The Wire Special Report - October 1, 2024

this is a wire special report for October 1st 2024 bottom line upfront details emerge regarding potential foreign threats to Trump on the hum front in the United States over the past few days various claims have been alleged on social media regarding current plots by nation state actors to assassinate Donald Trump in short claims have been made that the primary means of targeting Trump would be via Man portable air defense systems or man pads being used to shoot down his aircraft further claims have been made that nine man pads are already within the United States having been successfully smuggled in over the southern US border analyst comments for this wire while the potential for surface to a missiles being in the possession of malign actors within the United States is exceptionally concerning the real world threat this poses is not entirely clear to the American public it is normally unwise to place such heavy weight on unconfirmed rumor and already the media reporting on this information is highly circular and unconfirm however considering the gravity of recent events closer examination is warranted even though this initial information is nowhere near confirmed this scenario is a classic example of a low probability High consequence event when viewed through the lens of risk management using a classic risk management Matrix the likelihood of a man pad being used to down a civilian airliner in the United States is exceptionally low but if it were to happen the consequences would be catastrophic depending on one's analysis this means that the overall risk can vary from medium to high and thus warranting some level of mitigation efforts in short even if this recent information is completely false the following considerations remain relevant in the event that a similar threat materializes in the future now is as good a time as any to consider the implications of what has been a very substantial but largely ignored threat for some time a brief recap of recent events May provide better Fidelity on the situation and may provide more clarity with regards to the larger picture on September 16th in a press conference acting Us Secret service director row states that quote there could be another geopolitical event that could put the United States into a kinetic conflict or some other issue that may result in additional responsibilities and protectees of the Secret Service end quote on September 18th a weapon cache was discovered on the southern US border south of AO Arizona the cache reportedly contained RPGs and explosives on September 19th report surface regarding Congress improving continuity of governance plans specifically in the event of a mass casualty event that results in the death of many elected officials simultaneously on September 20th Us Secret Service director row reiterates his previous mysterious statement that quote we have to be able to have the Personnel the assets and be able to spread those out for an indefinite period of time and the event that another situation a geopolitical conflict or some other tension requires us to do so end quote on September 24th the office of the Director of National Intelligence or odni briefs Trump and his campaign staff on threats to his life also on September 24th almost immediately after this briefing Trump posts on social media accusing Iran directly of trying to assassinate him on September 26th various unconfirmed reports emerged via whistleblowers allegedly affiliated with customs of border patrol forces alleging the entry of manpads into the United States via an official Port of Entry in New Mexico on September 30th Donald Trump arrived in valdasta Georgia for a campaign event in a small unmarked aircraft despite valdasta Regional Airport being well within the limits of Trump's Boeing 757 which landed at this exact same airport for a similar campaign event in 2016 first and foremost a closer examination of the sources of this intelligence must be undertaken along with the causal links that are implied based on the events of the past few weeks following Trump's seemingly nonsensical post on social media regarding Iranian threats the puzzle pieces begin to come together it is very likely that Trump was briefed on this threat a few days ago and immediately posted about it on social media though pure speculation this manpad threat is probably what Trump was briefed on however many unknowns Remain the exact contents of the briefing remain classified and thus unknown to the public Trump could have been briefed on something else entirely there's no way for the public to know after all Trump's campaign was allegedly hacked around the same time frame so the September 24th briefing could be related to that currently developing incident however most official statements or remarks have indicated that the September 24th briefing was related to a physical threat to Trump thus the loose correlation with with these reports of the man pad threat another detail to consider is the source itself the very same Legacy intelligence agencies that have been targeting Trump for years the initial manpad threat specifically allegedly comes from within US Customs and Border Patrol sources not the big intelligence agencies however it's exceptionally unlikely for this intelligence to originate with CBP it probably leaked from the border patrol learning about the situation since they were allegedly involved at some point since the missiles allegedly came in Via an official port of Entry the extremely specific nature of these allegations are also caused for more attention and likely means that a legacy intelligence agency probably the CIA is really the true