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More Details Emerge On How the US Is Bugging Its European Allies
dryriver writes with this excerpt from the Guardian: "U.S. intelligence services are spying on the European Union mission in New York and its embassy in Washington, according to the latest top secret U.S. National Security Agency documents leaked by the whistleblower Edward Snowden. One document lists 38 embassies and missions, describing them as 'targets.' It details an extraordinary range of spying methods used against each target, from bugs implanted in electronic communications gear to taps into cables to the collection of transmissions with specialised antennae. Along with traditional ideological adversaries and sensitive Middle Eastern countries, the list of targets includes the E.U. missions and the French, Italian and Greek embassies, as well as a number of other American allies, including Japan, Mexico, South Korea, India and Turkey. ... One of the bugging methods mentioned is codenamed Dropmire, which, according to a 2007 document, is 'implanted on the Cryptofax at the E.U. embassy, DC' – an apparent reference to a bug placed in a commercially available encrypted fax machine used at the mission. The NSA documents note the machine is used to send cables back to foreign affairs ministries in European capitals."
There is a difference between doing intelligence work and outright bugging and performing illegal surveillance.
You clearly don't know what that difference is and I feel sorry for you.
We know countries spy on each other for political capital and leverage, even allies. They embarrass leaders they don't like with smears and leaks. The give opposition leaders they do like, intel and tips. Trying to influence elections, trying to learn trade secret that aid their corps.
It's a nasty game, but it's a known game.
So WTF is GCHQ doing, giving NSA a tap on 300 lines into Britain, which almost certainly contains information on British people, companies and politics?
Which side are you on there in GCHQ?
It also doesn't support the 'Snowden is evil' image either. Afterall he is only reporting what any 'responsible' government already knew and did......
Secure messaging: http://quickmsg.vreeken.net/
Someone doesn't realize that embassies are foreign soil. You clearly are assuming that what they are doing is illegal and not sanctioned under national security. See, you are just making an ass out of yourself and YOU KNOW IT or you wouldn't be posting as an anonymous coward.
There is no "-1 offended" or "-1 you don't agree with me" mod options for a reason.
So how does this relate to "war on terrorism"? This is plain and simple espionage, most probably for economic gain.
"Friends spying on friends" is not something new and unusual, despite what at least 1 German politician implied. The US has arrested Israeli spies in decades past. Israel has arrested US spies. It may be deplorable, but it's universal. Raising a ruckus about it is just a sideshow.
Snowden apparently originally thought that this was part of his job and was OK with it. What allegedly turned him was when he realized that a lot of what he was doing was unrelated to spying on other nations, other nationals and terrorists, but was spying on US citizens even when there was absolutely no reason to think they were doing anything worth spying on.
I wonder why those who advise upon security matters allowed the purchase of such kit? Things have changed a bit of late, witness the fuss about Chinese companies and associated hardware http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-19988919, anti trade, xenophobia or real security worries?
Most intelligence work is illegal by definition. The only question is whether the work is whether the US intelligence work breaks US laws. I envy your fairy tale worldview, but in the real world things work differently.
Everything the US has been accusing China of doing like sticking backdoors in communications equipment, the US has been doing it it's allies?
So much for don't buy Chinese, sounds like it's more risky to buy US equipment because at least there's now some hard evidence that US equipment contains backdoors, with China it was all just unproven speculation.
Those countries are probably spying on us as well. And our government has a responsibility to know what other governments are doing, to the best of our abilities.
That said, it shows how much damage Snowden has done to publicly reveal this undoubtedly top secret information. He's a traitor.
Nice to know what your friends really think of you. Smiling and shaking hands for the press while someone from one of the 3 letter agencies places a bug in your bag or jacket. Sickening hypocrisy!
They do the same things.
Oh, really? Everybody's doing that? Well, perhaps the USSR did, but do you honestly believe that close Western allies of the US are systematically bugging US embassies and spying on US politicians on a massive scale?
You know, if somebody found out that the US bugged one fax machine of their European allies, you'd be right - it would be swept under the carpet and handled through diplomatic channels. But we're talking about absolutely massive, persistent spying on close allies.
I can understand if the US spies on China and vice versa, and many of the discoveries in this areas is handled via side channels (e.g. swaping intelligence agence), but it's hard to understand why the US needs to massively spy on European administration to obtain more information about the latest regulation for the shapes of bananas or how much earth may be on potatoes.
Why would he want to return to the US?
This just confirm how much hypocrisy reign in all USA propaganda pumped foreign policies and explain why NATO is still up and running after 60 years: European people rightly demand to quit NATO, unfortunately invertebrate European governors aren't still prepared to give up this sort of economic/power trading deal. They get what they deserve now.I only hope there's more material to expose how European countries and their trusted Allied (aka Big Brother) work out their businesses.
I think we can all distinguish between spying on one's own citizens and spying on foreigners, in particular in foreign lands. That of course includes governments. Normally this kind of stuff stays under the radar, but this is not the first time it has happened. Israel has been caught quite a few times spying on the US and running agents to further their own national interests. France has a long history of doing corporate espionage on behalf of their own industries. The Brits have always had their fingers in everything.
Spying isn't just about military stuff. It is often about economics and politics and knowing what others are planning and doing (vs what they might say publicly).
I just cannot believe it! Countries around the world spy on each other?? What a remarkable revelation, who would'a thought?. Perhaps next we'll find out that corporations act in their greedy self interest or that middle school girls are catty. Thank you Edward Snowden for making the f*ing obvious even more obvious!
Well, intelligence gathering activities tend to violate the laws of the nation it is gathered from, not the nation doing the gathering. But that's not exactly a shock. Nations are nosy neighbors. There's more spying and gossiping then a meeting of a neighborhood book group. It's something that may outrage the people of the nations involved, but the governments expect it. Israel, an American semi-dependant state, spies on their closest friend and ally all the time. And, vice versa. It's like masturbating in front of the homeless - everyone does it, but it's embarassing to get caught.
Yes, as a matter of fact, I do.
That's beside the point though, because I also believe two wrongs don't make a right. I wish my government still felt that way, too.
Whether the US should take the moral high road or dive into the muck like "just another country" is a debate that goes back to the founding of the Republic. It looks like it's finally been settled. :-(
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
So you think that there aren't going to be any consequences for this? Fool.
With great power comes great responsibility, but you sound more like the local schoolyard bully - and that's exactly how the US has been coming across for years. Looks like the rest of the world finally figured out who they are dealing with.
For one thing, other courties don't have 5 million people cleared to handle top secret material. That makes the chances of a leak smaller. For another, related, thing, those countries don't have a security apparatus as creepily and absurdly extensive as the US does, so the few involved don't feel a strong need to leak.
Also, other countries see this as a human rights issue that involves everybody instead of something that only becomes an issue when it affects their own citizens.
That doesn't excuse it.
The business I conduct in my country in the EU is of zero import to the US.
I suspect that True Patriots interpret "national security" to include economic hegemony.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
do you honestly believe that close Western allies of the US are systematically bugging US embassies and spying on US politicians on a massive scale
I don't know if they're doing it systematically because there haven't been any European Snowdens lately. It certainly wouldn't shock me if it was true. There have been plenty of cases of allies bugging each other, including for business and commercial reasons.
but you broke the first commandment. THOU shalt NOT get CAUGHT
...there is a possibility that Snowden may be a "false flag" to discredit leakers. I'm not saying he is or isn't, but Naomi Wolf says it better than me - she's a writer and journalist with a proven record on whistleblower and civil rights issues... WELL worth looking up for End of America alone).
Snowden may very well be the real deal... but it's just worth thinking a step ahead and not balancing the foundations on him or any one person. These issues are much bigger than any single entity anyway... the problems are systemic. We need to act, and act positively despite the potential for political tricks.
The resulting outrage will be highly amusing. Even more so when other agencies like the CIA find *they're* being monitored.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
Achievement unlocked: you've unmasked your first NSA plant.
Spiderman only has pretty good power. Hulk and Thor have great power.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
There is, but every government does both kinds.
It's pretty informative to see all the AC posts in this thread... what is everyone afraid of?!?
Oh, wait... the NSA is watching and listening.
Seriously folks, this is BS and needs to stop. The US govt via the NSA should NOT be performing this level of spying on trusted allies or US citizens not suspected of any wrongdoing. As an American living in the EU, it makes me sick that my home country is engaged in this activity.
