? And filing them under "national security threat"?

Originally posted by vuoto
I mentioned eralier that both TALON and CIFA are "force protection" units. This means that their job is making sure that terrorists don't attack military installations or personnel. So what are they doing, you may ask, acting as security for some of the largest, best-connected corporations in America? The answer to this question cuts to the very heart of the War on Terrorism.

Maybe you havent informed the members what their job really is.

www.dtic.mil...

The mission of the DoD CIFA is to develop and manage
DoD Counterintelligence (CI) programs and functions
that support the protection of the Department, including
CI support to protect DoD personnel, resources, critical
information, research and development programs, technology,
critical infrastructure, economic security, and U.S.
interests, against foreign influence and manipulation,
as well as to detect and neutralize espionage against
the Department.

Even people like ecoterrorists would probably threaten to destroy military installations because they are killing the animal habitats, polluting, etc. As well as attacking corporations linked to it.



[edit on 24-1-2006 by deltaboy]