originating source of this intelligence the person who physically briefed Trump on September 24th was probably ail Haynes the current director of National Intelligence she is a former Protegé of John Brennan and is 100% committed to continuing the Patriot Act era of James Clapper esque National Intelligence priorities this detail alone should cause serious questions regarding the sourcing and accuracy of this intelligence full stop this story leaking could actually be anything from election interference to warmongering to more nefariously the CIA laying the groundwork for further assassination attempts however speculative these possibilities may be the very real unspoken truth is that if Trump's plane were to be shot down right now the instinctive gut reaction from most Americans would probably be the CIA did it on the other hand giving the National Intelligence agencies as much leave way as possible if Iran was indeed convinced that Trump will start a war with them they would be motivated to ensure that Trump never makes it into office the chief rebuttal to this theory is that Trump was already in office and didn't start a war with Iran during his previous 4-year term of course the situation has changed dramatically since then however it is challenging to argue that Iran's motivations to Target Trump are so radically different now than they were 4 years ago when he was still a wild card especially to the point of literally launching a missile at his plane this is one Hard Sell of an assessment considering that President Biden currently in office has resulted in the worst relations with Iran in decades what's far more likely is that if malign actors are indeed invested in trafficking arms into the United States for a potential First Strike from within the American Homeland which is a very likely possibility it's probably not specifically to Target Trump China for instance has been purchasing large Parcels of land via Shady shell corporations Parcels of land that just so happen to be immediately adjacent to major military bases that often include airfields China or even Russia stashing a few crates of man pads and or drones within the United States for strategic targeting purposes in the event of War makes vastly more sense than Iran attempting to carry out such a high-profile terror attack at the current time however taking these specific allegations as they have been made and assuming for a moment that the intelligence is accurate and Iranian agents are indeed legitimately trying to Target Trump with no assistance from federal intelligence agencies other difficulties r that assist in assessing this threat more accurately the technical nature of man pads along with their real world use at this exact moment in Ukraine can also shed some light on details that help assess the real threat these allegations pose man pads even old and busted models from the Soviet era are absolutely lethal on the battlefield in certain situations being Man portable all man pads are shoulder fired the Gunner has to Hoist the missile onto his shoulder activate the battery visually observe the target aircraft and depending on the model obtain a lock onto the heat signature of the aircraft one of the most complicating factors for the use of man pads by insurgents is simply not having all of the pieces needed to assemble the missile unlike in Hollywood users can't simply take a missile out of a case and pull the trigger to fire it assembly is usually needed of the launch tube the grip stock the battery coolant unit or the thermal battery and sometimes an ejection motor depending on the model of missile throughout the history of the global war on terror most insurgents throughout the Middle East had a hard time getting all of the parts needed to assemble a fully functional Sy system however this historical trend is unlikely to matter much with regards to threat assessment since any Iranian smuggling operation that is dedicated to such a high-profile attack would undoubtedly have all of the required hardware to make it work and considering that insurgents throughout the Middle East have used man pads to successfully engage dozens of commercial airliners in the past it is always wise to assume the worst case scenario of the Insurgent having a brand new shiny man pad with all of the parts and training to use it another complicating factor is the activation of the the battery coolant unit or the thermal battery depending on the model of missile the man pad will have one or the other but in either case a BCU or thermal battery will be needed to spin up the missile for launch once the Gunner activates the BCU or the thermal battery they are fully committed to the attack since either option lasts a very short period of time once it's activated it can't be reactivated a new one is needed additional complications arise from the technical range of most man pad systems it's usually very short man pads can't be used to Target aircraft flying at cruising altitude they're only effective for low-flying aircraft such as helicopters or fixed S aircraft that are taking off or Landing in short a lot of things have to line up perfectly for a manpad gunner to successfully engage an aircraft however once again most counter manpad Doctrine comes to us from the battlefield a commercial airliner poses very few of these limitations and difficulties for the Gunner perhaps most importantly all of these considerations are nowhere near a secret all of these details have been very well known by the public and hwood for decades examining the technical nature of most man pads another point of contention lies with the smuggling of the man pads themselves from exploding pagers in Beirut to guns