The 10th Mountain Division, headquartered at Fort Drum, N.Y., got a new toy that will keep Soldiers in touch with their commanders as they reach the edges of their battlefield.

The Capability Set (CS) 13, inspired by rounds of testing by actual troops, uses a mobile satellite to keep all the echelons of a brigade on the same page.

Recently fielded to 10th Mountain's 3rd and 4th Brigade Combat Teams (BCT), the new equipment addresses the fact that most of the US military's fixed infrastructure will be handed over to Afghanistan as US troops draw down.

It's also a new way of distributing equipment. In the past, individual networks were issued; but in the case of the CS 13, the brigades got an integrated communications package. Dismounted soldiers will have better communication with the tactical operation center (TOC) instead of having to go through other steps.

Quicker communications give better situational awareness.

The system includes a range of goodies like smartphone-type gadgets, radios, and better software throughout. It was all validated by the Army's Network Integration Evaluations (NIE).

As the 10th Mountain explores the abilities of the new system, they'll offer their own feedback to the NIEs, making the CS 13 better for units that get it in the future.

The brigades will begin pre-deployment training in spring 2013.

Now watch China's live-fire training >

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One exchange in the pre-trial hearings in the military commission case against the alleged plotters of 9/11 pointed to the big, dark elephant in the room.

Torture.

The lawyers for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, and four alleged al-Qaeda conspirators contend that their treatment in secret CIA prisons is relevant to every aspect of the case.

But the judge, Army Colonel James Pohl, has repeatedly dismissed issues of torture raised by the defense.

Today Air Force Captain Michael Schwartz, Mohammed's lawyer, brought up the subject when arguing that forcibly bringing the defendants out of their cells and into court would remind them of their time in CIA custody.

The judge, Army Colonel James Pohl, once again declared that the topic of torture was not relevant to the discussion.

From Reuters: 

"We have to talk about torture," Schwartz said.

"No we don't," the judge replied.

"I think we do," Schwartz said.

"I'm telling you I don't think that's relevant to this issue. That's the end of that," Pohl snapped.

When Schwartz persisted, Pohl said angrily, "Are you having trouble hearing me? Move on to something else!"

The government will continue to argue that any statements by the defendants concerning their “exposure” to the CIA’s detention and interrogation program are classified because they concern U.S. intelligence “sources, methods and activities.”

A 2005 Justice Department legal memorandum stated that Mohammed was waterboarded—a technique described as illegal torture by top Obama administration officials—a total of 183 times in March 2003. Eventually he allegedly confessed to planning the attacks.

The military commission's own rules state that any statement "obtained by use of torture shall not be admitted into evidence against any party or witness."

So the question is not whether torture occurred, but what torture-related evidence will be allowed on either side and if the public will ever hear about it.

SEE ALSO: The 'Enhanced Interrogation' Techniques Used After 9/11 Came Straight From This Military Manual >

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While visiting the Persian Gulf last month for an international mine clearing exercise it was mentioned that the whole area was under constant surveillance by a Broad Area Maritime Surveillance (BAMS) drone.

Check out the BAMS drone >

The BAMS offers a 360-degree scanning ability with an Automatic Identification System that clocks and catalog's all surface vessels from 60,000 feet.

If the BAMS truly is flying above the Gulf it's early, not having been pegged for regular duty until 2015, but that's what I heard.

In addition to the high altitude scanning, the USS Ponce also uses the Scan Eagle drone system that can zoom in on individuals in small boats from several thousand feet in the air.

We posted this presentation several months ago, but thought it interesting after getting wind it was stationed in the Gulf, and shows that multi-level surveillance could become the norm.

Here's what the U.S. is watching. These are the 5 main operating bases where the MQ-4C fleet will be used, networking with other Navy and Air Force drones — notice the Persian Gulf has overlapping coverage by two BAMS drones

The MQ-C4 is designed for persistent maritime surveillance and intelligence-gathering — its makers say the Navy will have "24/7" coverage. The drone can travel 11,450 miles before it needs to be refueled

Along with its 360-degree scanning, it can capture images or full motion video at high resolution

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While Hillary Clinton jumps on a live hand grenade for the Benghazi attack, the White House has leaked to the AP its latest spin on the situation in Libya.

Apparently the U.S. has drones and SEALs on standby around the Mali and Eastern Libya area in case intelligence officers are able to locate those responsible for the consulate attack — which is hardly news. Though the timing is convenient, the position is unchanged from military options on the table Sept. 13, two days after the attack, when CNN reported that "drones and warships" were patrolling the area around Benghazi.

With Libya on the lips of every prominent Republican, the foreign policy one-two punch comes just in time for the all-important presidential debate on foreign policy tonight. Both parties are trying to hone an otherwise scattered message, a messy truth — Obama wants the chaos in the Arab world to reflect part of his larger plan, undoubtedly "democracy in action." The Romney camp seeks to box the flames and fighting into phrases like "foreign policy unraveling before our eyes" (and, in tinfoil circles, "massive cover up").

All of which makes what's really happening more disturbing.

