DefenceTalkRussia’s setbacks in its invasion of Ukraine could lead President Vladimir Putin to resort to using a tactical or low-yield nuclear weapon, CIA director William Burns said Thursday. “Given the potential desperation of President Putin and the Russian leadership, given the setbacks that they’ve faced so far, militarily, none of us can take lightly the […]https://www.defencetalk.com/cia-warns-desperate-putin-poses-nuclear-threat-78693/

DefenceTalkUS Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) chief William Burns held a secret meeting in Kabul with Taliban co-founder Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday, citing unnamed US officials. The Monday meeting, which if confirmed will have been the highest-level encounter between the Taliban and the Biden administration since the group’s return to […]

DefenceTalkUS Central Intelligence Agency chief William Burns was due in Israel Tuesday for talks on common foe Iran, as rising tensions overshadow talks on restoring a landmark nuclear deal. A spokesman for Prime Minister Naftali Bennett gave no details of the agenda for the CIA chief’s talks in Israel. But the Walla News website said […]

DefenceTalkThe US Central Intelligence Agency said Wednesday it had formed a special unit dedicated to assessing North Korea’s nuclear weapons threat. The CIA created its first single country-focused mission center, pulling together resources from a range of units to collect and analyze information on Pyongyang’s nuclear weapons and long-range ballistic missile technology that could extend […]https://www.defencetalk.com/cia-forms-special-unit-focused-on-north-korea-threat-69958/

DefenceTalkUS President Donald Trump said Wednesday he thinks waterboarding and other interrogation techniques widely seen as torture — and prohibited by law — “absolutely” work, but would defer to his CIA and Pentagon chiefs on whether to reinstate them. When asked about waterboarding in an interview with ABC News at the White House, Trump said […]https://www.defencetalk.com/trump-says-torture-works-but-will-follow-cia-pentagon-advice-68906/

DefenceTalkOn October 30, 1962 President John F. Kennedy received a secret CIA briefing on the first results of his diplomatic dance with Nikita Khrushchev to end the Cuban missile crisis. Now, thanks to a major release of previously classified CIA documents, Cold War historians can read along with him the daily memos he and his […]https://www.defencetalk.com/inside-cold-war-oval-office-cia-releases-intel-briefs-65453/

DefenceTalkThe leader of Al-Qaeda’s branch in Yemen was targeted in a CIA drone strike last week, though US officials would not immediately confirm he had been killed, The Washington Post reported Monday. Nasir al-Wuhayshi’s group, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, is behind several plots against the United States, including an attempt to blow up a […]https://www.defencetalk.com/cia-drone-strike-targets-top-al-qaeda-leader-in-yemen-report-64511/

DefenceTalkA US federal judge has reinstated a CIA cloud computing contract with Amazon, rejecting a challenge from IBM, according to court documents released Tuesday. Judge Thomas Wheeler of the Federal Court of Claims said in a notice posted by the court that Amazon Web Services’ is “restored” and that a “corrective action stay is lifted.” […]https://www.defencetalk.com/us-court-sides-with-amazon-on-cia-cloud-contract-49324/

DefenceTalkThe CIA selected Amazon over IBM to build a cloud computing service for the spy agency even though IBM’s proposal carried a lower price tag, according to a government report. IBM protested the CIA’s decision to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), the investigative arm of Congress, which sided with IBM on two of its main […]https://www.defencetalk.com/cia-faulted-for-choosing-amazon-over-ibm-on-cloud-contract-48203/