MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
We wanted to talk these stories over with someone with experience in intelligence gathering. So we've called Daniel Hoffman. He's a former CIA senior executive clandestine service officer. He's now an advisory board member at the global consulting firm, BGR Group. Good morning, Mr. Hoffman.
DANIEL HOFFMAN: Good morning.
MARTIN: So let's just talk these through separately. In the case of the charges linked to Iran, we just heard about these alleged operatives carrying out attacks remotely, ranging from this FaceTime call from Iran to coded messages, passed from a New York jail. Is there something that strikes you about these details?
HOFFMAN: It does. Look, I think many would like to say that the war - U.S. war against Iran is over, but I would argue that in spite of their depleted military, the Iranians still have the capability to inflict harm on the United States. And for sure, our military bases and other critical locations are in the crosshairs for the Iranians. They want to demonstrate that they have the power to target us kinetically, and I think they believe that would give them leverage in whatever negotiations may or may not take place.
MARTIN: You know, the DOJ released a detailed narrative about the accused, including photos of them allegedly planning and directing terrorist attacks. How would they get that information?
HOFFMAN: Right. Well, a lot of the information that the terrorists would gain would be through open source. These days, what terrorists like to do is conduct surveillance of targets before they strike. And you can do a lot of that with Google Earth and other tools available on the internet. Now, that's also going to give us an opportunity, if we're watching them, to determine or to learn where they might be planning their next attack.
MARTIN: So does that suggest to you that these people were under surveillance at the time, but, oh, some of these attacks did take place? I guess that's one of the things that's sort of confusing about this.
HOFFMAN: Right, and there are probably ongoing attacks. So when we make arrests like these, and we hold alleged conspirators in custody, we're also at the same time, in an incident response phase, that there are possible attacks that have been attempted and we need to be aware of that. And we need to conduct sort of a damage assessment to understand where other threats may be out there, and then appropriately defend ourselves. We've seen that already at the U.S. Army bases in the U.K., and Iran has targeted our bases in the Middle East as well. They want to degrade the U.S. ability to project power both in the Middle East and globally.
MARTIN: Well, I guess what seems so concerning about this is that these threats seem so dispersed. So the question is, you can't surveil everyone. I guess...
HOFFMAN: Right.
MARTIN: ...That's the - that is the thing that seems so worrying about this. But these groups seem to operate in these small groups or small cells or individually, all over the world at this point. And I'm just wondering, how does one counter something like that?
HOFFMAN: Right. So that's definitely the challenge. These groups are operating reportedly at the behest of Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps. So the goal for the United States has always been to recruit sources inside the institutions of our adversaries, whether it's the KGB during the Cold War, or today in Iran, and that way, we may learn something about their planning. But you're absolutely right - when the attacks are being planned in such a dispersed way, without central control, it makes it extraordinarily difficult for us to detect the threat, way out what we like to call left of boom before any harm is caused to our installations or our homeland and then preempt the threat.
MARTIN: OK. Before we let you go, we have a minute left here. Let me talk about that other case, the case of the U.S. soldier arrested on suspicion of spying for Russia. I do have to emphasize here, no charges have been filed. A lot we don't know. But what questions do you have about this? What's open in your mind about this?
HOFFMAN: Well, look, it's quite significant if he was arrested and on suspicion of espionage, that is assisting a foreign intelligence service, obtaining, disclosing protected information. That's a big deal. We don't know when the Russians have recruited him. We don't know what information he passed. To connect these stories together, I can tell you that Russia and Iran have a very robust intelligence-sharing relationship. And so whatever Russia obtained from this U.S. Army officer, quite possibly, most likely, they passed it to the Iranians, not to mention their other allies. China, for example.
MARTIN: OK. I'll just say one more time that individuals are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. I just think it's important to sort of emphasize that since we do not know. That is former CIA senior executive clandestine service officer Daniel Hoffman. He's now with BGR Group. Mr. Hoffman, thanks so much.
HOFFMAN: Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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