The reality on the ground is that the drones and SEALs have not much to go on and intelligence officers can't triangulate a legitimate target. In fact, there's not enough supporting evidence to point the finger at any one particular group of "insurgents. "

Initially, the finger pointed at a group recently dubbed "Ansar al Shariah" (Partisans, or Soldiers of Shariah, depending on who translates). But following the attacks Ansar released a statement saying it "didn't participate in this popular uprising as a separate entity ... the brigade didn't participate as a sole entity ... rather, it was a spontaneous popular uprising."

The statement has since been corroborated by evidence on the ground. But like all statements coming from "terrorists" groups following attacks, diplomats in Washington simply replaced, or more accurately, washed it out with statements more convenient to their own domestic political ends.

Initially, for Obama and the Dems, the attack was just a protest gone horribly wrong. For Republicans, it was an "organized, planned, commando style raid."

Republicans stated the use of weapons, like Rocket Propelled Grenades (RPGs), mortars, and Ak-47s, as evidence of a more militaristic approach. Those same Republicans, just a year earlier, however, were arguing concertedly for the issuing of those weapons to that same exact populace — and largely looked the other way as Egypt and Qatar dumped those weapons into the country.

Prior to the ousting of Muamar Ghaddafi, those weapons were not easy to come by for citizens in Benghazi.

Meanwhile, the Obama camp's picture of a protest over a film gone horribly wrong unraveled as intelligence officials concluded that yes, in fact, it was a "terrorist attack" on the consulate.

First, the film was undoubtedly related, but not solely responsible — one need only look at the concurrent riots that spread through the Muslim world as a result of the video, and also that this same group attacked an Italian consulate, in Benghazi, six years prior because a minister allegedly wore a t-shirt bearing the image of Muhammed.

Second, reports from the ground initially said that there were some protestors, while reports coming out of the state department later strongly indicated otherwise. There's even video from the BBC the night of the attack which shows citizens, in front of the burning consulate, angry over the video.

The truth is that initial reports coming out of Benghazi were rushed, scattered and inaccurate, and an administration hell bent on shaping the high-ground message simply cherry picked the best one: out of control riots.

Conversely, Republicans sought to paint a picture of a unified enemy, mounting a centrally-planned, Al Qaeda related attack. Stevens himself reported that he thought he was on a hit list.

Though there isn't an American ambassador in a fractious Muslim country that isn't on some group's hit list. And just how, 'planned' was the attack? There are several types of planning — ranging from mock-up Osama Bin Laden compound in the North Carolina woods type of planning, versus cell phones and trucks and standing orders to take out American diplomats type of planning, as we reported here at BI shortly following the attacks.

A few key graphs from a John Walcott and Christopher Stephen report out of Bloomberg this morning best illustrate the situation: 

- While details of the attack that killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya last month may never be fully known, there is ample evidence neither the Obama administration’s initial accounts nor Republican portrayals of the incident are accurate.

- There is no intelligence suggesting that either the remaining core of al-Qaeda in Pakistan or its loose affiliates in Yemen and North Africa plotted, financed or directed the attack, which one of the U.S. officials described as amateurish.

- Instead, accounts from U.S. intelligence officials and Benghazi residents, along with evidence in the burned-out American diplomatic compound, point to a hasty and poorly organized act by men with basic military training and access to weapons widely available in Libya.

- "The partisan debate is feeding public misunderstanding of foreign events and the nature of diplomatic and intelligence work," Paul Pillar, a former U.S. intelligence official, said in a telephone interview.

The report goes a step further when it says that Obama's recent drone/warship report is basically the awkward position of political posturing, while intelligence forces him to publicly state that there isn't enough "actionable" intelligence to mount a strike anywhere.

NOW TAKE A LOOK BACK: At Our Original Report On The Likely Story Behind The Libya Attacks >

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A British computer hacker accused by the United States of causing more than $700,000 damage to U.S. military systems will not be extradited because of the high risk he could kill himself, Britain's Home Secretary Theresa May said on Tuesday.

Gary McKinnon, who has been fighting extradition for seven years, faced up to 60 years in a U.S. jail if found guilty of what one U.S. prosecutor called the "biggest military computer hack of all time".

McKinnon, 46, admits hacking into Pentagon and NASA computers under the pseudonym "Solo" but said he was looking for evidence of UFOs.

The former computer systems administrator has Asperger's Syndrome, a form of autism, and is suffering from depressive illness. He has been fighting extradition since British police arrested him in 2005.

"I have concluded that Mr. McKinnon's extradition would give rise to such a high risk of him ending his life that a decision to extradite would be incompatible with Mr. McKinnon's human rights," May told parliament.

"I have therefore withdrawn the extradition order against Mr. McKinnon."

His case was one of the most high-profile extradition decisions ever faced by the British government.

Campaigners had said it highlighted the unbalanced nature of Britain's extradition treaty with the United States, arguing it was easier to send a British suspect to the United States than the other way round.

'SERIOUSLY ILL'

Prime Minister David Cameron expressed sympathy for McKinnon before coming to power in 2011 and raised concerns over the extradition agreement with U.S. President Barack Obama earlier this year.

