OF PROPAGANDA AND INTELLIGENCE BLUNDER

Abu Munzir, Ph.D

The PDRM would like Malaysians to believe that it is among the best, if not the best in the world. The Affidavits of the ISA detainees recount Special Branch interrogators boasting that they are better than the CIA. Yet recent events cast serious doubts on the effectiveness and competence of the SB specifically, and PDRM in general.

The essence of any intelligence effort is to gather accurate information for the purpose of security and threat assessment. The emphasis here is on accurate information. To achieve this, intelligence services need to be objective in their assessment of potential threats. This requires a certain degree of independence in its thinking. What course of action will ultimately be taken  is something that will be decided by the political leadership. These three aspect, i.e. intelligence gathering, threat assessment and action decision has to be kept separate to ensure an objective outcome esp. in the first two processes.

The failure of any intelligence service begins with its inability of take make an objective assessment of the situation. The failure of the US intelligence to predict the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour was not so much because of the lack on information. Instead, those who had to make the assessment and decision were perceptually biased. They felt that it was impossible that the Japanese, being non-Westerners, would dare attack the US. There was also a feeling of US invincibility. This perceptual bias led the US to ignore all the gathered intelligence showing that a Japanese attack was imminent.

If we were to observe the behaviour of PDRM, it is apparent that a similar perceptual bias exists. It has become so subservient to the  political wishes of BN that it has lost its objectivity and independence. It seems that anything that is a threat to BN is equated to be a threat to national security. It fails to see the distinction between legitimate and democratic political activities and dissent, and national security. Instead, we see the PRDM and SB behaving more like the security apparatus of  UMNO.

SB interrogators even went to the extent of  trying to persuade some of the ISA detainees to join UMNO. And when they were not doing that they seem to be projecting their own sexual fantasies by making all kinds of ludicrous allegation about the detainees' and their spouses' sex lives. As result of this jaundiced outlook of the PDRM, most of its intelligence work is directed towards ensuring the survival of UMNO. PDRM no longer serves the role as an instrument of democracy. Instead, it is subjugating democracy. Thus, we see a lot of PDRM effort in the last several months has been directed towards manufacturing allegations of opposition violence. As usual, when the PDRM cannot muster any evidence to support its claims the ISA becomes the favourite tool.

Yet at the same time we see the miserable failure of the PDRM is collecting accurate intelligence. The incidence involving Al Mau'nah in Sauk demonstrates this fact. The group is an officially registered organization and even has a website. When it struck and committed the arm heist in Grik, the SB had no forewarning of it. Even more embarrassing are the recent events since September 11. The media report in the US of Usamah Ben Laden's operatives having been in Malaysia came as a surprise to the government. How is it that foreign intelligence knew more about what took place in Malaysia that Malaysia's venerated SB?

An even more embarrassing event is the discovery that a number of letters containing anthrax were posted from Malaysia. Well, anthrax is not something that can be bought from the  local mini-market. It has to be either brought into this country or manufactured in a lab and then posted  to the US. All these require considerable organization and sophistication. It appears that there is an organized cell operating for this purpose. Yet, our  SB totally failed to identify and detect the presence of this cell.  This is only the beginning. Be prepared for more embarrassing revelations in the future.

That this large blind spot exists in Malaysia’s intelligence service should not come  as a surprise. The PRDM, and its SB, has been a part of the instrument of BN's, esp. UMNO, propaganda for so long that it has failed in serving its purpose in protecting national security. Instead of making a careful and comprehensive intelligence effort, the PDRM has been spending more time manufacturing the myth of reformasi violence and KMM. It has been so preoccupied with this that is has become detracted from the real issues of national security. In fact, the PDRM has committed one cardinal sin in psywar i.e. it believed in its own propaganda (of reformasi violence and KMM) and has been deceived by its own lie. It believes in a bogey that does not exists and fails to see the real villians.

To PDRM  the security and survival of UMNO and BN has become more important than national security. PDRM's eagerness to serve its political godfather has in fact jeopardized national security. It continues on this witch hunt of the mythical KMM. And the real security threats to this country continue to operate unhindered.

Thus, one must one be blamed for laughing when hearing Papa Doc Mahathir claiming Malaysia  intends to become a model country in fighting terrorism. How can Malaysia be a model country when the SB seems more like a bunch of incompetent and bumbling idiots suffering from some form of unresolved grief stemming from a version of Oedipus complex? What more when the SUHAKAM report released recently shows that the PDRM itself is a perpetrator of  terror, albeit a state sponsored one? Likewise, when Papa Doc Mahathir tries to sermonize the US about looking at the injustice that is the source of terrorism, he should be looking at the injustices closer to home. But how can he? The PDRM and its SB have become blinkers on his eyes!