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German Vice Chancellor: the US Threatened Us Over Snowden
siddesu sends this report from The Intercept:
German Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel said this week in Homburg that the U.S. government threatened to cease sharing intelligence with Germany if Berlin offered asylum to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden or otherwise arranged for him to travel to that country. 'They told us they would stop notifying us of plots and other intelligence matters,' Gabriel said.
You cannot implicitly denounce invasive intelligence while enjoying its ill-gotten fruits.
ve haff vays of making you ... oh wait
I can understand why they might have refused to take the risk. But it hardly seems like a smart idea to allow a country we value to be destabilized over one man. What affects the one, affects us all. If Germany became destabilized due to our childish antics, it wouldn't end well. Best case scenario, the euro zone would collapse. Worst case, nuclear power plants would be pilfered.
Restore the madness of youth's lechery
Without getting into the moral implications of such a threat by the US, this is the cost Germany et. al. pay when letting the US foot the defense bill. The US defense budget pays for a large portion of the defense of the first world. If they don't want to be beholden to the whims of the US, don't depend on the US for defense.
Anyway, Snowden would be stupid to trust Germany. Only sovereign on paper, Germany is America's lapdog.
France isn't part of NATO and has never had any trouble telling people to get stuffed. You know, like a good friend should.
By trying to prevent its allies from giving Snowden asylum, the USA has forced him to take asylum with a relatively unfriendly nation, Russia.
(T>t && O(n)--) == sqrt(666)
they aren't outsourcing it, the situation with defense was forced upon them, and who wants a fully armed german military? Europe burned down twice because of that.
The US imposing military will is hardly the same as countries FORCED BY INTERNATIONAL TREATY TO NOT REARM expecting defense from its allies..
Remember that little thing with all the jewish people going to camp? well germany's not been allowed to have a military build up.
Without getting into the moral implications of such a threat by the US, this is the cost Germany et. al. pay when letting the US foot the defense bill. The US defense budget pays for a large portion of the defense of the first world. If they don't want to be beholden to the whims of the US, don't depend on the US for defense.
Defense from who, exactly?
From imaginary retro-communist threat, or some "terrorists" that US themselves funded and created?
Said no one ever. I wish the U.S. would stop acting like such a thug all the time. Noam Chomsky is right.
We should give Mr. Snowden a medal for providing the information. It is blatantly obvious that the full power of the US government would make any fair trial impossible. And the really stupid part of it all is that alerts and warnings work both ways. If we deprive Germany of terrorist information you can bet that Germany would also not notify the US if their agencies picked up any information about an attack against an American interest. Further is the US wants to win the war against terror we have a simple way to make the Arab region very interested in hunting down terror nuts. Simply block 100% of the oil shipments out of the mid-east. That would cause every government and person of power in the region to eagerly hunt down terrorists with a great zeal. We could also seize all assets held outside of the mid-east. We could also keep the mid-east from importing anything at all.
The US, a country that couldnt prevent 9/11, shut down its own government twice, couldnt stop the Boston Marathon bombers, couldnt protect against the fort hood shooting, cant pass legislation to protect itself from school shootings, and cant prosecute detainees in or close the prison at guantanamo bay is threatening to withhold intelligence information from the country it routinely wiretaps and spies on anyway?
im sure if Germans knew about this, the question of the day would be, "Who the fuck cares."
Good people go to bed earlier.
... is for revenge and the mistaken idea that punishing Snowden would be a deterrent.
Snowden is no hacker any more than Manning is. Both were inside the perimeter and walked off with the goods.
The Snowden documents (not Snowden himself) will reveal more as time goes on.
The best tactic for US is to just leave Snowden alone to minimize the publicity.
In the matter of threatening Germany, that's no surprise -- and it worked.
Move along, nothing to see ...
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
Isn't Germany already paying by notifying the US of plots if they find any? Maybe it's not enough to pay for US intelligence acquired through both legal and illegal means, but maybe Germany could at least get the legal half instead of none at all?
This is Homburg, not Hamburg... it is not even among the top 100 largest cities in Germany. Ankeny, Iowa is bigger. Perhaps a better description of the location could've been given.
who, this germany?:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/paral...
http://www.spiegel.de/internat...
http://arstechnica.com/tech-po...
americans are and should be angry at the NSA
but other countries complaining about the NSA is hypocrisy
if i was german, would i be worried about the NSA? or the BND and the BfV?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F...
if you live in a country outside the USA, and your biggest privacy concern is the NSA, you're a moron: your own country is doing everything the NSA is doing, and in many countries, far worse. obviously, they can also abuse you a lot easier than the USA can. and they do
again: i don't have a problem with americans complaining about the NSA. americans SHOULD complain about the NSA. but i do have a problem with other countries complaining about the NSA when they do the same or worse
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
What "childish antics"? Are hardball negotiation now considered "childish"?
