Thanks for the kind words. I'll add to the discussion where I can going forward but I want to stay in my lane.
Understanding these three terms will help you understand and analyze antifa activity:
- In overt action, you conceal neither the act or the actor. The 82nd Airborne operates in an overt manner.
- In covert action, you conceal the actor but not the act. Armed robberies are usually meant to be covert.
- In clandestine action, you conceal the actor and the act. Embezzlement and marital infidelity are usually meant to clandestine.
We can't say that antifa has begun to undertake overt activity, but their covert activity implies the presence of supporting clandestine activity, which implies financial sponsors and a command structure with the ability to
- enforce directives through discipline or force
- gather information and convert it into intelligence
- communicate with internal and external audiences
- gather and store weapons, tools, and materiel
- recruit and train newcomers
- move people and materiel
- care for people (payment, food, shelter, medical care, legal representation, etc.)
The classic guerrilla movement is organized into three broad groups to carry out these activities. For security, these groups are organized into cells separated by cutouts. They don’t know of each other’s existence so they can only reveal limited amounts of information about their own activity. FWIW, the larger criminal organizations use essentially the same ideas.
The
guerrillas are the foot soldiers. They support the effort directly. They work full time and they get paid, even if they have to wait for the war to end first, so they need a lot of covert and clandestine support. They work in an overt or covert manner. In this case they’re still covert since they're covering their faces, intimidating people who document their activities, etc. We also haven't seen official uniforms or insignia--yet.
The
auxiliary supports the cause philosophically and provides part-time or occasional covert support as a part of their daily routine. This includes the legitimate trucking company that occasionally hauls cargo for the cause, the attorney who provides legal representation, or the funeral home that disposes of bodies as that arrive without documentation.
The
underground support the cause in a clandestine manner, such as by gathering and sharing information that can be incorporated into the intelligence cycle, facilitating communication between the command structure and captured fighters, etc. In this case, the underground includes the financial sponsors, members of the command structure, the media, and some public officials. This group runs the greatest risk and had the least plausible deniability, so they're usually the most compartmentalized.
There’s a lot more to it than this and every instance is different, but in broad strokes that’s how it works. Thus far the only things that we haven’t seen are the command structure and financial sponsorship, but the fact that everything else is there implies their presence.
The way to break this up is to focus on the links between these three groups, then expose and attack the clandestine and covert actors. I think that's what we're seeing when LEOs arrested a Seattle-based crew from Riot Kitchen in Kenosha yesterday (
https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle...rve-free-food/). I'd definitely want to know as much as I could about who owns the Riot Kitchen vehicles, who provided the food, who's cooking, what bank accounts they're using, etc.
Okie John
Originally Posted by okie john
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