with GPS trackers in the stocks courtesy of The atf's Fast and Furious operation it would be exceptionally unwise to assume that all of these man pads are indeed functional the global proliferation of man pads has been historically common in some of the more far-flung war zones around the world however due to the implications of such devastating weapons governments around the world have been more earnestly invested in tracking the proliferation of such arms in other words a low-level gang member is astronomically unlikely to roll around with AA 2 these serious arms are simply not something that is proliferated at the same rate as cheap handguns in inner cities though somewhat ironically this remains an increasing possibility in the future thanks to the mass proliferation of arms due to the Ukrainian War more directly if the ATF is willing and able to conceal tracking devices inside Firearms they traffic over the US border over 18 years ago and if Israel whose major adversary is Iran is able to do something similar today with consumer grade Electronics logical conclusions can be reached quite easily these are however assumptions based purely on the current events as available to the public assumptions that anyone would be hard pressed to gamble on continuing the technical examination of most man pads we arrive at the final Point worthy of mention counter measures most aircraft used to transport high value individuals or hvis such as Trump possess countermeasure systems that effectively nullify the threats posed by most man pads even some commercial aircraft from FedEx to L Airlines passenger aircraft are welln to often be equipped with measures to counter surface to air missiles fired from a man pad so it would not be out of the question for Trump's Fleet of aircraft to be similarly equipped however this is not a certainty As Trump does not travel on board official government aircraft and therefore this is likely to be a good question to raise in Congress in the closed door hearings that have undoubtedly already begun concerning this issue of of course relying on chaff flares or Optical countermeasures is a last resort saying it's okay the chaff caused the missile to break off is akin to saying it's okay the shooter missed considering all of the above factors where does the real threat lie if the Director of National Intelligence is telling the truth and if nine man pads are within the United States and if they have all of the parts and if they are in the possession of at least several Iranian teams and if each team is able to not get caught this poses major concerns for the average American public in fact if this exceptionally specific intelligence is so solid one has to wonder as to why the FAA hasn't issued a national airspace closure over this granted closing the entire country's airspace would be a gargantuan task and likely would have Untold impacts however one might consider that the shootdown of potentially nine civilian airliners might be a little bit more important in fact one would be hardpressed to find a situation more fitting for grounding all aircraft throughout the United States if this intelligence is real this is quite literally the most textbook clear and present danger to the United States that has ever been known to be a threat by the average American before the attack only 911 surpasses the magnitude of potentially nine civilian airliners being shot down however no average everyday American citizen knew the 911 attacks were going to take place beforehand now in this situation we do and many Americans are likely to wonder why we're being told about this via a standard news line item this is the kind of event that should stop the nation until it's resolved we should expect mobilization of a gargantuan order that makes the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan look like a cakewalk just to mitigate this potential domestic threat stock markets should be halting trading schools canceled and all military bases to go to fpcon Delta the highest alert level along with all leave being canceled and all reservice activated and every single major airport in the country should have increased security to ensure that terrorists can't get access to targeting positions for aircraft on short final or more dangerously on the initial climb out of the airport the FAA should be grinding every single aircraft and let every single federal agency pull out all the stops kicking in the doors of every single terrorist that the DHS knowingly LED over the Border until every single missile is accounted for if this threat is serious and our government is serious about protecting the American Homeland all of this should be in progress considering how easy it would be to mitigate this threat nearly completely one has to wonder why none of this has happened yet there are a few plausible explanations for this number one is the man pad threat could be false this is the simplest and most obvious explanation for the inaction and due to essentially zero confirmation or verification of this information by the public this option should always be considered right up front the leading counterargument to this is the overall trend of strategic moves being made within government that align with the severity of this situation the past few weeks have resulted in Non-Stop indications and warnings of an event just like this so the simplest explanation is that this is the a scenario that has triggered the questionable moves and statements by politicians over the past few weeks to include Trump being observed to travel in smaller more lowprofile aircraft than normal the second option is government agencies could be conducting clandestine