Let's just grab our ankles and ignore our own interests while every country jockeys to satisfy their own interests.
I really have no idea where this idea that we should do everything as a selfless act came from. Selflessness is not really part of our culture.
Look, why are you complaining about being "strong armed" by the USA? You didn't like their tactics? They where playing fast pitch hard ball and you wanted to play slow pitch softball?
IF you wish to play ball on the intelligence front, play ball. If you don't like how the USA plays, don't play with them. If you don't like the rules used by the USA, you don't have to play with them, just start your own game.
After all, it's not as if you where being threatened with violations of your sovereignty. The USA wasn't going to invade your country and just take anything and everything they wanted. They where not even threatening you with anything but withholding information.
My advice to Germany (and any other country who is in on this game) is to step up your game. Develop your own intelligence assets, do your own home work, don't be dependent on the USA for your intelligence. Put yourself into a better position so you can tell the USA to take a hike if you like. Until then, stop complaining about feeling pressured to play the game by somebody else's rules.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Why can't germany do its own intelligence? Why outsource intelligence to america?
From Russia, you Putinista asshole.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Without getting into the moral implications of such a threat by the US, this is the cost Germany et. al. pay when letting the US foot the defense bill. The US defense budget pays for a large portion of the defense of the first world. If they don't want to be beholden to the whims of the US, don't depend on the US for defense.
As if they had any choice, seen the ending of WWII :-)
China and Russia could possibly be an actual threat the Western world, if they wanted to be for some reason, and that's assuming that they start aggressively attacking and Europe just sits on its haunches and lets it happen. While the EU is pretty weak right now defensively, given some ramping up time spurred by an actual immediate threat like WW3, they could (as a group) put up the second strongest military in the world after the USA.
That's not to say China couldn't be a threat in the future if their economy continues booming and they manage to turn their masses of uneducated poor into a productive "middle class". But then, having an educated well-off people is probably an inoculation against that sort of crazy all-out war anyway.
It's all about motivations. Manning was just fucked up and betrayed his trust. Snowden had a point to what he was doing.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Wouldn't it have made more sense for Snowden to end up in Germany where he can have an eye kept on him, than in Russia where he is free to give any and all intel he has to Putin?
"Evil will always triumph over good, because good is dumb." - Dark Helmet (Spaceballs)
Lets connect some dots here.
US, UK, Canada, Aus, NZ, spy on everyone, break into everything including their own countries and hand that to NSA. The excuse given is 'terrorism' but once the NSA has it, its used for everything without warrant controls or other protections.
NSA gives 5 eyes countries a search engine in exchange, XKeyscore, with limited access back to that data, and some tips to Germany for German spy agencies help in this mass surveillance.
5 eyes in turn have blackops propaganda units with access to that data, who undermine companies, make false allegations against individuals and seek to discredit people they don't like.
UK's is called JTRIG:
https://firstlook.org/theintercept/document/2014/02/24/art-deception-training-new-generation-online-covert-operations/
US has one too:
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-social-networks
These propaganda units run propaganda ops to discredit opponents, create false victim complaints, break companies, and they have access to all that bulk surveillance data. Which is how they can change forum posts, and make false comms attributed to the person they want to discredit.
So to give some examples, JTRIG attacked 'Hacktivists' including the Anonymous group. Which turned out to be some UK script kiddies in their mothers basement.
JTRIG attack:
http://www.nbcnews.com/feature/edward-snowden-interview/exclusive-snowden-docs-show-uk-spies-attacked-anonymous-hackers-n21361
They're UK Hackers:
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-22552753
So these British script kiddies were demonized by UK GCHQ's JTRIG and then prosecuted in UK courts. The prosecution is tainted as a result. How many similar prosecutions have been tainted by them? WTF are they doing in that case anyway??
http://www.networkworld.com/article/2160115/data-center/new-zealand-intelligence-agency-illegally-spied-on-megaupload.html
Mega, Kim Dot Coms company, was spied on the the New Zealand spooks illegally. He appears to be under attack personally to discredit him, and his company is under attack too. Do you remember Paypal saying they won't pay his company because it uses encryption? Someone has gone to Paypal and pushed them to withdraw their service from Mega. See "undermine key business relationships" on this JTRIG Snowden leaks.
