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[infowar.de] WT 29.09.03 CIA pursues video game
Infowar.de, http://userpage.fu-berlin.de/~bendrath/liste.html
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mal wieder was für die Simulations- & Trainingsfraktion: ICT
The Washington Times
www.washingtontimes.com
CIA pursues video game
By Bill Gertz
Published September 29, 2003
The CIA is set to spend several million dollars to develop a video
game aimed at helping its analysts think like terrorists, The Washington
Times has learned.
The agency's Counter Terrorist Center, or CTC, is working with the
Los Angeles-based Institute for Creative Technologies on a project
designed to help its analysts, "think outside the box," a CIA spokesman
said. The project is close to approval, but officials wouldn't comment
on the exact cost of the program.
The institute, part of the University of Southern California, works
with Hollywood movie and video game specialists.
Disclosure of the CIA video game project follows the Pentagon's
recent cancellation of a plan for an online gambling parlor designed to
predict a Middle East terrorist attack. The Pentagon's gambling scheme
led to the resignation of retired Navy Vice Adm. John Poindexter, head
of the Total Information Awareness data-mining counterterrorism program.
A military official said the CIA video game is "a ridiculous and
absurd scheme that makes Poindexter's project look good in comparison."
A second critic of the program said: "These absurd ideas about
countering terrorism suggest that the war on terrorism has been a
failure, that terrorists are still ahead and that the CTC does not know
what it is doing. The key issue here is the CTC misspending funds on
silly, low-priority projects, exactly the kind of thing that forced
Admiral Poindexter to resign."
CIA spokesman Mark Mansfield defended the video project and called
it an "innovative approach" to counterterrorism. The game will select a
scenario that could involve analysts playing terrorist-cell leaders or
members, a terrorist "money mover" or a facilitator, he said.
"For out-of-the-box thinking, we are reaching out to academics,
think tanks and external research institutes that are critical in the
fight against terrorism," Mr. Mansfield said. "If it will help us to
prevent terrorist attacks, it is worthwhile."
A CIA analyst playing the game also could be placed in the role of
CIA analyst or operations officer, a U.S. Customs agent or even a
cooperative or hostile neighbor living next to a terrorist.
"Analysts would have to think and act inside the character they
choose or are assigned," Mr. Mansfield said.
The goal, he said, is for "our analysts to become accustomed to
looking at the world from the perspective of the terrorists we are
chasing."
Richard Lindheim, the institute's executive director, said in an
interview that the goal of the CIA game project is to train analysts.
"They will put their analysts in analytical specialities in one role
or another and then change the roles," Mr. Lindheim said. "It's a
learning tool."
He said the institute develops simulations, such as the virtual
reality simulator that it installed recently at the Army's Fort Sill in
Oklahoma.
The institute also makes video games.
"We think computer games are a really good way of imparting
information," he said. "We don't call them games; we call them
computer-based training aids."
A game developed by the institute for the Army, called "Full
Spectrum Warrior" and designed to help soldiers conduct peacekeeping
operations, has won awards, he added. The institute has also received
$45 million from the Army for other projects, including the warrior
game.
The Army game involves no shooting, Mr. Lindheim said.
"It's a decision-making strategy game," he said. "You never have a
gun. What you do is issue orders and see the effect of those orders.
That's the value of it."
Administration officials said the game is typical of the
"politically correct" Army under recently retired Army Chief of Staff
Gen. Eric Shinseki.
The CTC has come under fire from some in Congress for the
intelligence failures related to the September 11 terrorist attacks.
The September 11 congressional committee stated that the CTC staff
doubled from 400 to 800 after the attacks. Agency sources said that the
number of people, including CIA and other intelligence and
law-enforcement agencies, is now around 1,000.
The video game project is part of a $10 million "academic outreach"
program at the Counter Terrorist Center, headed by a CIA analyst. Army
officials say the analyst was responsible for derailing the career of a
senior Army intelligence officer by making false claims of sexual
harassment against the officer.
According to the officials, several Army officials objected to the
CIA video game project because they feared disclosure of the game would
undermine the service's work with the California institute for its
transformation and training program.
The analyst and several other CIA counterterrorism officials have
traveled to the institute and got VIP tours of movie studios in the
area, according to administration officials.
Other projects being worked on by the California institute
reportedly include Roman shields with skateboards that come off the
sides of tanks, and foam sprayed by troops that can stop tank rounds.
The congressional joint inquiry report stated that in 1999 an
internal CTC study found that the center "was unable to carry out more
ambitious plans against al Qaeda for lack of money and personnel."
The CTC funding and personnel shortfalls were highlighted at a time
when CIA Director George J. Tenet said the agency in 1998 had declared
"war" on Osama bin Laden's al Qaeda group.
According to administration officials, several Army officials
objected to the CIA video game project because they feared it would
undermine the service's work in using the California institute for its
transformation program.
Copyright © 2003 News World Communications, Inc. All rights reserved.
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