British legislators had demanded an overhaul of the treaty, signed in 2003 to speed up transfer of suspects between the two allies, saying it was biased in favor of the United States and failed to protect the rights of British citizens.

May said she would introduce legislation to allow British judges to block the transfer of suspects to a foreign court in extradition cases.

"I have decided to introduce a forum bar. This will mean that where prosecution is possible in both the UK and in another state, the British courts will be able to bar prosecution overseas, if they believe it is in the interests of justice to do so," May said.

U.S. officials say McKinnon accessed 97 military and NASA computers in 2001 and 2002, disabling naval systems and causing more than $700,000 of damage.

May said she had taken her decision not to extradite him after studying medical reports and taking extensive legal advice.

"Mr. McKinnon is accused of serious crimes, but there is also no doubt that he is seriously ill," she said.

It would now be up to British prosecutors to decide whether McKinnon had any case to answer in a British court, May said.

There was no immediate reaction from the U.S. government or its London embassy. The decision was praised by campaigners, legislators and McKinnon's family.

"Thank you Theresa May from the bottom of my heart. I always knew you had the strength and courage to do the right thing," the BBC reported his mother Janis Sharp as saying.

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A 20-year-old hacker faces up to five years in prison after admitting to taking part in the theft of a trove of data on people who had entered Sony Pictures contests, Graham Cluley of nakedsecurity reports. 

Arizona native Raynalo Rivera, who used online nicknames including "neuron", "royal," and "wildicy," acknowledged that he broke into the Sony Pictures website in May 2011 and extracted confidential user information such as names, birth dates, addresses, emails, phone numbers, and passwords.

Authorities said the hack cost Sony more than $605,000.

The hacker collective LulzSec, a highly disruptive offshoot of Anonymous, subsequently published the personal information online.

Cluley notes that Rivera attempted to hide his identity by using the HideMyAss anonymising proxy service to disguise his IP address, but HideMyAss co-operated with the law enforcement when given a court order to provide the IP information.

Under his plea agreement, Rivera will pay restitution to Sony and a fine of at least $250,000 in addition to the maximum five-year prison sentence.

Computer Business Review notes that in June, two UK members of LulzSec pleaded guilty to a string of cyber attacks on high profile websites while another UK member, Ryan Cleary, was indicted by an L.A. federal grand jury.

SEE ALSO: How A Two-Bit Phone Hacker Became The Music Industry's Biggest Enemy >

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In a request released Sept. 14 of this year, the Office Of Naval Research sought to find proposals for "Synthetic Biology Tools for Sensing and Bioprocessing" — essentially hybrid, organic inorganic "sensing" robots.

But the language can be deceiving. 

Googling the first three words — synthetic biology tools — yields research in the field of Biofuels. Even the "bioprocessing" part of the request equates to sources of "efficient" fuels in austere conditions. As we've covered most recently, the military is under tremendous pressure to curb its consumption of traditional fossil fuels.

Along with that, it's under even more pressure to reduce casualties on the battlefield — arguably the number one metric aside from monetary cost which affects public resistance to foreign military expeditions.

Sure, they're looking for inexpensive, efficient means to fuel war, but they're also looking for more efficient vehicles of war. The language farther in the proposal though makes it clear that the military is investing heavily into smart, cybernetic robots.

From the proposal:

This field is intended to serve two purposes: (1) to allow the design and engineering of organisms that possess a specific, reproducible function from a set of validated genetic parts, circuits and chassis organisms, and, (2) to allow the systematic study of the structure and function of genetic
components in natural cellular/multi-cellular systems.

Interpretation: We're looking to connect organic matter, be it single celled or multi-celled, to inorganic, possibly synthetic, circuits.

The organic matter would 'sense' certain stimuli. In one case specifically, chemicals or molecules in the air that would indicate bomb-making materials — kind of like a dog's nose connected to a computer.

But then the proposal takes a nasty turn for the weird and scary:

The Office of Naval Research has been funding basic and applied research in Synthetic
Biology for the past several years, with several applications or new naval capabilities as the
anticipated endpoint of this research program:

• Secure, renewable, scalable production of energy, fuels or high-value naval materials –
potentially in remote, resource-limited locations
• Stealthy, remotely-observable sentinel species for threat monitoring and response to these
threats (e.g., explosives)
• Autonomous, living-non-living hybrid robotic systems that utilize cells as environmental
sensing and information processing components
• Utilizing synthetic biology to effect inorganic materials fabrication across multiple length
scales.

Interpretation: The above means a wide range of different possibilities. Single celled 'chassis' could just be goop spread on a circuit that changes states when exposed to certain 'stimuli,' and a circuit which would detect this state change.

The objectives pretty much lay out the future for cybernetic organisms.

Objectives:
• Develop rapid, generalizable methods for designing/testing integrated sensing and
actuation components in a cellular/multi-cellular context. Approaches should consider
the use of both chemical and non-chemical signals for detection and response.