TV Links? I always am bugged by Anton Vickermans prosecution. Were you JTRIG lot involved in that judicial farce? WHY??? Since when has spooks been a copyright enforcer for a foreign country?
So how many JTRIG here? Trying to set the agenda and blame the victim?
Defense from who, exactly?
Russia still occupies (formerly?) German territory that it annexed and stationed military units in (including nuclear weapons). Maybe you've heard that they are invading neighboring countrries again, taking their territory, and annexing it? There are many European countries threatened by Russian aggression in this regard.
Russia had made repeated threats involving use of nuclear weapons. Maybe you missed that Puting just stated his willingness to brandish nuclear weapons in order to annex Crimea?
From imaginary retro-communist threat, or some "terrorists" that US themselves funded and created?
I'm pretty sure that the Russians aren't either imaginary or "retro-communists." And the "terrorists" of concern aren't "terrorists," they are terrorists. The US didn't fund or create them.
I hope you're actually good at your job.
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
In Canada there is huge pressure from the US for us to pass bill C-51 which might as well be called Orwell's law. There is endless talk about this country being dangerous or that country. But it seems to me there is exactly one country on this planet that is causing problems for just about every democracy or not.
What I love about these tools that think that they should be able to spy on us to "protect" us. Yet in Canada we have a motorcycle gang that all wear special clothing, have special tattoos, and hang out in known HQs; yet our national police force can't shut them down with every law needed already in place. Prisons which have pretty well no constitutional protections for privacy or intercepted communications are filled with drugs. So even if they manage to completely remove privacy and rights they have proven themselves incompetent at doing their jobs with simplistic criminals.
What hope do they have against actual terrorists with an IQ over 90? Or lone wolves who communicate with exactly nobody?
My assessment of all these laws is that they are there to protect vested interests. The politicians want to protect their friends in big business in the name of national security/stability. But my guess is that they mostly want to protect themselves from the erosion of power that is happening through the internet where the press and other investigators can find out what corruption is happening. Thus the ideal situation is that whistleblowers will be nervous about contacting the press because they don't know if their communications are secure. That even politicians will be nervous about trying to reduce the power of the security services because not only might they be listening but that the security services will be well placed to leak data about they or their friends.
Remember that this sort of power is very insidious. For instance when the government goes to appoint someone to a watchdog or judicial position that will oversee the security services the security service does a "background check" this is not only to make sure that the person isn't an enemy spy but to protect the politicians from embarrassment if it turns out that their potential appointee is unsavoury in some way. This could be something like anti women views or even something like they are 60 and often date 20 somethings. Thus if the person is going to a hanging judge and is happy to give the security service free reign they can give the person a clean bill of health during the "background check" but if the person has long been a defender of privacy and generally anti authoritarian then they will compile a list of rumours and innuendos that suggest the person will be an embarrassment.
Thus as we hear about judge after judge giving their blessings to insanely unconstitutional behaviour, and we hear about watchdogs that aren't watching keep in mind about who vetted these people in the first place.
What scares the shit out of these people is when they don't have control over them as in the case of politicians in other countries. This is where they have to play hardball. But my simple question is how many politicians in various G7 countries have had information "leaked" about them by the US security services? Leaked during elections where they were successfully running against right wing hardliners that the US would prefer to win?
Umm, Germany has the eighth largest military in the world. Or were you unaware of that?
Japan has the ninth, in case you were interested.
Aside from the Big Three (US, Russia, China), Germany is behind India, UK, France, and South Korea. Which puts them about where they were in 1939 (what, you didn't know that the Wehrmacht in 1939 was smaller than the French Army, much less the combined Anglo-French forces they faced in 1940?).
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
It would have been better for us to have snowden there. Germany knows what is at stake. They would have shut him up when he was speaking about spying outside of america.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
snowden's a traitor! he plan always was to go to china & russia to give them our most guarded secrets - the nsa said so & they would never lie!
well, except maybe to congress - under oath... but only twice! ok, that we know of...
oh, & if you ask someone who works for them the time of day they might, just out of habit & risk that you might just be a terrorist trying to synchronize swatches w/your associates so better to be safe...
I agree. In fact, I think that american partners need to do a lot more on their own defense and america needs to keep more of ours in america, combined with keeping the work here.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
As an American, I am truly ashamed my country has become the bully of the world.
Those from other countries should know that most intelligent Americans do not
support the actions of the US government. However, most Americans are both stupid
and easily led, so you can see how there could be popular support for misguided US
policies.
