GSN Exclusive – With SBInet behind it, CBP develops a new procurement strategy

On Jan. 20. To understand where CBP is now headed, said Borkowski, it would be useful to understand what went wrong with SBInet.

Essentially, during the Bush administration and the early years of the newly-created Department of Homeland Security, the senior leadership of CBP were in a big hurry to gain control over illegal immigrants who were crossing the southern border day and night, with impunity, by the thousands. Even before they had figured out how the U.S. Border Patrol would operationally use enhanced video surveillance, radar, ground sensors, tactical communications and other technologies, CBP decided to “outsource” the conception and implementation of this major interconnected undertaking to a world-class systems integrator.

“We used a competitive procurement program as a substitute for our own requirements analysis,” recalled Borkowski, of the birth of SBInet in 2006. “It was guaranteed to be a disaster.”

Technical problems emerged with individual components (which had never been deployed before) and with the integration of these systems (which had never been asked to work hand-in-hand before.) Schedule delays occurred. Criticism mounted. And eventually the Obama administration pulled the plug on SBInet in January 2011.

US radar system starts surveillance in Turkey despite strong opposition from Iran

ISTANBUL, Jan. 14 (Xinhua) -- U.S. early warning radar system started its surveillance activities in Turkey early this year despite strong opposition from Iran.

Local Hurriyet Daily News reported that the radar system was deployed in eastern Anatolian province of Malatya and began operation on Jan. 1.

The report said that a small number of U.S. troops were deployed to the military base at Kurecik in Malatya in the last week of 2011 since Turkey's military has no qualified personnel to run the U.S. AN/TPY-2 (X-band) early warning radar system.

Despite the deployment, the installation is a Turkish base and will be commanded by a Turkish high-ranking officer.

Turkey agreed to the deployment of the early warning radar system on its territory in mid-2011. Iran has strongly opposed Turkey's move to deploy the radar.

On Thursday, Iranian Parliamentary Speaker Ali Larijani told Turkey at a press conference: "The U.S. radar stationed in Turkey is no good for any Muslim country," demanding further information on the matter.

Somebody's Watching Me

1.(Sometimes capital letters 'V' and 'S' with no space) a style of writing or saying something using emotion and/or logic and snark, esp. in order to elucidate the obvious while pretending to be objective.

2. anything written by The Vidiot, The Sailor, Mr. Vidiot and anyone else they allow to post on the blog “vidiotspeak”

[Origin: loosely based on new + speak, coined by George Orwell in his novel, 1984 (1949)]

Source: Somebody's Watching Me

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