A lot of people are very worried about the rise of the far right these days in light of what happened in Charlottesville, Virginia on the weekend, at least based on the number of articles and op-ed pieces that I have come across in my news scanning as well as the number of media interviews […]
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I see that Ernst Zundel died the other day. For many Canadians of a certain age Mr. Zundel was famous, or rather infamous, for being, well, to be blunt, a pain in the ass. He was a Holocaust denier, a neo-Nazi and an all-around rabble-rouser. He often surrounded himself with hard-hatted supporters when he made […]
Ever since Michelle Shephard of the Toronto Star broke the news of a $35 million lawsuit by 5 CSIS employees I have agonised over what to write and even whether to write about this issue. I turned down several requests for interviews from major Canadian TV networks and a few radio stations since I did […]
As I have stated on many occasions, the threat to Canada from Islamist extremist groups represents by far the single greatest priority for our security services – CSIS, the RCMP and provincial and municipal police forces. We have seen around a dozen plots, both foiled and successful, since 9/11, the most recent one being the […]
As I sit looking at a torrential downpour out my kitchen window on this Saturday morning July 1 I am nevertheless quietly happy to reflect on what it means to me to be a Canadian on my nation’s 150th anniversary. For many today the weather here in Ottawa is reflective of a sour mood. Many […]
Intelligence agencies are generally poorly understood in our societies. The agencies themselves are partly to blame since they shroud themselves in secrecy, albeit for good reasons. In addition, public perception is at fault, partly due to the assumption by many that spies are nefarious creatures at heart and partly due to the often highly inaccurate […]
Well, we are coming up to the six-month mark of the Donald Trump era and it is time for a reckoning. So much print and coverage has been devoted to the Donald that I hesitate to add to this amount. And yet there is quite a bit that bears on counter terrorism policy and strategy […]
When you work for CSIS or the RCMP in national security the one thing that keeps you up at night is the possibility that you might miss something (or, more probably, don’t have enough resources to run down all the leads you discover) and a terrorist act succeeds in Canada. The second thing that makes […]
I am a big Isaac Asimov fan (and a big science fiction fan in general, although I don’t get to read as much as I’d like what with all this terrorism to look at). In his classic Foundation series we are introduced to a character right at the outset named Hari Seldon, a mathematics professor […]
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ISIS in Scarborough?
Once in a while I come across (or, in this case, have someone point me in the right direction) a story related to terrorism that surprises even me, a 30-year grizzled veteran of intelligence and counter terrorism. I saw a lot in my time at CSIS and had the incredibly amazing opportunity to work on […]