From whom? Ask those who lived next to the GDR & saw people shot running to freedom in the recent past or more recently people living in eastern Ukraine. Perhaps you would prefer to converse with Boris Nemtsov?
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
Seems fair to me ... last time i checked Germany seemed a friend ...
There's a trade treaty being negotiated TAFTA/TTIP and TPP, and Europe is being pushed to accept it. It has a nasty corporate sovereignty clause, which would mean corporate rights would trump national laws, and as you understand many EU countries refuse to accept that.
https://www.techdirt.com/search.php?q=ttip&search=Search
Lucky the US has a big massive surveillance database on all these EU politicians to leverage. That includes UK politicians, thanks to our very own traitors in GCHQ! Among other things, they hacked Belgacom, which gives GCHQ and NSA access to EU Commission and Parliament private telephone calls, which gives US info to leverage over EU, EU law then applies to UK law. So GCHQ have worked to aid a foreign powers legal takeover of the UK. [Donut cubicle workers. See how that works? See what you did?]
Canada has already accepted the sovereignty clause. Harper = child of the surveillance.
So it goes beyond the Orwell laws, these surveillance systems have a wider control purpose. They don't just spy on everyone to push through more spy laws, they spy on everyone to push through one sided trade agreements and nasty laws against the wishes of the target country.
The need for that imposition died of old age roughly 15 years ago.
The only reason Germany ran wild twice was because we (the victors of WWI) botched the unholy shit out of things the first time, basically wrecking Germany and creating a power vacuum.
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
No member of NATO could possibly keep anyone safe from the US because the Americans are already on the inside.
Europe never burnt down due to a fully armed German military. Europe burnt down twice due to warmoning idiots being in power in power in Germany (and other countries).
I would strongly prefer a military powerful Germany to a military powerful United States.
Amazing that this kind of stuff keeps happening yet many Americans still believe the US is "The Land Of The Free"(tm).
Terrible politicians getting involved in matters that they don't fully comprehend, making awful decrees and threats. Snowden is not the enemy of democracy: secret state actions are a greater threat to our nation.
Remember kids, if you're not paying for the service, YOU ARE THE PRODUCT THAT IS BEING SOLD.
Omniscience can be quite a tease.
If I was Merkel, even if I originally had no intention to take Snowden, I would now just to put the US in its place.
The only reason Germany ran wild twice was because we (the victors of WWI) botched the unholy shit out of things the first time, basically wrecking Germany and creating a power vacuum.
I'd say it was a bit more complicated than that. The issues were not Germany's alone, nor that of the losers, nor even the occurance of the Great Depression. The entire 20's and 30's was a three way battle between the idealogies and factions of Democracy, Fascism, and Communism. Italy, Spain, Austria, and Germany fell to fasicsm before WW2 even started.Before they did, there was a see-saw battle in the streets. The foundations of the Nazi party gained prestige when they helped overthrown a communist coup in Bavaria. There was even debate in the US along those idealogical lines.
Defense from who, exactly?
Those that would threaten US dominance.
They broke existing laws, were caught using existing techniques, and no need to mass surveil the rest of us. The last two caught in BC were basically being pushed into doing what they did by the investigators who are desperate for a win.
The ones in Halifax wouldn't have been caught by anything short of the most severe privacy violations and massive all encompassing dragnets.
Ah, the fjord rears his head again on Slashdot.
As a Canadian, I can say with certainty that I, and many many others, would rather put up with the occasional 'terrorist' (let's just call them criminals and murderers, since that's what they are, and avoid jingoistic labelling for political ends) rather than give up most of my essential privacy and freedoms for a dubious perceived sense of increased safety.
Those who would give up essential liberty, bla bla blah.. you know the drill I'm sure, but we really DO feel this way up here. C-51 is terrible, and made more terribly by its essential un-essentiality.
Oh, BTW: yeah, great job our police/intelligence forces did with the info they *already had* about the Parliament shooter. They didn' need C-51 then, they just needed to do their f*cking jobs and follow up effectively on *intelligence they already had without C-51*, before he did what he did.
This could only be the ignorant babble of an American.
It's easy to blame the US but we didn't create most of the problems facing the world. Europe did with colonialism. Though the US is responsible for the rise of ISIS, the political boundaries that aided the creation and much of the problems of the middle east are related to the divvying up of the middle east by Europe after WWI and the subsequent colonization that took place later. The problems Europe created will haunt us for a long time to come, probably several hundred years.