US law doesn't apply in the EU embassy.
I'm a staunch supporter of Snowden's revealing how the NSA was violating the 4th Amendment, but it's a shame that he's now revealing stuff like this. It will weaken the outrage over the US government wiping its ass w/ the Bill of Rights, because people will say that now he is endangering national security by revealing this information. He is shooting himself in the foot. TPTB will also have more justification for going after him. Having access to secret information beyond what is necessary for making his original case about spying on US citizens makes him less secure, not more. It also lessens the sympathy he'll get from Americans.
P.S. The latest "revelations" don't shock me, I doubt they shock TPTB in other countries, and the only effect on foreign relations will be the usual faux outrage. It doesn't bother me that the NSA is doing this, in fact I'd be more upset (or at least surprised) if they weren't. I also don't think it will do much if anything to harm national security, but he's still playing it wrong.
There is obviously some expectation of privacy in diplomacy, e.g. Diplomatic baggage is still treated as sealed. But obviously the US considers everything else to be completely fair game, including crypto-protected messaging. Hardly seems like playing according to the spirit of the rules. So, yes, it is plain and simple espionage against allies. This is surely not going down well in Europe.
If you were in one of the many countries the US was spying on would you extradite Snowden?
http://boingboing.net/2013/07/01/glenn-greenwald-gives-a-public.html
Glenn says they have a document from the NSA. They're now can record 1 billion cell phone calls per day.
You cannot elect a President if General Alexander can go through the candidates and pick out any that he doesn't like and leak their phone calls. You cannot have a democracy in that world.
We cannot elect a Prime Minister if General Alexander can leak his phone calls and monitor his communications. General Alexander will be able to pick and choose our elected officials by selectively smearing.
You cannot have a democracy in that world.
GCHQ, you have a job, and part of that job is to protect Brits from foreign powers spying on them.
but it's hard to understand why the US needs to massively spy on European administration to obtain more information about the latest regulation for the shapes of bananas or how much earth may be on potatoes.
Funny you should mention food regulation. The US has a huge problem with EU regulation of food. GMO foods have to be clearly labelled and most if not all US beef is banned within the EU because over here treating cattle with growth hormone is a serious crime and the resulting meat is not tolerated to enter the food chain, but this is standard practice in the US. There are huge economic interests involved and as Cablegate has shown, the US government is directly involved in putting pressure on EU states to further those interests. Knowing the thoughts of EU negotiators would give an unfair advantage.
I think this puts it into perspective. Still do not think it is right. Just shows how long they have been doing this.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/06/how-a-30-year-old-lawyer-exposed-nsa-mass-surveillance-of-americans-in-1975/
tl;dr version ... going on since at least 1950. Under different program names. All 'just ended recently'.
This has been going on a LONG time. 9/11 was just an excuse to make it legal and retroactive immunity in 2008. Some companies saw it as their duty to help the NSA. Others lawyered up. Others had a 'yeah the other guys do it too' attitude.
I doubt they will be all that outraged. They singed it into law letting them do it.
I doubt they will be all that outraged. They singed it into law letting them do it.
from http://crooksandliars.com/nicole-belle/jesselyn-radack-points-out-problem-fi -
STEPHANOPOULOS: But these surveillance programs, as the president has pointed out, were passed by the Congress, are overseen by a court.
RADACK: Well, both of those are incorrect. Congress has not been fully informed. Only the--
STEPHANOPOULOS: They passed the laws, there is oversight, or there is (inaudible).
RADACK: OK, but there is a secret interpretation of Section 215 of the Patriot Act, which nobody knows, except for the Intel Committee of Congress, and even they say that they think most Americans would be appalled by that. And to say that it’s been approved by the courts is a misnomer, because it gives the impression that federal courts have approved this, when in reality, it’s the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which has rubber-stamped every single--
STEPHANOPOULOS: Which is a federal court.
RADACK: No, it is a secret court set up at the Justice Department that has federal judges on it. But last year, it approved 2,000 out of 2,000 applications. They hear only the government’s side, and they have never -- they have rejected an application one time since 1978.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
..to this lately, and most of them were in the "We are big, bad, mean motherfuckers so of course we do this and if you don't like it go fuck yourself or we nuke you" (paraphrased, not literally uttered.. even though nuclear weapons HAVE been mentioned once or twice in the discussion.. I think it was on gizmodo or some site like that..)
Guys, just turn around the situation and it would be China doing the same in the US.. wouldn't your outcry be as big as ours (German here), maybe even bigger?
Just because you have the biggest guns doesn't mean laws are not for you anymore, just as a reminder..
Also, having the biggest Aircraft Carrier in the block means nothing, if you actually would take on an opponent that can fight back.. (I've read up on a lot of NATO maneuvers where even our old diesel subs blatantly sunk US carriers and the commanders didn't even believe the sub commanders that they were there, until they surfaced like 500 feet away from the carrier in full broadside view of the torpedo tubes..)
Really, if you ask me, as a German with a strong national pride myself, the only political answer to this would be simple (and something our corrupt and incompetent government would NEVER do..): close all US bases on German soil, including Ramstein etc., remove every single American non-civilian personell from the country immediately..
and while we're at it consider if this constitutes an "armed" (as in cyber-warfare) attack against Germany (and our Allies) as based on NATO Article 5 (Casus foederis).
Also, leaving NATO would be another option.
I wouldn't be surprised if individual member states are bugging each other routinely to obtain an advantage when it comes to trade talks, treaty agreements and all the rest. I wonder how the EU even manages to police that let alone develop its own pan-European security agency with which to counter international threats.
...of where you fall in the political spectrum, I think that everyone can agree that, as of late, the Administration has been exceptionally sloppy, amateurish, and far too invasive (due to sheer laziness).
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
I agree...'nuff said.
Everything that is "wrong" with the US today can explained by that 1947 incident. Afterall, war is good for business. Peace, of course, is good for business too. Afterall, even in the worst time someone makes a profit.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
This is what intelligence agencies do. And this is what they should be doing. I would expect American intelligence agencies to be spying on every foreign government. Of course I'd hope they're spending more resources spying on China and Russia and Saudi Arabia than France and the U.K., but at the end of the day, nations don't have friends, only interests.
Remember when the French played coy about if they'd put their military under NATO command if the Russians invaded West Germany? Knowing whether that was just the French being the French or if they seriously planned to sit out WWIII would have been really helpful if you were responsible for U.S. deployments in the Fulda gap. That's why you spy on your allies. Gentlemen don't read each other's mail. Which is why we should avoid hiring gentlemen to work at CIA.
Everyone should (and no doubt did) expect this kind of thing. But in revealing methods and practices and details of operations Snowden has actually done something wrong. Revealing the details of NSA's pervasive spying on American citizens was a public service. Dude should get a medal for that. But revealing the details of how the U.S. is spying on foreign governments today is kinda the textbook definition of a traitor.
On balance I'd say Snowden has still been a net positive -- the NSA operation is evil, immoral, and unconstitutional. It's worth losing some diplomatic intelligence in order to expose it. But it's not like that was the inevitable price -- he chose to reveal this new stuff in addition to the earlier revelations.
Whether the US should take the moral high road or dive into the muck like "just another country" is a debate that goes back to the founding of the Republic. It looks like it's finally been settled. :-(
You're kidding, right? I have a big problem w/ the US invading countries under false pretenses and for utterly indefensible reasons. This spying on allies stuff just means we aren't boy scouts. I'm going to be outraged at least until my next cup of coffee.
It's only illegal if it is against the law... You do realize that espionage is ALWAYS illegal in the country being spied on right? That doesn't make it illegal in the country doing the spying. It makes it a valid portion of the government's job. Spying has been a part of international relations since, well, when did people first make countries again? It isn't illegal and it isn't going to change any time soon. It's certainly not good for relations when it gets exposed, but everyone really is doing it. If you think that this is A) news or B) a valid leak that has any possible purpose than to hurt the US, then you are sadly ignorant of the realities of the intelligence community for the last forever.
AJ Henderson
How times have changed.
"Gentlemen don't read other gentlemen's mail." That's what Henry L. Stimson said in 1929 when he shut down the State Department's code breaking operations. Stimson was President Hoover's Secretary of State at the time.
Your "fair share" is NOT in my wallet.
It was a rhododendron, as I recall.