Possible lab exercises and hypotheses to test hybrid organic non-organic systems

• Design and test feasibility of using environmentally robust, genetically tractable, 
‘chassis’ organisms, including novel microbes and multi-cellular eukaryotes.
• Develop microbial/multi-cellular catalysts that can utilize electrical current directly as an 
electron donor, and elucidate mechanisms of electron transport into these catalysts and 
their metabolic pathways

From single-celled goop, to straight up eyeballs (multicelled), that notice change in light, change in smell, pressure or chemical reactions

• Enabling high information content communication between cells, or between cells and 
non-living components, possibly utilizing non-natural transduction modes and electronic 
coupling. Detection and/or production of chemical or non-chemical signals such as 
electrical current or fields, magnetic fields, mechanical forces, or specific wavelengths of 
light should be considered.

Getting the goop or eyeballs to communicate with nonliving tissue.

Finally, to bring it all full circle, we get the last objective:

• Identify high-throughput methods for discovery of unusual microbial metabolism/
pathways, and screening for new genetic systems and/or engineered systems that can lead 
to efficient production of fuels or other organic/inorganic compounds in remote locations.

Basically a lot of words just to say: turning sea water into jet fuel.

NOW READ: Yes, Apple's Siri Was Developed In The Military >

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Leaders in the manufacturing industry, and Lt. Dan, got together Monday morning to announce the Get Skills To Work initiative. The plan is intended to help the more than 700.000 unemployed vets start filling the 600,000 empty positions in manufacturing.

Over a series of three panel discussions at Milk Studios in New York, business leaders--many of whom are veterans themselves--explained the four main points of the program.

The first panel, led by Tom Brokaw of NBC news and including leaders of the initiative's founding companies--GE, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and Alcoa--introduced the nuts and bolts of the plan: accelerate training, translate military experience, empower employers, and give hands-on training.

At GetSkillstoWork.org, veterans can take a skills assessment. If they find they're ready to go to work, the site will create an electronic badge that the veteran can post to LinkedIn or the Get Skills to Work job search page, and find a job.

If it turns out the veteran needs more training, the site will direct them toward a technical school or community college, or possibly an apprenticeship. The "Right Skills Now" program, debuting at Cincinnati State Technical and Community College, near GE Aviation's hub in Cincinnati, Ohio, aims to provide accelerated training with nationally accepted certificates, in case someone who graduates in Ohio winds up moving to Texas, said Dr. O'dell Moreno Owens, president of Cincinnati State, during one of the later panels. 

The chief skill that translates best from the military to manufacturing, mentioned over and over during the course of the day, is team work. Every person on every panel brought it up. Also desired are problem-solving skills, which service members display every day, said Lionel Hamilton, GE Aviation Operations leader, who served five years in the Marine Corps and is now a pilot in the Army National Guard.

Hamilton spoke during a panel led by Gary Sinise, actor and leaf on a family tree filled with veterans. His foundation, the Gary Sinise Foundation, is working to promote the training program. The actor's panel focused mostly on transitioning troops, and making sure they know they have valuable skills.

Veterans going through programs like Cincinnati State's, which the the founders hope to replicate in other small cities, will likely  have to use their Post 9/11 G.I. Bill benefits. Apprenticeships and other company-run training programs will be funded by the individual companies.

NOW SEE: What Might Really Save Us From Iran >

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Obama's monetary collections from the various wings United States Military outpaces Romney even though Romney polling among military members doubles Obama.

The donation comparison comes from campaign finance tracking website OpenSecrets.org.

The previous political king of military support, votes and donations, was Rep. Ron Paul, who at one point during the Republican Primaries held a 10 - 1 campaign finance advantage over his opponents in terms of the military donations.

A recent Military Times poll found Romney with a 40 point advantage over Obama among active and reserve military members.

The campaign finance website found Obama had donations totaling to $536,414, while Romney had donations totaled to $287,435.

The OpenSecrets conclusion is a bit off base though, as it includes officials from the U.S. Defense Department, whereas the military times poll included only 3,000 members of active and reserve units.

If those totals are subtracted, the numbers still reflect a substantial lead for Obama — $360,293 to $216,392.

NOW SEE: Don't Listen To The Story Coming From Either Party About The Benghazi Attacks >

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Syria's rebellion may have just put themselves in the best possible to topple President Bashar al-Assad to date.

Reuters reports that the increasingly divided and disparate rebel groups have agreed upon joint leadership in order to overthrow Assad. 

"The agreement has been reached, they only need to sign it now," according to one rebel source.

If true (the rebels do have a history of publishing false reports), the alliance is a huge milestone for the opposition. For months, the international community backing the rebels have urged them and overlook the myriad of political and religious beliefs they hold in order to concentrate on overthrowing Assad.

In July, the Financial Times published an article entitled "Rebel forces must unite for Syria's sake," in which it claimed:

The Syrian insurgents are becoming an effective force, setting up councils in various provinces and co-ordinating with political activists on the ground. But there are also rivalries and friction among them, especially as some of the more radical groups are said to receive more regular funding.

FT also cited the US-based Institute for the Study of War, which added: “If these disparate sources of support do not become organized more responsibly, they may help defeat Assad but destroy Syria in the process."