Up until WWII the US was neutral and outside the fucking around in the western hemisphere pretty well minded their business. We didn't create the problems, we've just been dealing with them. And you should fear greatly the day people like me get our way and turn this country back neutral and start looking out after our own and stop caring about everyone else. Europe, Canada and many others will be in for a shitstorm when they have to start paying for their own defense.
...that we were promised. Maybe we can send John Kerry over to Berlin with a modified staples button that says "überladen" to try to make things right.
Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms should be the name of a store, not a government agency.
They would have been so much smarter to work a back-door deal with a partner country like Germany, with public "outrage" statements. Once Snowden was in Germany, they would have instruction on how best to lock down the situation.
You would think that professional politicians would be smarter with this stuff, sheesh.
sigs are for losers (except to point out that sigs are for losers)
yup ideology trumps reason every time. The Germany (any country) of today may not be the same tomorrow. This is the human condition.
And Israel had one of largest militaries per GDP, all because of the USA.
if anything Manning was misguided and possibly mentally unstable. A charge of traitor is bit much for some one who clearly should not have passed his mental assessment exam. The fault lies with the recruiting process and possibly the excellent DontAsk legislation. Thanks Clinton.
What threats are there to the first world? You seem like a typical, ignorant American, living with your funny Top-Gun view of the world, where enemy aircraft are flying around outside the borders, terrorists hiding and waiting to strike, everyone trying to take away your "freedom and democracy".
If there ever were any substantial threats, then it's because the U.S gov illegal actions, in primarily the middle east, created them. It's always convenient to keep the boogey-man and the illusion of a great threat alive.
and force the U.S to come in line, or cease all cooperation with them. Everyone knows the U.S is in much greater need of the world, than the world is of them.
So now we have the US willing to not share information and allow a terrorist attack to occur becuase it doesn't like the actions of one person. Nice moral high ground there.
I'm not supporting the idea that the NSA is doing good work. Just using their logic on why this is a must have. If the story is true, it's another example of how we have become the first world bullies/whiners. It's the diplomatic equivalent of threatening to take our ball and go home.
I hope you're actually good at your job.
No, you don't. You don't care one iota about that.
Europe has burnt down many times. Germany might be in modern history, but, we can go back at least a thousand years of Europe kicking its own ass in repeatedly.
By what metric? According to this list they are not even close to that. (And neither is Japan.) Which makes a lot of sense considering that they are situated in one of the safest parts of the world, and are not very interested in sending military abroad.
Basically, they were allowed to have a formal military in the 50's due to cold war tensions.
The problem with the appointments is that all applicants for watchdog are vetted to make sure they'll be compliant and ineffective lapdogs before they're appointed. This means we get to parade around saying we have checks and balances, but all the checks are bouncing and the money is in bundles of $100s in someones' back pocket.
Which makes me wonder if the statement is actually for real or to save face. Just as before when they denied participating with the US at all only for everyone to find out that they lied and were involved just as others were.
What hope do they have against actual terrorists with an IQ over 90? Or lone wolves who communicate with exactly nobody?
My assessment of all these laws is that they are there to protect vested interests.
Your assessment is useless. It apparently isn't even infomed by anything so pedestian as Canadian newspapers that have carried many stories on people being arrested for involvement in terrorism.
Thus showing that the current laws are working.
For a guy who sold himself as a global citizen and a better diplomat that the evil George W Bush, Obama has sure pissed off the Germans a lot for no reason. Canada too.
No, it's not an error. He really was in Homburg, a city with 41k inhabitants about 500km south of Hamburg, the big city everyone has heard of.
I'm seeing a pattern recognition issue here.
Germany may have been beaten into submission, but most of their stance is due to their ability to maintain a less militaristic demeanor because they know they aren't going to be attacked.
The warmongers may have caused the wars, but they were able to play on regular Germans' pride and fear. Right now, the Germans have nothing to fear militarily so there is no fear goading them into electing militarists. Instead, the US is dealing with the policy issues of having to maintain a large military.
As soon as Germany needs to stand alone again, the same issues will crop up. So, no. I don't think we're necessarily better off with a powerful German military, mostly because its not going to remain as non-threatening as the current Bundeswehr is today. It won't be able to succeed with the additional functions it will need to assume if it doesn't change its size and doctrine.
Thus as we hear about judge after judge giving their blessings to insanely unconstitutional behaviour, and we hear about watchdogs that aren't watching keep in mind about who vetted these people in the first place.
I'm not going to claim that there is no problem (and the biggest problem the country faces is inside the PMO), but the courts have been pretty damned good at blocking the Harper Regime's unconstitutional laws.
