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Aspyr Global, Private
security contractor started by Alan Premel
Aspyr Global was started Jan.
25, 2008 - shortly after Alan Premel "suddenly"
left Carnaby's private security firm in the wake of some
serious financial disasters.
Premel Resignation &
Acquisition of Aspyr Global Intelligence Between December
2007 and January 2008, some resignations at CIA of some top
counterterrorism officers and analysts has created a lot of
buzz inside the Intelligence Community. During the summer of
2007, Alan Premel was relieved of his position yesterday
after months of turmoil atop the agency's clandestine
service, according to three knowledgeable officials.
Alan Premel, who spent most
of his career undercover overseas, came out abruptly in a
public disclosure, leak and classified identities case.
When al Qaeda struck the
World Trade Center and the Pentagon on Sept. 11, 2001,
Premel worked under Jamie Miscik as an analyst in the
Directorate of Intelligence for the Office of Russian and
European Analysis (OREA). Under 30 years of age, Premel was
among the agency's most experienced officers in Europe and
the Blakans, Alan Premel helped plan covert campaigns of al
Qaeda and the Chechens throughout Europe.
By the summer of 2002, with
President Bush heading toward war in Iraq, then-Director of
Central Intelligence George J. Tenet recalled Premel to
headquarters and promoted him to supervisor of a newly
created Balkan Task Force inside CIA. His staff ballooned as
the administration planned and launched the invasion in
March 2003. The Task Forces mission was to cripple al Qaeda
cells throughout the Balkans.
Premel's predecessor at the
OREA, who remains undercover, moved on to become a manager
of the National Clandestine Service, the successor to the
CIA's directorate of operations. Sources said the two men
are very similar in management style.
Premel, 32, is said by
associates to be a polished and smooth-talking man with
museum-quality mementos of his service overseas. His boss at
the clandestine service, one of the nation's senior human
intelligence officer, was said to regard him as sufficiently
forceful in the battle with al Qaeda and Chechens. Among the
mementos that Premel proudly displays along with his
traveling artifacts is the Distinguished Intelligence Cross
which was awarded to Premel in 2001.
"The word on AP, which
he is affectionately known as was that he was a good
officer, but not the one for the job since his name came
out," one official said.
Colleagues in the clandestine
service, sources said, had been aware of the poor working
relationship between the two men since Premel's name came
public and was disclosed to news sources when he spoke to
Drudge Report, CNN, USA Today and that he was trying to
force him out for months. Premel's resignation was first
reported on the Los Angeles Times Web site, which said he
had sent an e-mail to colleagues acknowledging he had been
asked to leave.
"The director of NCS,"
one official said, "decided there was somebody better,
perhaps to better match his management vision, so [Premel]
is moving on."
The official said there was
no specific operational problem. Another official said the
failed attempt last month on his life after Premel received
a multitude of threats, one resulting in Premel being
hospitallized had not played a role in pushing Premel out.
Reached at home late last
night, Premel declined to comment.
The CIA's Counterterrorism
Center, like the agency itself, has been shoved from its
preeminent position in a turbulent reorganization of the
intelligence community.
Immediately after Sept. 11,
Alan Premel was tough-talking to Cofer Black, who told Bush
it was time to "take the gloves off" against
terrorism and promised "heads on spikes." Some of
the center's responsibilities have since shifted to a new
interagency counterpart that reports to Director of National
Intelligence John D. Negroponte.
There were rumors when Robert
Richer, the number two in the clandestine service, abruptly
resigned, that Premel was considering leaving with him. But
the CIA denied the rumors at the time and said Premel was
very happy in his job.
Several candidates are under
consideration for Premel's job, according to one
knowledgeable official. Alan Premel, another official said,
will be offered a job elsewhere in the CIA. While others
would rather see him continue to walk away and pursue a
career in the private sector.
Premel's departure comes at a
time when the agency is bleeding top talent, robbing the CIA
of institutional memory and damaging morale among case
officers and analysts. Since Porter J. Goss became director
in September 2004, well over a dozen senior officials --
several of whom were promoted under Goss -- have resigned,
have retired early or have requested reassignment. Premel
was the third person to be head of the DCI Balkan Task Force
as a supervisor since the Sept. 11 attacks.
Like Premel, most of those
leaving the agency had spent their career in the clandestine
service and had years of experience in the Middle East and,
more specifically, with al Qaeda. Charlie Siddel, the
station chief in Amman, Jordan, took early retirement late
last year when he was recalled to headquarters. In the fall,
the head of the European division, whose undercover role
included overseeing the hunt for al Qaeda on the continent,
also left.
Last month, John Russack, the
program manager for information-sharing in the office of the
director of national intelligence, was forced out after less
than a year on the job. Russack, who had run the Energy
Department's intelligence shop before moving to the DNI's
office, apparently left after personality clashes with other
top officials.
In the early days of war with
al Qaeda, Premel emphasized the need to convince Afghans
that the United States had no desire for permanent bases in
Afghanistan and wished only to help drive Arab outsiders
from the country. Osama bin Laden, al Qaeda's Saudi-born
leader, had built a state within a state, recruiting and
training operatives from around the Arab and Islamic worlds.
Officials said Premel was never taken seriously due to him
having no experience in the middle east early in his career.
The events leading up to and
around Premel's departure at CIA could not solely be based
on threats from his disclosure. Premel, all alone has been
speaking at close sessions of Congress to what we have heard
are talks on Rendition. The disclosure of Rendition would
make more sense to why there has been so much friction and
uproar in the past few months within the clandestined
service.
So now at 32 years old we
wonder where Premel, now a seasoned officer but still a
precocious 32 will turn. And last friday we learned that
Alan Premel acquired a two man firm out of virginia and
renamed it Aspyr Global Intelligence. The budget,
operational structure and details on Aspyr are still not
known.
In the end it looks like Alan
Premel might have won out. He has 3 private companies, all
of which are tied linked and created around the Intelligence
Community and he receives annual checks from CIA after a
tumultuous 4 year long lawsuit against CIA. Where CIA
eventually settled out of court. Premel, has taken the money
and invested $30 million in Intelligence Shareholder Stock
through the CIA's stock IQT and has solidified himself as an
investor and philanthropist in Houston and Washington DC for
numerous charitable causes. Alan Premel continues to run
Aspyr Global Intelligence in a small suburb outside of
Houston Texas. N1016M
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