Borealis Threat & Risk ConsultingAs I have stated many times I am not a fan of speculation in the absence of facts. All we know so far about the heinous act of terrorism this morning in Brussels is that three bombs went off and that at least two of the attacks were suicide. Belgian police and security forces are […]
If there is one theatre of war tactic that remains controversial – aside from the inevitable divisions of futuristic killer robots I keep reading about – it is the use of drones, or unmanned aerial vehicles as the military prefers to call them. Relentless, tireless, brimming with state of the art gadgetry, these flying platforms […]
I am fascinated by polls and the science of polling. Yes, some firms have taken a hit for what turned out to be inaccurate predictions (especially when it comes to election results), but we do not have a better way at present to gauge the pulse of the public on any given issue. It is […]
There are many occasions on which public perception does not hold up well once research is carried out and data collected. For instance, people in Canada and the US think that crime is on the increase when statistics show quite the opposite and that we are in an era of unprecedented safety. Global warming is […]
Despite my continuing efforts to understand why people become terrorists, I have always believed that the decision to do so is indeed a choice, and not due to some form of coercion or brainwashing. I view the vulnerability/victim arguments (i.e. it is not the fault of the terrorist) as both largely uninformed and perhaps the […]
I learned a long time ago not to jump to conclusions based on very little information (a cardinal sin in intelligence analysis). Hence some of this post will be tenuous in nature. I am writing of course on the attack at a Canadian Armed Forces recruiting centre in Toronto on March 14th in which a knife-wielding […]
OK, OK, enough with the stories of ridiculous over-exaggeration to what kids say and draw. We can all gasp with horror over the child who was referred to a UK counter-radicalisation programme for drawing a picture of his father slicing a cucumber but was misinterpreted to mean a “cooker bomb” and the one where a […]
In a statement of the obvious, Islamic State has taken barbarity to a new (recent) low. There is no question that throwing homosexuals off apartment buildings, burning people alive, beheading prisoners and raping girls qualifies as reprehensible behaviour. Not that we humans have never before engaged in these subhuman kinds of acts, but the frequency […]
Intelligence is usually a plodding business. Not that it is not exciting – quite the contrary! – but that it takes time to gather information, process it, analyse it, figure out what gaps remain, and then go out and get more. Rarely do you paint a complete picture, regardless of how good and diverse your […]
CSIS Director Michel Coulombe appeared before the Senate National Security and Defence Committee today and stated that his organisation has used its new disruption powers over twenty times since 2015. This measure was controversial when introduced by the former Conservative government and is still seen by some as too strong for a service that […]