Everything from
Federal Court rightly strikes down Harper’s refugee health-care cuts
Supreme Court prostitution ruling forces issue on Harper
Supreme Court strikes down assisted suicide ban
Supreme Court softens Tories' tough-on-crime sentencing law
As for over-seers, we do need more and better ones, but let's not forget Sheila Fraser
and
Kevin Page who was actually appointed by Harper (and I imagine Harper regretted it):
His approach of questioning government estimates and issuing reports that are at odds with official government forecasts has created controversy. "There are former parliamentarians saying I should be held in contempt of Parliament and should be fired, but I’m okay with them saying that. That’s just part of the debate."[9] He has been unapologetic about his desire to give the Parliamentary Budget Office a significant role in informing Parliament and Canadians about government finances, saying "I went to the OECD, and they said the Americans have the best budget office, bar none. Why can't we be the best in five years? If that's overstepping my mandate, then I'm earning my money."[10]
Don't even bother with cold fjord. No-one thoughtlessly defends the police state with greater knee-jerk reaction speed.
You've entirely misinterpreted my point, AC. I didn't say there are threats. I didn't say there aren't threats.
My point has nothing to do with whether or not the defense is needed but rather that the defense exists and other first world nations make use of it. If there are no substantial threats, as you imply, then the US using threat intel as a bargaining chip is worthless. However, since other nations value US threat intel, they must see value in it regardless of whether or not the value is real or perceived.
they aren't outsourcing it, the situation with defense was forced upon them, and who wants a fully armed german military? Europe burned down twice because of that.
Complete bullshit. That is stuff that should be cleared up by a 101-level understanding of international events. When the US "threatens" to reduce the number of troops stationed in Germany, the Germans protest. Literally, holding signs outside the US installations. It is what they ask of us, to keep lots of troops there. It is a major source of jobs, and helps Germany to maintain their lopsided manufacturing dominance.
Who wants a "fully armed German military?" I don't know, but not the Germans. Maybe Russia. Germans would riot in the streets if somebody tried it, too.
This isn't the 1950s.
WW1 wasn't Germany's fault.
But who wants a fully armed USA? they genocided nearly all their indians...
You're mixing up Germany and the UK. There was no letter in this case. They never intended to mention this. A journalist was pressuring him and only at that point Gabriel said this.
You should visit Europe sometime, that will lay to rest this silly idea of that the EU is being "dominated" by the US.
And ask European voters if they support politicians willing to increase defense spending to levels their own generals say would allow self-sufficient national defense.
I expect you'll find that European countries are entirely independent, have legit shared security concerns with the US, agree with the US on desired military outcomes, and do not fund the outcomes they expect. Why not? Because good ol' Uncle Sam will pay it for them.
The US desires and has achieved a Europe without major military conflict. If we were trying to dominate them, they wouldn't be united, and there would be continuing wars. And slightly over half of them would be nicer to us, because there would be teams. As it is they're on their own team, so they're happy to be defended but they're not going to give thanks for it, or say anything nice about other teams.
Ob: Terroist plots ... we just make shit up anyway.
There was no battle over "ideology". Wars are fought over power and riches. Period. Germany started its war campaigns in order to expand their power and riches, not to spread some nebulous concept of "ideology". The governments which fought against Germany did so to protect their own power and riches, not to protect "ideology".
Ideology is for the little men. The ruling class fights over power and riches, and employs ideology merely as a tool to convince the little men to rally behind them.
That's exactly what's happening in Brazil right now. US hacked Petrobras and disclosured only information related to the current political party in power, which has a non-US-aligned view in external affairs AND is not bending to international Multinational Corporations to weaken the work related laws. US also manipulated other local anarchist groups in protesting against government. And we are a friendly, democratic nation... like Germany! Even germany prime minister knew what was happening in Brazil in the world CUP and let a clue scape when she visited my country, Merkel said she would talk to Dilma "to understand the protests in Brazil". Both knew what was happening.. It was the US acting in both countries, Merkels phone was hacked by the US. Hell, US courts even disclosured what US intelligence agencies were doing to Brazil: http://motherboard.vice.com/re... US is waging cyber war in FRIENDLY nation. They call the hacking of GEMATO patriotism, and hacking of sony "cyber terrorism" I do not support communism, socialism or the current pary, but if I were a Brazillian authority I would issue an arrest order for US officiais in Brazil right now. My country is turning into a mess because of US actions. US throwed Brazillian goverment in a coup-de-etat supported by them 30 years ago and now they are doing it again! We are not Panama, we are a 200million nation, the 7th economy of the world. Hey forcing us to the same path they forced Venezuela in. Is there sanity in US government? I work for an american company. I love america and most people is nice and polite. But I fucking HATE the US goverment and OBAMA didnt help, despite my best hopes. Please american people, save us from your goverment, regain the power from the corporations.
