Praxis: Musings on Counterintelligence, Cockroaches and Rats.

"The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun." -- Ecclesiastes 1:9, KJV.

"Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves." -- Matthew 7:15, KJV.

NOTE: Before plunging in below, please read (or reread) this post and link in its entirety from Wednesday night -- "A timely reminder for some folks: What if everything you know is wrong?" Afterward, readers are also encouraged to seek out this article, "Clandestine HUMINT asset recruiting" and this one: "Counterintelligence."

Some will wonder that I have made this post a praxis. It will seem to you to be more philosophy than practical instruction. It is, and it isn't. I am going to teach an introductory class on counterintelligence in the Three Percent movement, but what we should do is ALWAYS be informed by who we are and why we fight. If we lose track of the who and the why, the how means nothing.

One of the twenty-five cent books I picked up at the Trussville Public Library today was Modern Critical Interpretations: J.R.R. Tolkein's The Lord of the Rings, edited by Harold Bloom. A collection of essays by various scholars, as I was leafing through it (I almost left it on the rack, for quarters are dear these days and I wasn't sure I needed another nonessential book) these words leaped off the page to me from an essay by Katharyn W. Crabbe, The Quest as Legend:

Closely related to linguistic creativity is the question of the kinds of information sources that can be trusted. Though supernatural sources of information are available (the palantiri), like the Ring's power, the usefulness of their information varies according to the characteristics of the user. Thus Denethor's use of the palantir drives him to despair and Saruman's seduces him to evil, for even the stones of Westernesse may be turned to the service of evil.

What is worthy of trust, then, is the creative and the individual -- the literature and lore of the ancient days and the intuition of the individual. From the literature and lore of ancient days come history, motivation, and prophecy, and though the stories may be dismissed (as by Ted Sandyman) or misunderstood (as by the Master of the Houses of Healing), they speak true to those who listen. From individual intuition comes a sense of where the public and the private dreams overlap and why, therefore, the myths of ancient days are important and true.

The trustworthiness of traditional and intuitive knowledge is a part of the larger value of respect for the past. Respect for the old tales and the refusal to assign them merely to the nursery or to the "cracked" is an attribute of both pragmatic and absolute good. On the pragmatic level, the usefulness of the information gained from traditional sources is clear. From the old books Gandalf has learned the secret of the ring. From the advice of the ancient seer, Aragorn is reminded to ride the Path of the Dead.

But it is not only, or even primarily, for such immediately pragmatic purposes that reverence for the past is valued. More significantly, and more generally, the literature and lore of the ancient days of Middle-earth, like the literature and lore of our own world, reflect the continuities of earthly human existence. -- pp. 160-161.

Yes! Exactly. I was speaking on this topic to a group of local Three Percenters a couple of months ago and they wanted to know how to avoid the traps of the snitches and the agents provocateur. I told them, "Remember to be true to yourselves, to what you believe and for what you fight. If you adopt the ways of the enemy and target the innocent instead of protecting them, if you fight indiscriminate terror with indiscriminate terror, if you initiate violence, then you might as well save yourself and all of us the trouble and put a bullet in your own brain, for you have become the enemy of the Founders' Republic, the Constitution and the rule of law that you claim to uphold." This is why I call such faux-patriots "neo-collectivists." The indiscriminate tactics they advocate, the language they employ, the substitution of bullying and name-calling for principle and reason only serve to put a different face on the same evil.

Well-intentioned people get sucked into this error by fear -- fear of inadequate numbers, fear of isolation, fear of defeat in detail -- and ignorance which exaggerates that fear. They are ignorant of their own strengths, ignorant of the inherent weaknesses of the domestic enemies of the Constitution, ignorant of just how many allies they have in the most improbable of places. And in their fear and ignorance they seek out companionship on the Internet, where anyone can pretend to be anybody, and comfort themselves with bluster and threaten tactics such as the killing of innocents that alienate potential allies. They are encouraged in this error by so-called "leaders" although often it is difficult to tell whether such "leadership" is provided courtesy of some desire to be a big fish in a little pond or of the age-old tradition of the Judas goat. As I said, when you look at the language of such "leaders" it is difficult to tell who such people really serve -- their own egos or the Dark Side. In the final analysis, it doesn't really matter.

This is a lesson I learned the hard way in 90s with the Constitutional Militia movement. And, I daresay, it was an experience that merely reinforced the lessons in rueful retrospect of my own foray into the Dark Side in the 70s as an enemy of the Founders' Republic. Experience is the harshest, but best, teacher. Yet I paid a price for the teaching that I shall never forget -- nor forgive myself for -- even if it makes me a better enemy of those I once agreed with.

