Thread: 9-11 Families For a Secure America

From: 9-11 Families for a Secure America Date: 2006/10/04 Wed AM 09:27:25 EDT
Subject: 9/11 Families for a Secure America -October 4nd - Mike Cutler Commentary on Washington Times article "Terror inmates' mail unread"


9-11 FSA Families and Friends: Please read Mike’s commentary and the hyper-linked article, as usual I would request you contact our elected officials and demand they correct this lack of commitment to our “war on terror”


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It seems that the only thing that is predictable where our nation's supposed "War on Terror" is concerned is that incompetence is the order of the day. Yesterday I forwarded a copy of an ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) newsletter that dealt with a thwarted effort by a translator who was employed as a contract translator at a U.S. military base in Afghanistan to secure an immigrant visa as the result of a fraudulent petition filed by a naturalized United States citizen who had falsely claimed to be the translator's father. For the sake of convenience I have attached a copy of that press release from ICE to the bottom of this e-mail. I believe it is important to once again provide you with this press release because it meshes with the story that appears in today's Washington Times that deals with a lack of translators who can read mail and other documents of detainees who are suspected of being involved in terrorism. According to the article, this lack of translators also prevents the Bureau of Prison, the agency in charge of these prisons, from monitoring verbal communications as well. This, in my opinion, creates two major critical issues that are not being addressed. First of all, it is important for officials in charge of a jail to be able to know what is going on to help prevent escapes and assaults on prison guards as well as other inmates. Second, this failure to read these letters and monitor phone conversations and other oral communication also impedes efforts to gain critical intelligence that might be culled from a review of all of these various potential sources of information.

As I previously pointed out when I reviewed the ICE newsletter yesterday, while our government agonizes over the issue of how much pressure interrogators should be able to bring to bear against inmates who may possess intelligence that might be critical in preventing future terrorist attacks and other such activities, our government is missing what might be critical information that would not even involve the interrogation of prisoners, only the ability to read and understand the languages in which they communicate, including Arabic.

Interestingly, I have made the recommendation at a number of Congressional hearings at which I have testified that it is essential to require that ICE enforcement personnel be required to successfully complete a Spanish language training program which was mandated when I attended Border Patrol Academy in 1972, as were all INS enforcement personnel. I further recommended that in addition to Spanish language training, a reasonable requirement inasmuch as the great majority of illegal aliens who are present in the United States are Spanish-speaking, that ICE academy also provide other language training where strategic languages are concerned. Among those languages would be Arabic, Farsi and Urdu. Thus far, ICE special agents are still receiving absolutely no foreign language training! Apparently Bureau of Prison personnel are similarly hobbled by a lack of language training.

I hate to keep on saying the same things, but we need to remember that we are at war. Three thousand innocent victims of the attacks of September 11, 2001 provide mute testimony to that simple fact. Yet, the "Can-do" attitude that America demonstrated in prosecuting World War II is lacking today. While members of both houses jump up and down, usually only when a television camera is taping them, demanding that we do a better job of screening the containers arriving on vessels to search for Weapons of Mass Destruction only a comparative few members of the House of Representatives and the United States Senate have been willing to tackle the issue of border security and the lack of integrity of the immigration system. Those who have consistently demanded such improvements are the true leaders of our nation but they are waging an apparent uphill battle with their colleagues from both sides of the political aisle.

Clearly it is critical to provide language training to employees of BOP and ICE as well as other agencies whose employees might be able to use a foreign language ability to help prevent future terrorist attacks by being able to read and understand the critical languages I have noted above. This is not a new issue. After the attacks of September 11 much was made about the inability of the FBI to translate a mountain of intercepts and other material that might have helped them to prevent the attacks of 9/11. Yet, even this obvious strategy of providing appropriate foreign language is not being pursued. So while the debates about the use of torture to extract intelligence and information from detainees at Guantanamo has made the headlines, other non-controversial methods of securing intelligence have been ignored!

Simply stated, you cannot make this stuff up!

We the people have the absolute right to demand our government does a much better job of addressing these critical issues immediately! No less than the safety and survival of our nation and our citizens hang in the balance.

Lead, follow or get out of the way!

-michael cutler-

http://www.washtimes.com/national/20061 ... -7030r.htm

9/11 Families for a Secure America
PO Box 156
Hawley, PA 18428-0156

Lead, follow or get out of the way!

-michael cutler-

Wow, I love that!!

So ... we've approved torture of prisoners but have failed to secure the language skills to properly translate the torture-derived information.

Why does this not surprise me?

Simultaneously, we've waged two wars on "terror" but haven't decided yet whether we should secure our homeland with something as simple as closing and locking our doors.

Cutler is right..."You can't make this stuff up!"