US ambassador to Germany hauled over the coals over Merkel spying allegations

[Platapus]

Originally Posted by Nippelspanner

It is simply illegal,

Many intelligence operations are illegal from the standpoint of the target.

Originally Posted by Platapus

Many intelligence operations are illegal from the standpoint of the target.

Exactly.

[Platapus]

This is why the United States gets upset when the Chinese "hack" into our systems, but is strangely silent when China gets upset when the US "hacks" in to their systems.

Espionage is always legal in the first person - our espionage programs. It is only in the second or third person -- your or their espionage programs that it becomes illegal.

Part of the hypocrisy of Realpolitik is that countries often act "surprised" when one country does to them what they are doing to the other country.

Renault: Everybody is to leave here immediately! This cafe is closed until further notice. Clear the room, at once!Rick: How can you close me up? On what grounds?Renault: I’m shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!Employee of Rick's: [hands Renault money] Your winnings, sir.Renault: Oh, thank you, very much. Everybody out at once!

[Feuer Frei!]

So BBC tells me today that the spying on Angie's mobile has been going on since early 2000. And Obama knew nothing about it. WTF?
Playing dumb? I think so.

The general feedback i've been getting, via BBC reports, when questioning department heads and various organisations, including the UK PM is that it's all ok to spy on people, and perfectly fine to spy on your allies.

The justification most agree on is that the countrie's security comes first and that, for example, in PM Cameron's words is that anyone that questions the necessity and reason for spying on individuals, no matter who they are, is to be criticized denounced as some evil-doer who has no right questioning the moral implications, not to mention the legal implications in some cases and the justification on select targets.

Once again, i say wtf?

If i was Angie, i would be furious. Livid.

If the Germans were spying on Obama since early 2000, what would be the implications of that?
Big bad Germany? I can see it now, the ignorant hate rhetorics bleated i bet.

It shouldn't be a shock that spying on other countries has gone on since ww2.

But what should be a shock is spying on your allies, indeed moreso the leader of a allied country!

Alliance my arse.

The US worried that Germany will become a super power (again) and rise up against the European nations and take Lebensraum?

What a joke.

EDIT:

I'll add this:

NSA monitored calls of 35 world leaders after US official handed over contacts

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...-leaders-calls

[Mr Quatro]

I don't have time to read everything the NSA whistleblower Snowden said or divulged to outside sources, but how can anyone be sure that what was said was what he really said?

Someone is making money off of this reporting that the NSA did this and the NSA did that and who they did it to. Who can tell what the truth is besides the NSA and they are not about to admit to or claim or disclaim anything, because that is their very nature.

I suspect and ponder all of this news is a way to make waves and lots of money ... life goes on.

One thing I do know Russia now knows a lot more than it did and how the NSA works. All that's left is for another country to get caught up in this spying effort to obtain classified information

One thing I do know Russia now knows a lot more than it did and how the NSA works.

Do you really think they didn't know already?
All this has meant is that the average Russian and the average American now knows a little bit about the huge scale at which phone calls are recorded.

[Jimbuna]

Pretty much how I see it.

[TarJak]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-10-2...eports/5051220

Spain is the next to jump up and down about the same thing.

[TarJak]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-10-3...encies/5056534

We get tarred with the same brush.

The whole partisan political crap being spouted here is laughable. I don't think either party can claim any moral high ground here because the spying on allies has been going on since the dawn of time. BO has just been left standing when the music stopped.

[Penguin]

Merkel can cry a big river of crocodile tears. The same woman who denied knowledge of Prism or the NSA or GCHQ surveiling German citizens suddenly cries wolf? Gimme a break.

Germany has always been on top of spying on its own citizens. In the 90s we already had nearly as many telephone surveillances as the US, with less than a third of its population. The difference is that the public here gets even less information about the scale of spying. An intelligence boss speaking in an open parliament session, like Keith Alexander did? Unthinkable in Germany. The plebs don't have to know anything.

The last numbers we got, were from 2010 when 37 million emails (out of an unknown monitored number n) were closer observed. They found "something" in whopping 213 cases, or 0.00058% - how many of those really lead to something usefull or arrests is also unknown.

Today we assume that about 20% of the email traffic in Germany get monitored. The same people who called the GDR an injust system, because it spied on its own citizens, are now fulfilling the wet dreams of the Stasi.

[TarJak]

http://pandodaily.com/2013/10/26/i-c...32974095220739

This article is about a journo qho arranged a a personal pwn test by a white hat hacking firm. Interesting and scary.

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by TarJak

http://pandodaily.com/2013/10/26/i-c...32974095220739

This article is about a journo qho arranged a a personal pwn test by a white hat hacking firm. Interesting and scary.

Indeed

[TarJak]

Merkel can probably blame her own security mob for not providing her with a secure mobile phone. But even if it was the BND were probably still recording and sharing the info with NSA anyway.

[TarJak]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-11-0...riends/5063818

I think this commentary is spot on. How BO can claim ignorance of the activities of his government agencies is beyond me.

Merkel also cannot be so naive as to no know her spies are also spying on Germanys allies. I'm pretty sure our mob are checking out Indonesia and other countries in the region.

[Platapus]

Originally Posted by TarJak

How BO can claim ignorance of the activities of his government agencies is beyond me.

Two words: Plausible Deniability.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plausible_deniability

In the areas of sensitive espionage, it is not uncommon for senior executives to specifically request that they not be told of the specifics.

This allows the President to avoid some blame and if the issue really gets serious, allows the sacrifice of minion for "over stepping their authority" in withholding information that should have been given to the president. Yadda yadda yadda.

Some Presidents are better at it than others. They did not call Reagan the "Teflon President" for nothing. He was a slick one. Or a slimy one depending on your viewpoint.

While the President probably knew that the US was collecting on our allies (we have been doing it for decades uh that's assuming that we actually do collect on our allies. ), it is entirely possible that the President did not have any information on specifically what is being collected. These are matters way below his paygrade. There is simply no way a chief executive of any large country could know or even understand the details of every single intelligence collection operation.

The DNI and DIRNSA knew about it.

This is why briefing congress is so complicated. There are issues in which congress does not wish to be involved in. Issues in which congress should not be involved in, and the issues in which congress needs to be involved in. The problem is when these are in conflict with each other.

Of course, if something goes wrong, all of a sudden congress starts yelling that they should have been informed. Unfortunately, the DNI is not allowed to state that he was instructed by the congressional committee not to brief the members. That's just part of the fun dealing with congress.

The problem with Plausible Deniability is that no one really believes it but it is still handy.