That said, my present attitudes are largely informed by my experiences with the minor galaxy of self-discrediting fools, snitches, agents provocateurs, con-men, disinformation artists, racists, neoNazis, "Mistaken Identities, and other miscellaneous riff-raff who, each for their own agendas, tried to glom onto, redirect, discredit, milk and bilk the Constitutional militia movement in the 90s.

This is what permanently cured me of any desire for a national militia organization. I was a board member of the Tri-States Militia Network whose national information center was run by a guy named John Parsons out of South Dakota. Tri-States was the first and only effective national militia umbrella group of many units and states. Parsons, in the end, was turned into a paid informant for the FBI. I resigned my position on the board in an essay called "The King's Shilling," pointing out that was impossible for anyone to take the King's Shilling and not be the King's man. Tri-States came apart in the harsh light of that day.

Another lesson learned: Public organizations made up of willing strangers are the most easy penetrated, compromised, discredited and destroyed. This is the reason that when I founded the modern Three Percent movement I made it a movement of ideas, not an organization with dues and membership lists, etc. I gave no thought to trying to protect the brand, thinking that the idea was sufficient. The charismatic con-man Kerodin has cured me of that misapprehension. Still, the 90s taught me that small groups of friends, family and neighbors, previously known and trusted folks, organized locally and informed by the Three Percent ideal -- self-defense, no proactive violence, community-networked, locally politically-savvy, training up to military competence in small unit tactics but absolutely committed to not giving up one more inch within their area of operations -- was the way to go.

Indeed, this practicality mimics the liberty movement of the Founders and the organizations that they created to secure their freedom from the King -- the Sons of Liberty, the Committees of Safety and Correspondence, the town militia and the Minutemen. Thus, I learned from both history and the practical lessons of the 90s that the best solution for organizing a resistance movement today to the domestic enemies of the Constitution and the Founders' Republic was to hearken back to that template of successful resistance to tyranny -- the only revolution ever, to my knowledge, that did not descend into collectivist butchery of one sort or another.

As Crabbe writes above, "The trustworthiness of traditional and intuitive knowledge is a part of the larger value of respect for the past. Respect for the old tales and the refusal to assign them merely to the nursery or to the "cracked" is an attribute of both pragmatic and absolute good."

That's the platform the true Three Percent stands on -- the lessons of the victories and defeats of the Founders' Three Percent. That is the basis of why we will fight and how we will fight. No initiation of hostilities, no indiscriminate terrorism, no killing of innocents, no winking at "collateral damage." Credible deterrence of tyranny is accomplished by a combination of our numbers, our military competency, our determination and our targeting -- in Fourth Generation Warfare terms the few inches of grey matter between the would-be tyrant's ears.

Political and moral legitimacy is the key. The neo-collectivists say that such concerns are negated by the overwhelming strength of the enemy. But what "overwhelming strength" is that? If they truly had it, they wouldn't be waiting to exercise it, they would be killing us now. And why exaggerate your own enemy's strength? Why not discuss their fundamental weaknesses and how they may be exploited? Perhaps they have a different motive than winning? The neo-collectivists say "Kill them all now and we'll sort the rest out later, And who will "sort it out"? A Hitler? A Stalin? A Robespierre? A Napoleon? A Kerodin? The fact is that for all our problems, the enemy betrays his weakness by what he is NOT doing. Politics still matter -- they matter to them and they matter to us. The fact is that we have been far more successful at the politics of liberty lately than the neo-collectivists are willing to give us credit for. The time for politics alone is nearing an end, BUT IT IS NOT YET ENDED. If it were, the agents of leviathan would not be seeking to discredit the Three Percent, Oath Keepers and others with COINTELPRO-type operations. Legitimacy (even pretended legitimacy) means something to them. And it means everything to us, if we actually are who we say we are -- the defenders of the Republic and her people. (See my letter to FBI Director Comey.)

Which brings us back, at last, to counterintelligence for the Three Percent. As the letter to Director Comey indicates, the Coalition of Willing Lilliputians has been working on the subject of present-day COINTELPRO operations. What we have discovered so far are the faint outlines of a federal law-breaking scandal that dwarfs Fast and Furious in size and apparent breath-taking scope. That's all I can say at this point, but it behooves us, all of us, to be cognizant of our own most effective countermeasures -- our moral compass, the foundations of our own history that we stand upon, and the antiseptic qualities of bright light.