operations to mitigate the threat and thus are not inclined to tell the American people about ongoing operations the main counterargument to this is now that whistleblowers have come forward and the cat is out of the bag there's very little downside to publicly confirming the threat the third option is similarly the US government could be aware of the threat and are only considering lowprofile mitigation efforts so as not to scare the public the counterargument to this is that the United States government has never once expressed a desire to not scare the public on the contrary mountains are frequently made of mole Hills for other more trivial threats even the Chinese military assets over us soil were almost certainly not concealed to prevent undue panic but probably to allow the Chinese assets to finish their intelligence collection Mission finally and perhaps most nefariously malign actors within the National Intelligence are setting the stage for future Highly Questionable events so what are the solutions currently there are only 503 commercial airports within the United States that serve the types of commercial aircraft that are vulnerable to manpad threats of these only 37 are considered to be Class B airports I.E major commercial airports even considering the 503 figure only a handful routinely host VIP Travel as such the Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security are dealing with a finite number of Potential Threat locations as a a reminder roughly 26,000 National Guard soldiers were deployed for the inauguration of Joe Biden in January of 2021 almost all of which stood around and did absolutely nothing only a fraction of these forces would be needed to provide security for major US airports until this threat is mitigated of course this would still be a major mobilization of historical records domestically but considering the alternative is to let malign actors shoot down a civilian airliner many might consider the inconveniences of deploying Limited numbers of troops to be exactly within the mission set of the entire US military after all if this mission is beyond the scope and capability of the US military there's quite literally zero point in having a military force at all considering the billions of dollars that were just sent to two foreign Nations last week for their defense ironically to include missile defenses for both of these countries the Department of Defense might consider a reexamination of their funding priorities to include the defense of the United States again defending the American Homeland is an expectation outside the bounds of all federal agencies at this point so it's understandable as to why these mitigation efforts haven't happened nor are likely to happen Donald Trump allegedly being the primary target is largely irrelevant on the Strategic level the shoot down of any aircraft whatsoever within American airspace is one of the most serious events that this nation can face this alleged intelligence also brings more clarity to the recent actions in Congress to ensure more resilient continuity of governance in the event of a decapitation strike Congress probably got this intelligence a couple of weeks ago in closed door sessions and is now probably concerned with their own aircraft being shot down even just considering the number of high- ranking officials that fly via commercial aircraft that do not have manpad countermeasures one can easily see why Congress has suddenly become interested in these apocalyptic scenarios Congress is very likely sold on the veracity of this intelligence solely based on their own actions however since politicians do not often understand the ways of warfare or wartime emergencies it would be understandable for Congress to simply not know what to do with the gravity of this situation all Poli politicians operate under the assumption that political means are always possible and likewise are usually not equipped to respond to situations that a subcommittee can't solve the Department of Defense however should know exactly what to do along with the Department of Homeland Security it costs absolutely nothing for a base commander anywhere in the United States to take their own Survival more seriously and increase real Combat Readiness not just checking boxes on routine inventory paperwork and ensuring that everyone wears their PT belt low-level military leadership the backbone of the military also have the means motive and opportunity to get serious about the threats that are already within the American Homeland if you are a soldier in the United States armed forces absolutely nothing is preventing you from taking your job seriously show up on time ready to learn and carry out your job as best you can if you are in a Billet where this is not an option find something useful to do there is zero excuse for sloth or I can't any longer if you are an NCO or an officer in any service Branch it costs you very little to prepare your people for almost everyone else the most feasible solution is a combination of remaining aware and preparing for major incidents as best one can especially since such a high-profile event will inevitably not simply be a one anddone incident but a Prelude to much more kinetic actions even if the man pad threat is inaccurate slightly overe exaggerated or completely false altogether this is a very solid reminder of the seriousness and deliberation that should be considered moving forward and due to the nature of this threat which Echoes the history of even 9/11 the first time this threat may be taken seriously is after a catastrophe takes place that could easily have been prevented this concludes the wire special report for October 1st 2024