Which of course is one way of looking at it. The other way of looking at is that if German cooperation is worth so much to us that we pony up all that dough, it's stupid to risk what we get out of that deal by issuing ultimatums over Snowden.
Sure he who pays to piper calls the tune, but if he calls tunes unpopular enough he's paying the piper to play in an empty hall.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
I'll concede that, though his actions showed a callous disregard for human life. I can't figure out anything Snowden did that got anyone killed. Manning almost certainly resulted in some people being outed and snuffed.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Integrity over everything.
Some Germans protest. Others would prefer the yankees to finally go home.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
I didn't use an absolute, so adding "some" wouldn't narrow it at all. I mentioned that the protesters exist. "Some" is redundant in that context.
If you're claiming that I was substantively wrong, it would be a high hurdle, because closing US bases has higher negatives than the US being there. And almost all the politicians take the "jobs" route of supporting the bases, even if they throw a bunch of anti-American language into their statements. The fact is that the US has proposed substantial reductions of troops numerous times over the past 30 years, and every time there has generally been a German diplomatic freak-out, and the plans are scrapped or scaled back in response. When the German government stops throwing its weight onto the side of those protesting the reductions, that is when it becomes relevant what other opinions are in play.
From the US perspective, it would be a lot better to shift most of those troops to Poland. The bases would be cheaper to operate, and the Poles really really want increased US protection.
Israel's military is large because 100,000,000 Muslim Arabs have tried repeatedly to destroy a tiny country of 5,000,000 Jews. Thank the Arabs.
I do not mean Germans here.
And Europe burnt to the ground the previous two times because of the French; as Homer would say "Your point being?"
http://www.theguardian.com/wor...
The thing is, if something exists, there will be some Germans that would protest against it. That the current chancellor is brownnosing the US is also not news at all.
As for me, I personally also wish your troops would go to Poland and never come back. It would be a win-win situation - no foreign troops on our soil and the constant Polish whining would finally be over. If it would bring them to leave the EU - even better.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
You're in such a tiny minority that there is no chance at all your government will agree with you.
Go tell them, don't tell me.
Poles have a good reason to whine, they're scared of Russia.
or even something like they are 60 and often date 20 somethings.
We need their secret sauce and the address of their plastic surgeon. Unless they are very rich, are aging rock musicians or are from Hollywood - that's normal and expected for them. We only mock these sorts of age-differential relationships if they guy's not famous. In reality we envy the horny old bastards.
I've heard that several divisions of lawyers were ready to cross the Rhine in massed Hummers and be airdropped into major commercial centers from a fleet of Gulfstreams.
My views aren't really a tiny minority as you can see from the comments here, many if not most of them are saying "good riddance" to American soldiers.
And as for Poles - I say let them be scared. It is the very least they deserve for the CIA torture prisons.
"It's such a fine line between stupid and clever" -- David St. Hubbins, Spinal Tap
Y'all are missing the whole point regarding the significance of the Manning breach.
Manning had access to information that was too sensitive for his position and rank. He walked in with a Lady Gaga DVD (that's one) and inserted it into a work computer (that's two) and was allowed to copy stuff (that's three) and he walked out with the stuff in digital form (that's four).
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
And why do you think Germany fell to facism if it isn't for the war damage imposed after WW1 who made the country poor. Oh wait that is exactly what the guy you replied to said...
I hope you are right, in Australia I would love to see the USA get the fuck out of this country. One of our greatest leaders recently died, he was the one who set up the alliance and was advocating strongly to cutting ties with the US and getting their army out of the country. Hopefully his work continues! No offense to the citizens, it is your government that I detest.
Defense from who, exactly?
Russia still occupies (formerly?) German territory that it annexed and stationed military units in (including nuclear weapons).
You are confusing that with Poland, both ways. Russia still occupies former Polish territory, and Poland as a replacement got former German territory.
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
So if Snowden gets the deal Petraeus got does that mean the US will stop sharing intelligence with the US?
By definition, you are at risk when you trust people. Information that can't be disseminated is not useful. Printers, optical disc writers, and usb sticks are "dissemination". Striking a balance between trust and paranoia, particularly in a theater where actual combat is going on, usually veers towards trust.
