(Shortly Before September 17, 2009): CIA Manager Involved in ‘Italian Job’ Kidnapping Joins Marketing Analysis Firm

Jeff Castelli, a former CIA Rome station chief involved in the blown rendition of Islamist extremist Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr in Milan (see Noon February 17, 2003), joins a Los Angeles-based marketing analysis company called PhaseOne Communications. Castelli had left the agency the previous year over the fallout from the rendition’s exposure. His role at PhaseOne, owned by former CIA officer Reynold Stelloh, is unknown. However, although most of the company’s clients are commercial, a source familiar with the business will say that his main responsibility will probably be generating government contracts. Reporter Jeff Stein will comment that a 2004 description of the company in a trade journal “suggests its work may be applicable to managing the effectiveness of US government propaganda operations.” The journal said, “The formulas and systems used by PhaseOne were originally derived during World War II as elements of classified work of US and British intelligence analysts, who developed the science of content analysis to a point where it was able to successfully predict enemy behavior based on public communications.” Stein will add, “Knowledgeable observers said they would not be surprised if PhaseOne were contracted by the government to analyze the effectiveness of terrorist propaganda against the United States, and vice-versa.” [Congressional Quarterly, 9/17/2009]