Author: Rachel Marsden

“Subversion introduced from the outside.” That’s part of Encyclopedia Britannica’s definition for a Trojan horse, the hollow structure that allowed Greek soldiers to penetrate the city of Troy and win the Trojan War. What if the drop in oil prices currently making everyone cheer at the pumps is exactly that — a Trojan horse? Subversion […]

No consensus exists between the U.S. government and cyber security experts as to whether North Korea is responsible for the online dumping of Sony Pictures Entertainment’s confidential business data and emails. Even if it could be proven beyond any doubt with uncontestable forensic evidence that this theft is also, in fact, an act of computer […]

The ongoing leaks of confidential business data from Sony Pictures Entertainment and the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee report on the use of enhanced interrogation techniques by the Central Intelligence Agency have something in common. Call it the “Snowden Privacy Paradox.” The Sony leaks and the so-called torture report are being celebrated by transparency cheerleaders who […]

Hey, did you see U.S. President Barack Obama yukking it up on “The Colbert Report” this week, reminding Americans how much fun he’d be to have a beer with to help forget all the challenges being fumbled by his administration? Sorry to be such a killjoy, but according to the International Monetary Fund, China just […]

PARIS — There’s no doubt that we are now well into a time when wars are won and lost on intelligence efforts. In an era of budgetary constraints, low appetite for overt foreign intervention, and highly asymmetric insurgency — the likes of which we’re currently seeing in Syria and Iraq — trading a clunky mass […]

PARIS — Less than 10 days before Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel announced his resignation, he addressed a memo to senior defense leaders. “While we have been engaged in two large land mass wars over the last 13 years, potential adversaries have been modernizing their militaries, developing and proliferating disruptive capabilities across the spectrum of […]

PARIS — U.S. President Barack Obama was elected in 2008 as a politician, and he’s on pace to finish his presidency as one, rather than as the statesman many presumed he would become. As it currently stands, his accomplishments aren’t likely to remain historically memorable — except in the way that a natural disaster might […]

PARIS — U.S. President Barack Obama had barely set foot in Beijing for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit before he was cutting lip-service deals with China, seemingly unaware of that nation’s long-term agenda and the American vulnerability that’s ripe for exploitation. For the Chinese, it’s not about trade anymore, but about making the U.S. […]

PARIS — While the U.S. and its allies are struggling to figure out how to stop the Islamic State from metastasizing throughout the Middle East and beyond, China has been conspicuously absent from the containment efforts. Given that China is the largest beneficiary of oil contracts in post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, you have to wonder why […]

PARIS — While the U.S. and its allies are struggling to figure out how to stop the Islamic State from metastasizing throughout the Middle East and beyond, China has been conspicuously absent from the containment efforts. Given that China is the largest beneficiary of oil contracts in post-Saddam Hussein Iraq, you have to wonder why […]

PARIS — Some warped minds believe that when a nation suffers a terrorist attack, it somehow deserved it and should set about doing some soul searching. Implicit in this argument is the notion that the attacker was somehow justified in his heinous actions — there was no other option but to lash out violently. Except […]

There are at least two things that the public expects the government to get right, even when it fails at nearly everything else: public safety and national security. The Obama administration has a responsibility to protect its citizens. There is no excuse for the failures we’re witnessing — from the containment and eradication of Ebola […]

In a nationally televised interview that aired Sunday, U.S. President Barack Obama spoke of his director of national intelligence, James Clapper, the way a manager at a fast-food joint would speak of a grill cook who just botched a burger. “Our head of the intelligence community, Jim Clapper,” Obama said in an interview with “60 […]

World leaders, some of whom are taking their shady human-rights records and diplomatic immunity out for some exercise, have descended upon New York City this week for the United Nations General Assembly. In this celebrated display of self-flagellation, leaders take unchallenged turns expressing what they want the masses to think, doing so from the safety […]

While recently commemorating the World War I centenary at an Italian military cemetery, Pope Francis declared: “Even today, after the second failure of another world war, perhaps one can speak of a third war, one fought piecemeal, with crimes, massacres, destruction.” The pope’s observation begs the question: If World War III has already started, would […]