But it's more fun to bash the US for everything that happens, because obviously, the US is always wrong and everybody else is always right.
Heroes don't run when they know they're 100% right.
Spoken like a true armchair hero. More importantly, this isn't about Snowden as a superhero. Look, it's a bird, it's a plane, no it's Super Snowden! In fact this isn't about Snowden at all, but about what he's released. Trying to turn this into a debate about Snowden is a person as a ridiculous distraction.
Masturbating in front of the homeless? I have never done that nor have I seen anybody do so. In fact, doing that would lead one to be registered as a sex offender.
Not really, that's a construct that you probably picked up from Hollywood propaganda.
The truth is that things are rarely if ever that clear cut. Heroes in things like this tend to try to avoid being sent to prison as being in prison makes it easy for the government to stop them from making a scene. Whereas a very visible fight to get Snowden extradited back to the US has brought a ton of extra attention to the problem that he highlighted with the leak.
As someone who posts as AC on a regular basis out of laziness, I can safely say I'm just as willing to make a fool of myself with my pseudonym as I am as an AC. Your argument is flawed.
Last week one of my hard drives crashed and I lost part of my entire porn collection. How do I contact the NSA to grab a copy?
It's only illegal if there are consequences for it, and if some authority can punish you for it.
Since the USA is the richest, mightiest, most powerful nation in the world, "legalities" are just a concept. There is a reason we are the only superpower on the planet. We can do whatever the fuck we want to you and you will take from us willingly.
That attitude is not sustainable. If you go dicking around with other countries long enough, it will come back to bite you. No country, or empire, is invincible.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
I would add France, Taiwan, and Australia to that list as well but you pretty much nailed it. They all do it, usually to gain advantage during trade and treaty negotiations. The official "outrage" is mostly posturing. In the long run this is going to be a bit of a windfall for the EU countries since this is going to give them a good bit of leverage for a while.
International diplomacy is a sport all it's own, and it's a very rough sport.
I browse on +1 so AC's need not respond, I won't see it.
Long hair is puny. Hulk is strongest one there is!
International intelligence work is almost always illegal almost by definition. That's why it called intelligence work, as opposed to, say, Aunt Mary's Cookie Vending.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
And it's always fun to claim any criticism is US bashing because the US is never wrong and does everything right.
Except that espionage is considered and act of war and can be sufficient to actually stat a war. The reason why some nations get away with it, is that the cost of an actual war does not merit the incident.
Even if US law doesn't apply there, it doesn't mean its a law-less territory. Then would at least the laws of the represented delegation apply.
Agreed. I think that Snowden hurts his own credibility and his self-professed cause by spilling out all the details of United States espionage activities overseas. Had Snowden had a compelling whistleblower case by simply reporting on US domestic spying; many would view him as a patriot (as he self-proclaimed) for reporting on these abuses. However, muddies the water tremendously, I would even argue crosses the line, by providing details of US intelligence activities overseas, not just to the European Union but also to the Chinese and the Russians. Those actions directly harming his home country, undermining American intelligence activities against nations that have comprehensive espionage programs targeted at the United States (this includes European nations).
... and then become a martyr. Not everybody wants to be shot on sight for the good cause.
Most intelligence work is illegal by definition. The only question is whether the work is whether the US intelligence work breaks US laws. I envy your fairy tale worldview, but in the real world things work differently.
You're very right. And international law is just as strong as military or economic power. So it now depends on how straight the EU can hold its back, given the perspective of a diplomatic and economic war with the US, given the current EU crisis. Looking back at the past twenty or thirty years, there is not much hope for the EU. We (yes I'm EU citizen) will probably shout and scream out loud, the US will give us some trade benefits plus a lot of useful intelligence to show how good that PRISM stuff works. In the end nothing changes, except that we now know what happens, and the US will continue and expand its practises. And I suppose that Snowden hasn't seen all, so who knows how far reaching it all goes?
I truly hope that the EU will give Snowden political asylum based on this information. He deserves it. But if I were Edward Snowden, I wouldn't count on it and I wouldn't show my face in the EU, as I expect that he will be extradited to the US within weeks. Russia is probably safer - and how sad is that?! Ecuador - I'm not too sure about that...
The cameras installed in copy machines. I recall reading about this many years ago and IIRC it wasn't just soviet copy machines. But memory of the article is too faded. Spying is nothing new.
Well, if the US laws do not apply there, maybe the laws from the country represented by the embassies apply there? And what if it is illegal under these laws? Have you thought about this for a second?
And obviously, the surveillance was performed outside of the embassies walls as well.
Stop trying to pat yourself on the shoulder and find excuses. Any way you look at it, illegal or unconstitutional acts have been made.
And give me a break with your sanctioned under national security. Some of it may be, but a lot is business protectionism. And that's whats so shocking about this. If only it were limited to national security, at least it would have been explainable and, to some extent, excusable.
I can say this for Germany, but it probably applies to any sane Government. The BND does intelligence gathering that any private individual could, such as areal photos and driving by installations. Their main effort is centered around inferring information from what is "publicly" available. To actually infiltrate installations, the country in question must be at war with Germany.
The US has always cheeped me out. The level of paranoia is astonishing and I think it is a mere wonder that we came out of the cold war without any major incident.
Snowden is Hot Potato. Agree with him or not, there's no country in their right mind who would want him on the premises. He was asked by HK/Chine to leave, and I'm pretty sure Russia can't wait to get him on a plane.
Unless he also has information about Russia (or whatever country he's in) and they find out. In which case he'll be in some pretty Hot Water.
So many people think this spying is primarily for military and security reasons but the EU is first of all an economic pact, the EU doesn't even have a joint military and the major EU powers are through NATO already allied with the US.
By consequence the spying on the EU is for economic reasons.
In the past there have been very suspicious deals where for example in China an Airbus contract was at last minute handed to Boeing, we don't need more of this crap were government organisations are doing dirty legwork for corporation.
The upcoming Free Trade negotiations are obviously a nice target, the US dearly wants to know how far they can push the EU in their own direction by exploiting divisions among the EU members, I'm afraid the US has now shot themselves in both feet.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
As you can see their very few terroristic attacks to Russia or china.
Not much terrorism in Russia or China? You're kidding, right? Next you'll add India and the UK to the list.
Who uses faxes anymore? And encrypted faxing? Oooh, so much more secure. How about secure FTP or encrypted e-mail?
Well the US. Got Two skyscrapers torn down because of their illegal activities around the world. You can say that US also took its revenge after, but that does not give the life back to the thousand of civilian killed because of the US foreign policy. As you can see their very few terroristic attacks to Russia or china.
First, your logic sounds a lot like some guy who beats his wife and blames her for asking for it.
Second, you are flat out wrong. Both China and Russia have experienced far more terrorist attacks than the US ever has. And that's even if you don't count all the ones which could be considered "Revolutionary" types of actions.
Afterall he is only reporting what any 'responsible' government already knew and did......
Incredibly false. What he did was leak a bunch of documents in a very irresponsible manner. He could have chose to quit his job and go on to tell the American people they were being spied upon. That's been done at least three times before. But instead what he did was take a bunch of classified documents and release them to the press without any redactions -- and some international presses too. Why didn't he sit down and carefully consider all the information and just pare it down to only the details that Americans were being spied upon by their government? That's why he's legally screwed right now and will likely never be able to return to the United States and be jailed for life if he does.
I don't know, it seems like he released all these documents in an un-redacted and irresponsible manner, and yet the earth continues to tun and the US maintains "national security". The US government doesn't like these leaks because it exposes the fact that its actions often don't match its rhetoric about freedom and democracy and the rule of law and all that.
It's interesting to me that we all seem to tacitly acknowledge that intelligence agencies are criminal organizations; that is, they break the law as matter of course. We know now, and should have known for a while now, that they lie to their governments and the public about what they are up to. For our own good, of course. I'm glad when we find out about this stuff because in a democracy, even a representative one like ours, the public needs to be informed to make good decisions.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Why would he want to return to the US?
Heroes don't run when they know they're 100% right.
You understand that "right" can be a very subjective judgement, yes? I think Snowden is mostly "right", but I'm sure John Brennan would disagree.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
"We are big, bad, mean motherfuckers so of course we do this and if you don't like it go fuck yourself or we nuke you"
I live in the US, listened to and read plenty of news/reactions about this and have yet to hear the utter BS you made up. Couldn't be further from the truth.
