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International News Title: Japan Mulls Creating Its Own CIA As Japan recovers from the shock of the hostage crisis, lawmakers are beginning to consider how they could have responded to the situation better. One of the key issues being discussed is how to overcome Japans reliance on foreign intelligence agencies to gather information abroad, because Japan does not currently have an independent intelligence-gathering entity. A Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) project team is looking into changing that. The team, chaired by House of Representatives lawmaker Takeshi Iwaya, will look at the possibility of creating an independent intelligence-gathering agency like the United States Central Intelligence Agency or the United Kingdoms Secret Intelligence Service. The team will meet with U.S. and British experts and learn about the British model firsthand over the summer. They are scheduled to draft a proposal by this autumn. The thought of creating a new intelligence-gathering organization is in line with Japanese Prime Minster Shinzo Abes pledge to develop Japans intelligence capabilities. It is vital to strengthen the governments intelligence functions and gather more accurate, prompt information that will be reflected in the states strategic decision-making, Abe told the House of Representatives last week. Public opposition has so far prevented the creation of a dedicated intelligence agency, attitudes might be changing in light of the governments recent failure to rescue two Japanese hostages from Islamic State. The weakness of the current structure was vividly highlighted by Japans reliance on the CIA, Turkish intelligence, and Jordanian intelligence during the crisis. As it stands now, a senior NPA official said, Japan has no choice but to depend on foreign countries information. If a terrorist attack was plotted in Japan, the current state of preparedness could not prevent it from occurring. A more serious failure of the Japanese intelligence community was the revelation in spring 2004 that a senior member of an Al Qaeda-related organization had been hiding in Japan from September 1999 to September 2003 without being marked by the Japanese authorities. Creating a new intelligence entity would be Japans logical next step after having created the National Security Council, which coordinates analysis of information gathered by other government bodies such as the foreign ministry, the defense ministry and the National Police Agency. Abe has also begun taking additional steps to bolster intelligence gathering, sending more defense attaches to embassies in Jordan and other Middle East states. These defense attaches will be important for gathering military information; as Abe put it, Military intelligence units tend to only share information with other defense personnel.
Poster Comment: Hmmmm... it never occurred to me that the Japs didn't have their own spook agency... You'd think that they'd need some stealthy ninjas or something to protect themselves from China or North Korea...
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#1. To: Willie Green (#0)
Perhaps not just officially?
потому что Бог хочет это тот путь
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