I was talking with a long-time friend the other day and he observed, referring to our efforts on this latest scandal, "You know, Mike, when you flip on a light switch in one room, it makes the roaches and rats in the next room nervous. And when you go to that room, you will find that the rats and the roaches have skipped their lunch and supper in order to put a banana peel under the light switch there. Evade that, and you will find that the Grand Presidium of Rats and Roaches has taken official notice of you."

"What they want to do," he added later in the conversation, "is to stop you and your crew before you get to the main power panel that controls the Congressional floodlights -- and they'll use any rat they can to do it."

"Credibility... It's the only currency that means anything on this kind of playing field. Dean's got the tape, and he's gonna come out with it. And when he does, I want his credibility. I want people to know he's lying before they hear what he says." -- NSA apparatchik Thomas Reynolds, Enemy of the State, 1998.

So, the whole point of COINTELPRO operations is to rob you of your credibility and enhance theirs. From the heads of DHS, DOJ, FBI and ATF down to the local Special Agent in Charge, what they want to do is "make cases" that can be popped at the right time for their own publicity and political purposes to build the case for their credibility by convincing the herd that we need them.

How does this work on a micro level? What should you be looking for in terms of penetration agents, snitches and provocateurs? Remember when your mother told you that when something seems to be too good to be true, it usually is? The penetration agent, or sensitive confidential informant, will be the guy that is too good to be true. He will be the most active member of the group, the friendliest, the one who bankrolls your activities. He will be the one who shows up at all the meetings, official and unofficial, and volunteers for every work detail. He will be everybody's friend and when the bust comes (courtesy of the snitches and provocateurs that we'll get to in a minute) no one will have expected the agent of their destruction to be him.

Snitches (and I mean plural because no agency likes to depend on just one, they love having snitches snitching on snitches as a quality control measure) are generally several cuts below the deep penetration agent or SCI. They won't be the sharpest knife in the drawer, and maybe they've "had a little trouble with the law" in the past but now its "all squared away." The snitches' role is just that, to snitch, although in a pinch they can be converted to APs to accomplish a quick bust but generally lack the skills to pull it off. It may be someone you have known for a while but screwed up, got busted on a firearm charge or some other problem which goes away magically. Of course it didn't go away, it is still being held over his or her head to ensure compliance. Or it could be that they got in a tight, needed some money and the Fibbies are now paying his bills -- reimbursing him by the name.

Agents provocateur can be similar to snitches but generally are brighter, higher-functioning, more sociopathic. The best ones are charismatic, but deeply serious about the cause. They are constantly urging action, warning of dangers, casting doubts on other group members, etc. Good APs are hard to find, so Feds often reuse them under different names with other groups across the country. He may have left one group because it wasn't "hardcore" enough, or claims to have had a falling out with the leadership over principle.

With all of these the best defense is the individual Threepers' moral center that I talked about above. DPAs, SCI,s snitches and APs all count on human weaknesses -- without that moral center, if they scare someone enough they can guide them into making threatening statements, taking steps to do something illegal, etc. The principal method used is the "what if they do this, then we should do that" hypothetical discussion. NEVER -- EVER -- GET SUCKED INTO HYPOTHETICALS. If you know who you are and Who you serve then it is harder for the evil bad guys to sucker you into betraying those principles. They may have the latest threatening news of some intended raid, with just enough detail to make it plausible. Beyond a certain heightened awareness, do not react. If you have good relations with the local sheriff, report the threat to him. If someone tries to draw you in to a can't miss deal on an automatic weapon or explosives, do the same thing. Do NOT call the Feds. Remember, they're the ones who sent you the puke to begin with in order to entrap you.

Why do you think the FBI does not record interviews (even though it is high-tech and extremely efficient and precise), but uses two agents to do the interviews and write down afterward what they claim was said? The report is called an FD-302, and they can, after the fact, make it say whatever they want since it is the word of the two of them against the one of you.

I remember vividly the advice that the retired Marine counterintelligence officer once gave me. When dealing with people who approach you, always ask yourself two questions:

1. Why is this guy telling me this?

2. Why is this guy telling me this NOW?

Another important caution, again from the Bible: "Take not counsel of your fears." DPAs, SCI's and APs all count on fear to make you do things you otherwise would not. Just keep doing what you're doing and don't take your eye off the ball. If you feel the need to do SOMETHING then go train, meet and greet with potential political allies, have a cook-out BUT DON'T REACT. A reaction is what they are looking for. Deny it to them.

And don't forget the antiseptic qualities of bright light. If you are not in a position to do that yourself, pass the knowledge on to someone who can.

I will have more on this subject later, but that's a good start. Remember to be true to yourselves, to what you believe and for what you fight -- and always have your finger on the light switch.  The Feds hate it when you do that.