Something like this (the illegal surveillance) asks for a war-like response, agreed. However, neither the US nor the EU are in a good financial position. I doubt they want to risk anything at this point. The EU will probably complain a lit bit, change its own policies, mandate the embassies double check everything and assume from now on they are permanently being spied on. Nobody has the balls these days.
After 4 decades on this planet it still never ceases to surprise me that "everyone does it" or "everyone else is just as bad" still seems like a logical defense to some people.
Would raping little girls be okay if more people did it? If only it were more popular then none of us would have to feel bad about being a total piece of shit. The kind of person who does stuff like that does it because they don't care about the little girl that they are going to hurt or even kill. That other person, that other consciousness means nothing to them. Only their narrow interests matter. Sound familiar?
Pathological liars of all sorts are always adamant about how no one else is any different. "Everyone lies", they say. Dishonest salesmen and cops are the same. They defend their bad behavior by saying that everyone else is just as bad. Uh huh. As soon as I hear someone say that sort of thing I immediately know not to trust them or believe a word they say. And I'll keep a close eye on my wallet and all my other possessions as well. There's a good chance they lack any sense of empathy, of right or wrong: what we call a conscience.
Well I've got news for some of you. Not everyone will lie and steal even from their so called friends whenever they think they can get away with it. I have known a few pathological liars in my life and as soon as I discovered who and what they really were I broke off any contact with them. Period.
I wouldn't be friends with someone who planted bugs in my home. In fact I would consider them the opposite of friends. They wouldn't be welcome anywhere near my home ever again. It would be pretty clear that their intentions were not good. If I were one of the countries mentioned in these leaks I would immediately break off all diplomatic relations with the US. I mean, what the fuck is the point when it's obvious you are being treated in a manner indistinguishable from how one treats an enemy? At the very least it would seem sensible to strip search and cavity search anyone carrying a US passport who wants to enter or leave an embassy/consulate or any other sensitive location. Are you quasi-sociopaths starting to see the problem now?
And how does one draw the line between just being naughty and an act of outright war? Seems like that line could be drawn very finely indeed. If in our eavesdropping we discover that a foreign diplomat holds beliefs that seem inimical to our interests would it be okay to assassinate them? How about just fucking up their life so badly that they choose to quit their jobs? Maybe infecting one of their children with HIV for instance? After all, what is the point of making so much effort to gather all that intelligence data if we do not use it to further our interests? Isn't that what this is all about? Our interests? Aside from "everyone else is doing it", that is the justification for this behavior is it not? Of course it couldn't possibly be in our interest to treat our allies like we ourselves would want to be treated: with respect and honesty. No. So much better to prepare for outright war even with such highly unlikely foes as, say, Canada.
Espionage is fine when you are in a shooting war with someone and it's tolerable when it seems that a shooting war is imminent, but it is neither honorable nor civilized behavior. Not even if you have proof that the other side is doing the same to you, which I don't think any of you currently have by the way.
I'm sorry, but just assuming that everyone else is just as amoral and dishonest and untrustworthy and two-faced and is also treating us in a way that is indistinguishable from an enemy is not sufficient. Not if we want to be seen as the good guys. Clearly any such pretense would be laughable now. The enemy is us. We are the baddies.
Even if we knew with absolute 100% certainty that all of the people we were bugging were bugging us back just as successfully the old two wrongs don't make a right rule still applies. If we discovered that one of our allies were systematically raping our female diplomats would we respond in kind? I would certainly hope not.
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
Evil paranoid people who play underhanded always believe that others do exactly the same as they do.
Don't complain about syntax, grammar, or spelling. There is no.hell like input on android.
If the US sat around doing nothing we'd all be way better off.
Whether the US should take the moral high road or dive into the muck like "just another country" is a debate that goes back to the founding of the Republic. It looks like it's finally been settled. :-(
The US is still here. That means they did what was needed to survive. If you don't understand that, you are not qualified to be in charge of anything.
Correlation does not imply causation. The fact that the US is still here does not mean that any given set of actions is responsible for it. I could just as easily say that the US is still here in spite of the actions taken by recent administrations.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
As you can see their very few terroristic attacks to Russia or china.
First of all: "there're" not "their"
Secondly: Just 'cause you don't hear about them doesn't mean there there aren't any of those happening. Try looking up the Dubrovka Theater, tell me there isn't terror in Russia.
Thing is Russia and China just like to hush up stuff like this, makes it much easier to respond with insane force.
Admit nothing. Deny Everything. Make Counter-accusations.
International intelligence work is almost always illegal almost by definition. That's why it called intelligence work, as opposed to, say, Aunt Mary's Cookie Vending.
bullshit. you know what most international intelligence work is? living in the country 100% legally and reading the newspapers. what kind of spy would bother to run their own undercover polls about who is going to win the next presidency ? or exit polls?
yes, it's amazing! the entire cia factbook is done that way.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
This has to be a troll. But, considering our leaders ... I'm not so sure.
Anyway, China will eventually stop buying our bonds. Then we're done. Google about Egypt, the Suez Canal, Great Britain, and how Eisenhower ended a war in Egypt before it really got rolling by telling the Brits he'd sell off the British bonds the US held which would devalue the pound.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suez_Crisis#Financial_pressure
When you owe lots and lots of money, someone has you by the balls no matter how big you are.
What changed under Obama? Nothing Good
You are right. The economic ware of the USA against the EU cover not only the food, but virtually any economic activity.
Also I think that Americans with their "one party has all the power in the government" has troubles understanding that the European countries where the governmental powers often are distributed on several political parties, in some countries even 10-20 different parties. With such a wide political diversity and also with parties that might be loyal to even other countries (communists etc) it's not so easy for "the power" to spy on other countries willy-nilly.
Twenty-five years ago Mexico was in delicate negotiations to restructure its foreign debt. The Mexican ambassador and former minister of the Treasury (Hacienda) was personally handling the negotiations in Washington.
Strategy planning was done overnight with the President of Mexico and, this goes without saying, utmost secrecy was needed. The only method considered secure enough was to fly the ambassador on a two seater supersonic jet fighter back to the Mexican capital every night for a face to face meeting in an undisclosed location and then fly him back to Washington the next morning.
Sounds overly dramatic. Until the latest models supersonic fighters couldn't fly supersonic for very long. An ordinary business jet would have been just as fast, cost less to operate, and let the ambassador get what was undoubtedly a badly needed nap. Otherwise, it sounds like a wise precaution.
The US can not trample all over it's[sic] allies...
The US can't even really count on having any allies, the way it's been behaving for the last few years.
That would be spectacular, but probably pointless to the economic relationship witch is the real subject.
International sanction to forbid the USA to endlessly print unrealistic amount of money would be far stronger response.
Heroes don't run when they know they're 100% right.
Spoken like a true armchair hero. More importantly, this isn't about Snowden as a superhero. Look, it's a bird, it's a plane, no it's Super Snowden! In fact this isn't about Snowden at all, but about what he's released. Trying to turn this into a debate about Snowden is a person as a ridiculous distraction.
Spoken like Ned Stark.
living in the country 100% legally and reading the newspapers.
I hope you're not serious, that's all. I sincerely hope.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
What really irks me is shit like this: http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/06/27/19166043-obama-not-scrambling-jets-to-get-nsa-leaker-snowden Whereby we now have US Trade Representatives considering revoking trade privileges of an entire country (Ecuador) because the administration has a personal vendetta against Snowden. It is really sickening what our government is willing to do to cover its own ass.
It doesn't matter from what country I am from when we say: "you Americans"
Stereotypes are universal? Please, you're denigrating your country's own culture by saying it doesn't add its own particular flavor to them.
More importantly, knowing what country you're from would help me make the appropriate references when praising your country's eternal goodness and niceness.
We are simply non-Americans for you.
More stereotypes! Please, we Americans hate different countries for different reasons.
I hope this will cause European governments to grow some balls. The US really isn't well served by having a bunch of subserviant mediocrities governing Europe. We were making a lot more progress when the Soviet Union, evil empire that it was, actually presented a real ideological, military, and technological challenge to the US.
(Oh, and next time, pick your Nobel Prize winners more carefully.)
This is like a newspaper cartoon series with the artist getting better each week.
