U.S. News and World Report has a short article on the U.S. intelligence community’s experimentation with wikis and blogs:
In an age when information sharing is the name of the game, intelligence agencies have also embraced the latest off-the-shelf technology to get their work out to others. “We are using wikis, we are using blogs, we are using chat, we are using instant messaging,” says Eric Haseltine, the chief scientist for the Director of National Intelligence. Given the sheer volume of information flooding into the community each day, he adds, “We have to be very creative in coming up with better stuff.”
Via Secrecy News
Updated: The Los Angeles Times also has a story on the intelligence community’s wiki:
The CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies have created a computer system that uses software from a popular Internet encyclopedia site to gather content on sensitive topics from analysts across the spy community, part of an effort to fix problems that plagued prewar estimates on Iraq.
Popular Science has a clip from Former VP Al Gore where he condemns the Bush Administration’s new Space Policy.
Key quote:
Very few people have analyzed the insides of this new space policy. I urge all of you who are interested in space to analyze it very carefully. It has the potential, down the road, to create the [same] kind of fuzzy thinking and chaos in our efforts to exploit the space resource as the fuzzy thinking and chaos the Iraq policy has created in Iraq. It is a very serious mistake, in my opinion. “We in the United States of America may claim that we alone can determine who goes into space and who doesn’t, what it’s used for and what it’s not used for, and we may claim it effectively as our own dominion to the exclusion, when we wish to exclude others, of all others. That’s hubristic.”
MSNBC’s Alan Boyle has more information on Gore’s speech up on his blog, Cosmic Log.
There are many ways you can contribute to this project as either a contributor or reviewer. The following is a list of current priority tasks and will be updated periodically on the Frequently Asked Questions page. Feel free to add your own suggestions in the comments.
- Virtually every argument in the database needs some editing attention. You can browse the argument tree or pick a random argument and do what you can to improve the argument.
- If the argument has a corresponding counterargument (for example, “China is not a space power threat“), you can help improve the system by evaluating the argument versus its counterargument and selecting the one you think is stronger. Arguments with a counterargument will have a ‘Compare’ link below the ‘Counterarguments’ on each argument page. You can also view a complete list of counterargument pairs here, or browse a random pair.
- We need more quotes, arguments, and definitions in the database that directly address missile defense systems, both space-based and otherwise. There is a direct connection between the two technologies and some existing missile defense technologies can serve as anti-satellite weapons. A fair evaluation of the space weapons debate has to include an examination of the pros and cons of missile defense.
- Users have flagged certain arguments with a ‘yellow flag’, indicating that they need to be improved. All recently flagged arguments are available on the updates page.
The Washington Post put last week’s revision of the National Space Policy on their front page, making it the first of the major papers to cover the policy shift. The Post’s coverage emphasizes the two key paragraphs again, noting that the new policy:
“rejects future arms-control agreements that might limit U.S. flexibility in space and asserts a right to deny access to space to anyone “hostile to U.S. interests.”
The blogosphere is dissecting the new policy, though the discussion seems to be falling in along party lines of “the Bush administration is extending the failed Iraq strategy to outer space” vs. “glad to see the U.S. is finally exerting its rights to weaponize space”. I’ll keep track of some of the better blog posts below, please let me know if I’ve missed any:
Other major media outlets that discovered the new space policy today:
Updated - The Bush Administration is sticking to its argument that there is no shift in our space policy, there is no news here. From today’s press gaggle:
Q The shift in space policy — can you describe that? And will it allow for weaponization of space?MR. SNOW: It’s not a shift in policy. This was announced in July, but apparently just discovered by some people. The notion that you would do defense from space is different than the weaponization of space. So I think what you have is a revisitation of a lot of old arguments in this case. We’re comfortable with the policy.
Few scattered responses today regarding the big policy announcement yesterday, I’ll keep updating this post as necessary:
Theresa Hitchens of the Center for Defense Information has an essay up on Defensetech.org analyzing the new policy. She finds that despite administration attempts to downplay the impact of the new policy, it still indicates a significant shift towards the weaponization of outer space:
While the new NSP doesn’t go as far as some space hawks wanted it to in openly endorsing the strategy of fighting “in, from and through” space, neither has it served to put a blanket – even a thin one – on those ambitions. And in taking a decidedly “us against them” tone, it is likely to further cement the view from abroad that the United States has taken on the role of a “Lone Space Cowboy.”
Michael Katz-Hyman at the Henry L. Stimson Center agrees, arguing that:
[On] balance, the new policy clearly shifts toward an emphasis on the Air Force’s freedom of action in space. The new policy will reinforce international perceptions that the US may choose to develop, test, or deploy space weapons, while reaffirming the administration’s rejection of negotiations or even discussions on space security.
He goes futher to do a side-by-side comparison of key passages in the 1996 space policy and the new one to show the shift.
The long awaited update to U.S. National Space Policy is finally out. It was posted on the Office of Science and Technology Policy on Friday but didn’t make it through the news cycle until yesterday. The full text of the document is available on the OSTP website but the key paragraphs for the space weaponization debate are:
To achieve the goals of this policy, the Secretary of Defense shall:
Develop capabilities, plans, and options to ensure freedom of action in space, and, if directed, deny such freedom of action to adversaries;
and ..
The United States will oppose the development of new legal regimes or other restrictions that seek to prohibit or limit U.S. access to or use of space. Proposed arms control agreements or restrictions must not impair the rights of the United States to conduct research, development, testing, and operations or other activities in space for U.S. national interests;
Exactly the kind of announcement everyone has been predicting and preparing for, but its finally official as U.S. government policy. Game on.
I’m going to tag everything I come across related to the new NSPD with the keyword U.S National Space Policy, please contact me if you see anything I missed or if there are any good discussions of this policy out there in the blogosphere that we should link to.