The rivalries between the various rebel groups have significantly stymied the fight against the current regime. In September a senior member of the Syrian opposition who lives in Europe told Haaretz in September that "the rivalry between the array of anti-Assad groups is preventing the opposition from bringing about the president's fall more quickly."

By coming together, the rebels may be able to pool what resources they have left and inspire much of the international community that has lost faith in the opposition.

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"Gun-walking" was purportedly a tactic of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) whereby agents purposely allowed licensed firearms dealers to sell U.S. weapons to illegal straw buyers in the hopes of tracking those weapons to Mexican drug cartel leaders and arresting them.

Operation Fast and Furious (2009-2011) was the largest of several gun-walking operations that took place under a broader initiative known as Project Gunrunner (2006-2011), which was intended to reduce the flow of firearms into Mexico.

The Los Angeles Times reports that the first Fast and Furious sentencing has occurred, and the case indicates just how backward the Phoenix-based scheme turned out to be.

On Monday Danny Cruz Morones, 24, of Phoenix was given 57 months in prison after pleading guilty to acting as a straw buyer—four of the 27 AK-47s purchased by Morones were seized by Mexican military officers in Tijuana in September 2010 and six AK-47s purchased by someone that Morones recruited were seized.

So, in a nutshell, Morones was arrested for doing exactly what the ATF wanted him to do, and it gave him nearly five years in prison for doing it.

Fast and Furious wasn't supposed to be about guys like Morones—it was supposed to create a situation where the ATF wasn't "limited to investigating straw purchasers for what amounts to paperwork violations and middlemen for dealing firearms without a license, also a wrist-slap," as reported by the Houston Chronicle.

After all, a lot of straw buyers did what the ATF wanted them to do: ATF data shows that 94,000 weapons were recovered in Mexico from 2006 to 2011 and 64,000 of them were traced to the U.S.

Given that Operation Gunrunner seemed to do the opposite that it was allegedly intended to do, it's not a stretch to wonder if Operation Fast and Furious actually did exactly what it was intended to do.

SEE ALSO: High Ranking Cartel Member Says Operation Fast And Furious Was Meant To Supply Guns To The Sinaloa Cartel >

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Fidel Castro's little brother Raul is continuing to loosen restrictions in Cuba, now letting his people take a vacation.

According to the Daily Mail, the Communist party paper Granma announced Cubans would no longer need an exit visa. As of January 14, citizens of the country can go abroad with only a passport, and stay wherever they like for up to 24 months without risk of losing property.

For the past 51 years, even if someone got the required documents, which could cost up to $350, they weren't always allowed to actually leave the country.

The restrictions would still be in place for people Cuba doesn't want to leave, like doctors and other professionals.

The United States has slowly lifted its own restrictions in regards to travel to Cuba, originally put in place to isolate the island after Fidel Castro took power in 1959. While it technically wasn't illegal, tourists couldn't spend money, making the trip pointless.

But determined travelers found ways to get in, often going through Canada, or other countries in the Caribbean. In 1999, American tourists could go to Cuba on "people-to-people" licenses, essentially educational trips on which travelers weren't allowed to spend US dollars.

George W. Bush did away with them when he took office. President Barack Obama brought back the licenses in 2011.

The US has a lot to gain from lifting its restrictions. Daily Beast writer Arian Campos-Flores found that the  US tourism industry could make close to $1.6 billion.

Boost the economy and get fresh mojitos? What are we waiting for?

Now read about the Navy's creepy new science project >

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Felix Baumgartner just broke the speed of sound in an unprecedented free fall from the stratosphere. But the Austrian thrill-seeker has dazzled the world with mind-boggling leaps many, many times before. 

Baumgartner, now 43, has completed some 2,500 jumps since he began skydiving at the age of 16. 

He has shattered at least six BASE jumping records, which involves parachuting from a stationary object like a statue or a bridge. BASE stands for buildings, antennas, spans (aka bridges) and earths (aka cliffs). Many of these jumps are illegal.

Here are our favorites from Baumgartner's greatest jumps.  

April 15, 1999: Felix claimed the world record for the highest parachute jump from a building after leaping from The Petronas Twin Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. At 1,479 feet, the Pertonas towers are the highest buildings in the world. Felix snuck into the building as a disguised businessman, carrying his parachute in a briefcase.

Dec. 7, 1999: Felix leaps off the right hand of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, setting a record for the lowest BASE jump ever.

May 31, 2001: The sportsman becomes the first man to jump from a 902-foot cliff in Meteora, Greece, next to the Agia Triada monastery. The rock was made famous by the James Bond movie For Your Eyes Only.

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According to Malcolm Gladwell, we're surprised by underdogs because we have bad definitions of advantage. 

Last week Malcolm Gladwell was up in Winnipeg and interviewed with the Canadian Broadcast Corporation before speaking at the city's Centralia business conference, where he talked about his upcoming book on underdogs.