You Americans are sooooooo screwed. And it was about time too. Perhaps you'll learn to pay attention when you vote now. There are more than two choices you know.
You really don't see the trajectory of this, do you? I'm not sure what country you're from, but it's a safe bet that the people responsible for bringing this attempted panopticon into being are coming for you too. This isn't about any nation state. It's about a supra-national elite running the world for their own power and gain. It's not a conspiracy, it's the recognition of shared interests. It would be irrational for the ultra-rich to not coordinate to ensure their continued preeminence. Unless you are a billionaire, or were an invitee at the last Bilderburg meeting, what is being done is not for your benefit.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Legal or not, it's still unethical. That's what it's "embarrassing" to be caught.
It seems abundantly clear to me that the US would be happy to do espionage on diplomatic baggage as long as they believe that they could get away with it.
Yeah, as they say "There are no rules in love and war" -- so which is it? It appears that the US is no longer getting away with playing the game as if there were no rules.
These actions might meet your expectations of your government (in the US), but it doesn't meet other countries' expectations of how the US should be acting. The difference between expectation and reality is what is going to bring consequences. For diplomats it is quite personal -- their private exchanges about negotiations were potentially being revealed to people they were sitting at a table with hours later. There is personal embarrassment here apart from anything else. Diplomacy is all about carefully controlled presentation of positions, and that has been violated in the eyes of negotiators. Where is there any trust now for future negotiations? EU-US trade pact coming up soon.
Angela Merkel comes off looking like a real asshole, IMO. When it came out that the US was spying on US and German citizens, she defended it as necessary for the war on terror. Then she finds out we're spying on her fellow oligarchs and all of a sudden it's an unjustifiable violation of trust.
Stop-Prism.org: Opt Out of Surveillance
Yes. I've read elsewhere that the French are particularly zealous about spying on businessmen from the US.
Here's an example:
http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19930418&slug=1696416
No offense to you, but the person you are quoting, "RADACK," is a nitwit. The FISA court is a federal court that deals with secret material, not a secret court. Issuing search warrants is not an adversarial process to begin with, and wouldn't be at any other court. There is more.
Secret Court's Oversight Gets Scrutiny
Michael Mukasey, who was attorney general under President George W. Bush, said in an interview that the lack of rejections by the FISA court doesn't mean the court is a rubber stamp. He notes the court sometimes modifies orders and that the Justice Department's national-security division is careful about the applications it presents to the court.
Of 1,856 FISA applications the Justice Department made in 2012, the court denied none but modified 40, the Justice Department reported.
Timothy Edgar, who was a top lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union, said he believed the FISA court was a rubber stamp until he saw the process firsthand when he became a senior civil-liberties official in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence in 2006. "It's definitely not a rubber stamp," he said in an interview Sunday. "On a very superficial level, they tend to approve pretty much everything that comes before them. They do meet in secret. It's just more complicated than that."
The reason so many orders are approved, he said, is that the Justice Department office that manages the process vets the applications rigorously. The lawyers there see themselves not as government advocates so much as neutral arbiters of the law between the executive branch and the courts, he said, so getting the order approved by the Justice Department lawyers is perhaps the biggest hurdle to approval. "The culture of that office is very reluctant to get a denial," he said.-- more
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
First of all: "there're" not "their"
/facepalm
So is ok if you kill someone because others kill too? And while claiming that killing is wrong, and punishing countries because they do it? And there is the thing of scale too. As someone else killed a person, you are now enabled kill a millon?
And yes, fully support Snowden image. If i tell everybody "oh, US killed a person", is my fault or is US? Everyone should be warned before giving its back to US, they could be the next victims, and US still feels that is their right to kill.
Yet 911 still happened.
9/11 happened in spite of the fact that the CIA were tracking some of the hijackers before 9/11 and just didn't tell anyone. And it happened in spite of the fact that two of the hijackers were living with an FBI informant before the attacks. Missed connections, intentional neglect, you be the judge.
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
Well, generally, if you f*ck with the Russians, they f*ck you right back, on steroids. Can't speak to the Chinese, but evidence of things like Tienanmen Square and their continuing prosecution of Falun Gong make me assume similar. The US. on the other hand, tends to go in big and slow. Drones may be changing that. And not to our benefit. . .
Targeted espionage for economic-industrial advantage is NOT a 'War On Terror.'
Yes. The problem here is that the agencies build with the excuse of the "war on terror" in now used to ruin the allies. Don't expect graceful reaction from them.
I don't know how to break this to you, but the BND does gather electronic data as well, including e-mails, text messages and other telecommunications data. The amounts have varied over time.
I'm sure you know that Germany also faces problems with terrorists.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Not really, that's a construct that you probably picked up from Hollywood propaganda.
Luke Skywalker in Tatooine - stays? no - runs.
Sarah O'Corner when t100 finds her - stays? no- runs.
Indiana Jones in front of boulder - stays? Heck no - runs!
Mad Max, Roger Rabbit, James bond, John McClanne,Spideman, Superman, Batman, Ethan Hunt, Rambo
Heroes ALWAYS run, in Hollywood as much as in real life.
You forgot one of the biggest US vulnerability: dollar, that gets massively printed by trillons without changes the value of things, and having a debt that would make the pile of bills reach the moon. What if the world decides to break dependence from dollar and just move the trade to Euros or a new virtual currency? That won't affect a lot the superrich, but will affect you. So, keep defend the bullying, you will the the one screwed if that have a repercussion.
If you want an ally don't keep whipping him in his back every 5 mins. You just want a slave. And don't be surprised if he don't want to play "ally" anymore.
I suspect that True Patriots interpret "national security" to include economic hegemony.
I'm not sure about that, but I am sure of the fact that international terrorism involves more than one country. Terrorists in country E can plot, plan, and prepare to attack targets in country U. Sometimes country U is just next door, and sometimes country U is overseas. In either case the terrorists travel from country E to country U to attack.
It might be nice to see that coming. If you aren't in country U, you can warn countries E & U. If you are in country U, you can warn country E and prepare for the attack in country U.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
What do you mean, "finally"?
Never before have US invaded random countries for no good reason, or randomly slaughtered civilians abroad. So some things are new and paint a much worse image than we used to have.
Feeding the trolls here but, The GP's point was no one country does everything right, its not just the US that has problems.
Everyone spies on everyone else. Spying on our friends will turn them into enemies so in retrospect it is entirely self-justifying.
It's called "diplomacy", a virtual role-playing game that was has been the refuge of nerds for centuries: it differs from modern shoot-em-ups only in that the deaths are real but take place out-of-scene.
In the past there have been very suspicious deals where for example in China an Airbus contract was at last minute handed to Boeing, we don't need more of this crap were government organisations are doing dirty legwork for corporation.
There may be a different explanation. And, as noted below: "95% of U.S. economic intelligence comes from open sources."
Why We Spy on Our Allies - R. James Woolsey - March 17, 2000 (Also available here )
What is the recent flap regarding Echelon and U.S. spying on European industries all about? We'll begin with some candor from the American side. Yes, my continental European friends, we have spied on you. And it's true that we use computers to sort through data by using keywords. Have you stopped to ask yourselves what we're looking for?
The European Parliament's recent report on Echelon, written by British journalist Duncan Campbell, has sparked angry accusations from continental Europe that U.S. intelligence is stealing advanced technology from European companies so that we can -- get this -- give it to American companies and help them compete. My European friends, get real. True, in a handful of areas European technology surpasses American, but, to say this as gently as I can, the number of such areas is very, very, very small. Most European technology just isn't worth our stealing.
Why, then, have we spied on you? The answer is quite apparent from the Campbell report -- in the discussion of the only two cases in which European companies have allegedly been targets of American secret intelligence collection. Of Thomson-CSF, the report says: "The company was alleged to have bribed members of the Brazilian government selection panel." Of Airbus, it says that we found that "Airbus agents were offering bribes to a Saudi official." These facts are inevitably left out of European press reports.
That's right, my continental friends, we have spied on you because you bribe. Your companies' products are often more costly, less technically advanced or both, than your American competitors'. As a result you bribe a lot. So complicit are your governments that in several European countries bribes still are tax-deductible.
When we have caught you at it, you might be interested, we haven't said a word to the U.S. companies in the competition. Instead we go to the government you're bribing and tell its officials that we don't take kindly to such corruption. They often respond by giving the most meritorious bid (sometimes American, sometimes not) all or part of the contract. This upsets you, and sometimes creates recriminations between your bribers and the other country's bribees, and this occasionally becomes a public scandal. . .
