Favorite Two decades ago, Shahawar Matin Siraj started to feel uneasy about a plan to bomb a subway station in Manhattan. Osama Eldawoody, a New York City Police Department informant recruited after 9/11, had established himself as a father figure to Siraj, who was 21 when they met. Eldawoody was almost twice his age. He…
Favorite During an appearance before a military review board, an attorney for Guantánamo Bay’s “forever prisoner” revealed that negotiations are underway for his possible release after being tortured and detained without charges for 22 years. Abu Zubaydah (whose real name is Zayn al-Abidin Muhammed Husayn) is perhaps the most egregious victim of the U.S. national…
Favorite This is a story about a story — one that I haven’t finished reporting. Federal prosecutors are so consumed by my efforts to report on a terrorism court case that they accused me in a recent filing of having “improper motives.” They said that, by doing routine reporting, I was somehow colluding with a…
Favorite Worried about a potential war with China, the Pentagon is turning to a new class of weapons to fight the numerically superior People’s Liberation Army: drones, lots and lots of drones. In August 2023, the Defense Department unveiled Replicator, its initiative to field thousands of “all-domain, attritable autonomous (ADA2) systems”: Pentagon-speak for low-cost (and…
Favorite In light of the deadly ISIS-K attack on the Crocus City Hall in Russia last month, the homeland security complex is newly focusing on a high-profile Islamic State attack inside the United States, according to new government reports and statements. For seven months, Hamas has been the primary focus of federal counterterror operations, with…
Favorite As the NCAA finishes up March Madness, another type of madness is unfolding as the U.S. military retools its weapons of mass destruction response apparatus to focus not on attacks by familiar foreign terror groups like Al Qaeda or ISIS, but by American citizens. Late last month, for the first time ever, the National…
Favorite With the 2024 elections looming, the Department of Homeland Security has a little-noticed weapon in its war on disinformation: comic books. Few have read them, but the series is attracting criticism from members of Congress. Calling the comics “creepy,” Rep. Dan Bishop, R-N.C., complained earlier this month that the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency-produced…
Favorite Ten years ago, the internet platform X, then known as Twitter, filed a lawsuit against the government it hoped would force transparency around abuse-prone surveillance of social media users. X’s court battle, though, clashes with an uncomfortable fact: The company is itself in the business of government surveillance of social media. Under the new…
Favorite Among the many hawks on Capitol Hill, few have as effectively frightened lawmakers over Chinese control of TikTok as Jacob Helberg, a member of the U.S.–China Economic and Security Review Commission. Helberg’s day job at the military contractor Palantir, however, means he stands to benefit from ever-frostier relations between the two countries. Helberg has…
Favorite Retired Navy four-star Adm. William McRaven — highly paid leadership guru, business consultant, and special operations commander — received a $50 million “Courage and Civility Award” from richest-person-on-Earth Amazon founder Jeff Bezos this past week. Actress Eva Longoria received the other half of the $100 million grant: the exact amount the Bezos-owned Washington Post…