France is abuzz with the rumor that former center-right French President Nicolas Sarkozy is set to re-enter public life. Could the era of the chill bros be over already? The world has been worse off since Sarkozy left — for the very same reason the French public voted him out of office. Sarkozy was seen […]

U.S. President is headed to Europe this week. There used to be a time prior to his election when he would travel to Europe and inspire the masses — mostly on the strength of their own idealistic projections. But now, never has a Nobel Peace Prize laureate seen so many global conflicts erupt on his […]

It should have been a no-brainer for the U.S. and Russia to cooperate to fight Islamic radicals in the Middle East. But even if you place the high-jump bar on the ground, some people will still manage to trip over it — then insist on going back and tripping over it again. Everything was perfectly […]

A cyberattack on Community Health Systems Inc., a private hospital network, in April and June resulted in the theft of non-medical data of 4.5 million Americans, including names, addresses, birthdates, phone numbers and Social Security numbers, according to a new Securities and Exchange Commission filing. The attacks were attributed to Chinese hackers. There’s justification for […]

Despite its military supremacy, the U.S. under the command of President Barack Obama is at risk of having an upstart group of Islamic terrorists take over Iraq — all because politically straitjacketed American military might has struggled against unrestrained guerrilla warfare, and the president has failed to absorb the lessons from America’s past mistakes. Obama’s […]

LAS VEGAS — The big players in the global information-security industry are intermingling with computer hackers this week at the annual Black Hat conference in Las Vegas. Even Chris Inglis, who stepped down as the deputy director of the National Security Agency earlier this year, is scheduled to attend the conference in his new capacity […]

Barack Obama’s foreign policy disasters are about what one might expect from a leftist community organizer elected to be leader of the free world. So many of the countries this administration has touched — Ukraine, Libya, Iraq — have descended into acute civil war on Obama’s watch. It’s worth asking why, exactly, this has been […]

Here we go again with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry leveraging a tragedy to make another “strong case” based on limited evidence. We have already seen this in the case of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and chemical weapons. Now it’s Russian President Vladimir Putin’s turn for the global smear treatment. Presumably we’re supposed to […]

PARIS — A newly leaked document stolen by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden last year reveals that one of the NSA’s partner agencies within the “Five Eyes” Anglo-intelligence network — Britain’s Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), responsible for signals intelligence — dedicated vast resources to fooling around on the Internet, according to journalist Glenn […]

PARIS — Billionaire Hungarian-American oligarch George Soros is an extremely concerned humanitarian who can be counted on to put his considerable bank balance where his concerns are. Lately, those concerns have included Ukraine and other former Soviet satellite states; Syria; immigration rights in America; the U.S. banking system; and the Great Lakes region of Africa, […]

The Islamic terrorist army often referred to as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) has made a faster womb-to-superstardom ascension than Justin Bieber. Largely unheard of just a few weeks ago, the group is now the self-proclaimed new ruler of an Islamic caliphate, or republic, extending across Iraq and Syria. These countries […]

The irony of recent U.S. foreign interventions is that despite Uncle Sam’s best efforts, the ultimate benefactor ends up being America’s primary economic rival in the area in question. It should come as no surprise that the two economic rivals who usually benefit are China and Russia, both absolute masters of subversion. According to ancient […]

PARIS — The fact that U.S. President Barack Obama is putting hundreds of boots back onto the ground in Iraq to protect American interests is the result of some bad decisions and missed opportunities to correct course. Except that Russian President Vladimir Putin had already staked out the proper course — and the Obama administration […]

PARIS — On June 6, the Central Intelligence Agency joined the social media platform Twitter with its first tweet: “We can neither confirm nor deny that this is our first tweet.” Presumably this is an attempt by the agency to develop its “brand.” Here’s why this is a really bad idea: — The CIA doesn’t […]

PARIS — U.S. President Barack Obama recently agreed to the release of five Taliban leaders from Guantanamo Bay prison in exchange for an alleged U.S. military deserter. It’s great trade for the soldier, Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who will be reunited with his loved ones back in America. Nonetheless, it’s a bad precedent for America. Obama […]