As Gladwell said to the CBC's Terry MacLeod:

"One of the things that's puzzling about conflict of any kind or competition of any kind is how often the people we expect to win don't win. Why does America keep losing wars to people who are a fraction of their size? How can the people of Afghanistan have humbled the two largest superpowers in the world in sequence? 

...there's sort of countless examples of this and each time it happens we're baffled, and what I'm trying to say is that maybe we're only baffled because our definitions of advantage and disadvantage are unsophisticated."

Certain privileges like wealth or military power are easy to see, and we tend to overestimate them. The little known advantages of the underdog, held by Afghanistan and other examples Gladwell gave at the talk  — like Steve Jobs early in his career or Israel early in its existence — are twofold. 

First, there's a sense of desperation. Steve Jobs faced huge competitors like Xerox, Afghanistan faced the Soviet Union and United States. The stakes were much higher for them than for their relatively complacent opponents, and they responded in kind.

Also, underdogs have to get around huge obstacles with fewer resources. While coming up with those solutions, they learn skills those with all of the advantages don't.    

As to what we can learn from these underdogs, Gladwell said "at the most basic level we can rearrange our categories of what counts as an advantage and what doesn't. And we can get over our I think unhealthy obsession with certain kinds of privilege."

NOW READ: Malcolm Gladwell On Why History Will Remember Bill Gates And Forget Steve Jobs >

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In a strange coincidence, just as a pair of females, a colonel and a sergeant major, are suing the Pentagon on the grounds their careers stalled because they weren't able to hold combat positions, the first two women to volunteer for the Marine Corps Infantry Officer Course washed out of the program.

In one side, Col. Ellen Haring, a highly-decorated soldier, was told at the last minute, after three months of training at Fort Bragg, that she wasn't qualified to lead a team of female soldiers who would search and interview Afghan women, according to the L.A. Times. Then she saw a lower-ranking, less qualified male take the position.

On the other, the first of the women to get dropped from the Marine course, which the Marine Times reports started with 109 students, was in the company of 30 men who also failed the introductory endurance test. The other female completed the test, but was later dropped for medical reasons. 

Both cases leave the question of whether the US military is ready to put women in combat positions unanswered.

While I was in the Army, I was the public affairs specialist for an artillery brigade. We had a lot of women in charge, but mostly in fields that were already welcoming to females. But in my five years with them, we also had quite a few female officers come from the artillery officer course at Fort Sill and not get artillery platoons to lead.

One in particular placed fourth in her class at Sill. Her scores on the Army Physical Fitness Test were perfect by the male standards. But she was assigned to be our public affairs officer.

But she also got to be our colonel's right-hand-man when we deployed shortly thereafter, and he made sure when we got back she got an artillery platoon to lead. Knowing that those opportunities would be few and far between, she switched to military intelligence after that position.

The lawsuit Haring, Sgt. Maj. Jane Baldwin, and the Molly Pitcher Project filed contends the exclusion policy holds women back in promotions, and therefore earnings and retirement benefits.

So far, none of the women who have fought to fill combat positions have asked for special preference--they just want to be judged by the same standards as their male counterparts. If the Army already paid to train someone, and the soldier aces everything that's asked of her, it doesn't make sense not to give them the job.

NOW CHECK OUT: The Navy's Newest All-Seeing Drones >

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The FBI's got a new video game designed to teach kids, parents, and teachers about the dangers of web browsing. The game's launch comes in the wake of several cyber stalking and cyber bullying incidents.

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A Mississippi man flying to visit his wife in Japan was detained during a stop in Hawaii on Monday and has been barred from re-boarding any flight because his name came up on a U.S. no-fly list, Elliott Freeman of the Digital Journal reports.

Wade Hicks, Jr., a former Department of Defense (DoD) contractor, believes he was detained because he's an outspoken critic of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) as well as the official story of 9/11.

Hicks was on his way to visit his newlywed wife, a U.S. Navy lieutenant stationed in Okinawa, Japan when he was escorted from the plane and detained by armed military personnel for several hours before being informed he was on the no-fly list.

"They just basically are telling me, 'You can't fly because we said so,'" Hicks said in an interview with radio talk show host Doug Hagmann. "They didn't know how I even left Travis Air Force Base [in San Francisco]."

Hicks was not given an explanation of why he couldn't fly but he's concerned it has to do with his outspoken views.

"I was very, very vocal about the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and I did contact my representative about [the NDAA]", Hicks said. "I do believe that this is tied in some way to my free speech and my political view."

Freeman reports that Hicks previously hosted a radio show called "Free Speech Zone" in which he discussed controversial issues such as 9/11.

"I am a very vocal opponent of 9/11," Hicks said. "I've seen the evidence, and I think the evidence I've seen warrants a new investigation, and I'm very vocal about it as well."

Hicks emphasized that he has never made any threats of violence. He has no criminal record or outstanding warrants and has passed extensive background checks to receive an enhanced concealed carry license. He also holds a Transportation Workers Identification Credential (TWIC), a security card issued by the TSA for transportation personnel.

"I have no idea how long I'm going to be stranded in Hawaii or if I'm going to be able to leave here on an aircraft," Hicks said. "Try to get back from Oahu to the [continental] United States," he said. "It's a long swim and it's a long boat ride."

