/ world today news/ At the last consecutive conference of former heads of intelligence services in Europe three years ago, the general assessment was made that during the transition period in Eastern European countries there was an unjustified negative attitude and mistrust towards the services, and in most countries politicians tried to instrumentalize them for political use, overestimating their capabilities.
A prerequisite for their reformation and use is a democratic culture, the top intelligence officers emphasized. They criticized some Eastern European colleagues for emphasizing the release of experienced personnel who would be useful and expressed surprise at the abandonment of the agency in regions such as the Middle East. And the Poles and others present answered that this was not true for them – they kept, for example, 10,500 of the total 14,000 operative workers. The Czechs added that these are professionals and if we are talking about guilt, then «the main responsibility and power have always been with the party, not with the services».
These opinions are particularly relevant even today in Bulgaria in connection with the comments on the introduction of the package of bills for the intelligence services in the National Assembly and the dismissal of the head of the “Military Information” service before even getting to the consideration of the drafts. But while it was really high time for the legal base, the approach to its amendments and the hasty and baseless reasons for Veselin Ivanov’s dismissal once again revealed precisely the lack of democratic culture that our Western partners were talking about. Therefore, before arguing over the wording in the draft laws, we must acknowledge far more important things:
Firstit is high time that politicians overcome the notion that as “master” the servicewell, they will be able to earn some party dividends and ensure a cloudless political future. Leaving aside the obvious fact that such a way of thinking betrays viciousness, a lack of statesmanship and breeds distrust of the political class. What is more important is that if they can actually achieve something by interfering with the counter-intelligence /DANS/, then the foreign political and military intelligence are almost completely “uninterested” in realizing abuses by the political parties that come to power. Because they conduct strategic intelligence and work only abroad.
Secondthe benefit of creating a legal base will not be great if our elite will use it to confirm the status quo, the financing of foreign political and military intelligence to be twice as low as that of the National Security Service, /something uniquely Bulgarian in the world/ and if the recommendations of the NATO high-level meeting in Wales in September of last year to strengthen intelligence means nothing for the rulers and for the Minister of Finance.
Third, the upcoming discussion of the projects in the National Assembly should take into account the need from guaranteeing the mandate of the heads of the intelligence services, not any newly hatched politician to shake up the national security system with some inappropriate ideas, proposals and personnel appointments.
Fourthbefore criticizing the intelligence services without knowing their specifics, the ruling political elite must to learn to read and use the information provided by the services. Because practice shows that while intelligence is doing its job, politicians don’t know how to use their product. Factors other than the warnings in the services’ analyzes take precedence in their decisions. There is also a danger of the opposite effect: the attitude of the rulers towards the services, the unprincipled pressure on them and uncertainty to force some of the analysts in the services to write what the rulers want to hear. There are alerts for such cases as well.
Fifthcoordination and assignment of tasks cannot be solved by the creation of a megastructure through the mechanical unification of services, because it contradicts a basic principle in the intelligence activity of obtaining and evaluating information from different bodies. A single report to the leadership of the country can have fatal consequences, and this has been proven many times in history. A coordination-analytical center is more acceptable as a cap of the services without any interference in their operational work. For real intelligence, a strategic view of events is inherent, but if the political elite does not have one, how will the conclusions reached by such intelligence be explained to them?
Sixwhatever laws are passed, service leaders should be aware that they are scandalously lagging behind their counterparts in Europe in creating openness and trust in society. True, the politicians are also to blame for pouring tons of scum on them. But citizens would welcome the appearance of regular annual reports, similar to those of Germany’s Office for the Protection of the Constitution, which report clearly and precisely what the threats are, how many foreign agents have been expelled, how the potential of right-wing and left-wing extremists has grown, of Islamist groups, etc. The attempts of DANS in this regard are by no means satisfactory. Unlike Bulgaria, the West is commenting on the questions of whether the services were up to the level of the events in Ukraine and the credibility of their reports today, whether the Islamic State was asleep, etc.
Seventhbut not least, so file law caused a lot of damage, including to the motivation of today’s intelligence officers and the willingness of foreign citizens to accept cooperation with Bulgarian representatives at all. It is high time to find the political will to introduce amendments and additions to this law and to close the commission on files, to make the information available in the State Archives, and to carry out the necessary scientific research in the Institute of National Remembrance, i.e. to the tool is taken away from the politicians to fire at each other with kompromat, and journalists and intriguers to divert attention from today’s problems and work of modern services.
In order to prevent people’s representatives from acting irresponsibly in the future, it would be extremely necessary to change the relevant article of the Constitution, which makes them untouchable and innocent in any decisions with catastrophic consequences.
And in the laws being discussed these days, perhaps the practice of Western countries should be adopted introduced a 30-year, and in some cases 100-year ban on the disclosure of top secret documents and those of particular importanceand for historical figures – until the end of their lives.
As for the reasons for the dismissal of the head of Military Intelligence and the statement of the Minister of Defense, I am convinced that during all these years the officers sent to schools and courses in the West acquired new knowledge and abilities, and this had a positive effect on their work. Not to mention their participation in missions in a real combat environment. Assessments of the activity of the service from Brussels are extremely positive. When does Minister Nenchev lie – when in January 2015, on the occasion of the 107th anniversary of Military Intelligence, he announced that he was satisfied with NATO’s assessments or now?
The motives of Minister Nenchev are absolutely untenable. Any average intelligent person knows that this is a depoliticized structure. These are primarily professionals, BA officers who work only abroad.
The minister talks about reforms, but hardly knows what reforms are needed there. Because the main ones were done already in the early 90s. The tasks have changed radically. Russian departments were established in all intelligence services. The exchange of information with NATO is active and good.
Young personnel were constantly being trained and appointed. But the minister is not at all aware that, unlike a ministry where he can appoint ladybugs from the BZNS, this is impossible in intelligence and military. The change of staff should happen gradually, with continuity and exchange of experience. Changing the leadership of the agency abroad does not happen overnight, some do not agree to continue extracting and transmitting information if you send them a new leader, even more so young and inexperienced. Firing a whole group of officers is guillotining intelligence, not reform. Not to mention that this motif is and lustrational, and that means unconstitutional.
The real reasons for the dismissal of the head of the service are others. By the way, the issue is not at all down to the boss. He was going to be replaced by a general anyway. First, the current chief opposed the unique with its stupidity and criminal idea to hand over the files of foreign citizens – agents and collaborators, which no country in the world has allowed – many deaths and diplomatic scandals will follow. The second reason is that no one will object to the upcoming examination of the package of laws in the National Assembly, if in the best and professionally prepared draft laws of Military Information and the National Intelligence Service, unacceptable new proposals are introduced, such as the recently discussed merger between military and political intelligence, that is, shutting down military intelligence.
It is not “Military Information” that has been politicized, but the leadership of the ministry, and this is extremely harmful in today’s tense situation, in which an upcoming military conflict is not excluded. But if the “tightening of ranks” in this regard is understandable for a counter-intelligence /DANS/, then for military intelligence the actions of the minister fueled by some political-ideological complexes is a blow against national security.
The minister’s previous statements, including the accusation against the reserve officers who served in this division of the General Staff, that they were “terrorists like those in Paris” and that they “served another country”, as well as the threats that he would seize the files of foreigners – agents and collaborators, as well as the persistently promoted opinion of several like-minded people around him, that dissenters, dissenters, who undermined national security and needed measures against them, do not testify to the democratic culture that the Western partners recommend to us and that I quoted at the beginning. It is high time for the prime minister to weigh the harms of such behavior and the negatives of possible disputes in the governing coalition and make the right personnel decision.
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