Why do you bribe? It's not because your companies are inherently more corrupt. Nor is it because you are inherently less talented at technology. It is because your economic patron saint is still Jean Baptiste Colbert, whereas ours is Adam Smith. In spite of a few recent reforms, your governments largely still dominate your economies, so you have much greater difficulty than we in innovating, encouraging labor mobility, reducing costs, attracting capital to fast-moving young businesses and adapting quickly to changing economic circumstances. You'd rather not go through the hassle of moving toward less dirigisme. It's so much easier to keep paying bribes.
The Central Intelligence Agency collects other economic intelligence, but the vast majority of it is not stolen secrets. The Aspin-Brown Commission four years ago found that about 95% of U.S. economic intelligence comes from open sources. --- more
Apparently there is more than one form of corrupt practice.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
Also, read this excellent post by brit74.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
That's not at all the same. The term for that isn't hero, it's martyr. And martyrs are ultimately only able to impact things upon being martyred if there's a strong movement behind them. They're at that point a symbol more than a person.
Hollywood is one place, and pop culture is another, but it's not a reasonable assumption that people would stay because they're heroes. They stay because there's a reason for staying, and in this case there's far more gain to be made by trying to escape than there is in voluntarily being arrested.
Also, other countries see this as a human rights issue that involves everybody instead of something that only becomes an issue when it affects their own citizens.
What? Which country sees it like that? As far as I can tell, no country seems to care until it affects not their citizens, but the leaders of the country.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
The point is that everybody engages in it, and it would be negligent not to. Until there's world peace and everybody agrees on things, that's how it's going to be.
And yes, there is plenty of evidence to back these accusations, but I've got better things to do with my time, the evidence is on Google. And really, calling them "accusations" is rather bizarre, given the long history of espionage, the bizarre accusation is yours that everybody isn't doing it.
They were conducting business and they should have assumed that the wires were being tapped by somebody. This isn't 100 years ago when the taps were restricted to just government entities, anybody with the capability to do the crack can get into a lot of this stuff. It's just that the government was going it in this case.
US spies on them. Why are people shocked by this?
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
And who has placed limits on US espionage so far? I don't see anything happening.
Then your expectations are wrong. It isn't the US government's job to protect the privacy of Europeans, and all this anger directed against the US isn't going to change anything at all.
Europeans should direct their anger at their own governments, for selling them out to the US, for not protecting them from US spying, and for spying on their own citizens.
Until Europeans actually get their act together in Europe, both Americans and Europeans will continue to get screwed.
As a Citizen of the USA, I believe we DO need a swift kick in the balls from the rest of the world. The Citizens need to take part in this ball-crushing event too. The beast is too wild and needs to be tamed.
All of this is especially true if everyone is a terrorist. This is why a world police state is so necessary and why we all must give up privacy and embrace the inevitable ubiquitous video surveillance in our homes. In every room. Keep in mind that the greatest threats usually come from within. Thus the need for all of us to be watched very closely at all times by our protectors and benefactors who will keep us safe. It gets me all warm and fuzzy just thinking about all of that womb-like safety. Thank God for the NSA, CIA, and FBI. Without them we would surely all be dead by now. And by "we" I don't mean just Americans. The whole world is in their dept. God bless America, citizen!
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
It's only illegal if it is against the law... You do realize that espionage is ALWAYS illegal in the country being spied on right? That doesn't make it illegal in the country doing the spying.
One of Russia's replies to the USA's request to extradite Snowden was something along the lines of
'In Russia, it's not a crime to spy on the USA'
The theory being that extradition should only apply to actions that are also a crime in the foreign country.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
The North Remembers!
Yes, their governments are irresponsible if they aren't spying warmongers! Spy on everyone whether or not it's likely they actually pose a threat!
Yes, because if I threatened to beat someone up if they claimed that 1 + 1 = 2 and they ran away, that would indicate that they know they're wrong.
So no one has noticed yet? The US spies on UK citizens (they're foreign, so it's a-okay). The UK spies on US citizens (they're foreign, so it's tickity-boo). The two then share all their info.
Add in Harpers' Canada and Panopticon Achieved.
Actually, you are wrong. Right now there will be very hard questions asked, and USA will pay the bill. It is not fair, i know, but that's the life, accept it.
If you think that everyone is a terrorist, you may be a terrorist yourself. That could mean that you, as an innocent victim, are endangered by yourself as a terrorist. Here is a helpful suggestion: Go talk to the police and tell them that you think you may be a danger to yourself. They should be able to arrange help with that.
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
This is well written. Assuming it is true, it points out how we (the US) are handling these things incorrectly.
If you go undercover and catch someone being unscrupulous, you announce it publicly, not privately. You do that because then the other side can't say "see, we knew you were spying!" Since they were exposed for their treachery, they are no longer credible. And since we owned up to what we were doing, we remain credible.
But if we expose their behavior privately, only to them, then we no longer have the moral high ground. We have compromised our position: they now know that we are spying, and can expose us as criminals. We won't have the proof of their unscrupulous behavior as a matter of public record to justify our actions. And they will continue the unscrupulous behavior because there was no consequence.
You mean, the same Google that lend their equipment to NSA? LOL, man, you are sooo naive...
Oh, like Europe has any leverage to get the US to do anything. What? Merkel would threaten the US with a BMW embargo? French waiters would become surly and refuse to speak English with tourists?
And what "bill" would that be that we have to "pay"? Withdrawing troops from Europe and ceasing spy operations in Europe would be a great money savings for the US. Bring it on, I say, the sooner the better.
It just strikes to me as naive to use Windows and Intel hardware to store state secrets. Or using Israeli firewalls (Checkpoint) China got it right with Red Flag Linux and Loongson.
US is not "closed" economy. They need the other countries to buy US stuffs, and to buy it with dollars. Remember Iraq? And what happened when they decided to replace USD with EU?
Now, i wonder, who is going to pay the US debt, if no one, but USA is trading with these little, greeny pesky things....
There is no well-defined list of acts-of-war, as in "if you do any of these things, we are justified in starting a war with you".
And you know this... how? Because they say so? And even if this were true, it would be a post-war restriction placed on the BND by the allies, rather than a voluntary choice.
And while the BND hasn't admitted much about their foreign intelligence gathering, they have pretty much admitted to vacuuming up all E-mail and other communications within Germany that they can get their hands on. The "Verfassungsschutz" even bugs parliamentarians and journalists. They used to listen in on many East/West German calls. And a large part of the German intelligence services were rebuilt from the employees of the intelligence services of the Third Reich.
Stop being so naive. Germany needs to clean house. This "at least we don't have amerikanische Verhältnisse" is a lame political propaganda tool to distract you from how rotten the situation is in Germany. It would be great if Germany started living up to its rhetoric, because then it could take a principled stance against NSA spying. As is, German objections are hypocritical and pathetic.
Damn, for such a supposedly low level employee, Snowden sure seemed to be able to garner a lot of intel. Just think of the stuff that is going on that he couldn't get his hands on.
Any Country "has every incentive to get an advantage in the economic and research realms by spying."
US did the same at one point.
Also OP's point has nothing to do with China spying/not-spying, but rather pointing out that there is now evidence that US IS spying.
I bet he is, since he is also 100% right. Most intelligense is collected what they call "Open Source", since the term has later got a different meaning it is now called "Open Intelligence". What do you think those thousands of diplomats granted official diplomatic rights in other countries actually do everyday for a living?
Have you looked at the German-US or French-US trade imbalance? It may not be economically rational, but less of that kind of trade would be politically popular in the US, and rather unpopular in Europe.
If nobody but the US were trading with US dollars, the US dollar would be worthless. In that case, Europe would hold a shitload of worthless US debt.
Any more brilliant ideas?
"It depends on what the meaning of the words 'is' is." –Bill Clinton
Stop being a drama queen on behalf of your country! Not everything is about you. Once you realize that you might also realize what other purposes this leak has.
No one who stays informed is hardly surprised, everybody who chooses to remain blissfully ignorant hardly cares.
The reveal is not so much .gov spying as much as on who's behalf it's being done. And the picture has been out there for the snapping; just a matter of focusing the dots.