SEE ALSO: Why You Should Be Outraged About The Ruling To Keep The NDAA Indefinite Detention Clause In Effect >

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The military has failed to bubble up as a key topic in this year’s election, but that hasn’t kept media outlets from trying to predict who the troops will vote for in this November’s presidential election.

Military Times has come forth and declared that Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney holds a 2–1 lead over President Obama in this November’s election.

The Open Secrets blog by the Center for Responsible Politics has written about how military members have donated more money to Obama than Romney—even donating more to one of Romney’s former Republican opponents, Rand Paul.

The military has traditionally voted Republican for decades. Any polls showing the troops would vote otherwise come as a surprise.

Open Secrets did find that Obama received more campaign donations from troops than Romney—$536,414 to $287,435. What was even more surprising was the type of support Paul received. The candidate who said he was opposed deploying U.S. forces to Afghanistan collected $399,274 from troops

Military Times issued an e-mail to its subscribers who are mostly made up of active duty, Guard and Reserve troops. The responses came from mostly NCOs and mid-grade officers. About 75 percent of the 3,100 responses they received came from troops in grades E-5 to E-8 or O-3 to O-5. The article didn’t specify how many responses they received from troops E-4 and below, the grades that make up the majority of the military.

The e-mail poll also found out the respondents didn’t rank “national security” high on their lists of what they cared about for the forthcoming election. Less than 16 percent said national security was their top concern in the race. And only 1 percent of respondents said the war in Afghanistan was their top concern. Comparatively, 66 percent said the economy is the top issue driving their vote.

Despite these reports by Military Times and Open Secrets, the way the military vote is leaning hasn’t received much attention from the national media. That might have a lot to do with the fact the military is not being talked about in this election compared to the last two.

The candidates will have another chance Tuesday night to distinguish their national security priorities in the debate, although it’s not expected to be a popular topic outside the controversial events in Benghazi. It’s clear from Military Times’ poll, the older troops don’t even find the military topic pressing compared to the economy.

NOW SEE: The Metric Where Obama Is Killing Romney In The Military Support >

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Author Mark Bowden had a juicy story from an agent in the Central Intelligence Agency he was itching to put into his new book, "The Finish: The Killing Of Osama Bin Laden."

But he couldn't.

"It was given to me off the record," says Bowden. "It's not necessarily about building lasting relationships with sources, it's about honest reporting."

Bowden says it wasn't the first time he had potentially compromising information — it was a situation he ran into frequently while covering Army "Delta" operators in Somalia, the subject of his book "Black Hawk Down."

A book as thoroughly researched as "The Finish" is bound to cross some lines into gathering information one might consider "sensitive." For example, Bowden builds a painstakingly detailed and borderline addictive narrative about how an eccentric, obsessive agent named Michael Schauer and his "harem" of specialized, detail-oriented female teammates tracked Osama like prey around the world. Team ALEC, they were called, named after Schauer's son, and they delivered several intel recommendations to drop bin Laden, each growing in anxiety to the point of an almost religious crescendo.

And all I can think is: Bowden's access is mindblowing.

Certainly developing sources in the clandestine American services has its considerations. In the following interview, Bowden gives us the details of these relationships, along with some other details about the killing of Osama Bin Laden:

Business Insider: What are some of the considerations when you’re researching these things, are you worried about exposing former or current CIA assets?

Mark Bowden: I think there is a very important dynamic between journalists and officialdom, in particular in the military and intelligence areas, there’s a very legitimate reason why people need to know certain things, but then there's legitimate reasons why they shouldn't know certain things.

I’m just trying to find out as much as I can. Even in those instances where I might withhold information it would be because I don't want to endanger someone’s life, or it might endanger ongoing operations. Then again, if I think the operations are wrong and need to be stopped, then I'd happily report the information.

The beauty of that is that I’m not answerable to anyone other than my own conscious, I'll do what's right, I wouldn’t betray or compromise anyone.

Business Insider: To our knowledge, you don't have any security clearances, but still people talk to you—Have you ever had sensitive information that you decided not to use? 

Mark Bowden: Yes, yeah, definitely. Some of it is old, but still sensitive. Particularly since I’ve written a lot about national security, I run into this issue, not often, but it still happens.

I try to make my own judgment, do the right thing.

Good example is Somalia (Black Hawk Down) I definitely left certain details out of that story. Those details, presently, are no longer sensitive, but I've never had an occasion to go back and revise. In the case of this most recent book, there was a story that was related to me by someone at the CIA and it was a really good little story and it would have illustrated a point I wanted to make in this book really well.

But it was off the record. I went back and made a case, and was still told no, I would have loved to have included it but I don’t regret the decision not to do.

Did it as a matter of basic honesty. I wouldn't release info like that unless I wanted to be a real shit.

Business Insider: Are there any precautions you have to take when working with these sources?

Mark Bowden: No, I don’t have to take any really, it's my job as a journalist almost to know less than what the people I’m talking to know, if they don’t know enough to know not to release information that shouldn't be known to the public, then how am I to know.

