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Covert Operation
A covert operation is a military operation intended to conceal the identity of (or allow plausible deniability by) the party that instigated the operation. Covert operations should not be confused with clandestine operations, which are performed in secret and meant to stay secret. Covert operations aim to secretly fulfill their mission objectives without anyone knowing who sponsored or carried out the operation, or in some cases, without anyone knowing that the operation has even occurred. Impact According to a 2018 study by University of Chicago political scientist Austin Carson, covert operations may have the beneficial effect of preventing escalation of disputes into full-blown wars. He argues that keeping military operations secret can limit escalation dynamics, as well as insulate leaders from domestic pressures while simultaneously allowing them communicating their interest to the adversary in keeping a war contained. He finds that covert operations are frequently dete ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plausible Deniability
Plausible deniability is the ability of people, typically senior officials in a formal or informal chain of command, to denial, deny knowledge of or responsibility for any damnable actions committed by members of their organizational hierarchy. They may do so because of a lack or absence of evidence that can confirm their participation, even if they were personally involved in or at least willful blindness, willfully ignorant of the actions. If illegal or otherwise disreputable and unpopular activities become public, high-ranking officials may deny any awareness of such acts to insulate themselves and Blame#Blame shifting, shift the blame onto the agents who carried out the acts, as they are confident that their doubters will be unable to prove otherwise. The lack of evidence to the contrary ostensibly makes the denial plausible (credible), but sometimes, it makes any accusations only cause of action, unactionable. The term typically implies forethought, such as intentionally setti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stealth Technology
Stealth technology, also termed low observable technology (LO technology), is a sub-discipline of military tactics and passive and active electronic countermeasures, which covers a range of methods used to make personnel, aircraft, ships, submarines, missiles, satellites, and ground vehicles less visible (ideally invisible) to radar, infrared, sonar and other detection methods. It corresponds to military camouflage for these parts of the electromagnetic spectrum (i.e., multi-spectral camouflage). Development of modern stealth technologies in the United States began in 1958, where earlier attempts to prevent radar tracking of its U-2 spy planes during the Cold War by the Soviet Union had been unsuccessful. Designers turned to developing a specific shape for planes that tended to reduce detection by redirecting electromagnetic radiation waves from radars. Radiation-absorbent material was also tested and made to reduce or block radar signals that reflect off the surfaces o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Terrorist Front Organization
A terrorist front organization is created to conceal activities or provide logistical or financial support to the illegal activities. See also * Hawala, an informal value transfer system useful to terrorists (and criminals) for transmission of money outside of regulated channels. * List of charities accused of ties to terrorism This is a list of charities accused of ties to terrorism. A number of charities have been accused or convicted in court of using their revenues to fund terrorism or revolutionary movements, rather than for the humanitarian purposes for which con ... Sources Hawala. An Informal Payment System and Its Use to Finance Terrorismby Sebastian R. Müller (Dec. 2006) {{Terrorism topics Front organizations ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nazi Era
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a dictatorship. Under Hitler's rule, Germany quickly became a totalitarian state where nearly all aspects of life were controlled by the government. The Third Reich, meaning "Third Realm" or "Third Empire", alluded to the Nazi claim that Nazi Germany was the successor to the earlier Holy Roman Empire (800–1806) and German Empire (1871–1918). The Third Reich, which Hitler and the Nazis referred to as the Thousand-Year Reich, ended in May 1945 after just 12 years when the Allies defeated Germany, ending World War II in Europe. On 30 January 1933, Hitler was appointed chancellor of Germany, the head of government, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Deutsche Verkehrsfliegerschule
The Deutsche Verkehrsfliegerschule (DVS), German Air Transport School, was a covert military-training organization operating as a flying school in Germany. It began during the Weimar Republic in Staaken, Berlin in 1925 and its head office was transferred in 1929 to Broitzem airfield near Braunschweig. The DVS was outwardly a flying school for commercial pilots, but in fact became a secret military arm training military aviators for the future Luftwaffe. This training facility grew in importance in the initial stages of Nazi Germany, while camouflaging as a harmless civilian organization (''Tarnorganisation''), at the time of Germany's rearmament in violation of the Versailles Treaty. On May 31, 1945, after Nazi Germany's defeat in World War II, the American Military Government issued a special law outlawing the Nazi Party and all of its branches. Known as "Law number five", this Denazification decree disbanded the ''Deutsche Verkehrsfliegschule'' and its facilities were ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Front Organization
A front organization is any entity set up by and controlled by another organization, such as intelligence agencies, organized crime groups, terrorist organizations, secret societies, banned organizations, religious or political groups, advocacy groups, or corporations. Front organizations can act for the parent group without the actions being attributed to the parent group, thereby allowing them to hide certain activities from the authorities or the public. Front organizations that appear to be independent voluntary associations or charitable organizations are called front groups. In the business world, front organizations such as front companies or shell corporations are used to shield the parent company from legal liability. In international relations, a puppet state is a state which acts as a front (or surrogate) for another state. Intelligence agencies Intelligence agencies use front organizations to provide "cover", plausible occupations and means of income, for th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Front Group