Evidence US .gov spying on behalf of corporate interests will probably be the next big shoe to drop. Specially considering how many private contractors our .gov is enlisting.
Corporate espionage has been around for a long time, and, it most likely has all along been entangled with government. Just not to the incredible degree it is today. Knowledge has become a growth industry and D.C. is in the thick of it, but for a historical record it would be worth looking at our old friend AIG:
Corporate espionage probably has it's roots around the time AIG (OSS via Vander Starr then Greenberg ), now AIU, purchased the "private spy agency" Kroll Associates; which began operations in 1972, 3 years after Mo Greenberg took the helm of AIG. Maurice was an omnipotent, a Fed Chair, CFR chair, Kissinger became his lap dog in China.
In 1993, AIG became Kroll Associates largest investor. Kroll was notorious during the 1980s as the "CIA of Wall Street" due to the prevalence of former CIA, FBI, Scotland Yard, British secret service and British Special Air Service men Kroll employed for corporate espionage in takeover bids, as well as for destabilization of foreign nations.
In December 1997, Kroll merged with armored car manufacturer O'Gara-Hess & Eisenhardt to form The Kroll-O'Gara Company. www.krollworldwide.com It's said that O'Gara had been responsible for the security of all US-Presidents since 1945. Worth noting: from 1993 to 2001 Kroll Associates were responsible for World Trade Center Security. That includes Building#7, C-n-C for bio-warfare. In August 2001, Kroll Associates was renamed to Kroll Inc.
May 2004, Marsh sent a 100 million dollar offer to Julius Kroll, looking to buy into a multi-billiion dollar industry filled with former military types, CIA, FBI, DEA operatives and any number of lettered agencies charged with the security of our nation. Kroll was and remains the grandcentral of information.
(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kroll_Inc)
In October 2004, Eliot Spitzer filed suit against Marsh, citing them for steering clients to preferred insurers with whom the company maintained lucrative payoff agreements, and for soliciting rigged bids for insurance contracts from the insurers;
He accused the company of having colluded, for years, to "cheat customers in an elaborate charade of price fixing and bid rigging" , including insider-trading by Marsh in betting against American Airlines.
The three insurers he named were the AIG, Zurich America Insurance Company and Ace Ltd. AIG was run by Maurice Greenberg, his son Jeffrey ran Marsh & McLennan and his son, Evan, was boss of Ace.
Kroll CEO, Michael Cherkasky became Marsh CEO in response to Spitzer's investigation. In January 2006, Cherkasky persuaded Spitzer to drop the civil charges against Marsh in exchange for $US850 million to clients that Marsh & McLennan had defrauded. On February 9, 2006, AIG settled in court for 1.6B,
In 1990 AIG purchased control of International Lease Finance Corp (ILFC), ILFC leases the full line of both Airbus & Boeing aircraft and made AIG fully responsible for the planes it leases.
So much for preamble. Last December, AIG announced it would sell 90% of ILFC to private interests in China. That hasn't turned out to well and since then AIG's taking major hits on ILFC.
But IFLC did serve them well for a time. As noted by others:
"As a order maker to the manufacturers, it allows for a virtual takeover of the manufacturing lines by claiming such a large inventory. This allows leverage against the manufacturing companies as a group. So, who ever controls AIG wags the tail of huge de
resist propaganda
Turns out it's bullshit:
http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fde.wikipedia.org%2Fwiki%2FBundesnachrichtendienst&hl=en&langpair=auto|en&tbb=1&ie=UTF-8
What should really "creep you out" is the history of the BND on the same page.
EU grants asylum to Snowden. That would send the message home quite effectively.
but do you honestly believe that close Western allies of the US are systematically bugging US embassies and spying on US politicians on a massive scale?
Um, yes, of course. I also bet those friendly nationals who are cleared to sit in SCIF's in the US report back to their respective nations' information that was NOFORN that they inadvertently come across as well. It is the world of espionage, and just how it goes. All the countries do it to friendly and hostile countries. It is only embarrassing when uncovered.
Yep, that's the reason no one YET abandoned the US greeny, but if USA continues to stretch the limits....who knows, people may decide they had enough, and just leave the ship, no matter the consequences. I just wonder, is USA stupid enough to force its hand because of some stupid spy triller??? I know i know, most of americans are idiots, but the ones that are the real leaders (of which you have not heard of), are not going sacrifice everything, for idiots like you.
Well unless you add greed as a good reason you are quite wrong... ...
And in practice the US started that way, Idian wars ? Mexican war, paraguay expedition, chilean war, philipine war, vietnam war,
Nothing new ...
You don't think just announcing, "I am a terrorist, but so are you, you fucking pigs!" would do the trick? But if we are all terrorists (and lets face it we all probably are) then there are no innocent victims to protect. And even if there were don't we have a policy of not negotiating with terrorists?
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
Yes, as a matter of fact, I do.
As you clearly wouldn't believe this without concrete evidence, I'm sure you won't mind presenting some of it for us less informed.
Why the heck even bother going anywhere? You can get all the papers you want shipped anywhere you want in the world, and you could - for many decades, probably closer to a 100 years in case of some newspapers. Never mind that almost any worthwhile paper can be had online these days.
Intelligence isn't about diplomats sitting around reading newspapers.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
What would the perks be in that? Diplomatic positions are things you buy or are handed as an award by people in power. They are meant to be cushy positions where you do little and have extraordinary perks, but to have those perks you need to travel to another country. Sitting at home doing light work just wont do, you would have to pay tax and stuff!
Also part of business after reading newspapers is talking to people and generally being aware of the local situation. You CAN NOT do that from another country. The media is not as unfiltered as you think.
Go figure. Fan boy of communism thinks his country, the capitalist USA, needs "a swift kick in the balls from the rest of the world," and the citizens need to get it too. News at 11. The revolution starts at midnight, purges at dawn.
Communism has been a bloody failure worldwide. The problem isn't that it has never been implemented properly, the problem is it isn't possible to implement "properly." It is based on a fundamental misreading of human nature, bad economics, and class warfare leading to the extermination of various social classes. (Round up all the bankers and shoot them, then keep moving down the list.) It is a genocidal creed.
The Black Book of Communism
The Black Book of Communism - (book review) by Daniel J. Mahoney
Reflections on Communism - Twenty Years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall
Although this centers on the Soviet Union, some of it sheds light on some common aspects of communist regimes.
The Soviet Story (2008)
much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot - George Orwell
For nation states, foreign spying *is* the moral high-road.
Look, why do countries keep secrets in the first place? In an ideal world, they wouldn't feel the need to. They keep them because they're playing games of one-upmanship and sabotauge and petty nationalism. Secrets are, as a point of fact, weapons, and spying is the means by which those weapons are disarmed. We have less nuclear stockpiling when the US and Russia can verify for themselves the number of nukes the other has, vs. having to assume the worst. We have less wars when countries can relieve their paranoia their neighbors might be massing troops and mortars on the border, or aren't as far ahead of them technologically. Humanity avoids a great deal of redundant research and other wasted resources when countries steal science and technology from each other.
The best case would be to not have secrets and have every nation working together for the common good, but that's never going to happen and spying on each other is the most pragmatic alternative.
When things get complex, multiply by the complex conjugate.
Because where are the leaks detailing how foreign governments spy on the US and influence US elections?
The resulting outrage will be highly amusing. Even more so when other agencies like the CIA find *they're* being monitored.
If the US is bugged by foreign governments the same way does that make news? Or is it only news if the US government does it?
Yes everyone spies on everyone, but it is still embarrassing when one is caught red-handed.
I'm not sure how that is supposed to relate to my comment, but I don't disagree with you. Russia has absolutely no legal reason to hand over Snowden, though political reasons could still result in him being sent back. I don't think we have any right to blame Russia if they don't send him back though, but politicians have to act angry about it, just like European politicians have to act angry about us spying on them even though everyone knows that spying on allies is what makes allies work. How do you know you can trust another government if you don't know that they are telling you the truth by knowing things they don't know you know?
AJ Henderson
Espionage is not an act of war, nor has it ever been. In fact, the penalties for spying in most countries differ specifically based on whether there is a war on or not. It's how countries make sure other countries are being honest with them, whether friend or enemy. It's also some of the most important information for getting at what countries actually want since the political sphere is all bullshit and positioning rather than actually getting things done.