The rules for handling classified data when I was in Iraq were much looser than those applied back home. I think this is a common feature of all active theaters since we have had information classification rules. It increased the harm generated by Manning's breach, but I don't think it's really avoidable.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
I'll concede that, though his actions showed a callous disregard for human life. I can't figure out anything Snowden did that got anyone killed. Manning almost certainly resulted in some people being outed and snuffed.
As opposed to the illegal actions he was whistleblowing on?
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
What "illegal actions"? Military and intelligence operations aren't subject to your bullshit ideas of "illegality". Nice try, lefty.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Isn't it odd the whole way the snowden thing has played out? Slowly, over time, the public is being released a bunch of, relatively useless information, about things, people in the know already suspected anyways.
The whole thing is just some big fucking tease.
I mean, come on... The guy was in China first, then ended up in Russia.
That's the big 3, USA, China, Russia...
It's just too obvious... Instead of watching Fox News, or mainstraim media, the alternative sources of information are just being spoonfed what they want hear...
In the meantime, nothing is being done, as per usual...
The real way to effect change, is at the political level, and it's just too slow and cumbersome to keep pace with the advancement of the technology on the other end, not to mention it's complete and total curruption at the core anyway...
The real situation for Americans is... it's illegal to protest on government grounds, and if they decide you are a terrowits, they can detain you indefinitely with out trial...
Checkmate, game over...
While we are sitting here eating theorizing, suspecting, and debating, they have slowly been laying down the legal foundation required to legally bend anyone over, at any moment, for any reason...
Germany should have responded with the threat to expel all US forces form Germany and to withdraw from NATO.
It is amazing to me how the American public is totally incapable of critically examining their own actions and and motivations; and as well, lack any ability to understand or empathise with the views of other nations when they are not identical to those of the US.
Could you imagine for one minute the hysteria which would have arisen in the US if it were revealed that Germany was intercepting the private communications of the US President. And the US response if Germany threatened the US with a cut-off in military and security cooperation unless the person who revealed this to the US was extradited to Germany for punishment.
If I were in that room where the US threat was made to Germany I would have told the US to fuck-off and woud have unilaterally halted all military, scientific, intelligence and diplomatic cooperation with the US until it apologised and with drew its threat.
What "illegal actions"? Military and intelligence operations aren't subject to your bullshit ideas of "illegality". Nice try, lefty.
Geneva Convention, you moronic war criminal. Were you just following orders murdering civilians?
Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
Once you are outside of lala land, let me remind you the US went into WW1 and gave Zfrance and the UK keys to those kingdoms and it was highly imperialist since at least the late 19th Century: see Hawaii and the Spanish American War/Philipines.
We want you and your troops to fuck off.
Americans can PRINT dollars to buy OPEC Oil;
You have to EARN dollars to buy OPEC Oil;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P...
Casteism
I have been to Europe many times. I like it there and might even think about moving to Germany if it wasn't for my conscience not letting me subject new coworkers to my horrible American accent on a daily basis. But by dominance, I do not mean strict military oppression. It's all about the dollar and economies and the Euro has enough troubles and the EU fractured enough that there is no need for any military against them. Instead we use our military as leverage for them against others in many cases so they will fall on our side. The only reason the US was involved in Tunisia is because Europe discovered it couldn't run large operations there without NATO/US resources. When push comes to shove we'll use our military like we did in Iraq. The only countries against our adventurism there were France and Germany, coincidentally the countries running the oil operations already for Iraq. In the end, they had to deal with it. Russia doesn't want to deal with it, but we'll probably not encounter them directly, but just sell arms to their enemies like we have been doing since the end of WW2. The idea of actually using the military for acquisition of land has pretty much been put to bed along with installing noble houses. Instead, militaries are being used to keep economies strong.
Which worries me some. The US is spending lots of money on the military and it doesn't seem to be making us money. Well, I'm sure it's making somebody money, but is the US coming out in the black? If we shrink our military, would our economy shrink with it, causing a lack of confidence which will cause it to shrink some more in a vicious cycle?
That's exceptionally derpy, pointing to internet comments to claim your view isn't extreme or unusual.
It is also particularly... odd for a German to saying things like that about Poland. If Poland deserves something bad for "CIA torture prisons," I guess we should be asking what you deserve for Germany's much more significant... history regarding torture. I guess you'd just blame Poland for being invaded, since you're blaming them for what the US did there in secret.
You seem like a nazi sympathizer to me. I'm not surprised you chafe at the troops. But you're pretty clueless about the world you whine about. Hating America won't stop your neighbors from protesting troop reductions.