I don’t do it to cultivate long term relationships, I do it because it’s am matter of basic honesty.

Business Insider: You’ve studied the hunt for OBL extensively, especially the gun-shy Clinton administration in the 90s and all the missed opportunities, do you think that all the collateral damages they were worried about come to the sum of one 9/11?

Mark Bowden: No way, no no, there’s no way. I think there would have been a tragic consequence to any of those missed opportunities. In specific, the hotel in Kabul comes to mind, that was in a fairly crowded part of the city. Concern for collateral damage was legitimate. That’s minimizing any fair-minded person would assess.

And I think it was right around the time when the US launched the missile that inadvertently hit a Chinese embassy. Understandable they were very cautious, in hindsight though it’s clear that it would have been better had they fired.

Business Insider: Is all of this a case of hindsight, or was there honestly a lack of attention payed to viable target?

Mark Bowden: When you’re President of the United States you’re payed to make these judgments, what’s important enough to launch a missile, diplomatic fallout, it’s really unfair to introduce into that equation the knowledge of the future.

I don’t think Clinton did anything wrong. Ultimately I would have to respect an honest judgment by the person sitting in the hot seat. At the same time, I think Clinton probably regrets not acting more aggressively.

Business Insider: Do you think the US has learned from its mistake missing bin Laden in the 90s?

Mark Bowden: I think we learned that lesson definitely, and we definitely recognize the threat of international terrorism. But it's never the thing you're ready for that levels you. I think we’ll be blindsided by something we’re not focusing on. Like cyber attacks. I was alarmed by how much vital pieces of our infrastructure is attached to the web, that you can compromise with a smart kid, a computer and a modem.

But what we really don't understand is the sophistication behind these types of attacks, we downplay it.

Business Insider: Like some punk kid with a nose ring and computer skills.

Mark Bowden: Right, but there's a real sophistication behind it and we're not ready for it. Frankly it might take a major shocking attack before we see it enough.

I'm glad it has been elevated as a concern, what with Leon Panetta coming out and saying it is. It's the nature of things, those who plan to attack find a weak spot. An international terrorist attack like 9/11 probably isn't going to happen again. But if we don't fix our cyber security, I think something along those lines will.

Business Insider: Well, we've seen Obama go weapons free on a bombing spree since he took office, often without proper transparency, should there be a concern that the weaponization of the web might send us along another moral slippery slope?

Mark Bowden: Some kind of due process needs to be stated, needs to be set down in the procedures for how our governments act in these cases, this is a Democracy. But the power Obama has is new, I don’t think they’ve done a good job showing us how they’ve reached these conclusions [for drone strikes], there are reasons to be reluctant to share that information of course, but I think those reasons can be overcome, to kill people or to spy without some measure of transparency and due process isn't right.

But you don’t want to give away how you came about the information. You don’t want to give away the methods you used to get that information. I think there are ways to accomplish that without betraying your personnel, the military has been dealing with that forever, and there’s no reason this should be handled any differently.

NOW SEE: 25 Things We Learned From The Book "No Easy Day" >

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The alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks railed against U.S. national security policies when he was allowed to address the courtroom at Guantánamo Bay on Wednesday, Reuters reports. 

Khalid Sheik Mohammed, wearing a military-style camouflage vest, accused the U.S. government of killing many more people in the name of national security than he is accused of killing.

Mohammed is accused of orchestrating the hijacked plane attacks that killed 2,976 people on September 11, 2001.

He was captured on March 1, 2003, in Pakistan and held in secret CIA prisons—where he was waterboarded 183 times in March 2003—until being transferred to Gitmo in September 2006. 

Here's what he said (in Arabic through an English interpreter), according to Reuters:

"When the government feels sad for the death or the killing of 3,000 people who were killed on September 11, we also should feel sorry that the American government that was represented by (the chief prosecutor) and others have killed thousands of people, millions ... 

Many can kill people under the name of national security, and to torture people under the name of national security, and to detain children under the name of national security, underage children ...

The president can take someone and throw him into the sea under the name of national security and so he can also legislate the assassinations under the name of national security for the American citizens ...

Your blood is not made out of gold and ours is made out of water. We are all human beings."

Mohammed's statements, while widely viewed as simply anti-American and advocating terrorism, also give a unique perspective into why the U.S. has been increasingly seen as a ruthless bully on the world stage over the last 11 years.

Prior to the attacks on 9/11 and the World Trade Center bombing in 1998, al-Qaeda's main gripe was that the U.S. should withdraw it's troops from Saudi Arabia, a place all Muslims consider the Holy Land.

So perhaps these statements were not just the reflections of a radical organization, but also grievances of common people in Muslim countries as well.

Mohammed and four other alleged conspirators could face the death penalty if convicted of charges that include conspiring with al Qaeda, attacking civilians and civilian targets, murder in violation of the laws of war, destruction of property, hijacking and terrorism.

SEE ALSO: This Courtroom Exchange Shows Why It's So Hard To Prosecute The Alleged 9/11 Plotters >

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