AJ Henderson
He was a US citizen with a US security clearance leaking details of activities that are both valid national security activities and common (and legitimate) practice for all governments. This leak is a direct compromise of national security and doesn't have any moral grounds as a leak to expose wrong doing as there is no wrong doing being exposed.
AJ Henderson
Someone doesn't realize that embassies are foreign soil.
Someone doesn't realise that this is a common misconception.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
It's happened a couple of times and it made things a lot worse both times.
I don't know about you, but my local paper is full of shit once editors put their political slant on things. If that's all you've got then you get occasional shocks when you find out things are happening out in the open that you are just not aware of (which radio listeners or people watching TV may know about).
People in East Timor who lost their country for a few decades due to Ford giving in to cold war fear (and a lot of Indonesian currency handed to him in person to be donated to the Republican party) would have different ideas about a major incident. So would a lot of others in Southeast Asia where a French colonial war against rebels was turned by Johnson into a major cold war incident that spread over many countries. That's just off the top of my head, I'm sure there's plenty of others.
...most if not all US beef is banned within the EU...
It is? I can buy US ribeyes in my neighbourhood grocery in here Stockholm, and Swedish food regulation is (supposedly) pretty tight--for instance, they won't let KFC operate here.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
Yeah, I think I've read that the court actually rejects a small percentage of the 'applications', too. Every pundit has to have their spin.
However, I think the actual point is that we have a court outside the regular hierarchy, which means that just a few people are creating the judicial "consensus" [*], and they're issuing a steady stream of secret rulings based on a secret interpretation of the law that only a handful of legislators are privy to, and aren't allowed to speak about.
I.e., very serious lack of congressional (and public) oversight.
But then, Congress is supposed to decide who we're at war with, and when.
[*] Like the patent court...
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
From the mouths of babes, fools, and fifty-centers...
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
1) Espionage has been going on before governance got past the "Big Man" phase.
2) Every other government bugs and/or spies on their rivals, even their friendly (right now) rivals, or wishes that it could (Rwanda bugging wherever the Hutu genocidals went might be hard for it). The French are notorious for this (mainly concerned with economic espionage since WWII; if before, it might explain the problems that they had in WWII and WWI).
3) Spying is certainly illegal in any given country, providing that it is some other country spying on the given country. If it is the given country spying in its own country on others, or country A spying on country B in country C, it becomes a very different matter, and is usually NOT illegal, although it might get someone declare Persona Non Grata.
4) Since when is the EU a sovereign government, that it has an embassy in Washington? Is this like certain governments which recognize American Indian tribes' passports, just to demonstrate their superiority since going "nyah, nyah, you suck" didn't work well enough? In this case, since it claims rights over territory owned by NATO countries, it MUST be an enemy, and we have every right and even a duty to treat it as hostile.
When has country X spying on country Y ever started a war between the two of them?
I read it once, and concluded there was nothing there to understand.
Il n'y a pas de Planet B.
The fact that you know about CIA Factbooks, let alone may have read one or two, should demonstrate just how little intelligence information it contains. One may as well take the writings of the local Chamber Of Commerce as gospel.
Nonsense. Superman either stands and takes the oncoming train, or he flies. Running is so ... Flash.
Damn those Chinese! The French bribes should have been enough, but the nasty Americans were able to lower their price (or raised their assistance fees, or whatever the Chinese euphemism for bribes is). Surely that is only because of secret information, because there is no way that the Chinese may have passed on the best offer received in hopes of a better one. That would be unpossible!
Again - for the most part, you don't need to be physically present anywhere to get this stuff. Sure freely available sources, including the demeanor of the public, must be taken into account, but this is but a part of what intelligence work is about. Never mind that you don't really want the foreign governments to have a list of your assets, and sending them abroad as diplomats is like putting a big searchlight on their back. Their whereabouts will be duly noticed wherever they happen to go.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
Sorry kid - this is where the intelligence (and business) fuckups have happened - not having anyone on the ground that can speak the language means that you just get a game of chinese whispers based on guesses as to what remote sensing is telling you.
> if before, it might explain the problems that they had in WWII and WWI
I am not French and so have no axe to grind but this is a pretty lame anti-french statement. What espionage issues did they have from WWI and WWII?
You know they won WWI don't you? and covered more of the front than the British and late arriving Americans.
In WWII the British and French were defending against the Germans and they BOTH lost initially, both winning later on. Espionage is not the reason they lost initially though knowing the German plans would have helped.
Ever since the French chose, correctly IMHO, to not enter the Gulf war there are these continual attacks on the French. I have no problem attacking the French personally, but these attacks are totally undeserved. It would be the equivalent of attacking the Americans for losing Vietnam, the ware of 1812 and failing to win the Korean war. Are the Americans "surrender monkeys" too?
Yes, the latest leaks are clearly illegal in the US and not covered by whistleblower status there. Still they are valid leaks to those being spied upon.
So, we agree, then. Intelligence is about a bit more than reading newspapers and listening to the news - the game of chinese whispers you allude to.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
Quite obviously not based on your post far above where you gave a very ignorant response to Carewolf's point. Legal intelligence gathering on the spot delivers far more than you appear to admit.
If I'm just reading newspapers about the USA for instance I may think your strippers are for some odd reason putting folded vegetable pies on their breasts instead of paper stars - because it's the same spelling and it makes no sense in every other place that has strippers for them to hide their nipples.
Right, I'm just saying there is no moral grounds for him being some hero now. When it was exposing illegal surveillance outside the government's jurisdiction, there was perhaps a moral argument that he was doing the right thing, particularly since it could be difficult to make an argument that it truly hurt national security (since anyone that had a working brain would have already been suspect that such things were possible).
While I'm sure that there are countries that are thrilled at what he did revealing spying on US ally governments, it's normal and valid espionage activity, so any moral grounds go out the window. There is no moral imperative to turn traitor on your country (whatever country that may be) and leak information that your country trusted you with that has a damaging impact on them when they were doing nothing wrong.
AJ Henderson
Thanks for the tip!
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
I am not French and so have no axe to grind but this is a pretty lame anti-french statement. What espionage issues did they have from WWI and WWII?
You know they won WWI don't you? and covered more of the front than the British and late arriving Americans.
They won WWI by losing a horrendous portion of the military-age generation, about 1/3 of all males. They lost WWII quite quickly, as well. If they were spending all their espionage efforts on beating Germany and Great Britain economically, rather than militarily, it might explain the poor performance.
Ever since the French chose, correctly IMHO, to not enter the Gulf war there are these continual attacks on the French. I have no problem attacking the French personally, but these attacks are totally undeserved. It would be the equivalent of attacking the Americans for losing Vietnam, the ware of 1812 and failing to win the Korean war. Are the Americans "surrender monkeys" too?
Actually, the USA has been attacking the French since the XYZ Affair, and before that, when we made a separate peace with Great Britain at the end of our Revolution, all the negotiators congratulated each other, as the French were screwed out of any gains, and we might be independent politically but we were still English emotionally. Except during the time of England's Kings John and Henry VI, the Sun King, and Napoleon, the French have demonstrated a certain lack of seriousness to military affairs that only their size seemed to compensate for, thus their problem with strong English monarchs and unified German governments.
Morality is in the eye of the beholder, but to those not jaded by modern life, spying on your friends is clearly immoral. It might be "normal" whatever that means. But moral? No way.
Contrary to popular belief, diplomatic missions do not enjoy full extraterritorial status and are not sovereign territory of the represented state.[5][6] Rather, the premises of diplomatic missions remain under the jurisdiction of the host state while being afforded special privileges (such as immunity from most local laws) by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diplomatic_mission
Sure enough, the cow costume was hanging up next to the superhero outfit and sailors uniform. (S,Spud)
"And while the BND hasn't admitted much about their foreign intelligence gathering..."
Exactly, the discussion was about foreign espionage and the and Germany is in general very carefully about anything that could be considered an act of war. For example bugging a foreign embassy. Now spying on private citizens and individuals within German borders, different story.
Maybe Germany is simply better at not getting caught: Germans seem to be considerably more obedient to authority than other nations, and Germany seems to be very effective at papering over many scandals. There isn't even a word for "whistle blower" in German.
(Initially, this was also a condition imposed by the allies; nobody in Europe wanted a German spy service, significantly composed of ex-Nazis, to go around spying on other nations after WWII.)