A front organization is any entity set up by and controlled by another organization, such as intelligence agencies, organized crime groups, terrorist organizations, secret societies, banned organizations, religious or political groups, advocacy groups, or corporations. Front organizations can act for the parent group without the actions being attributed to the parent group, thereby allowing them to hide certain activities from the authorities or the public. Front organizations that appear to be independent voluntary associations or charitable organizations are called front groups. In the business world, front organizations such as front companies or shell corporations are used to shield the parent company from legal liability. In international relations, a puppet state is a state which acts as a front (or surrogate) for another state. Intelligence agencies Intelligence agencies use front organizations to provide "cover", plausible occupations and means of income, for their cov ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
False Flag
A false flag operation is an act committed with the intent of disguising the actual source of responsibility and pinning blame on another party. The term "false flag" originated in the 16th century as an expression meaning an intentional misrepresentation of someone's allegiance. The term was famously used to describe a ruse in naval warfare whereby a vessel flew the flag of a neutral or enemy country in order to hide its true identity. The tactic was originally used by pirates and privateers to deceive other ships into allowing them to move closer before attacking them. It later was deemed an acceptable practice during naval warfare according to international maritime laws, provided the attacking vessel displayed its true flag once an attack had begun. The term today extends to include countries that organize attacks on themselves and make the attacks appear to be by enemy nations or terrorists, thus giving the nation that was supposedly attacked a pretext for domestic repr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Subversion (politics)
Subversion () refers to a process by which the values and principles of a system in place are contradicted or reversed in an attempt to transform the established social order and its structures of power, authority, hierarchy, and social norms. Subversion can be described as an attack on the public morale and, "the will to resist intervention are the products of combined political and social or class loyalties which are usually attached to national symbols. Following penetration, and parallel with the forced disintegration of political and social institutions of the state, these tendencies may be detached and transferred to the political or ideological cause of the aggressor". Subversion is used as a tool to achieve political goals because it generally carries less risk, cost, and difficulty as opposed to open belligerency. Furthermore, it is a relatively cheap form of warfare that does not require large amounts of training. A subversive is something or someone carrying the poten ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Coup D'état
A coup d'état (; French for 'stroke of state'), also known as a coup or overthrow, is a seizure and removal of a government and its powers. Typically, it is an illegal seizure of power by a political faction, politician, cult, rebel group, military, or a dictator. Many scholars consider a coup successful when the usurpers seize and hold power for at least seven days. Etymology The term comes from French ''coup d'État'', literally meaning a 'stroke of state' or 'blow of state'. In French, the word ''État'' () is capitalized when it denotes a sovereign political entity. Although the concept of a coup d'état has featured in politics since antiquity, the phrase is of relatively recent coinage.Julius Caesar's civil war, 5 January 49 BC. It did not appear within an English text before the 19th century except when used in the translation of a French source, there being no simple phrase in English to convey the contextualized idea of a 'knockout blow to the existing administrat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Assassination
Assassination is the murder of a prominent or important person, such as a head of state, head of government, politician, world leader, member of a royal family or CEO. The murder of a celebrity, activist, or artist, though they may not have a direct role in matters of the state, may also sometimes be considered an assassination. An assassination may be prompted by political and military motives, or done for financial gain, to avenge a grievance, from a desire to acquire fame or notoriety, or because of a military, security, insurgent or secret police group's command to carry out the assassination. Acts of assassination have been performed since ancient times. A person who carries out an assassination is called an assassin or hitman. Etymology The word ''assassin'' may be derived from '' asasiyyin'' (Arabic: أَسَاسِيِّين, ʾasāsiyyīn) from أَسَاس (ʾasās, "foundation, basis") + ـِيّ (-iyy), meaning "people who are faithful to the fou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sabotage
Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening a polity, effort, or organization through subversion, obstruction, disruption, or destruction. One who engages in sabotage is a ''saboteur''. Saboteurs typically try to conceal their identities because of the consequences of their actions and to avoid invoking legal and organizational requirements for addressing sabotage. Etymology The English word derives from the French word , meaning to "bungle, botch, wreck or sabotage"; it was originally used to refer to labour disputes, in which workers wearing wooden shoes called interrupted production through different means. A popular but incorrect account of the origin of the term's present meaning is the story that poor workers in the Belgian city of Liège would throw a wooden into the machines to disrupt production. One of the first appearances of and in French literature is in the of d'Hautel, edited in 1808. In it the literal definition is to 'make noise with sabots' a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
